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C# Fiction => General C# Fiction => Topic started by: Froggiest1982 on October 04, 2020, 11:19:32 PM

Title: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 04, 2020, 11:19:32 PM

Aurora, a political Story - Background

This AAR will feature many aspects of my Government Simulator (links on my signature or direct Download here http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=11908.0;attach=5899 ) and my Ribbons Set (links on my signature or direct Download here http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=11424.0;attach=5679 )

Disclaimer: the Background is a mix between Star Trek and Aurora C# lore. All credits go to the respective creators.

Started on 1.11 and ported on 1.12 from 2110 onwards

Background

The possibility of a third global war following the first and second was feared for decades, particularly during the Cold War, when geopolitical tensions between Earth's nuclear-armed nation-states were at their height. Everything started with factions of Eco-terrorists launching attacks responsible for as many as 37 million deaths during 2026 and the following few decades.
The political pressure causes the collapse of most of the European Governments and the EU as we knew it due to other small and major internal conflicts. At the time of the final conflagration in the 2050s, one side was composed of the New United Nations, including the United States and the New European Union; the other side was an alliance known as the Eastern Coalition (ECON). The catalyst-events for World War III escalation were a series of confrontations between these powers over oil fields located in Antarctica and Taklamakan. The war ended only during 2053 only after severing nuclear weapons, in which an estimated 600 million perished, were launched. Rioting breaks out in several major American cities during the days immediately leading up to the war, with fires and looting prior to the nuclear strikes as people attempted to flee the impending target zones with their lives.

On 1 May 2053, the Eastern Coalition launched a first strike comprised of intercontinental ballistic missiles, bomber attacks, and portable nuclear weapons, against major North American and European cities, combined with a simultaneous Interface viral assault against the New United Nations computer infrastructure. Much to the surprise of the ECON political leadership, the New United Nations immediately retaliated with nuclear launches of their own, as well as a bomber and satellite-based attacks against targets in the Middle East and Asia. Many Pacific nations sided with the Eastern Coalition against the United States when fighting finally breaks out. Other political groupings, such as the Muslim Bloc, were likewise hit extremely hard during the nuclear exchanges, despite being non-aligned with either side during the war.

The detonation of nuclear weapons over cities (in the multiple-megaton range) such as London, Moscow, Berlin, New York City, Chicago, Boston, Dallas, Toronto, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Mecca, Riyadh, Samarkand, Karachi, Singapore, and New Delhi killed nearly half a billion people instantly. Smaller detonations occurred over Hong Kong, Beijing, and Ho Chi Minh City. Un-detonated or failed nuclear devices were discovered in or around targets such as Washington D.C., Denver, Paris, Madrid, Rome, and Istanbul. Of the hundreds of ICBMs and bombers launched by the United States and allied forces, only one in five made it into the air, due to EMP weapons and viral attacks against the military computer networks — of these, only a fraction detonated properly.

Conventional military forces on both sides were quickly moved into offensive position against their respective foes — on 3 May 2053, the First, Eighth, and Sixteenth Fleets under New United Nations command carry front-line troops into the Bay of Bengal, and the ECON launches a massive invasion of the North American continent, sending troops and military aircraft southward through Canada. Targets in New England (including Massachusetts), Minnesota, the Rocky Mountains, and the Midwest are hit hard by ECON forces, the U.S. military's defenses along the Canadian border failing utterly. The United States Air Force and the United States Army both fought back against the invaders, but lose many fighters and ground soldiers to the enemy. The President of the United States survived the initial days of the war but found himself in command of very little afterward. In the initial nuclear exchange of World War III, Washington D.C. was completely destroyed, along with three surrounding U.S. states. Some major cities, such as Montreal, were actually spared from nuclear hits during the first rounds of ICBM exchanges. During the fighting in Paris, the Eiffel Tower was destroyed. Additional combat took place in San Francisco, resulting in the destruction of the Coit Tower, among many other structures. The U.S. state of Arkansas would be devastated by nuclear weapons at the start of World War III, owing to the many military installations in the region.

Furthermore, certain military units were abandoned in enemy territory during the war in late May. The Siege of Las Vegas was a significant battle in the war, with American forces battling ECON troops for control of the city. The forces of the US troops would eventually prove victorious, defeating the ECON troops there. Finally, the Eastern Coalition's governing palace was destroyed by American forces, killing ECON leadership and consequentially leading several of Earth's governments to meet in San Francisco to declare a cease-fire, effectively ending the war.
The post-atomic horror that followed severely destabilized global civilization; terrorist organizations and rogue states often detonated small-scale "suitcase nukes," while toxins and biological weapons were released. Drug-addled soldiers were often sacrificed in conventional battles on the ground after much of the planetary computer systems failed; numerous small-scale conflicts created chaos throughout the globe as warlords fought over the scraps of civilization. As a result of the ICBM detonations, an enormous dust cloud enveloped the Earth, resulting in several nuclear winters.

Humanity eventually turned over a new leaf when a few courageous people began to realize that they could make a difference. Early in the war, weather-control satellites developed by few green corporations begin modifying Earth's ozone layer in an attempt to regenerate it, along with raising the planetary temperature enough to mitigate the effects of the harsh nuclear winter. This proved successful, ultimately reducing the number of potential casualties from the war.

Sovereign nations, including the United States, essentially ceased to exist following the war, the country falling into barbarism, carved up into fiefdoms controlled by competing warlords and despite the end of actual hostilities, the after-effects of the war lingered for decades to follow. Without federal resources to fall back upon, most local governments are unable to feed their own people; chaos and anarchy would reign for generations afterward. Much of the United States economy was ruined, with the population reduced to standards of living less than that of the victims of the Great Depression a century earlier. Rule of law broke down in many places, and legal systems were abolished, with the suggestion to "kill all the lawyers" from Henry VI being taken literally in some places. Asia was particularly devastated. In the end, due to the war, high radiation levels, post-war conflicts, and genetic alterations, the death toll rose to 7 billion leaving only half a billion humans on Earth.

In 2063 the discovery of the Aether, a dimension co-existing alongside normal space and which has fluid properties and is much more compressed in terms of the distance between objects, led to the discovery of new Trans Newtonian Elements. These new eleven known elements that exist primarily in the Aether, could be, with the right equipment, detected from normal space, extracted and refined into materials that can be used for construction purposes. It was shortly after discovered that a ship or missile constructed of Trans-Newtonian Elements exists in multiple dimensions simultaneously. A TN ship travels primarily in the Aether, with only a small intrusion into normal space to maintain a connection. Because of the compressed distance within the Aether, a ship moves much more quickly from the perspective of a viewpoint in normal space than would normally be expected given the available engine technologies. As the Aether is fluid in nature the ship must be under constant power to maintain that speed. Unlike conventional spacecraft in normal space, ships in the Aether can use the compressed fluid environment to change course quickly, like a ship in the water. If a ship should suffer so much damage that it loses structural cohesion, the wreckage will be pushed out of the Aether, like an object floating to the surface of a fluid, and therefore will be detected easily in normal space.

The realization that Humans were not only free from the old energy sources but also able to finally explore and conquer the universe, united Humanity in a way no one ever thought possible, and within fifty years, less than two generations after the post-atomic horror, Humanity was finally able to eliminate poverty, disease, war, and hunger. Along with poverty, a lot of other things disappeared from Humanity, including hopelessness, despair, and cruelty.

A new Presidential Democratic United Earth was finally ready to start exploring the Sol System and maybe one day able to baldly go where no one has gone before.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The World in 2100
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 05, 2020, 07:08:17 PM

The Political Landscape

After 37 years from the discovery of Trans Newtonian minerals, humanity is up to 600 million inhabitants on Earth. Our Society is finally back up again as we are getting ready to venture space. During the past year, our constitution has been improved to the point that all men and women are equal, with full civil rights protected by an independent justice system. Our police forces are strictly regulated and we have an average determination (54), average diplomacy ability (50), moderated expansion projects (58), a considerate level of militancy (64) with good trade routes and quality goods (68).

Unfortunately, Earth is starting to be exposed to a few xenophobic movements (48) as there is the fear of what we may find in the universe. Elections have just taken place and as predicted the pacifist movements are still the greater majority on Earth. It will not be easy to forget the horrors of the past but who knows what this Space adventures are going to unveil. On the other hand, for the first time after decades, oppositions have been protesting highly due to the unusual amount of spoil votes during this turn of elections. It was rumoured that almost 1 vote every 10 has been voided due to not disclosed reasons. The latest poll of the National Media Service, the only source of information on Earth and highly manipulated by the parties in power, has shown that if we will vote today the Military Party will get some representatives in the house for the first time ever after the war. That goes in pair with a newly formed Nationalist movement that surprisingly managed to get 3 representatives in the house at their first election.

Our Parliament is then composed by a total of 235 seats: 24 went to the Federalists, 83 to the leading party of the Pacifists, 60 to the Mercantile and Industrialists, 65 to the Scientists and, as already said, 3 to the newcomer Nationalists.bIn the end, all disputes were easily settled as it was clear that, despite the unusual amount of voided votes, the President would have been still a member of the Democratic Party with the 62% of the preferences. The Federalist candidate came in second with only 24% and the Republican came in last with an embarrassing 14%. Regardless of this result, one thing it’s for sure, Earth needs the new Trans Newtonian minerals and Space is where Humanity is going to find them. The fear of another war and the consequential chaos from running out minerals is too high and considering we haven’t got any left on Earth except for the reserves of our stockpiles, it is then understandable that this new government will be up a great task in the effort of solving the problem before it becomes a crisis.

(https://i.imgur.com/VkY8fv2.png)
The Race Information Panel and the stockpile Situation. Earth is Depleted.

(https://i.imgur.com/dlDUg3d.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2100 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/DQEYoql.png)
Presidential Elections

(https://i.imgur.com/okd6Xv3.png)
National Media Service Poll

The Technologies

Since the discovery of the TN minerals in 2063 our scientists have been busy trying to understand the best use for each one of them. However, it is probably only now that we are really starting to fully grasp their use and properties and the advancement if the last few years has been impressive. Obviously, replacing petrol with Sorium was the big hit of 2070 along with the conversion of our metallurgy industry to work with the new sources of Duranium. Shortly after the Mercassium made it possible to finally build new systems that have pushed our research even further.

As our society moved into a fully peaceful society there was some concern in some experiments during 2086 that involved the use of Neutronium, Corbomite, Tritanium, Vendarite and Corundium mostly for military purpose. The government was forced to put an end to it as soon as it was clear what would enhance what and how following great protests all over the world as soon as the news broke out. That was also the main event that gave birth to our current National Media Service, mostly a fancy way to say that information was now manipulated and driven by the government. By 2093 most of the TN mineral sources on Earth were depleted and the focus switched on 2 main goals: a new power source to keep Sorium only for fuel purpose and new engines to leave Earth in the attempt of finding more sources of TN minerals in space.

Eventually, we discovered that the Boronide, a mineral which was overlooked for almost 30 years, could have been used in the construction of power systems and capacitors and also for the creation of terraforming facilities while Gallicite, another unused mineral until then, revealed to be the key to the engine issues and probably one of the most important TN minerals if we were to conquer the universe. Shortly after the build of our first manned space vessel in over 80 years, we realized that to navigate in space, deep space, our sensors weren’t just good enough and that’s when we could find a use for the latest of the TN minerals, the Uridium, which revealed to be perfect for that use.

Thanks to all these discoveries we were able to improve our terraforming rate, decrease our power consumption rate and have a better understanding of the Nuclear power to create a more clean and toxic wastage free emission. As soon as we started building space ships in space and get the most of the TN minerals properties we soon started to develop better shuttles to transport material and personnel in and out of Earth. We in fact discovered with a high price what happens if you try to land a TN ship from orbit. It was during the year 2098 that this first and latest attempt ended with a catastrophic failure of one of the first Geosurvey ships we built, resulting in the death of the entire crew and another hundred of thousands civilian due to the consequential tsunami caused by the crash in the Pacific ocean.

As our missions are mostly mining and exploring ones, the government developed only technologies that work towards these goals but, not being entirely naive, they have also allowed part of the mining laser technology to be developed for military purpose as well. The rules of engagement are clear though: they are to be used only for the defensive purpose and fire them without warning and authorization is prohibited. If any captain or member of the crew will be involved in such an incident the penalty is either prison for life or death for high treason.

The Army

Unfortunately, lasers weren’t the only compromise our government had to deal with during the years. After the war the entire military system was in disarray, turn into mercenaries or warlords acting for their own personal gain. It was clear that such a system had to be eradicated and eventually rebuilt from scratch. If eradicating the system was easy, due to the fact that most of the armies were simply killing each other becoming weaker and weaker every day, the rebuilt from scratch was never achieved as the population and most of the parliamentarians were completely against it.

At today all we have are police forces and a very basic Militia formed by the sons of the veterans of the war which decided to enrol and avenge the memory humanity has of their fathers. The technology hasn’t really progressed that much further as it was before the start of the war and the only real effort the government made was in improving the armours. Such a move was forced by the need of using the new Duranium sources and replace all the old manufacturing complexes rather than an actual real effort towards the army. To reinforce the pacifist vision of the Police Forces, strict non-combat training is provided in all police academies, leaving the fighting skills to fall entirely on the Militia shoulders.

(https://i.imgur.com/cpOGcZM.png)
Earth Ground Forces OOB

The police command is structured in Divisions of 250,000 tons with 4 Brigades of 50,000 tons each. Each Brigade contains 5 Companies of 5,000 tons each.

(https://i.imgur.com/TJQkY3J.png)
Police Division OOB

The Militia has a much simpler command as each unit acts individually and it’s mostly related to their country of origin. Usually, one or more Battalions of 10,000 tons are stationed in the area of provenience with few other areas under supervision if required.

(https://i.imgur.com/UPuRVAi.png)
Infantry Militia OOB

(https://i.imgur.com/IXJpLFU.png)
Armoured Militia OOB

The Navy

Our Navy situation it’s not much different than the Army. The Pacifist government has always been busy expanding and developing the commercial side of the Navy, leaving the Military one weak and mostly for short-range defensive purpose. Other systems are Light Years away and so far we have no reason to believe a real threat to humanity lies out there and if it does, they are probably thousands of years away. The only investment was towards the Geological Vessels and being the finding of new TN mineral sources the priority it makes sense.

(https://i.imgur.com/FjYXuea.png)
Range of our Military

The Military Navy is commonly called United Nations of Earth Navy (UNEN) while the Commercial Navy is often referred to as United Nations of Earth Commercial Navy (UNEC), simple names for simple organizations.

All our ships have been designed to fit the poor requirements of our current shipyards. Our military vessels cannot exceed the 10,000 tons of the Foret & Co. Frigates and if needed we can still build smaller vessels on the Tatham Corvettes Shipyard Inc. Which has a maximum capability of 7,000. Things are not bright on the commercial side either considering that notoriously commercial vessels are much larger than their military counterparts. Our 2 shipyards, the Hornbuckle Drydock Company and the Denoble Boat Builders have both a capability of 64,000 tons only.

All our commercial vessels are prototypes and only 1 per kind has been built mostly for testing purpose. At least in this circumstance, the government has spent more on the UNEN which can count more ships but with such outdated components that everybody still refers to them as a very expensive display of weakness. Regardless of that, every time someone brings up the issue, the government replies with the statistics that show they have invested more into the UNEN than the UNEC. While numbers are true, everybody knows that they don’t necessarily represent the truth.

(https://i.imgur.com/nD9y8xA.png)
The slide often showed by the National Media Service advocating enough military spending has been done

At the 1st of January 2100 the UNEN can count on the following classes:

Quote

Patriot LS class Corvette 8,999 tons 274 Crew 943.3 BP TCS 180 TH 240 EM 0
1333 km/s Armour 4-38 Shields 0-0 HTK 50 Sensors 25/25/0/0 DCR 14 PPV 57.6
Maint Life 4.34 Years MSP 662 AFR 162% IFR 2.2% 1YR 57 5YR 850 Max Repair 125 MSP
Commodore Control Rating 2 BRG FLG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Nuclear Pulse Engine (Vessel) (3) Power 240.0 Fuel Use 80.0% Signature 80.00 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 167,000 Litres Range 4.2 billion km (36 days at full power)

Quad 10cm C1 Visible Light Laser Turret (4x4) Range 60,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 12-4 RM 20,000 km ROF 15
Beam Fire Control R64-TS5000 (1) Max Range: 64,000 km TS: 5,000 km/s 84 69 53 38 22 6 0 0 0 0
Pebble Bed Reactor (Medium) (3) Total Power Output 37.8 Exp 5%

Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS3-R1 (1) GPS 10 Range 4m km MCR 359k km Resolution 1
Area Search Sensor AS58-R100 (1) GPS 10000 Range 58.6m km Resolution 100
Short Range TH Sensor TH5-25 (1) Sensitivity 25 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 39.5m km
Short Range EM Sensor EM5-25 (1) Sensitivity 25 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 39.5m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Quote

Patriot B class Corvette 8,999 tons 265 Crew 769.5 BP TCS 180 TH 240 EM 0
1333 km/s Armour 4-38 Shields 0-0 HTK 58 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 14 PPV 71.04
Maint Life 4.34 Years MSP 613 AFR 162% IFR 2.2% 1YR 52 5YR 787 Max Repair 51.2 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Nuclear Pulse Engine (Vessel) (3) Power 240.0 Fuel Use 80.0% Signature 80.00 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 205,000 Litres Range 5.1 billion km (44 days at full power)

Quad 12cm C1 Visible Light Laser Turret (2x4) Range 80,000km TS: 8000 km/s Power 16-4 RM 20,000 km ROF 20
Quad 10cm C1 Visible Light Laser Turret (2x4) Range 60,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 12-4 RM 20,000 km ROF 15
Beam Fire Control R128-TS8000 (1) Max Range: 128,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Beam Fire Control R64-TS5000 (1) Max Range: 64,000 km TS: 5,000 km/s 84 69 53 38 22 6 0 0 0 0
Pebble Bed Reactor (Medium) (3) Total Power Output 37.8 Exp 5%

Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS3-R1 (1) GPS 10 Range 4m km MCR 359k km Resolution 1
Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Patriot Class corvettes operate in squadrons of 6, 1 leader and 5 strikers. 2 Squadrons are currently available at Earth’s orbit.

Quote

Promise class Geological Survey Vessel 4,000 tons 67 Crew 320.2 BP TCS 80 TH 200 EM 0
2500 km/s Armour 1-22 Shields 0-0 HTK 28 Sensors 5/5/0/1 DCR 4 PPV 0
Maint Life 15.43 Years MSP 1,000 AFR 32% IFR 0.4% 1YR 8 5YR 118 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (2) Power 200 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 204,000 Litres Range 102.6 billion km (475 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Geological Survey Sensors (1) 1 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Quote

Valor class Diplomatic Ship 6,000 tons 124 Crew 609.5 BP TCS 120 TH 200 EM 0
1666 km/s Armour 1-29 Shields 0-0 HTK 33 Sensors 25/25/0/0 DCR 4 PPV 0
Maint Life 7.75 Years MSP 2,253 AFR 72% IFR 1.0% 1YR 66 5YR 994 Max Repair 300 MSP
Captain Control Rating 1 BRG DIP
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (2) Power 200 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 147,000 Litres Range 49.3 billion km (342 days at full power)

Short Range TH Sensor TH5-25 (1) Sensitivity 25 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 39.5m km
Short Range EM Sensor EM5-25 (1) Sensitivity 25 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 39.5m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The UNEC can count on the below:

Quote

UNEC Rising class Colony Ship 42,000 tons 276 Crew 1,588.4 BP TCS 840 TH 1,000 EM 0
1190 km/s Armour 1-107 Shields 0-0 HTK 86 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 23 Max Repair 100 MSP
Cryogenic Berths 100,000 Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (10) Power 1000 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 504,000 Litres Range 24.1 billion km (234 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Quote

UNEC Elysium class Freighter 42,000 tons 181 Crew 618.3 BP TCS 840 TH 1,000 EM 0
1190 km/s Armour 1-107 Shields 0-0 HTK 77 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 9 Max Repair 50 MSP
Cargo 25,000 Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (10) Power 1000 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 639,000 Litres Range 30.6 billion km (297 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Quote

UNEC Trafalgar class Tanker 3,500 tons 48 Crew 167.7 BP TCS 70 TH 100 EM 0
1428 km/s Armour 1-20 Shields 0-0 HTK 35 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 29 Max Repair 25 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (1) Power 100 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 1,173,000 Litres Range 674.2 billion km (5464 days at full power)
Refuelling Capability: 50,000 litres per hour Complete Refuel 23 hours

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

As said only one ship per kind as been currently built as a prototype and further production will depend on the new government decisions in the following years. We also managed to update and refurbish the old weather-control satellites in favor of a bigger and more effective terraforming station:

Quote

UNESS Poseidon class Terraforming Station 126,396 tons 510 Crew 2,688.2 BP TCS 2,528 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s No Armour Shields 0-0 HTK 66 Sensors 0/0/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 13 Max Repair 500 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months
Terraformer: 5 modules producing 0.0016 atm per annum

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Space Station for construction purposes

This will be used in combination with the Herald Class tug:

Quote

UNEC Herald class Tug 14,500 tons 140 Crew 496.8 BP TCS 290 TH 1,000 EM 0
3448 km/s Armour 1-52 Shields 0-0 HTK 71 Sensors 0/0/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 21 Max Repair 100 MSP
Tractor Beam
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (10) Power 1000 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 532,000 Litres Range 73.8 billion km (247 days at full power)

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

The only problem is that with our current technology and modules available it will require almost 298 years to terraform Mars and another 78 years to fully terraform Luna.

(https://i.imgur.com/fooZ9Lg.png)
Mars terraforming chart

(https://i.imgur.com/5563Wkw.png)
Luna terraforming chart

Few fighters have been also designed and produced:

Quote

UNENF-B1LS class Fighter-Scout 500 tons 11 Crew 59 BP TCS 10 TH 16 EM 0
1601 km/s Armour 1-5 Shields 0-0 HTK 6 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 0 PPV 1.8
Maint Life 8.11 Years MSP 27 AFR 20% IFR 0.3% 1YR 1 5YR 11 Max Repair 10 MSP
Magazine 12
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1
Intended Deployment Time: 15 days Morale Check Required

Nuclear Pulse Engine (Fighter) (2) Power 16.0 Fuel Use 252.98% Signature 8.00 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 17,000 Litres Range 2.4 billion km (17 days at full power)

Sting Box Launcher (2) Missile Size: 6.00 Hangar Reload 122 minutes MF Reload 20 hours
Fighter Missile Fire Control FC9-R50 (1) Range 9.3m km Resolution 50
Sting Anti-Ship Missile (2) Speed: 7,000 km/s End: 23.8m Range: 10m km WH: 4 Size: 6.0000 TH: 28/16/8

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS3-R1 (1) GPS 10 Range 4m km MCR 359k km Resolution 1
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

Quote

UNENF-B1 class Fighter-bomber 500 tons 4 Crew 45.2 BP TCS 10 TH 24 EM 0
2401 km/s Armour 1-5 Shields 0-0 HTK 3 Sensors 0/0/0/0 DCR 0 PPV 4.5
Maint Life 9.56 Years MSP 25 AFR 20% IFR 0.3% 1YR 0 5YR 7 Max Repair 5 MSP
Magazine 30
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1
Intended Deployment Time: 15 days Morale Check Required

Nuclear Pulse Engine (Fighter) (3) Power 24.0 Fuel Use 252.98% Signature 8.00 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 38,000 Litres Range 5.4 billion km (26 days at full power)

Sting Box Launcher (5) Missile Size: 6.00 Hangar Reload 122 minutes MF Reload 20 hours
Fighter Missile Fire Control FC9-R50 (1) Range 9.3m km Resolution 50
Sting Anti-Ship Missile (5) Speed: 7,000 km/s End: 23.8m Range: 10m km WH: 4 Size: 6.0000 TH: 28/16/8

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

The government has banned the use of radioactive warheads for obvious reasons so all missiles of the UNEN are designed without such deadly technology. Our fighters operate in squadrons of 10, 1 leader-scout and 9 strikers. 2 Squadrons are currently available at Earth’s orbit.
A full Admin Command structure is always available on the UNEN website:

(https://i.imgur.com/vG0FLfH.png)
Admin Command 1st of January 2100

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The First Danilov Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 07, 2020, 05:26:55 AM

2100 – The Start of the Danilov Democracy

Sevastian Danilov was declared the winner for the democratic party thanks to the pacifists and industrialists seats on the 1st of January 2100 almost immediately after the end of the elections as his lead was never really contested by the other candidates. While only these 2 movements clearly supported him, many others were also behind the already Earth governor, and his position looked firm and destined to stand for all of the 5-year mandates with no real opposition in the parliament. His first duty was to assign all admin posts which he did diligently in a few hours, thanks to an already compiled list. The 2nd of January was another very busy day with the whole state that had to be organized and goals had to be set for the following years. Looking at the distribution of seats a preliminary agenda was needed to ensure a smooth run of the operations.

(https://i.imgur.com/L5DpR5R.png)
Sevastian Danilov Profile

At a first glance, it was clear that this government will never oppose any peace treaties (if ever needed), diplomacy operations, and commercial researches. It was also easy to slip some military ops and production of both military and commercial products. The big obstacle would have been to get the parliament to vote for any military research as the first round of interviews showed a consistent 89 votes in favour and 146 against. Eventually, he also had the chance to modify the constitution but the only reform available was towards the media freedom and there was no intention of changing the current system that also served well over the years in spinning the right narrative.

(https://i.imgur.com/pTevGlj.png)
Military Research intention to vote

With the mandate on peace operations on the 3rd of January 2100, Danilov submitted the first resolution UNER00001 also known as the Danilov Plan. The resolution is a plan to colonize Mars and Luna in the attempt to first find and exploit new TN mineral sources, grow the Union population, and finally stimulate the civilian economy. The plan involved the formation of the colony of Luna and Mars on paper at first and physically later. Danilov went even further, nominating the planetary governors right away even without having set foot on the ground of either planet.

(https://i.imgur.com/pmKwVau.png)
Mars Governor Profile

(https://i.imgur.com/9QNPjbI.png)
Luna Governor Profile

The 4th of January 2100 was probably the busiest day for the government with all the motions to be voted and get humanity started. The agenda of the Parliament is always available on the government website:

(https://i.imgur.com/MBy8LZ5.png)
Government Starting Motions

As part of the Danilov Plan revolved around the increase of our terraforming capabilities to colonize Luna and Mars, motions were prepared to start production as soon as some of the current urgent projects would have been completed.

Meanwhile, the production of the Sting missiles was set at 94 units as based on our analysts the minimum amount of stock required was actually 94, with recommended 282 and ideal 470 units. As our TN mineral sources are non-existent and the possibilities of war extremely remote, 94 sounded like the right choice also considering the parliament did not really want to invest too much into the weaponry systems. There was some concern for the unusual choice of keeping some of the shipyards idle but the government decided to wait before committing the docks to any particular design at the moment so the decision of having only the Denoble Boat Builders to work on 1 more UNEC Elysium was confirmed without too much clamor. The idle time was used instead to improve the capability of the Tatham Corvettes Shipyard Inc of 2,000 tons and Foret & Co. Frigates of 2,500 tons while the commercial yard of Hornbuckle Drydock Company was set to be increased by 20,000 tons. Unfortunately and as expected, Danilov was pushing too hard on the military spending resulting in the parliament to reject the expansion of the Tatham Shipyard and the vote on the build of the Elysium passed for only 4 votes at the end.

(https://i.imgur.com/3LI7Imr.png)
The analysts data on the missiles stock levels

2100/2104 – The Danilov Democracy

As soon as all internal affairs were sorted Danilov ordered the survey of Sol to begin. The 4 Promise class Geological Survey Vessels: Akira Kurosawa, George S Patton, Hannibal, and Leonardo Da Vinci broke Earth’s Orbit for a 60 months mission. They were Humanity's best hope to find more TN minerals in the Sol system.

(https://i.imgur.com/p7ZlpzB.png)
Badge of the Geosurvey Mission

The UNEC Trafalgar 001 broke shortly after them to complete its mission of tugging the UNESS Poseidon 001 over Mars orbit and begin terraforming operations. Priority number one was removing Carbon Dioxide traces from the atmosphere.

(https://i.imgur.com/77djxdp.png)
Badge of the Terraforming Mission

It was only on the 7th of January 2100 that Danilov finally looked at the assignment of all the commanders for our ground forces.

Almost a year after departure, we finally heard back from one of the Geological Survey Vessels. On the morning of the 10th of October 2100, the best news received from Earth in a while: Mercury does possess some TN minerals, confirming then our theories that TN materials are possible to be found in other places rather than Earth. With an addendum on the Danilov Plan and with the resolution UNER00021, President Danilov formed another colony on paper and again also assigned it to a governor. This colony will be different than Mars and Luna though, as it will be marked as Mining Colony only, considering life on the planet is currently out of the question. Below a list of the minerals found on Mercury:

Duranium 2,630,300 Acc 0.9
Sorium 288,154 Acc 0.1
Corundium 688,236 Acc 0.9

(https://i.imgur.com/H6EPWFG.png)
Mercury Governor Profile

The end of the year goes by with the launch of the Elysium 002, the start of the construction of the UNEC Elysium 003 but, most importantly, with the final vote on the expansion of the Tatham Shipyard, finally confirmed with a great majority. On the 2nd of March 2101, another addendum for the Danilov Plan sees the formation of a second mining colony, this time on Venus. More TN materials are available on the planet and another governor is nominated. Venus has multiple TN minerals but, as it was for Mars, the accessibility of many of them is very low. In absence of better options at the moment, the formation of the colony was probably still the best call. Below a list of the minerals found on Venus:

Corbomite 2,475,965 Acc 0.1
Tritanium 25,843,802 Acc 0.6
Boronide 9,903,861 Acc 0.7
Mercassium 36,626,704 Acc 0.1
Gallicite 2,475,965 Acc 0.1

(https://i.imgur.com/eBnXJ9J.png)
Venus Governor Profile

Between October 2101 and the 1st of January 2102, due to the completion of the Foret & Co. Frigates expansion, discussion over the possibility of designing the first United Nations of Earth frigate begun. The impasse in the parliament was so hard that after the launch of the UNEC Elysium 003 all production was suspended waiting for an official shipyards policy from the government. On the 1st of January 2102 then, Danilov was forced to submit a request to vote to expand the number of slipways and production of the Foret & Co. Frigates, Hornbuckle Drydock Company, and Denoble Boat Builders which were all approved with works starting effective immediately. The extra slipway of the Tatham Shipyard passed as well but went on hold waiting for the current expansion to be completed. However, the important decision of designing or not the first frigate got lost into the bureaucracy machine as many parliamentarians believed that a vote for military research was needed while others were insisting on holding a vote over a military production. As no new components were required, Danilov allowed a vote to behold under a military production procedure but having already voted for quite a few policies he also decided to delay the vote for a few months, giving time to those who disagreed to digest the decision.

An important discovery was made on the 17th of March 2102 when news of abundance of Sorium in Jupiter broke out. Unfortunately, despite the initial reports, the accessibility of the Sorium wasn’t that great but considering that no better sources were so far found a small celebration was still held. Below the details of the discovery:

Sorium 643,500 Acc 0.3

On the 8th of October 2102, the expansion of the Tatham Shipyard was finally completed and the opening of the new Naval Dong Graving Dock and Commercial Chojnacki Shipyard Limited shipyard was also big news.

While plans were made for the new shipyards it was suggested that the new frigate design could be named after President Danilov and it would have also made to work with the current corvettes and as an integration of the current forces, not a new one. Part of these plans involved the Dong Graving Dock to be renamed Dong Graving Destroyers Dock along with an expansion planned to reach 15,000 tons. It would have been a very long process but the government reckons it was worth it. The Chojnacki Shipyard Limited was tasked to expand its slipways instead.

Quote

Danilov B class Frigate 12,500 tons 341 Crew 1,004.7 BP TCS 250 TH 320 EM 0
1280 km/s Armour 5-47 Shields 0-0 HTK 78 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 18 PPV 105.6
Maint Life 4.82 Years MSP 801 AFR 156% IFR 2.2% 1YR 57 5YR 852 Max Repair 51.2 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Nuclear Pulse Engine (Vessel) (4) Power 320 Fuel Use 80.0% Signature 80 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 251,000 Litres Range 4.5 billion km (40 days at full power)

Quad 12cm C1 Visible Light Laser Turret (5x4) Range 80,000km TS: 8000 km/s Power 16-4 RM 20,000 km ROF 20
Beam Fire Control R128-TS8000 (1) Max Range: 128,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Pebble Bed Reactor (Medium) (3) Total Power Output 37.8 Exp 5%

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS3-R1 (1) GPS 10 Range 4m km MCR 359k km Resolution 1
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The 1st of January 2103 in absence of any other Sorium sources, a new mission to extract Sorium from Jupiter has been submitted for a vote of approval. The Jupiter mission would include a new station designed with a particular technology that allows Sorium to be extracted from orbit and directly refined into fuel. Towing operations from Earth to Jupiter’s orbit would have been held by the UNEC Herald 001 class tug. The refined Sorium would then needed to be transported from Jupiter to Earth.

One year-round trip by the tanker UNEC Trafalgar 001 class tanker will be then scheduled perpetually. Also, the current Sol Fuel Harvesting Operations Department Admin will be renamed Jupiter Mission Operations Department. The new station name was decided to be UNESS Vera.

Quote

UNESS Vera class Fuel Harvester Station 67,746 tons 294 Crew 947.4 BP TCS 1,355 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s No Armour Shields 0-0 HTK 148 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 8 Max Repair 30 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months
Fuel Harvester: 26 modules producing 1,040,000 litres per annum

Fuel Capacity 1,250,000 Litres Range N/A
Refuelling Capability: 50,000 litres per hour Complete Refuel 25 hours

Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Space Station for construction purposes

(https://i.imgur.com/lWznpYG.png)
Badge of the Jupiter Mission

As not much time was left on his mandate, Danilov decided to put for a vote also the construction of the first 2 Danilov B class Frigate and ensuring his name will be remembered even after his departure. As the parliament was left believing that this vote was more to judge if such honor was deserved by Danilov it was easy to get it passed with a high majority.

2104 started with the discovery of the Improved Pebble Bed Reactor. Our scientists believed that further researches into the Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor could have led humanity out of Nuclear Technology once and for all. Danilov agreed and the same team in charge of the previous discovery led by Professor Humberto Gianotti started immediately. However, it is expected that a breakthrough would not be possible for at least another 6 years. January also saw the completion of the other 2 shipyards in production, the naval Takenouchi Drydock Company and the commercial Mandal Enterprises. The government voted for the increase of the number of slipways for the both of them while trying to figure what specialization they should undertake.

The good news is that the production of the UNESS Poseidon terraformer can now start. After they will be completed the terraforming of Mars will be considerably faster with a new estimate of only 60 years

(https://i.imgur.com/lTgvbUp.png)
Mars terraforming chart update

The 15th of May 2104 is the date that signed Danilov to enter the history of humanity with the launch of the 2 Danilov B class Frigates. First of their kind and with an impressive displacement of 12,500 tons they represent the best men can do nowadays. The ships were named UNEN Danilov, of course, and UNEN Achilles. The President was there for the launch and in a brief speech announced his intention of running for office again. Everybody was thrilled and big roaring applause came from the crowd while he was speaking. Once again the pacifist Democrats were the in the lead prior to the election.

In June we finished improving our construction rate capabilities and new research laboratories towards the propulsion system were allocated resulting in a new ETA for the technology to be the end of 2107. The remaining labs were tasked to find a way to improve our cargo capabilities.

While waiting for the new Poseidon to be launched our terraforming efforts on Mars managed to produce the first results: all traces of Carbon Dioxide were finally removed and the next step was now to start pumping oxygen into the atmosphere instead.

This concluded the Danilov Democratic mandate and new elections were about to be held.

The list of all the new resolutions is available on the government website:

(https://i.imgur.com/eVYcLy0.png)
Government Resolutions

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Second Danilov Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 11, 2020, 07:00:06 AM

2105 – The Start of the Second Danilov Democracy

As the elections approach, the polling is way different than 5 years ago. President Danilov acted fairly and firmly gaining the respect of many. With his few militaristic maneuvers he also managed to keep the Militaristic faction at bay and if 5 years ago it was almost sure to have the militaristic party to gain seats in the house, now the situation it’s very different. Both Maximilian van Gelder and Marcin Kruk have formally decided to run again against Danilov but the truth is that nobody is interested in a lost cause leaving them no choice.

(https://i.imgur.com/R28htuq.png)
National Media Service Polling prior elections of 2105

As predicted and expected Sevastian Danilov has been declared the winner for the democratic party thanks to the pacifists and industrialists seats on the 1st of January 2105 for the second time. Despite the big drop in popularity and the 7% fewer preferences of the previous election, his position still looked as firm as before and destined to stand for all of the 5-year mandates with again no real opposition in the parliament. As not many spoil votes were present this time, many felt confident in assuming that previous elections votes were probably all for the opposition parties.

(https://i.imgur.com/iQxAklA.png)
Sevastian Danilov Profile

Even with different numbers, the new government was very similar in ideas as the one just passed. It was clear that same as its predecessor it will never oppose any peace treaties (if ever needed), diplomacy operations, and commercial researches. Danilov would probably carry the same militaristic soft touch while the stalemate on the vote for any military research was still in place with the first round of interview of 104 votes in favor and 165 against.

Our new Parliament is now composed of a total of 269 seats, an increase of 34 seats was necessary to compensate our population growth. 34 seats went to the Federalists (10 seats more), 81 to the leading party of the Pacifists (2 seats less, confirming negative trend), 69 to the Mercantile and Industrialists (9 seats more), 69 to the Scientists (4 seats more), 15 to the Nationalists (12 seats more in rapid ascension) and for the first time after the war 1 seat went to the Military Party. For obvious reasons, the seat has been assigned to the leader of the party as well as the Navy: Admiral Maximilian van Gelder.

(https://i.imgur.com/kZWEyqe.png)
Maximilian van Gelder Profile

The President won with 55.5% of the preferences. Marcin Kruk for the Federalists came in again second with 27% and Admiral van Gelder came in again last with a disappointing 17% but at least with a seat at the table this time.

(https://i.imgur.com/wQdf2qE.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2105 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/oVeo4Np.png)
Presidential Elections

In the past 5 years, our society has changed quite a bit. Our determination has grown (from 54 to 60) probably due to the exciting new prospective over space travel and colonies. Our diplomacy ability (from 50 to 56) has also improved thanks to the mediation of our President while our thirst for expansion has been partially filled by the conquests of the human race in past years (from 58 to 52). A considerate level of militancy (from 64 to 61) it’s still present despite our trade routes continued to expand bringing riches to the entire community (from 68 to 74). The exposure to a few xenophobic movements over the last 5 years have also produced an increased xenophobic sentiment through the lower classes (from 48 to 50) as the new colonies look more like an affair for the rich and potent only.

Danilov's first duty was to review all admin posts and commands. No much organization in state affairs was needed as he intended to continue his Danilov Plan and most of the other policies adopted in the previous 5 years. His second mandate would have been under the sign of continuity and for this reason, he also confirmed and renewed the positions of all the other governors he appointed. As everything looked in order he announced that on the 6th of January 2105 the parliament will reunite to hear a speech and to vote on some important decisions. While a halo of mystery reigned around these words, sources close to the President disclosed that the announcement would have been in regard to the new empty colonies in the Sol System and the increasing malcontent of the population asking for more information.

(https://i.imgur.com/wxZnr1J.png)
The Race Information Panel.

2105/2109 – The Second Danilov Democracy and the start of the Space Age

On the 6th of January 2105 at midday, Danilov addressed the population and the parliament. A big badge was revealed by the big screens behind you while he started to talk. The badge said: Danilov Plan Colonize Sol. A gasp could be heard in the parliament and what was going to happen was suddenly clear to everybody. The President had decided to formally start operations for the colonization of the Sol system. All paperwork was ready for years and the investment into the commercial flotilla was started but never completed. Danilov plan involved a kick start of space traveling and colonization from the government but after that, the private sector would have provided the necessary infrastructure and ships to make the Danilov Plan a reality. No real interest was ever shown by the industrialists, however, a group of investors did create a company with such function a while ago named Settlemire Container Company which expressed interest in a space move to Danilov in a multitude of occasion and the President was always opened and supportive to them all he asked was a bit of time.

Finally, with the resolution UNER00043 also known as The Space Privatization Constitution (SPC), Danilov regulated all private enterprises in space. The decree ranged from colonization rights, mining and flight permits, and so on. No stone was left unturned and everything looked enough detail for the parliament to vote unanimously for the approval. The Space age was officially begun.

(https://i.imgur.com/l8z2AdM.png)
Badge of the Danilov Colonization Mission

Danilov knew that to pass more military bills would have been hard so he decided to push on the commercial side of the Navy in an attempt of supporting his plan and therefore his legacy to humanity. Several resolutions were up to a vote, from the construction of 1 new UNEC Elysium to transport the necessary infrastructure to build the first colonies, the training of more police units to keep order and stability, and mostly a new ship design able to transport the units from a planet to another.

These last points were crucial to his plan as with the new parliament attitude towards his militaristic fascination he was forced to design a commercial vessel to move the troops (which was fine at the moment) but it couldn’t help for the approval of the new Colonial Police Forces he had in mind. These would have necessary passed by a Military Production procedure and with 127 in favor and 142 against it was necessary to pick a day when only a few parliamentarians would have been available to attend and vote.

Quote

UNEC Raven class Troop Transport 70,000 tons 350 Crew 1,491.9 BP TCS 1,400 TH 1,200 EM 0
857 km/s Armour 1-151 Shields 0-0 HTK 182 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 13 Max Repair 80 MSP
Troop Capacity 50,000 tons Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (12) Power 1200 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 353,000 Litres Range 10.1 billion km (137 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

As the 60 months Geosurvey Mission comes to an end, all our Geosurvey ship started to slowly come back into Earth’s orbit for shore leave and overhauls. Crewman after crewman, the stories of the beauty and serenity of space started mounting up, increasing not only the interests in all sorts of space missions but also the number of volunteers that every day showed up at the academy’s door. The first round of the survey returned the several data, below the most interesting findings:

Mercury
Duranium 2,630,300 Acc 0.9
Sorium 288,154 Acc 0.1
Corundium 688,236 Acc 0.9

Jupiter
Sorium 643,500 Acc 0.3

Venus
Corbomite 2,475,965 Acc 0.1
Tritanium 25,843,802 Acc 0.6
Boronide 9,903,861 Acc 0.7
Mercassium 36,626,704 Acc 0.1
Gallicite 2,475,965 Acc 0.1

Haumea
Duranium 1,010,530 Acc 0.8
Neutronium 52,790 Acc 0.9
Uridium 128,881 Acc 0.9

Eris
Duranium 2,094,859 Acc 0.7
Boronide 1,071,370 Acc 0.7
Corundium 43,823 Acc 0.5
Gallicite 844,138 Acc 0.7

Machholz
Vendarite 14,956 Acc 0.5
Uridium 8,754 Acc 0.7
Corundium 97,078 Acc 0.9

Meanwhile, the production of the UNESS Poseidon continued, keeping our tugging and terraforming operations busy and closer to their goal. A new slipway became available on March 2105 and another UNEC Elysium was commissioned along with 1 UNEC Raven which will be temporarily aggregated to the Colonization Operations Department under the new Sol Troop Transport Operations Office. Eventually, the colonization of Mars officially started with the first shipment of infrastructure on both colonies followed by the first intake of colonists. As not many infrastructures were available on Earth and Luna did not possess any TN mineral, the colonization of the small moon has been postponed to 2106 after more infrastructure would have been constructed.

During May and June, we saw the construction of the first Civilian freighters as confirmation that both Danilov Plan and the new Constitution were working as intended. The next step for the government was to identify and reserve the most important mining prospect bodies before any civilian company decided to do the same for themselves. With a series of resolutions, Danilov created the new following mining colonies and relative governors: Eris, Haumea, and Machholz. The latter was due to its deposits of Vendarite, a TN mineral which was apparently very rare in the Sol system.

Another big issue in the long term would have been for sure Corbomite and also Mercassium as the reserves on Venus despite being numerous but of scarce accessibility, it was then decided on the 14th of June 2106 that another Geosurvey Mission ion Sol was needed and all Geosurvey Vessels were dispatched for another 60 months as soon as out of their respective overhaul. If the first round of the survey was reserved only to Asteroids and Planets, this time research was extended to Comets as well. Apparently, only a few weeks after departure, all ships started transmitting back sensational data on every single comet scanned. It looked like comets were a great source of all TN materials and if in line with their trajectory they would have made perfect candidates for mining bases. Thankfully the government started the construction of Mass Drivers early making it possible to automate the shipping process to Earth and along with Automines, there was no need to undertake expensive and long mining campaigns. All required was for the UNEN Elysium freighters to drop off the equipment and we would have been ready to go.

The civilian noticed that as well and the first Civilian Mining company in the history of mankind was deployed on 26/07/2106 on the comet Encke. The number of minerals was notable and this really looked like a wasted opportunity for the government plans however, it was always possible to buy back some of the minerals for a small price. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the only drawback. The civilians, acting as private entities thought that some protection was required to ensure their interests would be safe from ill-intentioned people and along with all the equipment and personnel a small mercenary Garrison was stationed on-site 24/7.

Danilov was furious as it looked like Settlemire Container Company was acting as their own little country and the presence of military units outside Earth and not under the direct control of the government was simply unacceptable. After a long meeting with the representants of the private sector and the government, it was established and acknowledged that even if the private sector had the right of protection over a body claimed under the rights of the SPC the government would have still been formally in charge with the direct assignment of a commander for the garrison forces which would have been answering to the government army plus the nominee of a governor which function was to facilitate communications between the government and the private institutions.

In the end, everybody got what they wanted: the private sector ensured that Danilov would have not stepped back the original agreement and the governor got to keep its reputation intact.

(https://i.imgur.com/BKpGpOy.png)
Private Mercenary Garrison OOB

On the 29th of October 2107, all the UNESS Poseidon were finally completed and moved on Mars orbit clearing the production lines to start producing the UNESS Vera officially starting the Jupiter Mission approved and announced now almost 5 years before. Mars terraforming was then on track with the latest analysis showing 55 years to full terraforming completion. More efforts would have been probably needed to accelerate the process but the government was now focused on the expansion of the civilian sector and firmly believed enough was done towards the terraforming case.

Christmas of 2107 will be always remembered for the greatest gift the human race has probably ever received. With the successful discovery of the Gas-Cooled fast reactor to get away from the Nuclear energy and propulsion was finally not a chimera but a concrete possibility. Humberto Gianotti explained to President Danilov that before getting there a new Nuclear Engine should have been built to test his theory. If the construction would have been successful then the team would have moved into replacing the Nuclear components with something greener and less problematic in terms of waste. In theory, this would have also increased power and reduced fuel consumption. Even if Danilov thought that it was too good to be true he did allow the professor to keep going with his research.

(https://i.imgur.com/02LUXqA.png)
Humberto Gianotti Profile

With the launch of the UNESS Vera 001 on the 24th of February 2108, Danilov moved into the core of his second plan’s part. The UNEC Raven 001 was ready since 2107 and all the cadets of the newly formed Lunar and Martian Police were about to come out of the academy to be transported on the respective planets. Despite all going as per planned it was clear that such a situation could have not been continuing for long. Firstly Earth could have not provided enough manpower for all colonies that were going to be formed over the years and soon each planet would start creating their traditions and customs wanting their people to be in charge.

(https://i.imgur.com/V4LbtcE.png)
United Nations of Earth Ground Forces OOB

Even if we were all humans Danilov knew that deep inside, men were still what they were and it was his intention to tackle these issues way before they would rise and destabilize the whole Democracy. For this reason, after having adjusted the production and ordered new production factories to be built he also proposed to build 2 new Military Academies: one for Luna and one for Mars. These academies would have provided the necessary extra officers as the colonies widen along with the needed cultural difference.

Unfortunately, the parliament wasn’t that progressive as Danilov and with a 75 versus 94 vote rejected the proposal. As retaliation Danilov decided to keep the 20% of the factory closed for a few weeks in an attempt of softening few parliamentarians forcing a result of his likings. 5 days later he decided to put the motion again for a vote rallying as many supporters as possible however, the opposition decided to show up en masse managing to have the proposal rejected again with 127 votes in favor and 134 against and an attendance close to 99% hardly seen in other sessions.

The dice were cast, Danilov didn’t hold the government reins anymore and it was clear. Knowing his services as president would have come to an end after this mandate he decided to wait till the 5th of March before making a move. During a normal session and after having carefully weighed his chances, Danilov called for an emergency vote to get the approval for the 2 new military academies, and with 89 votes in favor and 81 against he managed to see his proposal approved. Not satisfied with only the win and to make a statement to his detractors he went further allowing immediate relocation of 2 academies from Earth to Luna and Mars effective immediately so that the 2 new ones would have been just a replacement for Earth.

The following months were crazy, with the leading party of the pacifists going completely berserk against their own candidate and president and the opposition calling for a motion of no confidence pretty much every week. It was rough but the government survived and shortly after everything went back to normal. Danilov accepted that this would have been his last mandate and the party started looking for a replacement for the following elections.

On the 19th of August 2108, the geo scan of the Sol system was finally completed.

As 2109 goes by, the Dong Graving Destroyers Dock finally saw completion allowing the United Nations of Earth to potentially design and produce the first destroyers of its Navy. Danilov was mentally tired and ready to leave politics at the end of the year and after a brief skirmish in parliament decided that such a decision should have been carried by the new president and government which was due to be elected in less than 4 months. All shipyards operation were completed and a new policy would have to be drafted with potentially enormous weight on the state finances and minerals leaving simply not enough time considering the incoming elections making the call even easier.

(https://i.imgur.com/WUU69Lw.png)
Government Resolutions

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Garfunkel on October 12, 2020, 03:23:05 PM

Hey, froggiest1982 if I could give you a little constructive criticism:

1. Use more paragraphs. It can get difficult and tiring to read text when sentences blur together and your paragraphs do not have any spaces between them. The more readable your story is, the more people are willing to keep up with it.

2. Reduce the size of your screenshots. I have a 1920 x 1080 resolution and the images are still often stretched outside, forcing me to scroll right and left. Maybe you're playing on a 4K monitor and don't realize it or something.

3. Ditch the mineral reports. Very few people care about the total amount of minerals in a system. Personally, I wouldn't show them at all unless for some specific reason. Alternatively, you could show just the most important body or two per system.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 12, 2020, 03:31:37 PM

Quote from: Garfunkel on October 12, 2020, 03:23:05 PM

Hey, froggiest1982 if I could give you a little constructive criticism:

1. Use more paragraphs. It can get difficult and tiring to read text when sentences blur together and your paragraphs do not have any spaces between them. The more readable your story is, the more people are willing to keep up with it.

2. Reduce the size of your screenshots. I have a 1920 x 1080 resolution and the images are still often stretched outside, forcing me to scroll right and left. Maybe you're playing on a 4K monitor and don't realize it or something.

3. Ditch the mineral reports. Very few people care about the total amount of minerals in a system. Personally, I wouldn't show them at all unless for some specific reason. Alternatively, you could show just the most important body or two per system.

Thanks for the feedback! I will spend some time on it to fix it.

1. I will try to clear the reading sections a bit
2. I am trying to fix it as I use Snipping tool for faster use, I may fire up Photoshop elements and adopt a universal format.
3. I thought so, also it makes the post too long.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Garfunkel on October 12, 2020, 08:39:33 PM

Weird, snipping tool shouldn't cause that. For example:

(https://i.imgur.com/dpC1HQk.png)

It's the exact size of what I snipped - so that's why I was thinking that maybe you had a 4K monitor. But they also looked very zoomed in / scaled up. Does your snipping tool have an automatic zoom/scaling feature?

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 12, 2020, 08:59:30 PM

Quote from: Garfunkel on October 12, 2020, 08:39:33 PM

Weird, snipping tool shouldn't cause that. For example:

(https://i.imgur.com/dpC1HQk.png)

It's the exact size of what I snipped - so that's why I was thinking that maybe you had a 4K monitor. But they also looked very zoomed in / scaled up. Does your snipping tool have an automatic zoom/scaling feature?

Yes, I have 3 UHD Samsung Monitors and I do scale and zoom when I am using my Aurora Dashboard. I am rescaling all pictures and applying some of your suggestions (thanks again by the way) and if you start scrolling back you should see the difference.

I opted for a max 1024 width this time as should fit all modern minimum specifications.

I will keep working on as I am trying to stay away from the itch of continuing with the campaign having finished the 1.12 database porting but I really want to get this right considering the AAR serves also as a guide to using the aurora gov file and ribbons.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Zap0 on October 13, 2020, 12:57:20 AM

Quote from: froggiest1982 on October 12, 2020, 08:59:30 PM

having finished the 1.12 database porting

Your thread might not be the best place to start a discussion about this, but I'm interested in what you mean with the database porting. Did you just recreate the game in the new vesion or did you use the 1.11 DB and have modified it to be compatible with 1.12?

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 13, 2020, 01:13:54 AM

Quote from: Zap0 on October 13, 2020, 12:57:20 AM

Quote from: froggiest1982 on October 12, 2020, 08:59:30 PM
having finished the 1.12 database porting

Your thread might not be the best place to start a discussion about this, but I'm interested in what you mean with the database porting. Did you just recreate the game in the new vesion or did you use the 1.11 DB and have modified it to be compatible with 1.12?

I was lucky because just started so I did a bit of both. Part recreation part paste and copy parts of the database.

I know what you thinking, I love your AAR and I wish could be ported as well. Did you ask Steve? sometimes he does it...

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The First Ertegün Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 15, 2020, 04:35:00 AM

2110 – The Start of the Ertegün Democracy

As the elections approach and with the current polling showing an easy win of the pacifist movement again, it was time to select a successor for the redundant Danilov. With no apparent threats coming from the oppositions the party wanted to ensure that the new man or woman would have followed the party guidance without going too much astray on either militaristic or federalists ideals.

(https://i.imgur.com/Svp4cra.png)
National Media Service Poll Elections 2110

(https://i.imgur.com/1UVILv4.png)
National Media Service Population Census 2110

With both Maximilian van Gelder and Marcin Kruk formally going to run again against the new democrat pupil, it was clear that defeat was largely expected on both side making the selection of the right candidate even more important; charisma and personality wasn’t something that the party needed to deal with again nor was needed to win this election. Furthermore, both adversaries announced that this would be their last run, regardless of the final result.

Finally, as Danilov retires from the political stage entirely, the president would have also been able to run the Earth colony efficiently, not a simple task. With only a handful of civilian administrators available there wasn’t much choice for the party then to assign Halil Ertegün. Ertegün did not have any actual experience but it was the only one fitting the psychological profile required. He would have also brought few helpful insights to improve Earth’s logistic operations enough to most likely increase the production of the planet as well.

(https://i.imgur.com/Ej2wl4S.png)
Halil Ertegün Profile

On the night of the 1st of January 2110, as predicted and expected Halil Ertegün was declared the winner for the democratic party. Unfortunately, another big drop in popularity and the 4% fewer preferences of the previous election, are starting to make the democrats not as firmly in power as before and while destined to stand for all of the 5-year mandates with some real opposition in the parliament, uncertainty started to run through the party caucus.

Fortunately for this new government, the new powers in play have shared concerns over the militarization of the Democracy under Danilov and to accomplish anything over this matter will be simply impossible with plenty of negotiations required to get a vote over any military production proposals. For the rest, the new president will have free reins in pretty much all matters of the state. No president had so much power before.

The new Parliament is then composed by a total of 305 seats, an increase of 36 seats was necessary to compensate our 2 new colonies of Luna and Mars. 40 seats went to the Federalists (6 seats more), 95 to the leading party of the Pacifists (14 seats more), 76 to the Mercantile and Industrialists (8 seats more), 48 to the Scientists (21 seats less in a steady drop), 46 to the Nationalists (31 seats more in rapid ascension) and after only one year the Military Party lost their only seat gaining none at this turn.

(https://i.imgur.com/DwfURrT.png)
Elected seats of the 2110 Election

The ascension of the Nationalists is due to the division the new colonies are generating through the population, with the party busy in spinning the populist narrative in each colony and suggesting that Humans belong to Earth only. On the other side, the Federalists are singing the same song with a different tune, suggesting that each colony should decide on their own without Earth dictating every move. Even if currently under control, the situation could get out of hand quickly and many in the party are already regretting to have gotten rid of Danilov so soon as he obviously anticipated such trouble and many of his moves were now startting to make sense.

Halil Ertegün won with 51.5% of the preferences. Marcin Kruk for the Federalists came in again second with 27% and Admiral van Gelder came in again last with a comforting 21.5%.

(https://i.imgur.com/PCknWPV.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2110 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/hg1aO0s.png)
Presidential Elections

In the past 5 years, our society kept changing following the trends of the last decade with a notable exception. Our determination hasn’t grown much (from 60 to 61) probably due to the fading space myth. Our diplomacy ability (from 56 to 59) has also seen a slight improvement thanks to the mediation of our former President Danilov while our expansion desire has been entirely filled by the conquests of the human race in past years (from 52 to 48). A considerate level of militancy (from 64 to 65) it’s still present and our trade routes have now reached their full potential (from 74 to 75). The opening of the new colonies of Luna and Mars have produced a considerable decrease of the xenophobic sentiment through the lower classes (from 50 to 47) now motivated to leave Earth and find luck in these new empty worlds full of opportunities.

For the first time, Ertegün was to review all admin posts and commands. Since he did not know personally any of the administrators he decided to have a look and revamp the team with people of his choice and that he could trust. A complete reorganization of the state affairs was needed as he intended to scrap the Danilov Plan and most of the other policies adopted in the previous 10 years. Certainly, he couldn’t get rid of the colonies but his priority was to focus more on the original goal: find and exploit new TN mineral sources.

After having dealt with all these formalities he did something unusual as he sent for his adversaries and he held a private meeting of over an hour in his chambers.
At the end of the meeting, he announced that the Admiral and former Military Party Leader van Gelter would have been in charge of assigning all the military posts for the Navy for the following 5 years while Kruk would have been in charge of all the ground troops. As a result, he also promoted Kruk to the grade of Brigadier General. As Kruk shared concern over the lack of high-grade ground officers, the President allowed him to promote 2 officers of his liking from the grade of Colonel to the grade of Brigadier General. This move was very smart and the opposition understood that this new adversary had the political savviness his predecessor Danilov did not possess and that would make him a more dangerous player in the long run.

(https://i.imgur.com/ve6ZRqr.png)
The Race Information Panel.

2110/2114 – The Ertegün Democracy

With the intent of reforming the Danilov Plan, Ertegün started a massive investment into the UNEC. In the first year alone he approved the built of 4 new UNEC Elysium class freighters, the expansion to 100,000 tons of the Hornbuckle Drydock Company and up to 40,000 tons (+400%) of the Chojnacki Shipyard Limited. The remaining 2 shipyards, the Denoble Boat Builders and the Mandal Enterprises were instead tasked of expanding their slipways.

Immediately after, the Freighter Fleet 125k 001 led by Lieutenant Commander Alexandra Lundberg started to load Mass Drivers and Auto Mines from Earth destination Venus and Mercury. For the first time after decades Earth had again a stable source of TN minerals, not a major one of course, but still. As Earth was now without any Auto Mine available discussions started if was the case to convert the actual idle manned mines on the planet into automated ones. Ertegün did not need to make a decision immediately, preferring to wait and see how the situation would have developed in a few years. After all, the exploitation of the TN minerals outside Earth was just begun.

On the 6th of April 2111, news on the premature departure of Professor Humberto Gianotti arrived at the president’s ears. Ertegün wasn’t familiar with the professor work and he was forced to ask around if anybody knew what he was working at. After having acknowledged that nobody knew he tried to contact Danilov which after having retired from politics was nowhere to be found so that somebody was even insinuating that he was dead. The president sent for the only scientist available in the field then, Brygida Michalak, just to find out that she was probably even less prepared than he was. She was originally a biologist asked to start studying propulsion and power devices due to the lack of options.

As not many other scientists had the chances over the years to practice on real research the situation was not only serious but almost embarrassing. Ertegün had now a project in his hands that nobody knew where it was leading and that nobody could carry on efficiently. There were then only two options. Option number one to let Michalak continuing the researches of the departed Gianotti or spread the laboratories towards other researches and scientists in the attempt of creating a new generation of bright minds. No need to say that the latter would hold back the technological advancement of the Democracy for at least another 10 years. Considering the decision had to be taken immediately Ertegün decide for the only thing that he would have granted future stability and productivity. Effective immediate all the possible laboratories would have passed under the supervision of Professor Singh to complete the research over Large Cargo Holds. This research was a top priority for the new direction Ertegün was following.

The remaining 7 laboratories would have been assigned to 7 different scientists and 7 different projects, in the attempt of increasing the specialization ability of the most promising minds, even if that would mean to reclassify their studies entirely. As consequence, the research of the Improved Nuclear Pulse Engine was abandoned, at least for now.

(https://i.imgur.com/mylTjsQ.png)
New Research Plan

Even if Ertegün stopped the Danilov Plan, terraforming on Mars and probably on Luna would have been still needed. With an increasing population living on the 2 colonies, making the environment hospitable and suitable to human life as we know it it was a necessity. On the 16th of January 2112, the atmosphere on Mars was finally filled with the minimum amount of required oxygen for the human race, however, the atmosphere was almost pure oxygen and the temperature was way below human tolerance.

Eventually, new biological studies highlighted that it would have been possible for Mars to host life again and with a reasonable temperature thick and luxuriant vegetation could have grown all over the surface. Such “Martian Jungle” would have not only been good for the tourism and the appeal of the planet but also as the first line of defences if such need ever arose. The drawback was that the extra amount of Greenhouse Gasses would have pushed the clock further of another 10 years before complete terraforming could be achieved.

The 5 years of the Ertegün Democracy passed quite fast with nop hiccups and or problems for the president. As elections approach and with favourable polls, he is secure to having already the second mandate in his pocket. The new adversaries are Vice Admiral Stiaan Naudé for the Republican Faction and Lieutenant General Mahmud Abba for the Federalist Faction. The curriculum of the Vice-Admiral is one of the most impressive in the whole UNEN and even if without any chance to win he advised that he is there for the long run and he does not mind to wait for his moment, which he is sure it will come sooner or later.

(https://i.imgur.com/IEQyMOZ.png)
Stiaan Naudé Profile

(https://i.imgur.com/oWeRMYW.png)
Mahmud Abba Profile

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story – The Second Ertegün Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 20, 2020, 10:27:03 PM

2115 – The Start of the Second Ertegün Democracy

As the elections approach and with the current polling showing an easy win of the pacifist movement again, the concern shifted to the alarming drop in popularity of the party. Even if the democrat faction is supported by many other forces it is imperative to maintain the peaceful line that the government worked so hard to defend.

(https://i.imgur.com/oxqMjBr.png)
National Media Service Poll Elections 2115

(https://i.imgur.com/Z2jreYO.png)
National Media Service Population Census 2115

It was clear that the new candidates had brought in new lymph to the respective supporters and even if defeat was largely expected on both sides, it seemed like the tide was about to turn. Ertegün's first mandate wouldn’t be remembered for anything extraordinary and the people were so accustomed to the sensationalism Danilov put in any of his decisions that it almost looked like Ertegün didn’t do anything in past 5 years. Sure he was able to run the Earth colony efficiently but his lack of prestige was starting to pay its toll.

(https://i.imgur.com/280iV7o.png)
Ertegün first mandate Resolutions

On the night of the 1st of January 2115, Halil Ertegün was declared the winner for the democratic party winning his second mandate as President of the Democracy and, as polls were already showing, another big drop in popularity and 10% fewer preferences of the previous election were recorded. This new government would be then a bigger stage for those powers which were constantly backing the Democrats. Thanks to the shared concerns over the demilitarization of the Democracy under Ertegün, these powers would be forced to find new alliances leading to fierce battles over Military Productions bills which are now tied to 172 in favor versus 172 against thanks to the surge in votes over the Mercantile and Industrialists Guild.

The new Parliament is composed of a total of 343 seats, an increase of 38 seats was necessary to compensate for our population growth. 67 seats went to the Federalists (27 seats more), 76 to the former leading party of the Pacifists (19 seats less), 91 to the new leading party of the Mercantile and Industrialists (15 seats more), 43 to the Scientists (5 seats less and keep dropping), 67 to the Nationalists (21 seats more in constant growth election after the election) and again no Militarist Men were able to enter Parliament.

(https://i.imgur.com/FGa4Rm2.png)
Elected seats of the 2115 Election

An enormous amount of spoil votes (over 6%) was identified and immediately challenged by the opposition. A similar problem happened during the Danilov election with the difference that at that time there were more than enough votes for Danilov to secure a clear win. This time with Halil Ertegün win with only 41.5% of the preferences, the situation wasn’t that bright for the Democrats. In fact, Mahmud Abba for the Federalists came in second with an incredible 34%, and even Stiaan Naudé that came in last managed to get a reasonable 24%. After few hours of heated discussions, the Federalists acknowledged that even if all the spoil votes would have been for their candidate that would have not been enough for them to win and decided to drop the challenge even if with few extra votes the official distance could have been less than the 5% needed for a clear Democratic win.

Everybody understood immediately that this government would be very different from the previous one and many are already speculating on what future is going to lay ahead.

(https://i.imgur.com/uJGmetI.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2115 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/L3BgkK5.png)
Presidential Elections 2115

The second Ertegün mandate will rule a very different society than the one Danilov led on his second one. Our determination has been growing year after year (from 61 to 62) along with our diplomacy skills (from 59 to 62). As our military has been kept at the margin of our society so as our expansion desire (from 48 to 45) also causing an increase in our militancy level (from 65 to 69). The trade has reached peaks never reached before and the surge in preferences during the election is a natural consequence of that (from 75 to 76). As our society started to see first humans born on Luna and Mars along with the first cadets from their academies a considerable decrease of the xenophobic sentiment through the lower classes (from 47 to 44) has been maintained in the last 5 years.

The president knew that the government would expect to see some immediate results reflecting the new landscape of the parliament, therefore he arranged an extraordinary session to discuss all matter of the state as soon as all results were in. All parliamentarians were notified with those that could not attend physically expecting to attend by conference call. Before the meeting, he announced that the Admiral and former Military Party Leader van Gelter would have been still in charge of all assignments. The same goes for General Kruk.

(https://i.imgur.com/r7a3CLQ.png)
The Race Information Panel

As the meeting started, the first item the parliament wished to discuss was the research policy. The new majority believed that priority should be given to technologies capable of “bringing us out of the solar system”. While the president tried to explain that such technology was not only further away but also pointless giving the resources in government possession, one of the parliamentarians asked to speak. Apparently, the person asking to speak was a woman that claimed to have been involved in a romantic relationship with the departed scientist Humberto Gianotti. She couldn’t even start telling what she knew that Ertegün asked to interrupt the session and bring the lady in his private chambers as a person of interest in an ongoing investigation.

The parliament was boiling with people talking over each other, some asking for a formal investigation and not a private one, others claiming the president was abusing his powers. Ertegün addressed the house after managed to get everybody listening to him again saying that the meeting with what was so-called Lady Gianotti would require only a short period of time, therefore, only a short recess was required. Once face to face, Ertegün acknowledged that Gianotti’s researches were more than just power and propulsion researches. He was working with Danilov formally to get humanity out of the Nuclear power dependency but secretly he was working on a new theory that would have revolutionized the way we were conceiving space travel.

Intrigued by what he just listened the president was ready to talk to the parliament. He explained all he discovered after the death of Gianotti and what he was just told. Ertegün then asked the parliament if it was favorable in allocating as many resources as possible to pursue such a theory. As this was basically what everybody was asking the best scientist in the field, doctor Engela Prinsloo was appointed to research the now known as “Jump Point Theory”. Based on Gianotti’s material received, Engela informed the president that, if revealed correct, the theory would be validated by 2117.

The second item in order was the situation regarding the shipyards. The parliament reckoned that keeping the workers sitting on their hands for the most part of the year was inadmissible and even if some of the shipyards were focused only on military production it was imperative that these would be kept busy.
Despite the formal agreement, the government still got hit on almost all military resolutions with the new military ship construction rejected 132 votes against 139 and the new military design rejected too with 141 votes in favor and 149 votes against. What surprised was that out of 4 new slipways construction only 2 were actually approved. Ertegün was disappointed as it was clear that the opposition was intentionally voting against friendly resolutions in the attempt of undermining his authority. Sadly this was something he did witness already as this is exactly how Danilov got kicked out. The vision of 5 years under this sword of Damocles over his head did not thrill him.

Clearly, while everybody agreed on the concept, the pacifist soul of the government managed to keep the militaristic one at bay meaning that, as usual in politics, a compromise was found without letting the President know. The Naval yards would have been then allowed only to either expand their capacity or increase their slipways and no new military ship construction would be tolerated. Different was the situation on the commercial side. The Industrialists and Trade representatives needed more freighters to don’t rely entirely on the civilian fleet and this is why on the commercial side, everything went as expected. Eventually, President Ertegün was finally left going home with a humiliating defeat considering that out of 7 motions presented, 4 were rejected and only 3 approved.

2115/2119 – The Second Ertegün Democracy

Following the Industrialists and Trade representatives' suggestion, the president organized for the mining Colonies of Eris, Haumea, and Macholz to start mining operations with both Freighter Fleet 125k 001 and 002 tasked to dispatch all relative installations from Earth with operations expected to be completed by October 2115.

Furthermore, without the need for any geological survey in Sol for more than 6 years now, all the Geological Survey Vessels were ordered to scrap, not only to recover precious components but mostly to decrease the maintenance supplies use and therefore the mineral consumption. The Promise Geological Survey Vessel class was then officially decommissioned from the UNEN after 15 years of honorable service: from 2100 to 2115. As a reward and compensation for losing their respective commands, all the captains were awarded the Medal of Honor to have successfully completed the Sol operations even if many of them didn’t even manage to break Earth’s orbit since in command.

Once scrapping operations will be completed the class will be declared officially obsolete.

On the 23rd of December 2115 after the completion of the Deep Space Tracking Stations on Earth the final part of the Industrialists part took place with the order of constructing 1 Commercial Shipyard to replace the current Mandal Enterprises one as 10,000 tons operations. As result, the Mandal Enterprises shipyard was ordered to expand his capability to 25,000 tons. The construction of the new shipyard is scheduled to be completed by January 2117 and the name will be Murkami Fabricators. As soon as completed the Murkami shipyard will be ordered to increase its slipways.
Also, on the 21st of April 2117, the Chojnacki Shipyard Limited finally reached the expansion to 40,000 tons started 7 years earlier.

It was a sunny morning of the 23rd of September 2117 when the president, during his usual briefing, got the news over the validation of the Jump Point Theory. He rushed to the research center where doctor Prinsloo was already waiting for him with a detailed explanation of what to do next. Basically, based on Gianotti’s theory of Space Jumps, 3 elements were required to build an engine capable of moving through dimensions and Jump instantly from a particular place of interest to another. Additionally, equipment capable of identifying such places of interest would be required. The device, called Gravitational Survey Sensor, could work similarly to the Geological counterpart and could be potentially installed on similar ships to the now obsolete Promise class.

Back to the engine, the first element required would be a stabilizer. In theory the better the stabilization of the gravitational field the longer we could leave the breach into the space continuum allowing more ships to transit at once. The second element would be the spread where such ships would be coming out of the Jump. While knowing exactly we are going to “land” could be seen as a good thing, some are implying that so could eventual other “entities” predict that, limiting the jumping ship options post jump. This was important because Prinsloo predicted that such a high amount of energy couldn’t come without a price and it is to be expected that ships may be sensor blind for a few seconds (5 to 30 at least) immediately after the jump. Finally, all these elements would require a great effort in engineering them to increase their efficiency reducing the size of the engine per tonnage transit.

Prinsloo went also further than Gianotti did, probably helped by the possibility of actually verifying the theory. She did theorize that if it was possible to temporarily stabilize the gravitational fields then it may have been possible to keep them always stable allowing any ship passing through them. Such a portal or gate would have been constructed on-site and it would probably take a considerable amount of time.

Ertegün referred the discoveries to the parliament and it was agreed to immediately start the research for the Gravitational sensors and once completed all the components required to build a jump engine prototype. The decision on the gate builder was postponed as it looked a bit stretched as a theory if we considered that we did not know if we could really jump from a system to another yet.

With the construction of more Automated mines completed in 2118, the plan of the industrialist was completed; President Ertegün was then called to report in parliament again to define the strategy of the new production but mostly to find a new agreement on the Military Spending. The new discoveries along with the new components under study were, in fact, all military components. Mindful of what happened at the start of his second mandate, Ertegün adverted a chill over his spine.

The proposed massive reform included: the classification of all geological survey vessels and gravitational surveys vessels as commercial to untie the parliament stalemate over this matter in the past 10 years, the possibility for sensitive and strategic elements to be designed but not produced even if for a military purpose under the commercial build act, and the unification of the commercial and military navy under a new entity called United Nations Navy (UNN). The president knew that this was not only a can of worms better staying closed but that most likely this would have been also the end of his political career if not played well.

If going through the reform unharmed was impossible all he needed was a way to get out of it alive. He called representatives of all parties and as he did already once, with a savvy maneuver, managed to get a seat at the table in the figure of president special counselors to both Admiral Maximiliaan van Gelder and General Marcin Kruk. It was time to cash in the benevolence and faith shown in them over the past 8 years.
The President could then represent: 91 seats of the Industrialist and Trade Party and 67 seats of the Federalists Party thanks to Kruk for a total of 158 seats, only 14 short for the majority. Assuming that though van Gelder many from the Nationalist Party would be okay with the reform, Ertegün was able to at least starting negotiations on a position of strength with the whole Scientists Party still in play and only the Pacifists against.

He went then through the proposal and considering the different pressures he was receiving from all parties he went with what recommended by his counselors. First, the Geological and Gravitational Vessels would have remained under Military structure. Such vessels from now on would have been operating outside the Sol system in a potentially hostile environment ad on uncharted territory. Such conditions needed a military-grade preparation and in the end, pretty much everybody agreed on that.

Second, the design of the ships and components would have been allowed without the need for a vote from parliament. Ertegün stated that as long as production and research of such elements were at the hand of the parliament there was no need to worry about any misuse of the technology. Also, it did make no sense to limit the creativity and the technological advancement of the Human race entirely based on the fear of what happened. That should have been a lesson learned and it was time to move on. Thanks to the full support of the Scientists' party even that decision was approved.

Third and final, the unification of the Navy under a new entity was scrapped as the current system was defined as good enough.

It was time to decide the resolutions to be put under vote and here Ertegün would have been forced to walk on a very narrow road. Due to the expected increase in military ship construction, all the shipyards would have been required an upgrade and the build of at least another facility was also not a bad idea. With the designs unlocked and the shipyard ready to potentially produce destroyers the president wouldn’t also mind getting at least one on the line. Surely soon an entirely new generation of ships would have been required but he thought to leave this to who is going to be eventually in charge that day.

On the production side, not only a new shipyard was required but also more terraforming, fuel harvesters, and another batch of fighters was postponed for too long.

On the 26th of May 2118 all motions went up for a vote and the first 2 resolution regarding the expansion of the Naval Slipways were both rejected 112 versus 145 and 139 versus 159. The President was starting to feel nervous and he was afraid that the scheming in the shadows was about to have the upper hand. He decided then to rally his troops and cash in all favours he granted over the years to pass the most important and significative bill: the production of the 1st destroyer of the fleet, just designed for the occasion and renamed May B Class Destroyer. Under a fragrant gasp, the resolution passed 120 versus 102, it was time to counterattack and present the 2 resolution with the unanimity of votes to keep the morale of his supporters high before introducing the resolution for the new batch of fighters and the production of a new naval shipyard the Tarhan Industries Inc. It was a triumph with all resolution passed without problems.

Even if with a couple of wounds, Ertegün gained a solid win and at least a couple of prestige points to spend over the next election campaign as it was now assured that he would be the lead candidate for the Democratic Party even in 2120.

(https://i.imgur.com/XCBRNK8.png)
New Prestige Levels, Ertegün was at 5

Quote

May B class Destroyer 15,000 tons 417 Crew 1,150.7 BP TCS 300 TH 400 EM 0
1333 km/s Armour 5-54 Shields 0-0 HTK 91 Sensors 5/5/0/0 DCR 18 PPV 134.4
Maint Life 4.00 Years MSP 783 AFR 225% IFR 3.1% 1YR 78 5YR 1,172 Max Repair 51.2 MSP
Captain Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Nuclear Pulse Engine (Vessel) (5) Power 400 Fuel Use 80.0% Signature 80 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 273,000 Litres Range 4.1 billion km (35 days at full power)

Quad 12cm C1 Visible Light Laser Turret (5x4) Range 80,000km TS: 8000 km/s Power 16-4 RM 20,000 km ROF 20
Quad 10cm C1 Visible Light Laser Turret (2x4) Range 60,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 12-4 RM 20,000 km ROF 15
Beam Fire Control R128-TS8000 (1) Max Range: 128,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Beam Fire Control R64-TS5000 (1) Max Range: 64,000 km TS: 5,000 km/s 84 69 53 38 22 6 0 0 0 0
Pebble Bed Reactor (Medium) (3) Total Power Output 37.8 Exp 5%

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

With the Tarhan Industries Inc. on the way, the president decided to try again asking permission to expand the Takenouchi Drydock Company from 1,000 tons to 5,000 tons. This would allow more flexibility in building the future Gravitational Survey Vessels as soon as in September the new sensor will be ready to be installed. Spending some of the credit gained during this mandate he managed to get approval from parliament with 125 votes in favor against 122, close but still valid.

Once September arrived it was time to vote for the production of the first Twilight class Gravitational Survey Vessel. This class was nothing more than a copy of the Promise class Geological Survey Vessel but with a gravitational sensor instead. The problem was in the delay of the expansion of the Takenouchi Drydock Company from the parliament that made the vote obsolete and therefore postponed to once possible to actually build the ships. In the meantime, it was decided to rename Takenouchi Drydock Company into Takenouchi Drydock Survey Company to better identify the production reserved for such a shipyard.

It was then time to prepare for the new elections, knowing that this time would have been a tough battle.

(https://i.imgur.com/jEpozIe.png)
Government Resolutions

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 23, 2020, 03:48:12 AM

2120 – The Blue Tide

With 2120 elections approaching and with some not very favourable polling, for the first time the Democrats were to fight to keep their presidential candidate in the house. Ertegün had certainly performed well in the last mandate gaining the respect of many. Unfortunately, respect alone wouldn’t buy that many votes. The Democrats strength was always in the alliances but the shadows of the previous dubious elections along with the scandal of the many spoil votes was a deeper scar than the party thought.

With both opposition candidates polling high and the almost certain consistent presence of military party men, there was serious concern over the safety of the whole democratic system. Custom wanted that the winner would also take the Earth seat as Governor, therefore, an eventual defeat would have meant also losing any say over Earth’s people. A reshuffle of all posts was also feared as it would lead to losing even more democratic representatives in all key stations and offices.

(https://i.imgur.com/h0ZGscs.png)
National Media Service Poll 2120

The final consideration was over the completely different situation in the colonies of Mars and Luna after more than 10 years of their creation. Combined they represented the 12% of the population and their fealty to the pacifist ideals was pretty much non-existent. The party never showed too much interest in these seats and because of that National or even worse (Federalist) sentiments were the majority. In an election to be decided on the line, these votes could have been the deciders between winning and losing.

(https://i.imgur.com/YuZVNFE.png)
National Media Service Population Census 2120

On the night of the 1st of January 2120, the expected unexpected happened. First results from some of the smallest areas were all blue winners for the federalist party. With preferences tied and only 15% of the votes to count it was clear that we would have a close election between Democrats and Federalists and this would have potentially angered some supporters of either losing side.
Side note: I just realized I have swapped the blue with the purple for federalists and democrats so I have corrected it, just in case you wondering why blue is going to be Federalists from after this post and onwards. The interesting fact is that without this AAR I would have probably never picked this up as it has been like this forever and I did something like 6 or 7 testing games already.

As final votes were counted and having enough margin to be declared a winner the Federalist candidate Mahmud Abba was waiting faithfully for Ertegün to concede. He would have waited all night. With the official 35.75% of preferences, the Federalists had surprisingly won the 2120 Elections. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a clear win and the Democrats were determined to have some sort of ballot between the 2 candidates facing some strong opposition from both Republicans and Federalists. For the first after the war, Humanity did not have a working government on the day after new year’s eve.

Fortunately for the new government to be, the Democrats simply did not handle well their alliances after having fired Danilov and the Pacifist party alone wasn’t the votes machine it once was. The presence of the military party and the total neutrality of the Mercantile and Industrialists Party was enough to secure a stable majority for the 5 years to come.

The new powers in play have shared concerns over the upcoming interstellar travels and the pacifist was too naive in the eyes of many to handle potential threats. Even if focused military researches would have still been very difficult, the military production and organization of the Democracy could have been potentially unlocked after 20 years.

The new Parliament was then composed by a total of 386 seats, an increase of 43, the highest ever recorded. 100 seats went to the Federalists (33 seats more, new majority and head of government), 90 to the Pacifists (4 seats more), 77 to the former leading party of the Mercantile and Industrialists (14 seats less), 25 to the Scientists (18 seats less and destined to disappear from the political landscape), 76 to the Nationalists (9 seats more) and 28 to the Militarist Party which is cashing in the great prestige and popularity of its candidate.

(https://i.imgur.com/OdfAfkc.png)
Elected seats of the 2120 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/Hb3NzLB.png)
Presidential Elections 2120

The ascension of the Federalist party is a great threat to democracy. Many people have voted for them due to the promise of a government more focused on the real problems of every single colony with more independent governors. A series of constitutional reforms were announced to tackle these issues and they will be put for a vote a soon as possible. One of them was the reform of the justice system with the institution of different laws decided by the state to better reflect the life in the colonies, which was very different than the one of the privileged citizens of Earth. Or at least this was the narrative the party was spinning around.

(https://i.imgur.com/zp3Qp7Y.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2120 Election

For the first time, a non-Democratic President was to review all admin posts and commands. Since Mahmud Abba was also a Lieutenant General he respected the chain of command and decided to keep the assignment on the hands of his “superiors” Admiral Maximiliaan van Gelder and General Marcin Kruk. Although his nature was aggressive and with strong motivation, Abba truly thought that was the right thing to do and if it wasn’t for Kruk’s attitude and rude character that would have been it. Unfortunately, Kruk couldn’t accept being “allowed” to lead his troops by a lesser grade official, leaving the president no choice. With regret, Abba decided to demote Kruk and consequentially promote himself as General. Kruk was furious but after have been told by many that it was his fault he decided to keep quiet avoiding further reprisals.

Interested in keeping his role in the military, it was obvious that the president couldn’t and wouldn’t take the Governorship of Earth. Abba’s plan for the civilian administrators was simple and similar to the one used by the Army. The right man for the right job as long as he is also loyal. The political reliability and the personal skills would have then been the decider of who will do what.

(https://i.imgur.com/m70DirY.png)
Mahmud Abba Profile

A complete reorganization of the state affairs was also needed as he intended to scrap the most of the policies adopted in the previous 20 years and move the old democracy into a new and more dynamic federation of planets.

(https://i.imgur.com/9aSFEwB.png)
The Race Information Panel

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Start of the Abba's Federalist Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 27, 2020, 03:34:07 AM

2120 – The Start of Abba’s Federalist Democracy

Abba’s win against more competent adversaries gained him a fair share of prestige. Furthermore, the former president decided to resign and a new rampant democratic pupil emerged from the pool of suitable replacements. At 2120 the Democracy could then count on a prime level of Political representants.

(https://i.imgur.com/6xPA0bL.png)
Prestige Levels 2120

(https://i.imgur.com/OWtIp0X.png)
Melisa Zorlu Profile – Democrat

(https://i.imgur.com/SQcfZxC.png)
Stiaan Naudé Profile – Republican

The first week was very busy for the new Federalist President as he was drafting all the resolutions needed to activate his party plan. The most important was, of course, the promise of the constitutional reforms that got him elected. People wanted a Judiatiary System where the state could overrule and or change sentences considering the place the alleged crime was committed. In fact, it was starting to take form the idea that the harsher conditions that the colonists were subjected to the colonies would have required lighter sentences for some crimes while harsher for others. This was something that some privileged inhabitants of Earth could not understand not having spent ever a day either on Luna or Mars if not for a brief vacation.

To get approval Abba needed 2/3 of the majority in the Parliament. While running the numbers he realized that he could have either win of a maximum of 49 votes or lose by 73 giving him 40% chances of actually pass the reform. Obviously, he would have liked better odds but he was confident in shifting the undecided (120 votes) more on his side than his detractors could. At the end he was right and with the bare minimum (257 votes) he managed to get approval to change the constitution. It was the first time since Democracy was ever created that somebody succeeded in such a task.

(https://i.imgur.com/VDyteKS.png)
New Democratic Constitution 2120

The government in exchange for the reform wanted the colonies to be more independent and the increased unemployment and the great effort in terraforming Mars deserved more active participation from all the citizens. The delegates of both Luna and Mars were enthusiastic at the idea of not only actively contributing to the Democracy’s economy but also to move towards a more independent economy.

This new goal required a complete revamp of the production chain. A motion to build 2 new academies (destined one to Luna and one to Mars) was approved with the intent of increasing the output of officers and crewmen and create then more jobs. Also, it was decided to move some of Earth’s Financial Centres to Luna as many businessmen were moving their Headquarters or simply relocating there and for this reason, 100 more Financial Centres were ordered to refill Earths's hole. Eventually, 2 new spaceports would have been build to service both colonies and helping with the civilian sector expansion. With Earth’s seat occupied by his former adversary due to Abba’s unavailability of filling the role, the president decided to put there somebody more “politically reliable”. His former Academy friend and trusted advisor Baty Agar was perfect for the role. Not only his career was extensive, but his experience would have provided many other benefits to Earth’s new multiple production outputs. Surely, he wasn’t the most reliable of the pool but Earth is a big colony and unfortunately not all Administrators are ready to administrate such a hub.

(https://i.imgur.com/yWiN9ci.png)
Batu Agar Profile

Military speaking, the missile supplies were very low with only half of the minimum required capacity, so it was decided to top it up, bringing levels to a medium capacity. Furthermore, Abba thought that it was silly that only one of the defensive fleet had the privilege of displaying a destroyer therefore he opted to build another one. Also, talks started to explore the possibility of moving away from the Militia and build a proper army. The Federation Army, as it was called by Abba, was perhaps too much and it did not warm the hearts of the Democracy men for obvious reasons, more work needed to be done on that front by the Federalist PR department.

(https://i.imgur.com/3LI7Imr.png)
The analysts data on the missiles stock levels

As research was too slow for the party’s taste 5 new research facilities were queued to start as soon as the new terraformers would have been completed. The priority was still finding a way to leave the Sol system but not for the search of new TN minerals; instead, the Federalists wondered of new Colonies on new systems to be united under the soon born Federation. Eventually, thanks to the efforts of the previous government, the president was able to launch a new mission to have a full gravitational survey of the Sol system. A badge for the mission was released and a new Sol Gravitational Survey Department was opened under the Sol Survey Operations Command. Commodore Riette Barnard was appointed to lead operations as soon as everything will be ready.

(https://i.imgur.com/ic3eTQv.png)
Badge of the Gravsurvey Mission

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The First Abba Federalist Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 27, 2020, 09:42:39 PM

2120/2124 – The First Abba Federalist Democracy

On the first of July 2120, everything was ready to start researching the first Jump Drive and so it is prepared by our scientists and once completed, to honor the inventor of the theory, it will be called Gianotti Commercial Jump Drive and is was expected to be ready in only a few months. For this reason, the whole Geosurvey mission could not wait any longer, therefore a quick rethink of the Twilight was needed, and being the displacement now close to 7,000 tons it was decided to use the idle Tatham Corvettes Shipyard Inc. which could provide with 4 slipways of 9,000 tons each. The new craft will then be called Twilight J class with the first batch commissioned to be completed before May 2121. Furthermore, projects were being drafted for a new Promise class with jump capability as the twin sister of the Twilight J. For clarity purposes, the name selected was Promise J class.

Quote

Promise J class Geological Survey Vessel 7,000 tons 82 Crew 368.3 BP TCS 140 TH 200 EM 0
1428 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 32 Sensors 5/5/0/1 DCR 5 PPV 0
Maint Life 11.20 Years MSP 964 AFR 78% IFR 1.1% 1YR 14 5YR 211 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Gianotti Commercial Jump Drive (7.5k) Max Ship Size 7500 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (2) Power 200 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 467,000 Litres Range 134.2 billion km (1087 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Geological Survey Sensors (1) 1 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Quote

Twilight J class Gravitational Survey Vessel 7,000 tons 82 Crew 368.3 BP TCS 140 TH 200 EM 0
1428 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 32 Sensors 5/5/1/0 DCR 5 PPV 0
Maint Life 11.20 Years MSP 964 AFR 78% IFR 1.1% 1YR 14 5YR 211 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Gianotti Commercial Jump Drive (7.5k) Max Ship Size 7500 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Commercial Nuclear Pulse Engine (2) Power 200 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 100 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 467,000 Litres Range 134.2 billion km (1087 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 17.7m km
Gravitational Survey Sensors (1) 1 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

On the 21st of April 2121, the 4 Gravitational Survey Vessels were successfully completed and within the presidential May deadline. UNEN George Gaylord Simpson, Henry W. Posamentier, UNEN Paul F. Hoffman, and Peter Szatmari were ready to start surveying the Sol system in the search for possible Jump Points. All 4 Vessel broke Earth’s orbit at 8 am while Tatham Corvettes Shipyard Inc. was ordered to start retooling operations to accommodate the production of the Promise J, models required to exploit any new system within reach.

The year 2121 also saw the melting of the Martian ice sheets which gave access to pure water on the planet’s surface. The event was studied closely by our scientists that could not understand why such a reaction happened when the surface temperature was still far from the -17 degrees Celsius that was, until then, believed to be the minimum for the ice to melt.

In August 2121 a new civilian mining colony was founded and as established by previous agreements both the administration and the military contingent were transferred under the Democracy authorities. To avoid future issues Abba’s decided to send the former president to oversee the production. Halil Ertegün, now out of any political scheme, did not protest much and it left as soon as appointed. For him, it was most likely the end of the road.

Unfortunately for Abba, in the meantime, another of his political adversaries was getting stronger and stronger. Due to the early retirements of one of the Admirals of the fleet and with the impossibility of ignoring curriculum and position, the Navy promoted Stiaan Naudé to the rank of Admiral and decided that the role of Commander in Chief, replacing then van Gelder, was more suitable to his status. This resulted in an increase in the prestige of the republican candidate.

With the first batch of Promise J out in February 2122, the president doubled down production with another 4 vessels commissioned and to be completed by the end of the year. Clearly, Abba’s strategy was to get the most out of the military swing in parliament avoiding any delay as he couldn’t be sure a new government after the elections of 2125 would have had the same approach on the matter.

At the start of 2123 with new ships maintenance close to the limit, thanks to the new vessels built, it was ordered to keep building Maintenance Facilities on top of the almost completed ones. Another batch of 100 started construction immediately. Relief could also come from one of the research started as a training ground for unemployed scientists and promised a 25%increase in the operations and therefore of the total tonnage permitted.

(https://i.imgur.com/GIUKyQJ.png)
Maintenance Status 2123

(https://i.imgur.com/0rK9xh2.png)
Navy Information Panel 2123

Other researches included new Thermal ad Electromagnetic sensors which could have either be used to reduce the size of our current sensors or to increase their current range. With the possibility of finding Jump Points in Sol, soon we would have been in need to analyze new systems and better sensors would potentially allow us to have more scouting capabilities. The possibility of building scout vessels was also discussed while drafting a preliminary exploration strategy. Considering no new jump points were yet found though, the conversation was postponed to a later date.

Eventually, on the 3rd of July 2123, the first Jump point was detected by the UNEN George Gaylord Simpson under the command of Commander Wilfried Rosenwald at 2.7 Billion kilometers from Sol and bearing 271, just between Saturn and Uranus orbits. The discovery was huge, with the news traveling fast through the colonies. There wasn’t the time to even metabolize such a big deal that 20 days later another Jump Point was detected, this time by the UNEN Paul F. Hoffman captained by Commander Benedito Carreira and located at 3.63 Billion kilometers from Sol and bearing 55, right between Uranus and Neptune orbits.

Exploration continued as there were 30 identified survey points and only a bit less than the half were surveyed so far.

As part of the autonomy program for the colonies and with the new officers available from the new academies on Luna and Mars, it was decided to promote some of the brightest local cadets to take charge of the respective police commands. One of them, Esteban Puga Villa, was already in charge of the Mars Academy before being promoted and assigned to the Martian Police Command.

(https://i.imgur.com/oUO0GP9.png)
Esteban Puga Villa Profile

Meanwhile, on the 1st of Jan 2122 and 1st of Jan 2124, a constitutional change regarding the Police structure was rejected. Both times, in the attempt of getting more federalist ideals through democracy, the pacifist and industrialists found themselves again aligned to save the democratic hearth of the parliament. Despite being labeled as a good reform overall, the content left many people scared over the fact that the police may have too much power if approved. Furthermore, all these attacks to the constitution were seen as a big federalist push which would probably lead many to go back to the old pacifists' ideals.

(https://i.imgur.com/BwtvPco.png)
Government Resolutions

With the elections coming fast it was time for Abba to prepare for campaigning leaving the final months of 2124 to go by with the laid plan without too much interference. The good news was that all candidates were finally able to campaign on the Mars surface without the need for any installations to support life. The atmosphere was finally breathable and the temperatures were an average of 5 degrees Celsius all around and a plan for 1,850 installations laying on the planet surface was now potentially needed. To be fully colonized, now Mars required a consistent increase in its water levels.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Purple Strikes Back
Post by: Froggiest1982 on October 30, 2020, 03:44:26 AM

2125 – The Purple strikes back

The political landscape of 2125 elections seems to be back to normal after the brief Federalist parenthesis. With some very favourable polling, the Democrats were back on top and it looked like a fight to put back their presidential candidate in the house will most likely not be needed. Abba’s Federalist push in the last mandate did scare many electors which were now orientated to vote for the old guard and avoid surprises in the long run. Still, the Democrats would have needed to bring back some fragile alliances but overall the numbers seemed bright.

With a possible win on hand to retake governorship of Earth was also in the cards and thanks to Abba’s decision of exiling Ertegün, the road to a suitable governor was already paved. The reshuffle of all posts proposed by the Federalist was also something eventually to deal with, however, not all new appointments were that bad and with the colonies happy after their brief experience due to an increase of wealth over their citizens, more industrialists votes in these areas were expected which should have guaranteed extra seats aligned more with the democrat view than the republican or federalist ones.

(https://i.imgur.com/P5nn1YJ.png)
National Media Service Poll 2125

As usual, on the night of the 1st of January 2125 elections took place to decide who will govern for the following 5 years. With results coming in and the preferences tied exit poll after exit poll, it was clear that we would have another close election between Democrats and Federalists. Once all sections closed and finished to count votes, final results came in all party headquarters declaring the Democrats winners for only 2.29% of the votes. The soon to be president Zorlu was waiting for Abba to admit defeat and start working on the new government. The Federalists decided to don’t replicate the sad display in admitting defeat by the democrats in previous elections and with an official note on their social accounts decided to congratulate with Zorlu for the victory, practically admitting defeat.

(https://i.imgur.com/r9jG1EE.png)
Presidential Elections 2125

The new government to be would have needed now solid numbers all the times considering the democrats simply did not have enough margin to support all bills by themselves. After all, the federalists were still the majority party in parliament and without the total support of the Mercantile and Industrialists Party, no government would be possible. The current situation would still require them to allow some “hostile” resolutions and there was a growing intent of restoring the old constitution. However, Zorlu wasn't sure that reforming the constitution back to what it was would have been the right move. The party was pressing her quite a lot on the matter so she decided that rather pursue reverting the decision over the Judicial system she would have reformed the Media instead. The President did acknowledge the advantage of a controlled media platform but she believed that real democracy should have a truly free media and information system.

It was finally time to have a look at the new Parliament number which was now composed by a total of 437 seats, recording an increase of 51 seats then, the highest ever. 103 seats went to the Federalists (3 seats more, enough to keep the majority), 93 to the Pacifists (3 seats more), 100 to Mercantile and Industrialists (23 seats more), 49 to the Scientists (24 seats more and a good bargaining chip), 71 to the Nationalists (5 seats less and decreasing for the first time since their first appointment back in 2100) and 22 to the Militarist Party (6 seats less) which will have representatives in the house for 2 consecutive mandates, first time for them.

(https://i.imgur.com/TFjPcyb.png)
Elected seats of the 2125 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/X85AanT.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2125 Election

With President Zorlu not interested in moving back to Earth after over 20 years spent on Mars, the democratic forces wanted a civilian administrator which could bring prosperity and a real benefit to the planet’s economy. Abba’s choice, governor Agar, wasn’t that bad, to be honest, but the party wanted to send a message to Earth and all the other colonies: the wind had shifted again. It was clear then that the only suitable candidate would have been Constance Beaudry. The Machholz governor was stationed there till 2110 after being the previous 10 on Haumea. A total of 20 years spent on far away rocks without any complaint should have sufficed to demonstrate her fielty. Her survivalist nature overcame the aggressive one and now all her sacrifices were about to be rewarded with probably the most prestigious post after the presidency.

(https://i.imgur.com/nM8Ahza.png)
Constance Beaudry Profile

Zorlu needed also to find a way to move forward the career of her brother Ertug. He was determined in exploiting the fortune of his sister and he wouldn’t let it go until have obtained what he wanted also threatening her with the reveal of personal embarrassing things over what he called “martian pleasures” the sister was entangled with. With Vice Admiral Zhang Ji-Won severely sick, she managed to get his brother a long waited promotion from the rank of rear Admiral. Ertug Zorlu career was successful so far and he wouldn’t have really needed a push, however, he was getting tired of being moved from ship to ship and wanted back to admin jobs. The move wasn’t seen with favour from the military and the civilians resulting in a loss of prestige for the president. A small price to pay to keep her secrets actually secret.

(https://i.imgur.com/XCUB353.png)
Ertug Zorlu Profile

With lots of the policies still in place from the previous government, there wasn’t much the president could address in the first week so she decided to focus on getting the media reform drafted properly for the formal approval.

(https://i.imgur.com/9qQn39A.png)
The Race Information Panel

2125 – The Start of the Zorlu Democracy

As soon as the constitutional reform was ready, the fate of the National Media Service would have to be decided. Even if there wasn’t the need of getting rid of a state-run agency in grade of counter-attack private institutions and motives, the president decided that a clear sign of a change would have to be shown and that must have come from the government first. The new agency would have been then privatized and renamed Independent Media Service.

(https://i.imgur.com/CREPh7j.png)
New Democratic Constitution 2125

With the government desperately in need of more support, President Zorlu decided to form an alliance with the revitalized Scientists party. The party in exchange for the support wanted the government to push a bill with the purpose of doubling down the research facilities of the Democracy. Melisa, accomplished academic and mathematician, wished to be able to approve the proposal, however, the 42,000 tons of Mercassium needed for such effort was just too much and with a Neutronium crisis at the gates already, she could not offer more than 15 extra laboratories on top of the one almost ready.

Without the intention of letting the president off the hook that easily, the party accepted the 15 laboratories with the condition of starting research to improve the scientific method and output of the laboratories. The president agreed that an effort in that direction would have been made within the year. Both parties left the meeting satisfied in the end and the government was starting to finally walk on more solid grounds.

Unfortunately, the deal required not only a considerate investment in minerals but also a production extension of the laboratories which would have kept the lines busy for the next 12 years at current capacity. Enough said that many weren’t happy with this unilateral deal made as it would have fallen on the shoulders of the next 3 government. Furthermore, the new research would compromise the development of all new technologies needed for Jump techs. On the bright side, once fulfilled, both promises would have increased considerably the research output of the democracy.

Professor Franck Girard was tasked to start as soon as his current research project will be completed in April.

On the Military side, the Neutronium stock levels were enough excuse for the president to keep the pacifist quiet as no new operations would have been possible until a new stable source of the mineral would have been found. Even if stockpile wasn’t at a critical level yet, a cautious approach on the usage would still be required. The Federalist government did a lot on the military side of the democracy and thanks to that there weren’t urgent project to be undertaken.

However, the level was low enough to call for a stocktake of all minerals ensuring better management over the incoming years.

As soon the results arrived on the president desk she noticed that all levels were different than the one actually registered in the system. The president called for an inquire with the team in charge of the operations and asked for another check on the levels. This time 2 of her trusted advisors were present while the team was completing the check.

It was with great concern that it was acknowledged a 20% margin of error in all democratic inventories with the Gallicite stock overestimated by over 100,000 tons. Overnight the democracy lost over 300,000 tons of minerals due to this miscalculation. The damage was of a catastrophic size and certified how lightly the TN minerals issue was taken by the previous administrations.

(https://i.imgur.com/TNNEdOz.png)
Mineral Stock levels 2125: Up Believed – Down Actual

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Zorlu Democracy and the start of Ion era
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 02, 2020, 01:52:25 AM

2125/9 – The Zorlu Democracy and the start of Ion era

The new government started with the coronation of Danilov and Gianotti’s dream. The discovery of the Ion Drive, a thruster in a form of electric propulsion that creates thrust by accelerating ions using electricity, projected the Human race out of the nuclear era right into the Ion one.

Basically, an ion thruster ionizes a neutral gas by extracting some electrons out of atoms, creating a cloud of positive ions. These ion thrusters rely mainly on electrostatics as ions are accelerated by the Coulomb force along an electric field. Temporarily stored electrons are finally reinjected by a neutralizer in the cloud of ions after it has passed through the electrostatic grid, so the gas becomes neutral again and can freely disperse in space without any further electrical interaction with the thruster.

This discovery would require new engines to be researched and produced to be then installed into either existing or new vessels. With the incumbent mineral crisis, a refit of the older crafts seemed more logical, however, the president believed that putting more pressure on mineral reserves was simply too risky. It was decided to declare all Nuclear classes officially decommissioned but not obsolete as yet. New designs would be then studied and eventually produced later to befitted also with the new sensors discovered in 2124. Only once all new projects will be completed and if the mineral situation will allow it, 2nd generation space ships will be produced.

The plan seemed solid and was submitted to the parliament for a vote. Regrettably, all military projects were rejected and a warning was sent to the president advising to don’t pursue the militaristic path of her predecessors unless she wanted to experience the same fate. Scared, president Zorlu decided then to submit only the commercial projects and go ahead with them, leaving the military researches aside for the time being.

There was still a problem. In fact, even with the new engine technology, all hulls were still too heavy. As a lighter and more cost-efficient armour alloy would have been beneficial not only for the military but also for the commercial Navy, it was proposed to vote for the resolution under the commercial production act and, considering that the parliament did block all military initiative, it was agreed to concede the new armour to be researched as commercial technology knowing that no military ship would have been able to benefit of such advancement after all.

On the 16th of May 2127, the temperature on Mars reached the 25 degrees celsius wanted by the scientists and required the bare minimum for vegetation to start growing on the surface. With the temperature now under control, atmosphere and oxygen at optimal levels, the terraforming stations started to pump the water vapour needed to stimulate enough rains to cover at least the 20% of the planet surface, ideally 30%.

Later, in December, the president fulfilled the promise of improving the Research output of every laboratory and with 6 laboratories out of 16 already delivered and the full production effort applied to this sole goal, Zorlu decided to ask the Scientist party to help her in passing the resolution to finalize the research of the military engines again. As the president seemed a reliable partner, the party agreed in supporting the new proposals. Unfortunately, even with the extra support, there was no way to pass more military bills and considering the previous warning issued by the party and government, the president was now walking on very thin ice. Ultimately, all these failures resulted in another hit to her prestige.

Furthermore, the impossibility of pursuing the propulsion research left few laboratories idle. President Zorlu decided to take advantage of the situation and pursue the wild theory of doctor Prinsloo according to which if it was possible to open the time-space for a limited amount of time then it would have been also possible to keep it open permanently. Doctor Franck Girard was tasked to find a way to make it work.

On the 19th of July 2128, with only 2 survey locations left to be surveyed and 2 jump point already known, the president ordered the 2 idle Geosurvey Vessels Paul F. Hoffman and Peter Szatmari to reach jump point locations and prepare operation for the first jumps in human history. Obviously, the prestige coming for being the first captain to attempt and eventually succeed in such operation was great.

In charge of the Szatmari there was the courteous and enthusiastic Commander Guglielmo Falcon while in charge of the Hoffman there was Commander Karolina von Liening. Having observed Falcon many times and noticing his courteous nature, the tough nordic lady commander insisted to let her go first. Her optimistic personality let her believe that such attempt was without any risk and the only glory would have awaited her once succeeded.

Either way, the first human transiting out of the Solar system would have not been coming from Earth. The irony of destiny.

(https://i.imgur.com/izalMqA.png)
Karolina von Liening Profile

(https://i.imgur.com/mYxlq04.png)
Guglielmo Falcon Profile

In the end, Karolina got approval from Commander Falcon to jump first and advised operation command of the decision. Rear Admiral Pak Hong-Chol acknowledged the plan from Sol Survey Operations Command and awaited for all preparations to be completed before giving the order. President Zorlu was also present to witness first hand. Then plan was for the ship to jump, get a preliminary report and jump back to Sol in a week time.

At the midnight of the 30th of August 2128, both ships were ready at respective Jump Points. Due to the time the operation was set to start, it was decided to call the operation Midnight as well.

(https://i.imgur.com/jFhEkOo.png)
Badge of the Midnight Operation

Everybody was holding their breath as Hoffman started the countdown for the jump to suddenly disappear at the end of it with a gasp of the room. After that no communications, no radar signature, absolute nothing. Nobody was worried though as the impossibility to communicate was predicted and expected. After all, the ship could have ended up anywhere in the galaxy and with such great distances, messages could take years if not centuries to travel back to Earth. The plan was to wait for the ship to be back in a week, so there was no need to be worried, or at least not yet.

Exactly one week later the UNEN Paul F. Hoffman appeared back on the jump point location and started transmitting her report.

Based on known star charts and stars position respective to Earth, the ship had most likely reached the Luhman 16 System, an unremarkable binary system 4.1 LY away from Sol, completely empty if it wasn’t for the 2 stars. It was classified as a very unlucky first Jump but as an extremely successful mission. Commander von Liening confessed that she wanted to jump back to Sol right away but she decided to stick to her orders and wait for the week to pass as it was expected. After all, this could have still been a very good exercise for her crew.

With the Hoffman back it was the turn of the Szatmari. The protocol would have been the same as the Midnight operation but this time Command ordered to remain in the system only if necessary. Commander Falcon, which was waiting on the Jump point for over a week, gave the order to jump out of Sol as soon cleared by Rear Admiral Pak Hong-Chol.

On the 13th of September and exactly one week after the jump, the ship jumped back into Sol.

The jump of the Szatmari was definitely more interesting. The ship ended up in the HH Andromedae system where 8 Planets, 66 Moons, 125 Asteroids and 3 comets were waiting to be surveyed at 4.4 LY from Sol. The HH Andromedae-A II planet also revealed to be a level 2 habitable world entirely covered in Ice and with a thin Nitrogen Oxygen atmosphere. Even if terraforming could be possible, to remove the water after the ice melted would have been a titanic effort. The planet was then marked as suitable only for a mining outpost if the system reveals a good quantity of TN minerals to be present.

Commander Falcon revealed to have spent most of the time scanning the system but more accurate scanning was required as observing from the jump point couldn’t reveal anything more than the topography of the bodies and the amount of them. He did find something curious though. One of the asteroids is a potentially habitable one. The gravity does not require LG Installations and therefore it could be possible to terraform it. Before such discovery, it was believed that such bodies were, in fact, impossible to exist.

After having analyzed the report, President Zorlu ordered all Geological vessels to break orbit, destination HH Andromedae. Earth needed minerals and it needed them fast. Even the research facilities were tasked to find a way to dig minerals faster.

However, the military wasn’t quite happy to have ships roaming around in “unsecured” systems but the president dismissed such concerns asserting that both discovered systems didn’t show any sign of hostility, and also none of the military ships stationed on Earth had jump capability, The democracy couldn’t afford to wait to build one prior starting to exploit nearby systems.

What the president forgot to mention was that thanks to a recent discovery made by Franck Girard, it would have been possible to permanently stabilize jump point allowing any ship, with or without a jump drive, to travel within all systems connected to such gate network. However, being jump technology forbidden to be installed on civilian ships, the president was only making sure that civilians would have been precluded any exploit of the new systems until necessary.

On the 3rd of July 2129, the full gravitational survey of Sol was completed revealing a total of 4 Jump points to be present in the system. The 2 ships having not jumped into a new system yet, the George Gaylord Simpson and the Posamentier, were ordered to pick a jump point each and operate jump as per known protocol as soon as ready.

After taking the position, the Posamentier emerged in Sirius, a binary system at 6.6 LY from Sol. With only 4 planets and 4 moons and despite 3 of the total 8 bodies were level 2 habitable words the system would be hardly a candidate for colonization unless huge mineral presence that could not be ignored would be found. On the other hand, the jump of the Simpson was more worth noticing. The Vessel jumped right in the Alpha Centauri system 9 LY away from Sol. The Binary system had a total of 9 Planets,16 Moons, 180 Asteroids, and 2 Comets making it the ideal candidate for colonization and exploitation also thanks to several potentially habitable level 2 worlds. Unfortunately, the system was also extremely big with 3.45b kilometres separating Alpha Centauri-A and its orbiting sister Alpha Centauri-B.

As all Jump points were now explored and with geo survey ongoing on all relative systems, the president ordered to start gravitational survey of all new known systems. It was noted that the current ship availability couldn’t properly get the job done in a short period of time and either new ships or a refurbish of the existent one could have been a good idea. With elections approaching fast, the decision on expanding the survey fleet was postponed to a late date.

(https://i.imgur.com/g0LmpqU.png)
Government Resolutions

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Start of the Second Zorlu Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 03, 2020, 02:54:14 AM

2130 – The Start of the Second Zorlu Democracy

On the 1st of January 2130, everything was ready for the elections to take place. As usual in one very busy day, all eligible citizens were called to express their vote for one of the approved parties. With some very favourable polling, the Democrats were approaching this election knowing their win was almost certain. In fact, not knowing if the pacifists would be supporting her due to the militaristic crisis of the previous mandate, Zorlu’s new alliances with the Scientist and the less trusted Industrialist Party should have been still enough to secure the win.

(https://i.imgur.com/ArJjA7A.png)
Independent Media Service Population Census 2130

(https://i.imgur.com/IpTEnA3.png)
Independent Media Service Poll 2130

As soon as all the sections closed, results started coming in fast and it was immediately clear that all predictions were true after all: the Democrats were the winners with numbers unseen in the previous 10 years. The final uncontested win by more than 8% of the votes and more than 40% overall was a great injection of confidence into Zorlu’s leadership and ideas. This would have helped her a lot with incoming negotiations while forming the new government. In particular, the reelected president wanted the new parliament to acknowledge that a small militaristic effort would have to be made in order to colonize space and maintain security.

(https://i.imgur.com/wTXD7iZ.png)
Presidential Elections 2130

President Zorlu wasn’t for sure the most prestigious of the presidents but her ideas were solid and included all points of view: Federalists, Republicans and Democratic. This broad view allowed her to manage the most intricate situations forging alliances on the go. Unfortunately, these unstable alliances were also used as traps to obtain favours in exchange for the support of one or the other resolution discussed. It would be unlikely to see Zorlu run for another mandate, the third, as the toll of favor was rising every day and it would soon be unmanageable.

(https://i.imgur.com/KHWx1aV.png)
Prestige Levels 2130

The new Parliament was composed by a total of 498 seats with an increase of 61 seat respect to the previous election. 104 seats went to the Federalists (1 seat more, not enough to keep the majority), 119 to the Pacifists (26 seats more), 120 to Mercantile and Industrialists (20 seats more and the new majority just by one seat), 57 to the Scientists (8 seats more), 80 to the Nationalists (9 seats more) and 18 to the Militarist Party (4 seats less) and finally considered a stable party of the parliament.

(https://i.imgur.com/KvEJrqc.png)
Elected seats of the 2130 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/U0r4pom.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2130 Election

With all civilian administrators still in their place and with the complete trust of the President in them, it was decided to don’t change the status quo and keep that branch of the government as it was. Also, Zorlu’s brother Ertug was still quiet and happy after the latest promotion and with lots of the policies from the previous mandate needed to be looked at, there was already enough work for the president to address in the first week without the need of complicating the things further.

(https://i.imgur.com/ybbhuow.png)
The Race Information Panel

With the government fully supporting President Zorlu, she decided that before putting in new motions the old pendant ones on the military engines and Active Sensors should have been given priority. After a very serrated negotiation, she managed to get approved at least 2 of them.

It was time to decide the strategy for the following 5 years then. Considering now that Luna was hosting more than 200 million people and that some financial centres were already sent there it was decided that the colonization was officially over and there was no more need for colonist to be sent there. With the stabilization of the colony, it seemed a good idea to also give another injection to the Lunar economy with another batch of 100 Financial Centres.

As already did in the past they will be borrowed from Earth immediately while the Terran Factories will slowly replenish the losses.

Eventually, it was recognized that a plan should have been made for Mars as well however the need for completing the terraforming effort was recognized as a priority before deciding any future for the planet inhabitants. With Luna designated as a financial hub and the complete absence of TN materials, the choices were quite limited.

The discovery of new TN minerals on other galactic systems also required a change in the current strategy on the mining effort. As the mines on Earth haven't been used in decades, the possibility of moving them on other bodies was concrete but still far away. In the meantime, another 100 auto mines were ordered to make sure eventual new deposit could be exploited. Obviously, there was still the matter of transportation but the new Permanent stabilization module could help mitigate the issue as building tender ships with the only duty of facilitating jumps was also in the cards. Decisions will have to be made during this mandate.

An expansion of the Military shipyards Dong Graving Destroyers Dock and Takenouchi Drydock Survey Company was planned to add an extra slipway on both of them while all the commercial shipyards were still idle due to the Neutronium low levels.

Having few factories still available, the President ordered to build 5 more terraforming stations to start Luna terraforming efforts and another harvester station to help with the Sorium refining on Jupiter.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Second Zorlu Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 04, 2020, 04:09:50 AM

2130/4 – The Second Zorlu Democracy

On the 28th of March 2130 in the HH Andromedae system, the gravitational survey identified another jump point, confirming that the theory could have been applied to multiple systems and not only Sol. The news was received with great euphoria by the whole scientific community and non.

With the expansion of Democracy’s influence on other star systems, a restructure was needed in the way we view our administration. As governing a planet was still a thing, what would happen when such a planet was not in the Sol System? How could the president oversee all the governors potentially scattered around the galaxy? A new position and a new title with it was necessary to be found. Based on the feudal experience, it was decided to divide the galaxy in “Sectors”. Each Sector would have been in command of one or more adjacent star systems reporting directly to the president.

On the 21st of August 2130, the first Sector was created and called Sol Sector. Under Sol’s jurisdiction, there were all the new start systems discovered so far. A new Building would have been required to administrate the systems efficiently and one was scheduled to be constructed on Earth as soon as possible. In the meantime, to comply with the president wishes, it was decided to dedicate resources in finding a way to increase the number of ships able to jump with the help of a tender.

As the HH Andromeda system got fully surveyed an interesting find emerged from the few available geological sites:

Asteroid #43
Duranium 45,723 Acc 1
Corbomite 155,867 Acc 0.8
Mercassium 16,952 Acc 0.9
Sorium 72,253 Acc 1
Uridium 81,567 Acc 0.8
Corundium 72,253 Acc 0.8

Being the Neutronium the only mineral in need, the mining site was put aside waiting for results of the scanning in Proxima Centauri prior to making a decision on what and where to mine. Also, to bring mines for only one asteroid was deemed as too expensive so the President decided to allow researches for a station able to mine from orbit.

During the start of 2132, the first UNESS Poseidon destined to Luna was completed. Terraforming operations should be faster than Mars and the democracy objective was to complete them within 10 years. Furthermore, thanks to the advancement in the Jump theory researches, new Jump drives were available to be built. This last piece of technology would allow better usage of the components resulting in a downsizing of the overall tonnage of the drive. New jump drives along with a new tender design were then tasked by the government to be researched.

Considering the biggest older model displacement was 70,000 tons, this was marked as a minimum requirement for the new Tender Drive to being able to serve. However, if we were to move also stations, we would have required a minimum capability of 130,000 tons, almost the double.

As it was believed that by then we would have been in possession of far better technology and considering that one of the stations was still possible to be transported even on the 70,000 tons mark, it seemed logical to opt for the smaller and easier design to be researched and produced.

Meanwhile, with many Research Labs available still, President Zorlu decided to use a similar approach to one of her predecessors. Many scientists and field weren’t being exploited as they should have as priority was given to projects of more immediate importance. However, as urgencies were running out a broader (and consequentially slower) range of researches could have been possible in the following 3 or 4 years. She put together a Commercial Research Plan (CRP) with the goal of improving different sectors and technologies overlooked till then. The project was received well from the Scientific community resulting in an increase of the President Prestige due to her scientific foresight.

By July 2133 all systems were finally geo surveyed with the most interesting results coming from the Alpha Centaury system as expected. Plans will now have to be made to arrange a proper mining operation in the system. In this direction, the new tender station will help with the logistic issues in the short term.

Quote

Stargate class Jump Tender Station 21,166 tons 98 Crew 286.1 BP TCS 423 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s JR 3-25(C) No Armour Shields 0-0 HTK 15 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 8 Max Repair 201.7 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Tender Drive (4x70.5k) Max Ship Size 70500 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 3

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Space Station for construction purposes

With the current limit of 4 ships per trip, all our freighter fleets were rearranged from groups of 5 to groups of 4 and resulting in total 4 fleets from the previous 3. With 375k currently being able to be hauled, the president ordered another batch of 5 Elysium to bring the hauling capacity to 500k which would suit many of our infrastructures to be transported in one or maximum two trips. After careful consideration, the Elysium was the only ship spared from the massive decommissioning of the Ion era and brought back in service. Its range was still enough to serve the nearby systems and with the urgency in organizing all new mining operations, there was no time to design, produce and refit new models.

On the 23rd of May 2134, operations in Alpha Centauri started with the establishment of a collection centre on Asteroid #109. Another 3 asteroids nearby were selected to start mining Tn minerals all to be shipped to the collection centre for a freighter to transport back to Earth. This last part wasn’t organized as yet due to the small number of minerals currently being a mind that would not justify the investment in fuel. As operations will expand the President agreed on sorting out the collection issues.

Just before the start of the election campaign of 2135, the Sol Sector Command Building was finally ready to be opened. While it was of extreme importance to get this up and running as soon as possible, it was agreed that an exiting government couldn’t be expected to make a decision on such an important assignment. Speaking to the house and against every prediction, President Zorlu declared that she wanted to attempt what has never achieved before: the third mandate. In light of positive pollings and strong alliances, she believed that most likely she would be granted another mandate and she would be also then the ideal person to nominate the Sol Sector Governor. Furthermore, she assumed that such a person should have been her.

With what seemed like an autocrat manoeuvre by the President, the government dismissed immediately the motion and moved for a vote of no confidence against President Zorlu. Many thought that too much power in the hand of one person would have made a mockery of the democracy and the entire system built so far. Surprisingly, not only the vote of no confidence failed, but a majority agreed on getting President Zorlu to keep the Sol Sector Governorship in exchange for her presidential nomination. She would have been President and Sector Governor at the same time but only for a short period of time.

Melisa had so far an impressive career and being the first Sector Governor ever nominated would have been the classic cherry on the pie. Unfortunately, the price tag of such honor had been set very high. After a few days of deep consideration, the president accepted the parliament’s counter-proposal giving up the third mandate and gaining then the Sol Sector Governorship in exchange.

(https://i.imgur.com/4OL8CpP.png)
Melisa Zorlu Profile

On the 21st of July 2134 at 8 pm Earth's time, Melisa Zorlu announced her withdrawal from the presidential run. The Democratic Party, which was already looking for a replacement after her first mandate, indicated that the new runner would have been the colony governor Constance Beaudry, one of the most respected civilian administrators of our times.

(https://i.imgur.com/PXXsTAi.png)
Constance Beaudry Profile

After this announcement and considering the lack of prestige and the terrible illness suffered in 2133, former president Abba decided to step aside from the run as well. The Federalists needed somebody more focused and “hungry” if they wanted to get back to leading the house. As a surprise, the party announced that the respected scientist Engela Prinsloo would have under their banner. The news was received with suspicion as it was believed that the scientist was more inclined of siding with the Democrats. Losing Zorlu was then a bigger hit than the one assumed by the Democratic Party but still not enough to undermine their dominance in the parliament.

(https://i.imgur.com/usPtqr3.png)
Engela Prinsloo Profile

On the Republican front, nothing changed as it was known that even changing the leadership would have not changed their fate even in this election so they opted to send a stability message instead.

(https://i.imgur.com/CQgDzol.png)
Government Resolutions

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The illegitimate election of 2135
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 04, 2020, 06:42:32 PM

2135 – The illegitimate election

On the 1st of January 2135, everything was ready for the election to take place. With some last-minute polling showing possible different results than the ones expected over the last few months many different extremist fringes of all parties decided to stretch their votes in the attempt of getting more seats than the one predicted. If in the past such attempts were tolerated and kept secret by the National Media service, with the new Independent Media Service it was almost impossible for all the officials to keep the situation under control.

As disdain mounted through the civilian population, it was immediately clear that whoever would come on top at the end of this long day would have not been perceived as a true winner or rightful leader. With recasting the ballots entirely out of the question it was needed to find an agreement within the parties. Looking at the final results compared with the one of the latest polling, it was noted that the difference wasn’t much and still within the 5% tolerance always accounted for.

(https://i.imgur.com/yCQISbN.png)
Independent Media Service Population Census 2135

(https://i.imgur.com/vYlxDem.png)
Independent Media Service Poll 2135

In light of these numbers then an agreement was signed between the parties and the Democrats were declared officially the winners with results similar to the ones of the previous election. The uncontested win and preferences over the 40% overall was a great first mandate business card for the newly elected president. This would have helped her a lot with incoming negotiations while forming the new government. However, the stain of the fraud would have followed and questioned Constance Beaudry’s leadership for the next 5 years regardless of the support she had.

(https://i.imgur.com/dyIigif.png)
Presidential Elections 2135

Fortunately, her prestige and abilities were recognized among many, supporters and non. The government needed a firm leadership and the president would have required as many allies as possible to keep her position stable. For this reason, she decided to keep a very low profile during her mandate without pushing through many controversial resolutions.

(https://i.imgur.com/ZctLq09.png)
Prestige Levels 2135

The new Parliament was composed of a total of 561 seats with an increase of 63 seats with respect to the previous election. 119 seats went to the Federalists (15 seats more), 145 to the Pacifists (26 seats more) and a new questioned majority in the parliament, 112 to the former majority of the Mercantile and Industrialists (8 seats less), 46 to the Scientists (11 seats less), 97 to the Nationalists (17 seats more) and 42 to the Militarist Party (24 seats more).

(https://i.imgur.com/ZmMzH2K.png)
Elected seats of the 2135 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/WqfOnQW.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2135 Election

A full restructure of the administrators and the military was in order as 10 years under Zorlu did have definitely tied some allegiances. The criteria used for the restructuring was only meritocracy: the right people in the right places. Obviously, it wasn't enough to ensure full support but it was a good start.

(https://i.imgur.com/buU8oNt.png)
The Race Information Panel

The plan laid ahead by former president Zorlu was quite good and it would have kept busy the administration at least for another 2 or 3 years. This would have allowed the president to just sit and cash in merits, not hers, of course, but still enough to avoid serious confrontation with the opposition for a reasonable period of time. By then the all this fraud thing might have been water under the bridge opening to new horizons and options.

The only outstanding decisions were over the survey strategy and the resource collection from Alpha Centauri.

The survey strategy required either the scrap and rebuilt of a newer fleet of ships or just integrate new ones into the existing flotilla. such operation not only would have been extremely expensive but also not fully supported by many branches of the government. In line with the president low profile stand, she decided to postpone all decisions to a more suitable time and after having received more information on how many jump points were effectively present out of the Sol system.

For the pickup operations in Alpha Centauri, President Beaudry decided to use a similar strategy currently used by the fuel operations on Jupiter. Small freight cargo ships could be built and tasked to run round trips between the collection centre and Earth. The ship would be designed with very economic and fuel-efficient engines to ensure low costs operations. The new freighter, called Centaur, will be in service as soon as possible.

Quote

UNEN Centaur-I class Freighter 7,500 tons 40 Crew 179.5 BP TCS 150 TH 156 EM 0
1041 km/s Armour 1-34 Shields 0-0 HTK 17 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 14 Max Repair 39.0625 MSP
Cargo 5,000 Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 2
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (1) Power 156.2 Fuel Use 8.94% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 226,000 Litres Range 60.6 billion km (673 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

As we entered the new “Ion Era”, all ship classifications were changed to identify immediately the type of engines. Based on the new presidential guidelines all Nuclear Era ships were identified as Nt or NP depending on the design while the Ion would have been identified as I. Furthermore the Jump capable ships would have included a J and Tenders a T. All these measures should allow the administrators to understand how old our fleet is and what would require updates in the future.

A new naval status graph was then possible to be drafted, showing the real status of our navy.

(https://i.imgur.com/XbRIY2a.png)
Navy Information Panel 2135

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Beaudry Democratic Era and the Alien Threat
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 08, 2020, 05:55:26 PM

2135/44 – The Beaudry Democratic Era and the Alien Threat

The completion of the gravitational survey in Luhman 16 showed that 4 further Jump Points were present in the system besides the one leading to Sol while HH Andromedae showed 3 more. This news was already enough to understand how our 4 gravitational survey ships were not enough to keep expanding the Democracy’s domain over the nearby systems.

There were now only 2 possible roads: use the Geological Fleet to help to observe new systems following the Midnight protocol or to build More Gravitational Survey Vessels and increase our scouting capability.

It was also noted that scout ships, cheaper and smaller, could have been a far better solution. Unfortunately, such a project would have ended in the Military Branch of the Government based on previous agreements during the Ertegün Era. As winning a Military Resolution was a coin flip with 288 possible in favor and 273 against, the president decided to keep playing safe just for the time being and wait for more results coming from other systems.

As years go by, the president wasn’t intervening much, if not at all, in any of the activities of the government. All policies were going ahead and were being completed as per the original schedule set by Zorlu’s administration. With all productions terminated it was time to introduce some ideas into the mix. President Beaudry knew that to keep expanding mining operations there was more need for Mass Drivers to replicate the strategy already in place in Alpha Centauri so she ordered 10 more to be constructed. As this wouldn’t be enough to arrive at the end of the mandate, the president decided to allow an extension to the Sector Command building so that it could be ready to accommodate the extra staff required to manage the potential new systems out of the HH Andromedae and Luhman 16 Jump Points.

Thanks to the discovery of a few new techs, it would have been possible to build new more efficient commercial engines. As all the new designs were still into the design stage this would have resulted in an overall increase of the operational range or in less fuel to have been carried by the ships.

Without any real downside, the President decided to allow the project to be concluded.

Furthermore, considering that from what seen not all new planets discovered were habitable, the government pushed for researches towards a more suitable colonizing effort. The idea was to have orbital colonies in worlds of particular interest but that for any reason they couldn’t allow any terraforming effort to succeed, such as Venus for instance.

The new technology would make it possible to still grant some human presence without too much effort in pretty much all the systems if required. To also facilitate logistic operations a new orbital Hub was to be researched to allow multiple ships to be refueled at once.

On the 30th of January 2139, due to the lack of workers, it was decided to halt any new production until further notice. Even if it was possible to move some jobs on other colonies, perhaps Mars, the President opted in keeping her low profile hoping of being able to run for a second and more active mandate. Such a passive approach was appreciated by all parties but it resulted in a considerate loss of prestige by the President as many were thinking that she wasn’t just brave enough to lead the Democracy through the intricate bureaucratic web.

Despite that, the election of 2140 ended up with another uncontested win from Constance Beaudry and the Democratic Party. The only difference was that the Mercantile and Industrialists party became again the majority party in the parliament. It goes without saying that it was the pacifists which were trying to rig the elections in 2135 to ensure they could become again the pivot of the government.

Free from the fraud stain and without the pacifist strict control, President Beaudry could have finally be allowed to push more on the reform so needed by the old Democracy. With only 6 resolutions in 5 years, her government was the least productive ever, focused more on doing than planning.

Obviously, after 5 years of no planning, in January 2140 the Democracy was left without any plan for the future and massive work had to be done to catch up with all the time wasted.

(https://i.imgur.com/wuuDM7O.png)
2140 Election Results

Without the need to worry about any administration posts, the president's attention went all into production, research, and expansion.

The production plan relied on the completion of terraforming on both Mars and Luna. As Mars was almost completed and with Luna only a few years away, the amount of infrastructure that could have been relocated was massive. With the President not happy in wasting minerals to produce more mines to mine such minerals, the plan was to relocate all Earth mines, the Lunar infrastructure, and the Martians one to Mercury. With one stone the President was hitting the proverbial 2 birds. First, she would have been able to relocate the Auto Mines on Mercury to Alpha Centauri increasing the overall productivity of the system. Second, the shortage of workers on Earth will be sorted with new human resources possible to be reinvested elsewhere.

The production efforts were then diverted to some Fuel Refineries and Deep Space Tracking Stations. The refineries were to increase the fuel production before levels dropped too much while the Deep Space Tracking Stations were to be used around other systems to keep monitor and securing the areas around Sol.

With the production in place, it was time to look at the Research plan. Increasing the number of refineries alone, unfortunately, would have not been enough. A method to increase the annual output and production of fuel was also ordered to be researched along with other modules ordered before the election.

Regarding the expansion, the President informed the parliament that the matter should have been seen and divided into two groups: one was security and the other was logistic.

Point number two was already widely discussed and all criticisms tackled in all their forms. All that was left was to increase the operations.

However, on point number one nothing was ever been done or discussed. In particular, it was noted that while all civilian mining colonies were guarded by some sort of garrisons, democracy’s ones were entirely unprotected.

The President proposed the formation of a “Colonial Garrison” with the intent of protecting all the small logistics or mining compounds around the galaxy. As such corp would have been used only for security purposes, she managed to get approval to produce a few under the commercial branch and not a military one. The condition was that the units would have not been trained for combat. Also, a new National Police would have been required on Mercury and the ones stationed on Luna and Mars would soon need to be expanded due to the increase in population. To tackle this issue two new National Police Brigades were ordered to be trained on Earth.

Eventually, a new Troop Transport design, the Sparrow, was designed and produced as a smaller Raven Class option to accommodate the faster and smaller transport needs.

Quote

UNEC Sparrow-I class Troop Transport 9,000 tons 65 Crew 300.3 BP TCS 180 TH 313 EM 0
1736 km/s Armour 1-38 Shields 0-0 HTK 31 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 20 Max Repair 80 MSP
Troop Capacity 5,000 tons Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 2
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) (2) Power 312.5 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 414,000 Litres Range 105.8 billion km (705 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Both Research and Production were the building blocks for the expansion project. The President firmly believed that every ship, to perform her duty at the best of its ability, should have been focused on one job and one job only. For this reason to having Geological of Gravitational Survey Ships to be tasked with the exploration of new systems along with their Survey was simply slowing down our expansion.

A new class of Exploration Ships was needed. With a swift Military Resolution the UNER00197, the President ordered 4 of the new Discovery-IJ Class Scout, designed just for this purpose. The motion was discussed, voted, and approved the same day. Furthermore, with exploration and survey ship displacement being set at 7,000 tons, the Takenouchi Drydock Survey Company 5,000 tons capability was obviously not enough and expansion to 7,000 tons was ordered, approved, and started as well.

Humanity was finally moving fast towards becoming a galactic force.

Quote

Discovery-IJ class Scout 7,000 tons 105 Crew 447.3 BP TCS 140 TH 313 EM 0
2232 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 29 Sensors 30/30/0/0 DCR 5 PPV 0
Maint Life 9.07 Years MSP 999 AFR 78% IFR 1.1% 1YR 22 5YR 328 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Gianotti Commercial Jump Drive (7.5k) mk2 Max Ship Size 7500 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) (2) Power 312.5 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 281,000 Litres Range 92.3 billion km (478 days at full power)

Area Search Sensor AS58-R100 (1) GPS 10000 Range 58.6m km Resolution 100
Short Range EM Sensor EM5-30 (1) Sensitivity 30 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 43.3m km
Short Range TH Sensor TH5-30 (1) Sensitivity 30 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 43.3m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

In February, Melisa Zorlu announced her intention to retire from politics and to consequentially abandon her Sol Secor Governorship due to medical reasons. Having fulfilled and achieved more than any other Civilian Administrator in Human History, she would now be able to enjoy what was left of her life on her beloved Mars which just a few months later, on the 18th of July 2140, could have been officially declared completed all terraforming efforts.

Mars's physiognomy was drastically changed from what the former president experienced more than 30 years ago. There was vegetation now composed of broad-leaved evergreen shrubs, bushes, and small trees usually less than 2.5 m (about 8 feet) tall; together they often form dense thickets. The climate, similar to that of the Mediterranean area, was characterized by hot, dry summers and mild, wet winters.

With all stations on Mars' orbit now moved to Luna, it was also possible to enjoy a clear blue sky similar to the one on Earth.

The New Sol Sector Administrator would have been former Federalists President Abba’s best friend: Batu Agar. A controversial appointment but still in line with the meritocracy policy of the president.

(https://i.imgur.com/MOmfkhN.png)
Batu Agar Profile

Meanwhile, on the 29th of January 2141, all the new scouts were finally completed.

The President ordered immediate dispatch to the Luhman 16 system which had exactly 4 unexplored jump points with all ships ordered to starting to explore following Midnight Protocol but without the need to stay in the system for a certain amount of time. Orders were to explore any system of interests and leave immediately any empty system. The ships returning back from respective jumps could then move into HH Andromedae and perform the same action prior to reporting back to Earth.

The new systems of Struve 2398, WISE 1506+7027, Proxima Centauri, Giclas 99-49, LHS 288, WD 1142-645, and V1581 Cygni were explored in a ranging distance between 4.6 LY and 8.1 LY from Sol System. A total of 28 planets (3 of which Level 2 Habitable Worlds), 219 Moons, 222 Asteroids, and 9 Comets were discovered. The Majority of them were located in the Cygni System which was by far the only one worth noticing of the lot.

As our knowledge of nearby systems started to grow soon it would have been necessary to find more suitable names for such systems otherwise too hard to remember. The government put something understudy while waiting for more Jump Point to be explored revealing the exact composition of all the systems within at least 2 jumps.

On the 29th of October 2141, the exploration of the Altair System 6.1 LY right out of Sirius and 11.9 LY far from Sol, revealed a system with 5 Level 2 Habitable Worlds out of 9 Planets and 96 Moons. The discovery was of great interest as prior to that it was believed that Habitable Worlds were a rarity.

As the UNEN Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld, captained by Commander Xiong Cai Wen, approached Altair-A IV for a closer look, the unexpected happened.

On the 30th of December 2141, after a month without any report from the UNEN Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld, the President ordered the UNEN Abel Tasman to jump into the Altair system in search of the lost scout. As soon as in the system, Commander Shikitei Naomi picked up a distress signal playing in a loop just not too far from the Altair-A IV Planet. The Beacon contained some recordings and appeared to have been originating from the Nordenskiöld. Some wrecks were also visible from the scanners and they appeared to be approximately in the same position as the beacon. It was fair to assume that the wrecks were in fact from the missing scout.

Without the intention of investigating further and having already obtained the recordings, the Tasman headed back to Earth.

The President, along with the security commission, started the recording. Everything sounded normal until the last log played:

Start of the Ship Log
Saturday 2nd of December 2141 4:01am Earth Time (ET)
Tactical: Commander, I am reading unusual signals coming from the planet Sir
Commander: What do you mean by unusual officer?
Tactical: The signals appear to be coming from the planet’s orbit Sir and are interfering with our surface scan. It looks like something is there Sir.
Commander: Officer, I need you to be a more specific son, unusual and something doesn’t really cut it.
Tactical: I understand Sir. Let me caliber sensors for orbital scanning and I will be able to...oh smeg! CONTACT, Sir, CONTACT! GSP signal strength of 14,868 sitting right above the planet. New contact registered XX Pairy 001 and transmitted to all navy frequencies, Sir.
Commander: Gentelmen, red alert. Halt the engines.
XO: Red Alert, Halt Engines.
Commander: Distance from Contact?
Tactical: 147 Million Kilometers, Sir.
Commander: Did it see us?
Tactical: I don’t know Sir, It hasn’t moved so far.
Commander: Set a waypoint within Scanning Range and move in half speed.
XO: 55 Million Kilometers Waypoint 1 Bearing 045 from Contact set, advance half speed.
Tactical: Sir, multiple contacts! 2 new contacts GSP signal strenght of 14,868 registered XX Mosegi 001 and XX Mosegi 002 sitting on Planet’s Orbit. 1 contact in intercepting course, speed 4,957 kms, GSP signal strenght of 22,302 registered XX Sekhemkare 001.
Commander: Cancel all operations and Abort Mission. Set course for Sirius Jump Points. Open Channel and Transmit to all frequencies: Multiple contacts Altair-A IV, possibly hostile, do not approach.
XO: Abort and set course to Sirius Jump Point, open channel and transmit the commander message on all frequencies.
Tactical: Sir, another Pairy contact, and it appears to be moving fast towards us. 4,956 kms. They are fast!
Commander: Tactical I understood the situation and thanks for the update. Please inform me only if something changes either for good or worse. Start recording and analyze all data as soon as in Sensor Range.
Tactical: Roger Sir! New class contact GSP signal strength of 22,302 registered XX Akil 001 and XX Akil 002. Oh no, I cannot believe it…
Commander: Officer, what’s going on?
Tactical: Thermal contact Sir, 4 of them. Speed 30,733 kms.
Commander: Fighters?
Tactical: No Sir, Missiles.
Commander: Well, it’s the end then. Thanks, gentlemen, it was a pleasure flying with you all.
Tactical: But sir…
Commander: It’s okay son, we all knew it was a risky job. Please seal the records and beacon them out. Once done reach the life pods and abandon ship.
XO: Seal the record and beacon them out. Abandon Ship. Good Luck Sir and God bless us all!
End of the Ship Log

The biggest fear of the Military Party was finally revealed to be true. We were not alone in the universe and we were not prepared to defend ourselves properly against this new threat.

The President knew that it would have been hard to pass a more militaristic line in the parliament at this stage and she needed to focus the efforts on early scan and detection along with defensive capabilities.

So far our intel reported that the enemies were faster than us and heavily armed with strength 6 missiles going as fast as 30,000 kms, well above our AMM capabilities. Assuming their Anti Missiles defenses to be at least matching their offensive capabilities our 7,000 kms Sting missiles had no chance of getting through the enemy AMM barrier and reach the target. This was already a massive issue that required a complete rethink of our navy.

The discovery of alien threats would have also impacted the Midnight Protocol. Such procedure was in fact wrote and tested assuming the systems were either empty or with no other life forms. Obviously, having the reality been proved otherwise, a new cautious approach should have now been studied.

As keeping the news from the population was virtually impossible, it was decided to release smaller news over the following months, hiding the most disturbing information until the people were prepared to heaving the big bad one delivered. It goes without saying that this would have impacted the electorate in a very unpredictable way and a more militaristic swing would have been expected in the years to come.

A strategy meeting was called a week later with the intent of addressing the Human position and situation. The most important system now would have been Sirius. The gravitational survey there was still underway and if new Jump Points would have been found they could potentially lead to new alien-controlled systems. Furthermore, Sirius was only one jump from Sol and was imperative to defend and militarize it. The President asked why, if the aliens were hostile, they did not leave their system yet to pursue our other scout or to simply explore the nearby systems. The analysts weren’t sure but the most plausible answers were that they either did not have the capacity to jump, highly unlikely considering the higher technology shown, or they had a limited range of operations. The latter would also indicate that such a base would have been just a small outpost than an actual colony.

With that assumption, to reinforce our borders as planned would have probably been the best strategy in the long run. A Jump Tender on the Sirius Earth Jump point would have been required for all the logistic efforts in the systems, therefore, the President ordered one to be built immediately.

Finally, we would have required more intel on the enemy ships and a solution was already under study.

With no apparent imminent threat, President Beaudry ordered to keep surveying all the new systems except for the Altair one which was marked as Alien Controlled and to be avoided at all costs.

On the 9th of January 2142 due to a grave accident on the way to the Parliament, The President died. The Government took power as expected by the constitution. Democracy was running without a president for many years and as far as it was better to have one, the government could still function for a short period without it. With so much going on, it was a risky decision but new elections would have just been a further distraction, therefore, to keep the status quo, was the only possible outcome of the emergency session scheduled right immediately after the news reached the parliament.

The Government agreed on not passing any resolution but to carry only the orders already agreed to prepare the Sirius system and also complete all the outstanding policies.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 09, 2020, 05:07:11 PM

Interesting concept here, sounds like the government inability to agree on things severely slows military development. It remains to be seen if this is good or bad, on one hand lack of a military can be very dangerous but on the other hand not building ships until they are needed avoids wasting resources.

I'm curious about the inner machinations of the different parties and factions. It would be interesting to hear more about the motivations and goals of each party and how it relates to why they form the various alliances and coalitions they do, and what common goals these alliances have. For example why the industrialists or scientists would side with the pacifists when perhaps a more military party would give them more latitude to study and build lucrative military projects.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 09, 2020, 06:13:09 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on November 09, 2020, 05:07:11 PM

For example why the industrialists or scientists would side with the pacifists when perhaps a more military party would give them more latitude to study and build lucrative military projects.

Considering that in the formula there is a great deal of RNG, it is true that some of the parameters are fixed. For instance, to build ships is easier than research components in this game as the background was a democratic pacifist government after a disastrous world war 3.

So the industrialist and Merchant/trade party does not count in for military scientific research as they wouldn't simply benefit from it because they can still profit from Trade and use civilians and commercial building research to perpetuate their cause safely. You have to remember for the first 45 years Humans believed to have been alone in the galaxy. However, they do count in for 1/3 to the military building component because as you said they have no problem in building as long as they build but they still have internal fringes that want this build to be freighters, colony ships and so on.

The scientist party is indeed aligned with the military for the research and also for the build as it's good for their business.

INDUSTRIALIST and MERCHANT: Commercial and Civilian with a small Militaristic Fringe.
SCIENTIST: Interested only in Science, nothing more. Because of that, they are almost in favor of all motions.

The big problem at the moment is that when power was shifting towards a more Federalist position, the fail in changing the constitution has favoured the rise of more Nationalist sentiment which is not really happy with military expenditures as they want the money to be spent for the people (being a more populistic faction).

NATIONALIST: Populist peaceful faction
FEDERALIST: Populist military faction

As a result now that the military is rising, the drop of the federalist support and the great ascension of the Nationalists has again put all military project aside forcing the current government to face the alien menace using more of a smart approach (commercial Troop Trasport, Non-combat units, Commercial Magazines and so on) than the proper military build-up.

It is worth noting that if a status of war will be recognized to be active against the aliens (which I am sure are spoiler precursors) it will probably change the composition of the parliament drastically with a possible Republican lead that could bring down the current Pacifist Democracy in favor of a more Militaristic Republic.

Eventually, Earth won't be safe with the current government unable to effectively react to threats or find agreements on important matters such as security. Soon more sectors will grow in population and will be in need of protection and the civilian unrest may lead to a big change hopefully before it's too late. Like all things in politics, you need time and a bunch of complacent people to revolutionize old ways and governments.

EDIT: I may include some strategy updates in future posts

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 09, 2020, 07:25:23 PM

Thanks for the reply! It would be cool to see these elements come out more in the writing, to get more depth to the worldbuilding especially as the specter of war and potential alien incursions could motivate certain factions as you point out.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 10, 2020, 03:43:53 AM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on November 09, 2020, 07:25:23 PM

Thanks for the reply! It would be cool to see these elements come out more in the writing, to get more depth to the worldbuilding especially as the specter of war and potential alien incursions could motivate certain factions as you point out.

It's a valuable feedback and I thank you for that. I will certainly try from now on. Unfortunately, I have already wrote the next 10 years (nothing really big happening yet) but I will definetely put something in place from 2155 onwards.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story – The Hancock Democratic Era
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 12, 2020, 04:11:54 AM

2145/9 – The Hancock Democratic Era

As Election of 2145 approaches, a very different political landscape and leaders were battling for the win. With the retirement of Admiral Stiaan Naudé and the premature departure of President Constance Beaudry, two brand new candidates would have taken their seats as party leaders for the Republicans and for the Democrats, with Engela Prinsloo still in her position as Federalist leader instead.

On the 1st of January, everything was ready for the election to take place and all eyes were on the unusual pollings shown by the Independent Media Service.

(https://i.imgur.com/woUy9xp.png)
Independent Media Service Poll 2140

The Republican candidate was again coming from the Military. Admiral Ravati Sidhu was set to take command of the Navy after the retirement of Admiral Naudé. Chosen due to her young age, she was extremely untrustworthy and dispassionate for her job at an extent that her prestige and respect among her colleagues were extremely low. Unfortunately, other candidates were either too old or with too low ranks to have been even considered for the job and to give leadership to someone outside the Military circle was something that the Republican Caucus wasn’t ready for.

(https://i.imgur.com/2Oe319l.png)
Ravati Sidhu Profile

The Democratic candidate was, as usual, coming from the civilian administrators' pool. Due to extreme political reliability, Natasha Hancock was the person tasked to lead the Democratic Party to victory. Having spent the majority of her life either on Luna and Mars, she wouldn’t mind to come back home and with such prestigious assignment.

(https://i.imgur.com/uUTAOXs.png)
Natasha Hancock Profile

(https://i.imgur.com/oklWFci.png)
Prestige Levels 2145

As results started to come in, for the first time it was clear that it would have been a run between the Republican and the Democratic candidate with the Federalist still in the cards only to their Leader Prestige and recognition in the scientific community.

After a few hours of uncertainty, the Democratic Party started to increase their lead until it was actually too late for any party to challenge the soon to be declared winners democrats.

(https://i.imgur.com/4G4yjH0.png)
Presidential Elections 2145

Natasha Hancock was then elected with over the 40% of the preferences while for the first time ever the Republicans were the runners up with over 30% of the votes, another record for the party.

The new Parliament was composed by a total of 729 seats. 91 seats went to the Federalists, 167 to the Pacifists (the majority in the parliament), 159 to the Mercantile and Industrialists, 60 to the Scientists, 165 to the Nationalists and 86 to the Militarist Party, the highest military representatives ever recorded.

(https://i.imgur.com/ROwdfai.png)
Elected seats of the 2145 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/NhAn0sE.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2145 Election

After a brief restructure of all military and civilian positions, the President was ready to assess the situation in Sirius and to review the strategy to protect sol from the alien menace.

(https://i.imgur.com/Yo6Wzdf.png)
The Race Information Panel

The plan laid ahead by former president Beaudry was quite good and it was carried well after her departure by the government. The new Military Outpost in Sirius-A IV was already established and did have all that was required to function. Duranium, Uridium and Gallicite were mined on site by both manned and unmanned mines for our Maintenance Factories to produce the necessary spare parts to service a potential fleet garrisoned on the planet’s orbit.

A refuel station, a cargo shuttle station and an ordnance station were already transported on-site to help with fuel production and logistic.

The colony was classified as a military colony, therefore all personnel and inhabitants (almost 1 million people already) were acting under the military. This was true for everybody, from the miners to the farmers in charge of collecting the food out of the hydroponic farms. To help the effort 3 of the new Ionic Class Rising were ordered by the president.

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UNEC Rising-I class Colony Ship 35,000 tons 216 Crew 1,501.3 BP TCS 700 TH 781 EM 0
1116 km/s Armour 1-95 Shields 0-0 HTK 53 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 26 Max Repair 100 MSP
Cryogenic Berths 100,000 Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) (5) Power 781.2 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 589,000 Litres Range 38.7 billion km (401 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Sirius-A IV had good terraforming potential but the president thought that it would have been better to keep focusing on Sol system for the time being and with Luna colonization efforts came to an end the focus was diverted to Mercury. Relocation of all orbital terraforming stations was already in place.

With no real production needs, the president ordered the construction of more 100 Maintenance Facilities. More research labs could have been of use too but with no much Mercassium left it was decided to keep it avoiding to stop critical researches.

As troops were possible to be relocated further than Sol and with the Sparrow already operational, it was decided to also produce one Ionic Raven which would be based at the outpost and it would have carried a Brigade of Military Police on its way from Earth to help with the internal security.

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UNEC Raven-I class Troop Transport 64,500 tons 302 Crew 1,498.6 BP TCS 1,290 TH 1,250 EM 0
969 km/s Armour 1-143 Shields 0-0 HTK 163 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 14 Max Repair 80 MSP
Troop Capacity 50,000 tons Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) (8.) Power 1250.0 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 914,000 Litres Range 32.6 billion km (389 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

The President had to face the impossibility of pursuing any militaristic project but she still had the need of dropping Ordnance to the new outpost. With a workaround, she managed to convince the government that the simple act of transporting weapons was a logistic effort and had nothing to do with the military. Sure the ordnances were for the military, however, she wasn’t taking of actually use or produce them but only to move them from A to B. Once the government agreed, new research was ordered to accommodate the production of commercial magazines.

As fighter could not have been transported yet and considering their limited range, it was decided to build some extra Fighter Factories to be shipped out directly on Sirius-A IV and allow production directly on-site instead and considering that the planet did have deposits of all TN minerals, albeit in low accessibility, run different productions and industries would have not been an issue.

The final problem the president had to deal with was relative to the fuel. With reserves on Earth getting thinner and thinner and with the Outpost’s production just started, a new fuel strategy was needed.

Currently, the only alternative source was the Jupiter mission, however, production has never been enough. To expand the operations either a new site would have been required or more ships and station would have to be built. With the accessibility of 0.3, Jupiter was never an ideal solution and that was also the reason for keeping the operations small, therefore, to expand them now seemed like a fools move. A better site would have allowed a production increase of 70% without the need for any more constructions.

Search for a better site started with the only suitable site found in Alpha Centauri on the farthest star. As this would have been too far the choice went for the second-best pick which was in the HH Andromedae system.

While the government agreed on having a new site for our fuel operations, many disagreed of removing the Jupiter Mission and voted for a new mission to be launched instead and construction of new Ion Tankers and Harvesting stations started as soon as possible.
As a result, all previous classes of the models discussed were officially declared obsolete.

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UNEC Trafalgar-I class Tanker 3,500 tons 48 Crew 153.8 BP TCS 70 TH 156 EM 0
2232 km/s Armour 1-20 Shields 0-0 HTK 16 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 27 Max Repair 39.0625 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) (1) Power 156.2 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 1,173,000 Litres Range 770.8 billion km (3996 days at full power)
Refuelling Capability: 50,000 litres per hour Complete Refuel 23 hours

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

On the 29th of July 2147, the first vessel entered the orbit of the Sirius Military Outpost to resupply, overhaul and refuel. With all operations being completed and carried as expected, Humanity could have finally reached the status of interstellar power. The success of the logistic machine and the military planning was celebrated by all the people with images of the historical operations played over and over again across all the media platforms.

To improve the level of service of the base and for future operations, a new support vessel was designed and ordered by the president. Thanks to the completion of the commercial magazine research, the new vessel would have acted as Tanker, Collier, and Supply Ship. The first task would have been to transport Missiles, Fuel and Spare parts to Sirius Outpost. The ship was named UNEC Sirius-I in honour of the colony.

Quote

UNEC Sirius-I class Support Vessel 25,500 tons 216 Crew 966.2 BP TCS 510 TH 1,563 EM 0
3063 km/s Armour 1-77 Shields 0-0 HTK 85 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 10,023 Max Repair 39.0625 MSP
Magazine 1,000
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) (10) Power 1562.5 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 4,202,000 Litres Range 378.9 billion km (1431 days at full power)
Refuelling Capability: 50,000 litres per hour Complete Refuel 84 hours

Sting Anti-Ship Missile (166) Speed: 7,267 km/s End: 21.6m Range: 9.4m km WH: 4 Size: 6 TH: 29/17/8

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Considering the great job and smoothness shown by President Hancock in all the operations, the research advancement and how she managed to keep securing our borders, the reelection was less than a formality. As expected, in the election of 2150, President Hancock gained the second mandate again over the Republicans which were gaining more support year after year.

(https://i.imgur.com/88FRInI.png)
2150 Election Results

After having secured the second mandate, the president went back to work to complete what started 5 years earlier.

The signs of progress on the Sirius System were many, however, still not enough. The Military Outpost could now count on 3,830,000 effective, 53 Automated Mines, 16 Deep Space Tracking Stations, 12 Fuel Refineries, 24 Maintenance Facilities, and 8 Manned Mines.

With rearming, refuel and resupply capabilities already in place all was left was for the first supply to arrive from Earth around July 2150.

Despite that, the goal set by the President was 10,000,000 effective and at least 100 Maintenance Facilities.

Freighters and Colony Ships were tasked to work day and night to get it done within the next 5 years.

Eventually, with the mines now being busy mining the TN minerals, a new Geological Survey Team would have been trained on Earth as multiple reports confirmed the low possibility of finding more sites or increase accessibility of the current ones.

Meanwhile, operations on HH Andromedae were proceeding as expected with the first fuel round to be probably completed by the end of the year. This extra fuel source should have allowed Earth to keep serving our exploration efforts.

The research was focused over the past years in improving our Jump Capabilities with the final tech ongoing. The effort would have allowed better tenders and more efficient Jump Drives even if it wasn’t clear yet if the government would have been willing to invest in new ships and tenders. Surely, as new commercial drives were also available, a mark 2 Ion propulsion was most likely to happen sooner or later.

On the 30th of September 2150, the Sirius System was fully surveyed, confirming that Jump Point leading to Altair and Barnards Star Systems were the only ones beside Sol.

Due to the strategically important position of the Sirius System and the presence of hostile aliens on Altair, priority for the next gravitational survey was given to the Barnards Star system in the attempt of finding any connection to either Altair or other alien-controlled system not discovered as yet. This would have also functioned not only as a test for the Sirius Outpost by providing support to the survey vessels for all the duration of the mission but also as the benchmark for future Outposts.

As planets get surveyed and analyzed to explore the possibility of extra sources of minerals escaped from the first scans, another concerning news reached the Navy HQ. Apparently, on Struve 2398-B III some ruins of an alien outpost had been found. It was not clear yet if they were from a race different of the one in Altair or they were part of a more ancient race now extinct. The scientific value of such discovery was immense and projects were already being made to find a way to exploit the site.

Considering that nobody was really ever being thought Xeno Archaeology in our Academies, a new branch was created to deal with alien cultures, diplomacy, languages, and more. A new team of experts would have been deployed as soon as possible along with a small military contingent to ensure protection on the alien world. The mission was not only to understand more of the aliens but also to find a way to recover and utilize the infrastructures on site. A team of Engineers would have been then tasked to accompany the expedition as well to supervise the archaeological digging.

(https://i.imgur.com/x7DVOmx.png)
Badge of the Xeno Mission

With the discovery of a solely new Jump Point in Barnards Star, the UNEN Abu Abdullah Muhammad Ibn Battut stationed at Sirium Military Outpost was ordered to leave to explore it right away as planned.

On the 7th of February 2152, after jumping from the unexplored jump point, the ship came back to report the findings as per new protocol before jumping back to have a closer look.

The scout ended up in the DEN 1048-3956 system at 2.5 LY from Barnards Star, where 4 Planets, 11 Moons, and 20 Asteroids were discovered. The system looked relatively uninteresting and small.

(https://i.imgur.com/aRFalPN.png)
Known Space at 2154

As all leaders began preparation for the incoming election, for the first time a planet which was not Earth was hosting more human population in the galaxy: Mars. The news was received with enthusiasm from all the other democratic colonies which were now finally recognized as the future while Earth was just seen as our ancestorial home.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 12, 2020, 06:52:31 PM

55 Years in - Political Summary

(https://i.imgur.com/Fsz8iZ7.png) Federalists

The Federalist Party believes every colony should be managed by local administrators and the government should reflect the diversity of the population rather than being a centralized entity on Earth just giving orders to be followed without questions asked.

Due to the nature of the ideals, the party wasn’t popular until a colony was established on another planet. As conditions in the colonies were harsher than the one on Earth in the first colonization years and thanks to a focused campaign on these sites, the Federalists are the only party, besides the democrats, to have managed to elect their leader as president.

They wasted the opportunity pressing too much on reforming the constitution when the population wasn’t ready yet for such change.

Their strategy over the years has mutated. In the beginning they were a true opposition force but after had been in power they managed to forge new alliances and their radical view lately have faded in favor of a more conservative approach focused on defending the economy of the new colonies and their inhabitants.

Since new alien threats have emerged, the Federalist Party have been campaigning hard supporting the government initiatives in the attempt of gaining favor in the most centric areas of the electorate.

Their political orientation is towards Federalism.

(https://i.imgur.com/MnnK8i5.png) Pacifists

The Pacifists have been the ruling party of the Democracy before the TN age and they continued to be the most important faction until the defeat against the Federalists.

Their policies are in favor of the community and the pacific expansion of the Human race in the galaxy. The ideals were shared by the majority of the population on Earth, however, with the increase of population in the off world colonies and the birth of new humans not linked to Earth, it’s becoming difficult to let people remember of the horrors of the past.

With an increasing knowledge of space and the encounter of hostile alien races, the pacifist vision has now been seen as naïve by the majority of the voters.

They still have a great deal of weight in the government decisions and their strategy is to allow the Democracy to grow their military only if the commercial and pacific nature of the government will be preserved.

Destined to fade and become a minor party, the Pacifists are pushing as much as they can to increase the Democracy’s knowledge on more social and logistic views.

Their political orientation is towards Democracy.

(https://i.imgur.com/zcGqDjj.png) Mercantile and Industrialists

The “Trade Party” is probably the most variegated of the lot.

As economy on Earth was stale for a long period, the space era have revitalized the interest in the concept of profit. For the first time in centuries people could dream again of a new beginning, the possibility of doing more.

Farming on Mars or Luna was not a chimera but a reality. A small transport company or ship to transport minerals was another good business. The government was paying off people even for just relocating off-world.

The possibility were endless and this has just brought in more and more votes year after year.

After the collapse of the Federalist experiment, the population turned to the “Trade Party” en masse.

In the past 30 years there wasn’t a government really able to govern without asking permission to them. This great deal of power allowed the Party to imprint their views and will into every resolution.

Thanks to this fluid electorate the Mercantile and Industrialists have different fringes inside that can swing the balance of power in the blink of an eye. Even if the base idea is a pacifist one focused on trade, their constant need of expansion and growth can sometimes require the muscles of a strong military.

With the alien menace just 2 Jumps out of Sol, the party have been quietly waiting to see how the government can perform before asking for a change in direction and if they will it could be the end of the democracy as we know it.

They don’t have any particular political orientation.

(https://i.imgur.com/S6R7hqu.png) Scientists

The Scientist Party has always been a minor faction.

Knowing their weakness all they could do was to wait for the right moment to act. They managed to do that in perhaps one of the most critical times of our government stability ang gained frankly a lot from it.

For a period of time they were risking to be excluded from the government as their efforts were entirely focused in finding a way to leave Sol without releasing any new tech for decades.

This let the population believe that Scientist weren’t fit for parliament and bureaucracy. Fortunately, thanks to the boost in research and some prominent figured emerged over the years they managed to reverse course and see their electorate grow again.

Thanks to the discovery of new alien races, ancient ruins from other species, and the need of more knowledge of these events, now the Party can enjoy and benefit from a renewed popularity among the population.

They don’t have any particular political orientation.

(https://i.imgur.com/0JY5otr.png) Nationalists

The Nationalists are the most populist faction in the government and their popularity can rise or fall depending on the population’s mood. They are the opposite of the Federalist Populist ideas.

While Populist are more military driven and in favor of decentralization the Nationalists believe in increasing the social welfare of the state and in centralized power.

Their strategy over the years has been to destabilize the government which was too inclusive and liberal. They have been reporting of corruption and frauds over elections multiple times and their popularity is increasing thanks to alien findings which have made being Human more important than ever.

As usual people refrain to big changes and ignorance is always fertile soil for populistic ideals to grow.

The most important part they played over the years was in helping to bring down the Federalist Government to favor the ascension of the Trade Party.

Their political orientation is towards a Democracy or a Republic.

(https://i.imgur.com/GKXft2K.png) Militarists

The Military Party was the latest party to join the government. Banned after the war, they needed time to reorganize and gain support. It took almost 30 years for them to be welcomed back in the parliament on permanent basis.

They favor strength and expansionism without disliking industrialization of what they call the war machine.

Since now, they haven’t been able to really drive much any resolution in their favor and it was always up to the president in charge to establish a minimal military politic in the democracy.

With the discovery of hostile Aliens they are getting more support and the idea of a strong Navy is now being freely speech by most body, something unconceivable only 10 years ago.

Their strategy is to continuing to gain support and find enough votes to force a new expedition on Altair. Assuming continuation of hostilities by the aliens, a declaration of war could be motioned in parliament and if approved it would officially swing polling on their side.

The idea of a strong Military Republic has never faded in the minds of the party leadership and obviously their political orientation is towards a Republic.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 12, 2020, 08:10:39 PM

Thanks for the excellent summary!

I do have to wonder what the impact of a fully-implemented Federalism ideology would be... seems like the endgame for them is for humanity to be a loose confederation of colony-states, which would severely curtail the sort of inter-colony cooperation needed to mount effective military defense against an alien empire. Fortunately for humanity, unless the Federalists cut some serious deals with the science and industry sectors it seems doubtful that they can ever accomplish this in reality.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 12, 2020, 09:43:02 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on November 12, 2020, 08:10:39 PM

Thanks for the excellent summary!

I do have to wonder what the impact of a fully-implemented Federalism ideology would be... seems like the endgame for them is for humanity to be a loose confederation of colony-states, which would severely curtail the sort of inter-colony cooperation needed to mount effective military defense against an alien empire. Fortunately for humanity, unless the Federalists cut some serious deals with the science and industry sectors it seems doubtful that they can ever accomplish this in reality.

Actually the Federalists want all colonies to work together keeping yes their identities but still under one banner.

The problem with Federalism is that allows for Separatists. Now that is a force that would want what you are suggesting and it would really be hard to deal with.

I am rooting for the Republic, but we all know how it ended in Star Wars, so let's hope if it does happen, to be at least less authoritarian.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 13, 2020, 01:23:52 PM

Quote from: froggiest1982 on November 12, 2020, 09:43:02 PM

I am rooting for the Republic, but we all know how it ended in Star Wars, so let's hope if it does happen, to be at least less authoritarian.

Super Star Destroyers or bust! Go big or go home! ;D

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Federalist Whispers
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 15, 2020, 05:20:43 PM

2155/6 – Federalist Whispers

The election of 2155 landed right in the middle of a democratic crisis. With the Militarist Party growing and the impatience shown by the Industrialist due to the lack of much needed military contracts, the balance of power was again in dispute after another few decades of Democrats Hegemony.

(https://i.imgur.com/DunmsYZ.png)
Independent Media Service Poll 2155

As Engela Prinsloo retired from the political scene, the Federalists decided to seize the moment putting back in leadership a representative from the Army. The maneuver was a clear attempt to rally some sympathies among the military and score a few more extra votes.

Furthermore, the choice of General Pulcheria Hinc was also a clear attempt to mend relationships with the Scientific Faction. The General, in fact, spent most of her career teaching on Earth’s Academy and she was one of the few people with xenoarchaeology experience, such in high demand these days.

The Federalist managed then to have a federalist candidate not only able to mingle with the military and the scientific community but also to face with experience the alien affair.

(https://i.imgur.com/a4ilvN0.png)
Pulcheria Hinc Profile

With such strong candidates against, the Democrats started to campaign very hardly on Earth. The pacifists needed a lot of their votes back and to keep the democracy in place the only way was to have more seats than the Industrialists party, ready to support a Federalist Government if required.

With few votes left to count, both Democrat and Federalist candidates were cruising hand to hand to the finish line. It was clear already that we were witnessing a close election.

As final results arrived, Natasha Hancock, leader of the Democrats, resulted in the winner for only 1.5% of the votes. With more than 3% of spoilt votes, mostly coming from Earth, and with the stain of a rigged election already on their head, the Democrat win was being questioned by all parties and media.

With the situation in the street getting out of hand and over 24,000,000 people protesting everywhere, a solution had to be found right away.

(https://i.imgur.com/J2LQQSD.png)
Presidential Elections 2155

The new Parliament was composed of a total of 938 seats. 211 seats went to the new majority of the Federalists, 182 to the Pacifists, 169 to the Mercantile and Industrialists, 124 to the Scientists, 117 to the Nationalists, and 135 to the Militarist Party.

The new composition did not allow the Democrats to decide on any policy, with all the matters of the state in need of a parliamentary resolution and vote. Such a situation was perhaps never faced by any President so far.

With a majority set at 470 seats, the Federalists could potentially govern through their seats plus the military and the scientists. Considering that it would have been easy to get support from at least a third of the Industrialists' seats, Admiral Hinc requested the parliament a mandate to govern as she did not have conceded to Natasha Hancock yet.

Without having the number but with the firm intention of respecting the popular vote, President Hancock was forced to sit with her adversary and sign a shared program.

The Federalists would have obtained the chance to discuss all military and scientific projects that they advertised during the electoral campaign and the Democrats would have to save the appearance and ensured no constitutional changes would have been presented during the next mandate.

(https://i.imgur.com/7mVCjzQ.png)
Elected seats of the 2155 Election

The negotiations were going on all night and the day after before everything was ready to be presented in parliament. The massive agreement was called the Restructure Protection Plan (RPP) and included: Formation of a professional army to replace the current militia organization, Modernization of the Navy, Development of new Weapons Researches, and expansion of shipyards capability, both military and commercial.

When the first part of the RPP hit the parliament it was composed of 18 Resolutions, mostly regarding the army and the expansion of the shipyard. Out of 18, 14 got approved. All the new tanks and the new range of active sensors were rejected by the parliament as more time was needed for the commissions to analyze the benefits. The Federalists didn’t take well this first opposition, however, as President Hancock reminded them, it was her prerogative to ensure all resolutions would have been thoroughly analyzed first prior approval in parliament.

Natasha was the first president to ever served 3 mandates and even if this last one was more a concession than a real appointment, she did know how to handle the bureaucracy and how to write and pass resolutions. Her experience and connections would have been helpful in time and so the Federalist decided to drop the complaints and get back to work.

The Sirus Military Outpost was more than complete and installations were being transported steadily. Currently, it would have been possible to handle more than 100k of ships there but more fuel and spare parts would have been needed if that was to become the main hub in our resistance against the aliens.

Unfortunately, with not much fuel left to spare on Earth and the HH Andromedae mission just started, the only excess would have been on Spare Parts, however, a trip just for them would have been only a further excess of fuel consumption.

On the 14th of August 2155, parliament received amended resolutions for the rejected RPP plans. After more resistance in the parliament was found, the Federalists threatened the President with a motion of no confidence if discussions would have gone further than necessary. President Hancock managed to get all the tanks for the army approved with the utility of the sensors grav strength still at bay due to the reluctance of multiple parliamentarians both in the majority and opposition sides.

As further work was required, the federalist leaders advised that if the next attempt would have been unsuccessful a new leadership would have been required to ensure their interests were looked after as they should and as it was agreed. So, when on the 16th of March 2156 the resolution was rejected again and the No-confidence motion landed in Parliament the situation was the following: all Federalist and Militarists were in favor of removing the President (346 seats) and Nationalists and Pacifists were in favor of the status quo (299 seats).

With a majority of 470 votes needed and 293 in play, everything was possible. However, a more accurate count was produced by the President’s advisors. From this more in-depth analysis emerged that the scientists were split (minimum 13 max 62 seats) and the Industrialists could count on at least 1/3 of their members to go for the no-confidence (minimum 56 max 84 seats). With these numbers at least 415 votes would go to replace Natasha Hancock as president and then only 77 votes were in play. The president needed to swing only 23 of them to keep the presidency, 70% chances.

The odds were in her favor but the parliament is always unpredictable.

As the voting count was about to be completed it appeared that the President managed to convince only 20% of her detractors ending the count at 451 versus 487 in keeping her as President.
With the resolution UNER00266, the president was forced to resign and leaving her position in favor of the Federalist candidate Pulcheria Hinc. As the transition was never approved by a formal election the Federalists were banned from any attempt to changing the constitution during the rest of their mandate which would have ended as per the original one on 31st December of 2159.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 15, 2020, 06:34:51 PM

This update has everything one could ever want, by which I mean of course political drama and tanks!

What, this is supposed to be a game about spaceships? Nonsense... ;D

Interesting play here by the Federalist side. I wonder about the implications, not only on the remainder of the mandate in terms of parliamentary interaction but also how the voters will respond to their elected choice being ousted by political machinations. We might see a push-back against the Federalists that will mark this as a premature move by their party - I doubt most voters will be swayed to recognize the wisdom of the Federalist tactics by the apparent necessity to improve sensor technology.

On the other hand General Hinc has some time to make a mark, if she can accomplish major projects and reforms she may gain popularity and prestige to win an elected term as well.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 15, 2020, 07:09:55 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on November 15, 2020, 06:34:51 PM

This update has everything one could ever want, by which I mean of course political drama and tanks!

What, this is supposed to be a game about spaceships? Nonsense... ;D

Interesting play here by the Federalist side. I wonder about the implications, not only on the remainder of the mandate in terms of parliamentary interaction but also how the voters will respond to their elected choice being ousted by political machinations. We might see a push-back against the Federalists that will mark this as a premature move by their party - I doubt most voters will be swayed to recognize the wisdom of the Federalist tactics by the apparent necessity to improve sensor technology.

On the other hand General Hinc has some time to make a mark, if she can accomplish major projects and reforms she may gain popularity and prestige to win an elected term as well.

I can partially answer to this with the attached...

Funny thing, I wasn't expecting this outcome either as the chances were very low not only for the motions to be rejected 3 times in a raw (base value is currently 51/49) but also Natasha rolled a 2 out 10, again hitting the 30% .

For Mathematicians nerds you looking at: 49% 3 times in a raw + 30% on the 4th attempt for the no-confidence

0.49³ x 0.3¹ = 0.0352947 Basically 3%

EDIT: What happened just made re evaluate Zorlu's presidency. She was the only one that managed to survive so many pressures and rejected resolutions during her first mandate. If we add the impressive amount of ribbons and public offices held, we truly are looking at one of the most important human figures of the last 50 years and possibly the whole century.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Hinc Federalist Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 16, 2020, 02:35:44 AM

2156/9 – The Hinc Federalist Democracy

With a new Federalist President leading, the strategy was clear. Every resolution would have been voted until approved even if it would have been necessary to vote for the same resolution every voting cycle (5 days).

The intent was to weary every resistance until election time. The Federalists knew that this behaviour would have cost them some votes but they also knew that the Democrats would have paid the fact that for the first time in modern history a government wasn’t able to govern till the end of their mandate, demonstrating weakness and general disorganization within their ranks.

Obviously, the no-confidence motion signed the end of the political career of former president Hancock as well with a new candidate that should have been found by the Democrats would have hopefully also resulted in some other loss in votes.

Eventually, with the end of Hancock presidency, even the RPP was scrapped in favour a strong militaristic imprint of all resolutions.

Thanks to the efforts of the new commander in chief Hinc there was finally enough fuel and spare parts ready on Earth to be delivered to the Sirium Military Outpost. The Sirius-I 001 was tasked for collection as soon as the news reached Navy HQ and was due to come back by November 2157. This operation, once completed, would have granted enough basic means to service a considerately large fleet. With the maintenance capabilities now reached 176,000 tons and the availability of fighter factories on the ground, humanity had finally managed to secure one of its borders.

Furthermore, the establishment of a mining colony on one of the moon orbiting the outpost would have facilitated the mineral collection and usage to an extent that the government decided to buy such minerals and get them all delivered by mass drivers.

Obviously, without knowing what was waiting on the other side of the remaining 3 branches, it was still early to feel fully secure but the confidence that if required the government could have reacted to alien threats was received with pleasure by the population resulting in an increase in popularity of the Federalists actions and its representatives, President included.

With the line Earth Sirius finally safe, a new project was proposed. Using the researches done in the past on the permanent stabilization of Jump Points, the government decided to produce a ship able to perform such a task.

Quote

UNEC Osiris-I class Construction Ship 45,000 tons 154 Crew 1,030.8 BP TCS 900 TH 1,350 EM 0
1500 km/s Armour 1-112 Shields 0-0 HTK 72 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 14 Max Repair 600 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months
Jump Point Stabilisation: 360 days

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Medium) (9) Power 1350 Fuel Use 1.73% Signature 150 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 820,000 Litres Range 190.1 billion km (1466 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

This would have allowed civilian traffic in the system and the easy transit of all military ships produced on Earth. Even if it was noted that the jump point would have then been possible to be used also by our enemies the advantages were far too many to be ignored. It was the time that Earth and the Sol system would have been more connected to the rest of the sector controlled by the Humans.

With elections approaching fast it was time to lay down projects for the future. With the government busy in releasing and investing only on theoretical researches, people were asking to see actually something rather than read fine studies on scientific magazines. The more the government released advancement on any given field, the fewer the people were actually believing that this money and efforts were actually being really invested into something concrete.

On the 24th of July 2159, the government announced then that if the Federalist would have won again elections, they would have pushed for a less theoretical scientific effort and a more practical one. The announcement was well received by the industrialists' party which along with the military and the scientists would have most likely formed a very powerful ally for President Hinc.

The subtle lie that it was the pacifist line to forbid the government to act swiftly towards a more practical science, was easy to be swallowed by the people which in many years have seen the pacifist deny any military or industrial project of a certain size hitting, even more, their already fragile reputation.

(https://i.imgur.com/9n1ItNx.png)
Government Resolutions

As Ravati Sidhu retired on 2157, the new Republican candidate and replacement as Grand Admiral was Igor Fomin, a conservative and weak history buff with a decent military career behind. It looked like the Militarists wanted to make sure Pulcheria Hinc to win another mandate presenting possibly the weakest opponent possible.

(https://i.imgur.com/AvFK4SZ.png)
Igor Fomin Profile

The Democrats choice fell over the shoulders of Logistic Professor Tyler Cunningham: a very odd choice obviously aimed to win some sympathies in the Scientific community and contain the haemorrhage of votes started a few years back now. However, considering the weak and intolerant character of the young scientist it would have been entirely possible to obtain the reverse effect with this choice.

(https://i.imgur.com/s6W6Nfq.png)
Tyler Cunningham Profile

Immediately before the elections, in November 2159, a Sorium shortage crisis hit Earth with millions of people remained without a job and the consequential shut of all refining operations. Again, the government managed to pin the current crisis on the stale pacifist government rule, incapable over the last 50 years to find a suitable source of Sorium due to their limited views on expansion and technological advancement.

As the popularity of the Party was already increasing due to the strong populistic propaganda on every Democratic World the result was a massive surge in preferences on the upcoming pollings.

(https://i.imgur.com/8LUPg9x.png)
Independent Media Service Poll 2159

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 16, 2020, 03:43:07 PM

This new strategy of ramming failed resolutions through is a bold one, given what happened to the last President, but it seems to have worked out very well here. The Federalists have successfully leveraged their "illegitimate" term into strong action while shifting blame for humanity's problems onto the previous administration. It will be interesting to see if they can win the next election with a dominant fraction of the votes and potentially begin thinking not only about military expansion but also constitutional amendments.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The historical elections of 2160
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 17, 2020, 06:08:40 PM

2160 – The start of the first official Hinc Federalist Democracy

After the oppositions restructure, president Hinc could capitalize not only in a successful political message but also on an aura that would make people think she could achieve anything.

Seeing the democracy progressing so fast was thrilling, especially for the younger voters. After a long period of time, humanity was starting to think again in a great and larger scale.

(https://i.imgur.com/xeXaDtv.png)
Prestige Levels 2159

With election pretty much in the bag, the real deal was to get as much power as possible to avoid compromises and alliances that would have hurt not only the party but the whole operations. The critical points, as usual, would have been the seats on Earth which are usually driven by pacifist and democratic ideals.

On the 1st of January 2160 and the first results started to come in the number across the board were astonishing. Hinc was polling over 50% pretty much everywhere but Earth. As votes stopped count, the re-elected president Hinc cashed in almost 48% of the preferences. No candidate ever got even close to these numbers. Federalists managed to elect along with their loyal allies militarist 500 parliamentarians. With a majority set at 520 seats to govern would have been a walk in the park.

(https://i.imgur.com/WArPUDx.png)
Presidential Elections 2159

The new Parliament was composed by a total of 1037 seats. 367 seats went to the Federalists, 148 to the Pacifists, 110 to Mercantile and Industrialists, 67 to the Scientists, 212 to the Nationalists and 133 to the Militarist Party.

The main opposition would have been composed by the Pacifist and the Nationalists which were strongly opposed and concerned by this Federalist drift. Fortunately, together they could reach together only 360 seats.

As soon as the numbers were formalized interviews started to see where the new government was standing regarding policies and motions.

It was with great pleasure that President Hinc realized that there was enough support for all the policies the government was willing to push through as long as it was opened for discussion.

(https://i.imgur.com/kN5NOzJ.png)
Elected seats of the 2159 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/fvZ6Lh7.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2159 Election

A final analysis was done on the constitutional strength of democracy and the possibility of changing a few things as already attempted without success in the past.

Most of the conversation held with the most influential parliamentarians and group leaders showed that there was extended consensus in changing the old democratic and bureaucratic system in favour of a faster and slimmer one. Which one this system would have been should have been discussed further over the next 5 years.

(https://i.imgur.com/7Vffqad.png)
The Race Information Panel

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Hinc Federalist Democracy
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 18, 2020, 08:03:34 PM

2160/4 – The Hinc Federalist Democracy

As conversations deepened between all parties it was agreed to revert the constitutional changes on the free press. As much as the people were enjoying the amount of liberty and information they were getting from the media it was as clear as daylight that few crises could have been averted or handled better without having to put them into the spotlight.

Surely the Federalists were the ones that have been benefitting the most out of the current situation, however, after further reflections, the leadership decided that everything was much better when the old system was in place.

The constitutional changes were then translated into a constitutional reform and voted by more than 80% of the parliament becoming the law of the state on the 5th of January 2160.

As the constitution still did not allow the government to directly control the media the best way to ensure the government would still have a little say on the editor’s press line.

With 117,540 wealth credits in the bank (1 credit value could have been roughly compared to $10,000 US dollars pre-world war 3), the government decided to invest 100,000 of them to buy back the Independent Media Service from the national stock by acquiring the majority of the shares, liquidating the board and finally reinstating the National Media Service as it was: an independent press agency with governmental participation.

(https://i.imgur.com/cmSSAUn.png)
Stock Payment

With the training completion of the first professional armies on Earth, by the end of 2160, it was finally time for the new government to unveil the projects in which it was decided to invest. A plan, the Technical Scientific Advancement Plan (TSAP) was draft.

The TSAP included: new active sensors to extend the range of detection and potentially missile fire control, new Missiles designs to compete against alien technology, new engines, and Military Jump Drives. New lasers would have needed to be produced but not much research was done there, resulting in only an improvement of on the fire controls. The Government released a statement declaring that it would have invested in that and other projects after the first batch of new components would have been ready for production.

The goal was to have a bigger caliber on laser weapons and at least another kind of laser light, more powerful than the current one. Eventually, a plan for ships to produce some sort of force fields (shields) to help absorbing damages was also under study.

On the 11th of October 2160, the resolutions were put to vote for approval in parliament. The impressive document contained 19 motions, 17 of which approved at first reading and 2 approved on the second read a week later and with the new missiles approved only by 1 vote. It was clear that the opposition was working hard behind the scenes to block the government in the attempt of gaining the voters' favor again.

Some of these new techs would have also been used for the new generation of Survey Ships which were due to an update for a while now.

(https://i.imgur.com/SFnlhqY.png)
Army Organization

(https://i.imgur.com/3mp0NBx.png)
Infantry Army Brigade OOB

Meanwhile, on the desk of the President, was still present the file on the Struve Abandoned Outpost. As understanding the enemy was considered a priority, the General decided to call in the war council to approve the invasion and officially take control of the planet. The operation was called Cai Wen in honor of the commander that lost his life along with the ones of 105 crewmen in the first lethal encounter with the aliens.

The plan was to move the tender on the Earth Sirius Jump Point to the one on the Luhman 16 Struve 2398 as soon as a gate would have been built connecting permanently Sol with Luhman 16 system. Once done, a series of troop transport would have landed on the planet leaving all involved personnel around the alien outpost while the army would have taken control of the perimeter.

As the plan was marked as urgent, a new Osiris was ordered to ensure operation could go contemporary with the ones on the Sirius Jump Point. It was in fact noted that it would have taken roughly a year for each point to be stabilized and the government did not have 3+ years on hand just for the operation to start, they needed a victory before the new election.

With all plans drafted, resolution UNER00304 landed in parliament under the name OPERATION CAI WEN which was approved with 577 votes in favor against 460 against. 2160 would be then remembered as the year when the first military operation in space of Humanity was approved.

The other concern over the head of President Hinc was on the Navy intel we could collect so far on the aliens which were less than satisfactory, to use a euphemism. The only good information was on the speed of their vessels which was around 5,000kms. Based on that it would have been absolutely necessary to match or even better surpass such a mark.

A new scout would have been required to be produced and designed. Once done we should have organized a series of spy missions in the Altair system. Another plan was then drafted with this aim in mind. The operation was called RUSSIAN ROULETTE as it was acknowledged that the chances to come back from such a mission were extremely low. Because of that, all crew would have been selected only by volunteers. Due to its nature, it was hard for the President to get the motion approved in parliament, and only after some tight negotiations she managed to pass the resolution by only 18 votes.

The compromise that the President was forced to make implied the use of long-range probes which would have been launched from a safe distance. The probes would have most likely been shot down not before having provided some extra information on the number of forces in Altair and most likely on the enemy weapon capabilities.

With the discovery of a new jump point in Alpha Centauri and with the gravitational survey of the system almost completed, the President ordered the scout UNEN Abel Tasman to move into the system and explore it. Once the mission would have been completed the scout was ordered to wait for the survey to be completed prior to reporting back to Earth and to continue its exploring mission in the eventuality of new findings.

As no other jump points were found at its return the scout reported having ended up in the Luyten 726-8 Binary System where a total of 10 Planets, 83 Moons, and 150 Asteroids were waiting to be surveyed. The system was over 7 LY away from Alpha Centauri and more than 12 from Sol and it was marked as the farthest place ever visited by men. Despite having few level 2 worlds, none of them was actually worth notice due to the few inhabitants they would have been able to hold.

(https://i.imgur.com/GGb5xUu.png)
Known Space 2162 and Military Plans

In February 2162, the president called in a representative of the scientist party for a private meeting. As factories on Earth were idle due to a shortage of workers and also a lack of important projects to complete, Admiral Hinc proposed to extend the amount of Research Facilities on Earth in exchange for further support to the Federalist resolutions and constitutional changes. Thrilled by the idea of extending their influence on Earth, the party accepted the offer. 10 New laboratories would have been built then and few other operations would have been moved off-world to release the necessary workers to man the stations.

With the deal signed, the Federalists proposed a restructure of the Police Corps which, due to the new Army Units, were called to less active roles in the defense of the Democracy and more into the security of the people. As courts were full of sues from citizens over the police operate, the government decided to let an internal independent commission to handle such cases in the attempt of clearing the judges' desks and fill them with more important crimes to pursue.

The institution of an internal affairs department would have also given the police more power over certain matters making possible certain hard measures against few problematic fringes of the population to be carried easily and with the blessing of the government. The motion was a success with 940 votes in favor and only 97 against. The constitution was now more similar to one of a Federalist Democracy and for this reason on the 1st of January 2164, a government form change was proposed to switch directly to a Federation model.

The proposal defined The Federation as a political organization characterized by the union of planets, groups, or parties, which would have been self-governed in internal affairs and united under the central government on Earth. The division of power among the states and the central governing body would have also been constitutionally entrenched.

The reform entailed that after the elections the number of seats would have been determined by the number of people entitled to vote with a cap of 250 representatives per planet of the Federation, currently Earth, Mars, Mercury, Luna, and Sirius Outpost. This system would have ensured that each planet would have had the same weight in the political decisions avoiding malcontent.

Once the representatives would have been elected they would have joined one of the Senate coalitions based on the population preferences. The coalitions with the majority of members would have been leading the government policies with motions approved through a classic 50%+1 majority of the votes. The same would have applied to eventually reform the constitution.

Furthermore, it was proposed to extend the length of the government from 5 to 6 years and to remove the figure of the President.

Overall, the changes proposed weren’t totally unacceptable and a certain level of Democracy was still maintained. From a perspective, elections would have looked after more the territory than the general coalition as it was under the current model so it could have been said that the proposed model was indeed more "democratic".

As the proposal landed in parliament and being evident that many wanted a true change, a positive outcome was already known and expected. The 788 votes in favor against 249 was only the confirmation of what was already in the air in the past 8 years. The Democracy as we knew it was officially dead, leaving space for a more dynamic Federation of Planets.

The government set the 31st of December 2164 as the final term of the current legislature and after the new election on the 1st of January 2165, the Federation would have officially stepped in and begun their rule.

(https://i.imgur.com/eAgqvzZ.png)
Elected seats of the 2164 Election

(https://i.imgur.com/lazkEX7.png)
Parliament seats distribution after 2164 Election

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Early Years of the Federation
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 21, 2020, 02:32:01 AM

2165/70 – The Early Years of the Federation

With the establishment of the first Senate in 2165, a first coalition should have found the numbers to govern. With a stalemate in place, everything had to be rearranged as none of the classic coalitions could have to governed alone, forcing the formation of 2 major alliances: the Hawks and the Doves. The Hawks, more inclined to expansion and militarism found themselves short of several votes against the Doves, a more pacific coalition aimed at expansion by trade and colonization.

As few military operations were already approved and financed, the new Enlighten Federation decided to allow them to happen as planned but they would have been the exception rather than the rule. 3 Raven-I, the new Troop Transport vessel, broke Earth’s orbit direction Struve 2398 carrying 1 Army Infantry Brigade, 4 Archaeological Digging Stations, and 2 Ruins Recovery Stations, effectively starting the Operation Cai Wen.

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UNEC Raven-I class Troop Transport 64,500 tons 302 Crew 1,498.6 BP TCS 1,290 TH 1,250 EM 0
969 km/s Armour 1-143 Shields 0-0 HTK 163 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 14 Max Repair 80 MSP
Troop Capacity 50,000 tons Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) ( 8 ) Power 1250.0 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 914,000 Litres Range 32.6 billion km (389 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1000 Range 18.5m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Even if more pacific in its view, the new government recognized the need for completing the previous administration plan of modernization of the Navy and expansion of the military capabilities.

With that in mind, several ships were refitted into newer models and the fleet was going to be expanded to better reflect the status of the Federation in the galaxy.

The most important decision was to upgrade the survey fleet. Both the Promise and Twilight class were remodelled to a better and faster survey capability plus an extended range able to cover even the most distant stars.

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Promise-IJ class Geological Survey Vessel 6,500 tons 100 Crew 583.2 BP TCS 130 TH 188 EM 0
1442 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-31 Shields 0-0 HTK 34 Sensors 6/6/0/3 DCR 7 PPV 0
Maint Life 14.72 Years MSP 1,192 AFR 48% IFR 0.7% 1YR 10 5YR 154 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Commercial Jump Drive (7k) Max Ship Size 7000 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Small) (2) Power 187.5 Fuel Use 2.18% Signature 93.75 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 511,000 Litres Range 648.3 billion km (5203 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Geological Survey Sensors (3) 3 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

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Twilight-IJ class Gravitational Survey Vessel 6,500 tons 100 Crew 583.2 BP TCS 130 TH 188 EM 0
1442 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-31 Shields 0-0 HTK 34 Sensors 6/6/3/0 DCR 7 PPV 0
Maint Life 14.72 Years MSP 1,192 AFR 48% IFR 0.7% 1YR 10 5YR 154 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Commercial Jump Drive (7k) Max Ship Size 7000 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Small) (2) Power 187.5 Fuel Use 2.18% Signature 93.75 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 511,000 Litres Range 648.3 billion km (5203 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Gravitational Survey Sensors (3) 3 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The government not only refitted the whole fleet but expanded it with 8 extra Twilight-I bringing the total at 12.

As it wasn’t still possible to refit the warships, the government decided to start refitting all the fighters. The operation would have taken ages, therefore, another naval shipyard was ordered along with the expansion of an extra slipway on the 1,000 tons displacement Santoro & Sons Ltd. Once completed operations would have been carried faster and more efficiently. In the meantime, the 4 slots were already active refitting the first 4 fighters stationed on Earth.

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UNENF-B1LS-I class Fighter-Scout 500 tons 11 Crew 79.9 BP TCS 10 TH 28 EM 0
2752 km/s Armour 1-5 Shields 0-0 HTK 6 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 0 PPV 2.7
Maint Life 7.23 Years MSP 29 AFR 20% IFR 0.3% 1YR 1 5YR 15 Max Repair 16 MSP
Magazine 18
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1
Intended Deployment Time: 15 days Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Fighter) (2) Power 27.5 Fuel Use 280.92% Signature 13.75 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 7,000 Litres Range 0.9 billion km (3 days at full power)

Sting Box Launcher (3) Missile Size: 6 Hangar Reload 122 minutes MF Reload 20 hours
Fighter Missile Fire Control FC12-R50 (1) Range 12.9m km Resolution 50
Sting Anti-Ship Missile MK2 (3) Speed: 24,433 km/s End: 10.6m Range: 15.5m km WH: 3 Size: 6 TH: 105/63/31

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS5-R1 (1) GPS 16 Range 5.5m km MCR 497.5k km Resolution 1
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

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UNENF-B1-I class Fighter-bomber 500 tons 3 Crew 51.2 BP TCS 10 TH 28 EM 0
2752 km/s Armour 1-5 Shields 0-0 HTK 2 Sensors 0/0/0/0 DCR 0 PPV 6.3
Maint Life 9.02 Years MSP 26 AFR 20% IFR 0.3% 1YR 1 5YR 9 Max Repair 8 MSP
Magazine 42
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1
Intended Deployment Time: 15 days Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Fighter) (2) Power 27.5 Fuel Use 280.92% Signature 13.75 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 33,000 Litres Range 4.2 billion km (17 days at full power)

Sting Box Launcher (7) Missile Size: 6 Hangar Reload 122 minutes MF Reload 20 hours
Fighter Missile Fire Control FC12-R50 (1) Range 12.9m km Resolution 50
Sting Anti-Ship Missile MK2 (7) Speed: 24,433 km/s End: 10.6m Range: 15.5m km WH: 3 Size: 6 TH: 105/63/31

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Fighter for production, combat and planetary interaction

The fighters were also carrying the new Sting Missiles and had increased their firepower. The new Sting was increased in speed by 400%, was 150% more powerful and had a 45% more range. In the end, the study of the enemy 30,000kms missiles did benefit our project and design abilities. The first batch of 150 units was ordered for the refit to be completed and later a new stock order will be added and kept on both Earth and Sirius Outpost. Our Analyst calculated that ideally, we should have between 594 and 990 missiles in stock. Alternatively, a minimum amount of 198 per ordnance centre could have also served its purpose.

With the operation Cai Wen ongoing, Grand Admiral Igor Fomin ordered all gravitational ships to survey the Struve 2398 system in the attempt of finding a link with the Altair system. On the 7th of April 2165, one jump point was found by the UNEN David Brewster. As to understand what was beyond enemy lines was considered paramount by the Admiral, the scout UNEN Adrien de Gerlache was tasked to explore the new finding immediately.

Not even the time to depart that another Jump point was discovered in the Struve system. Orders to explore both jump points were then sent to the departing scout.

Once back, the David Brewster reported that the first jump point was leading back to the WISE 0855-0714 System, probably a parent of the already discovered WISE 1506+7027 System. The new WISE was empty except for a couple of random comets. The second jump led to the Kapteyns Star System, 7.5 LY away from Sol and 2.4 from Struve 2398. A first scan did not reveal any alien activity and with only 5 Planets, 19 Moons, and 2 Comets the system was marked as uninteresting.

Meanwhile, on the 22nd of May 2165, Human Troops landed and secured the Alien Ruined Outpost on the Planet Struve 2398-B III. Translation and Xenoarchaeology operations started immediately after.

By November the system was fully surveyed revealing the 2 already explored jump points to be the only ones present besides the one leading to the Luhman 16 System and the new WISE System revealed to do not have any other jump point besides the one leading back to Struve 2398.

On the 15th of April 2166, the Archaeology team finally identified and translated the alien language on the Struve System. Apparently, such race was identified as the Collingwood and they appeared to not be related to the aliens found in Altair. The news was welcomed but it was also concerning. It looked like space was less empty than Human Scientists originally thought.

The Struve system was then marked as within the Federation territory and the 13 installations found on the planet’s surface would have been inspected in the attempt of recovering them.

The Operation Cai Wen was declared successful and all the participants were awarded the operation ribbon.

(https://i.imgur.com/y6k9Yhc.png)
Known Space 2166

In August 2166 the full recovery of the assets in Struve included: 1 Automated Mine, 1 Fighter Factory, 480 Infrastructure, 2 Mines, 1 Research Facility, and 1 Sector Command. The presence of the latter would have probably meant that this may have been the capital world of the Collingwood and considering the small findings, we were probably looking at a race hundreds of thousands if not millions of years older than the Humans.

In the findings, there were also 2 weapons, unknown at our Scientists which were identified as a sort of Particle Beams. Further exploration of the surface revealed hidden warehouses with stockpiles of 9,600 tons of Duranium, 6,202 tons of Corbomite, 4,600 Maintenance Supplies, and 7,600,000 litres of refined Sorium Fuel.

During all 2166 and 67, our new exploration fleet started to push boundaries of the Human Federation further and further. Apparently, after the systems beyond Struve, there was only empty space. The exploration was then diverted on the Centauri Systems and the other branch of the WISE Systems.

Meanwhile, Mercury was fully terraformed and a new plan for the Terraforming Stations had to be found. The first idea was to Open the Sirius outpost to civilians and expand the colony making it the second Hub of mining and production. The colony was easy to be terraformed and the project could have been completed fast. Unfortunately, there were two concerns. The first was on the aliens which were just next door but, considering their behaviour, we could have assumed that the colony would have been relatively safe from invasion as no enemy ships have ever crossed the borders since their discovery. The second was on the relative distance between Sol and Sirius which would have made either one only a redundant colony.

Eyes were then on the second option, more ambitious and of a better strategic value. The Luyten 826-8 System just passed Alpha Centauri had an easy terraforming candidate with water, not too extreme temperature and a base atmosphere of Nitrogen and Oxigen. The Tidal Lock of the world wouldn't have allowed more than 800 million people to live on the surface; however, as an outpost for further exploration would have served its purpose well.

The systems were also rich in minerals that could have been shipped to the planet.

The plan was then put on hold waiting to the gravitation survey to be completed and ensure the nearby systems were as well safe and ready to be colonized and explored.

On the 21st of October 2167, the government was finally ready to unveil the new Navy design. As technology advanced and Aliens have discovered it was necessary to refurbish some concepts and also change some of the roles of the old ships. A new doctrine was established for many of the ships. The most important novelty was the adoption of the single turret doctrine. Being currently impossible to match aliens speed it was necessary to install all lasers on turrets able to track the fast enemy ships. Along with that, a new powerful turret was needed to shoot down the 30,000kms missiles of the enemy. Eventually, the fleet was also reassembled and the number of ships per fleet was increased.

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Patriot-I BS class Corvette 9,000 tons 297 Crew 1,394.3 BP TCS 180 TH 647 EM 0
3593 km/s Armour 4-38 Shields 0-0 HTK 70 Sensors 30/30/0/0 DCR 14 PPV 46.2
Maint Life 3.81 Years MSP 787 AFR 162% IFR 2.2% 1YR 85 5YR 1,280 Max Repair 107.81 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (3) Power 646.9 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 751,000 Litres Range 18.5 billion km (59 days at full power)

Single 10cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (11x1) Range 90,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 3-3 RM 30,000 km ROF 5
Beam Fire Control R192-TS8000 (2) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor (Medium) (3) Total Power Output 59.4 Exp 5%

Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS5-R1 (1) GPS 16 Range 5.5m km MCR 497.5k km Resolution 1
Area Search Sensor AS57-R100 (1) GPS 8000 Range 57.4m km Resolution 100
Short Range EM Sensor EM5-30 (1) Sensitivity 30 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 43.3m km
Short Range TH Sensor TH5-30 (1) Sensitivity 30 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 43.3m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

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Patriot-I PD class Corvette 9,000 tons 217 Crew 1,285.2 BP TCS 180 TH 647 EM 0
3593 km/s Armour 4-38 Shields 0-0 HTK 71 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 14 PPV 71.82
Maint Life 2.69 Years MSP 757 AFR 162% IFR 2.2% 1YR 149 5YR 2,240 Max Repair 129.12 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (3) Power 646.9 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 700,000 Litres Range 17.3 billion km (55 days at full power)

Quad 10cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (3x4) Range 90,000km TS: 30000 km/s Power 12-12 RM 30,000 km ROF 5
Beam Fire Control R96-TS5000 (2) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 5,000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor (Medium) (3) Total Power Output 59.4 Exp 5%

Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS5-R1 (1) GPS 16 Range 5.5m km MCR 497.5k km Resolution 1
Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

With the Flag Bridge moved onto the May class, the Patriot classes were divided into 2 main roles: detection and point defence. The main role of the small Corvettes would have then been to protect and support the main attacking fleet.

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Danilov-I B class Heavy Frigate 12,000 tons 382 Crew 1,750.5 BP TCS 240 TH 862 EM 0
3593 km/s Armour 6-46 Shields 0-0 HTK 101 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 18 PPV 77.14
Maint Life 5.02 Years MSP 1,129 AFR 144% IFR 2.0% 1YR 75 5YR 1,120 Max Repair 107.81 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (4) Power 862.5 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 907,000 Litres Range 16.8 billion km (54 days at full power)

Single 12cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (14x1) Range 120,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 4-3 RM 30,000 km ROF 10
Beam Fire Control R192-TS8000 (2) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor (Medium) (4) Total Power Output 79.2 Exp 5%

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Danilov class was strengthened to accommodate a better armour passing from a Frigate classification to the more suitable Heavy Frigate one.

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May-I BL class Destroyer Leader 15,000 tons 506 Crew 2,220 BP TCS 300 TH 1,078 EM 0
3593 km/s Armour 6-54 Shields 0-0 HTK 117 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 20 PPV 108.96
Maint Life 4.62 Years MSP 1,325 AFR 180% IFR 2.5% 1YR 101 5YR 1,515 Max Repair 125 MSP
Commodore Control Rating 2 BRG FLG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (5) Power 1078.1 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 810,000 Litres Range 12 billion km (38 days at full power)

Single 15.0cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (16x1) Range 180,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 6-3 RM 30,000 km ROF 10
Beam Fire Control R192-TS8000 (2) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor (Medium) (4) Total Power Output 79.2 Exp 5%

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

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May-I B class Destroyer 15,000 tons 429 Crew 2,100.3 BP TCS 300 TH 1,078 EM 0
3593 km/s Armour 6-54 Shields 0-0 HTK 114 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 20 PPV 115.98
Maint Life 4.04 Years MSP 1,275 AFR 180% IFR 2.5% 1YR 125 5YR 1,875 Max Repair 129.12 MSP
Captain Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (5) Power 1078.1 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 1,014,000 Litres Range 15 billion km (48 days at full power)

Single 15.0cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (10x1) Range 180,000km TS: 5000 km/s Power 6-3 RM 30,000 km ROF 10
Quad 10cm C3 Near Ultraviolet Laser Turret (2x4) Range 90,000km TS: 30000 km/s Power 12-12 RM 30,000 km ROF 5
Beam Fire Control R192-TS8000 (1) Max Range: 192,000 km TS: 8,000 km/s 95 90 84 79 74 69 64 58 53 48
Beam Fire Control R96-TS5000 (1) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 5,000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor (Medium) (4) Total Power Output 79.2 Exp 5%

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS5-R1 (1) GPS 16 Range 5.5m km MCR 497.5k km Resolution 1
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The May class was refurbished to serve as Leader of the fleet and strengthened with thicker armour.

Production of new Ships and Refit of the old ones started immediately after the presentation. Along with that, a new Intelligence ship was designed and as planned by Admiral Hinc, it would have been tasked to carry the Russian Roulette Operation as soon as ready.

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Vigilant-IJS class Intelligence Ship 7,000 tons 129 Crew 626.9 BP TCS 140 TH 188 EM 0
1339 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 38 Sensors 30/30/0/0 DCR 10 PPV 5.4
Maint Life 16.02 Years MSP 1,359 AFR 39% IFR 0.5% 1YR 10 5YR 149 Max Repair 160 MSP
Magazine 36
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Commercial Jump Drive (7k) Max Ship Size 7000 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Small) (2) Power 187.5 Fuel Use 2.18% Signature 93.75 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 111,000 Litres Range 130.8 billion km (1130 days at full power)

Sting Box Launcher (6) Missile Size: 6 Hangar Reload 122 minutes MF Reload 20 hours
Fighter Missile Fire Control FC12-R50 (1) Range 12.9m km Resolution 50
Spy 6 (6) Speed: 2,033 km/s End: 1.7d Range: 300m km WH: 0 Size: 6 TH: 6/4/2

Area Search Sensor AS57-R100 (1) GPS 8000 Range 57.4m km Resolution 100
Area Search Sensor AS86-R120 (1) GPS 19200 Range 86.2m km Resolution 120
Short Range TH Sensor TH5-30 (1) Sensitivity 30 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 43.3m km
Short Range EM Sensor EM5-30 (1) Sensitivity 30 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 43.3m km

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The new Spy 6 missile was designed to meet government requirements of spying on the enemy from far in the attempt to preserve the crew safety.

On the 5th of May 2168, the Centauri Arm proved to be a dead-end at Luyten 726-8 limiting the expansion plans of the Federation to the only way still unexplored beyond the HH Andromedae System. The good news was that these dead ends would have provided a Safe Harbour for the Mining and Civilian operations. The Luyten 726-8 System was then renamed Ultima Centauri as a reminder.

It was October 2168 when the Vigilant-IJS UNEN Tsotha-Ianti captained by Commander Philippine Barbier left Earth to start Operation Russian Roulette. The ship reached the Altair System on the 2nd of December 2168.

(https://i.imgur.com/YIclI7N.png)
OPERATION RUSSIAN ROULETTE Phase 1

2 Waypoints were set, 1 at the range of the Spy 6 missiles and one on the Altair IV Planet which supposed to be the location of the Alien base. Launching Station was reached at 10:02 am on the 7th of January 2169 and the first of the 6 Spy 6 Missiles was launched.

(https://i.imgur.com/kWzILXU.png)
OPERATION RUSSIAN ROULETTE Phase 2

As our probe approached the readings identified several classes on the Planet’s orbit, somewhere already known while some others were entirely new. A total of 33 Signature were identified ranging from 8,346 tons to 25,170 tons.

(https://i.imgur.com/lHKOfWe.png)
OPERATION RUSSIAN ROULETTE Phase 3

With results back, Commander Philippine Barbier had the order to go back to Earth immediately to report. As soon as her ship docked into Earth Shipyard the whole Navy Command was waiting to debrief her along with some representative of the government which would have reported in the Senate shortly after.

Thanks to the mission now we knew: the size of the enemy’s navy, the displacement of the ships or stations, the speed of their ships and missiles. Furthermore, we knew that the aliens could not pick up and detect a 7,000 tons ship at 225 Million Kilometers from their base. The tactical value of the mission was invaluable and the Commander was awarded not only with the mission ribbon but also with the Medal of Honor for the courage in volunteering for such risky operation.

(https://i.imgur.com/i2Ws0Zr.png)
Philippine Barbier Profile

Eventually, the commander also provided some interesting insights. Based on her observations and analysis, Philippine theorized that we were facing a sort of sentient species tasked with the protection of someone or something on the planet. In fact, it seemed like unless “activated” the alien ships would not move and or display any activity. Furthermore, as some signal could be traced back to the ones already known by the Federation, it seemed like all ships, once completed their mission, would just go back to their original position.

The martial order displayed made them more similar to machines than actual life forms.

Meanwhile, space exploration continued expedited. The most remarkable find was the Epsilon Indi System which displayed the impressive amount of 8 Jump Points leading into some very interesting systems. The good news was that none of them seemed to host life forms of any kind or to display any sort of hostility.

The strategic value of the system imposed consideration. Unfortunately with only 3 planets, there wasn’t much choice in terms of creating a working colony unless some remarkable mineral findings would have been shown by any of the 3 bodies. Before making any decision then the government ordered the survey of the system as a priority and reminded any decision to a later date.

If the system could not have supported an outpost in any way the strategy would have been to close access to Sol by controlling the WISE 1506+7027 System. On the 2nd of June 2169, reports indicated that there weren’t any TN mineral in any of the planets of Epsilon Indi, leaving then the command with no much choice than to go for the plan B.

On the other side of the galaxy, our scouts were encountering only empty systems to an extent that the sector was named as the Andromeda Void. Not many would have been comfortable in exploring in these areas which were more similar to what we thought space would have looked like a century ago.

(https://i.imgur.com/448eBDD.png)
Known Space 2169

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 21, 2020, 08:02:58 PM

Just a note - it looks like you posted the Promise-IJ class twice where you meant to post the Promise and Twilight refits.

Quote from: froggiest1982 on November 21, 2020, 02:32:01 AM

During all 2166 and 67, our new exploration fleet started to push boundaries of the Human Federation further and further. Apparently, after the systems beyond Struve, there was only empty space. The exploration was then diverted on the Centauri Systems and the other branch of the WISE Systems.

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On the 5th of May 2168, the Centauri Arm proved to be a dead-end at Luyten 726-8 limiting the expansion plans of the Federation to the only way still unexplored beyond the HH Andromedae System.

You seem to be getting quite unlucky on these dead ends. I can't even seem to get one dead end lately, and here you're closing off two whole branches in one update!

Quote

If the system could not have supported an outpost in any way the strategy would have been to close access to Sol by controlling the WISE 1506+7027 System. On the 2nd of June 2169, reports indicated that there weren’t any TN mineral in any of the planets of Epsilon Indi, leaving then the command with no much choice than to go for the plan B.

Seems like a hasty decision by the government. If there's good deposits in some of the moons or even asteroids, the strategic importance of that system would still justify placing a base on a suitable planet there and supporting it with resources from the outlying bodies. That's just a massive transport hub there to risk leaving open to alien occupation.

There's a lot of potentially important issues in this one, which could have a significant impact on the government dynamics. I say "could" but I fully expect the politicians to punt these questions down to the next mandate as the election cycle starts up again.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 21, 2020, 08:46:22 PM

I had to actually change the designs as I had to use new active sensors and engines so accidentally pasted and copied the same I guess, thanks for that I will amend the post.

Unfortunately the system had literally only 3 planets, that's it. No moons or asteroids or comets...

New election is going to be on 2 main factions: those who seek war and those who do not, hard to know who will prevail now that there are no ruins and mineral crisis to impact the formulas.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Election of 2171
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 22, 2020, 04:08:15 AM

The Election of 2171

As parties prepared for the first Election under full Federation rules, it was evident how there were 2 main blocks with different ideas. The first one, led by the Nationalists, wanted to invest in several new colonies to better cover the new expansion happened in the last decade. The plan was to secure the WISE 1506+7027 system and massively explore its connections. The Nationalists had the backing of the pacifist movement which sought the opportunity to go back in power through a popular ally.

On the other side, there were the Federalists and the Militarists which were pushing for a call to arms by the Federation against the Aliens in Altair. The main reasons were 2. The first was a strategic one. Humanity was able to explore space in great lengths everywhere but on the Sirius branch. The presence of Aliens did stop all the efforts in the sector and forced our survey vessels to find alternative routes to the systems beyond that point.

The second one was purely military. The Navy thought that we had the advantage of knowing more on them than the Aliens did on us. Our new military researches and technologies were modelled around the alien menace and all the Senior officers seriously thought of being able of defeating the enemy.

The biggest concern was on the speed as the enemy vessels which were still faster than our counterparts and this would have called for some ingenious tactics to be studied prior to attacking them.

As votes around the planets are counted and councillors are elected, the new Senate is sworn in.

(https://i.imgur.com/NOpdfLg.png)
Senate seats distribution after 2171 Election

Its new composition revealed that Democrats and Republican sentiment were still present, however, the majority was split between an Industrialist Federation which would have adopted the Militaristic line and a more Nationalist Federation which would have preferred the Pacifist line.

As the shadow of war hovered on the Federation, all parties but the Scientists started to plot on how to get the best out of the situation. The Scientists, in fact, could have favoured one line or the other without too much to lose considering that with or without their votes a majority would have been still possible.

The Militarists had more seats than the Pacifists and their strategy was to promise industrial and Scientific output thanks to the war keeping both these parties on their side. But this would have led some sympathies between the Nationalists as well thanks to the rise in employment and wealth pro capita rates.

The Nationalists knew that they would have still been an important part of the government and they needed just to get the best deal possible and that was identified in the one the Pacifists have offered.

All the Pacifists wanted was to go back in power and work to bring Democracy back. With 675 votes that would have been possible only if there weren't other majorities stronger than their claim; being not the case then the main goal was set into avoiding war at all costs. They offered full backing to the Nationalists in exchange of the opening of the Sirius outpost which would have led to a partial demilitarization of the Sirius System and a consequential civilian growth.

This strategy was very inclusive as the demilitarization of Sirius would have made happy all parties but the Military one. The Federalist would have obtained a brand new Colony and the industrialists a new civilian hub. Considering that, as said, the Scientists were out of the game and the Nationalists would have obtained the leadership it was easy to see why it succeeded.

(https://i.imgur.com/TY91kq8.png)
Possible Coalitions 2171

On the 1st of January 2171 then a new Nationalists Federation Government took power effective immediate, scrapping all military plans and starting the demilitarization of the Sirius System.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Winds of Change
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 26, 2020, 04:33:03 PM

2171/77 – Winds of Change

During January 2171, the government opened the Sirius System to civilian traffic. As it was forbidden to settle into the Military Outpost, the first order of business was to allow colonization from other worlds. The most populous world at the time was Mars. With a population larger than Earth, unemployment was starting to be a massive issue due to the majority of colonies being now closed for relocation and accepting only specialized workers. The Sirius outpost would have then been a good opportunity for the government to ease the Martian situation before would have become out of control.

A special permit was then issued for all those who would have welcomed the opportunity of moving out of Sol and find more fortune on Sirius.

While relocating to Mars or Luna 50 years ago would have allowed people to go back to Earth if things would have not worked out as they hoped, moving to another star system would have been a completely different journey. Currently, the civilian sector faster liner would have taken 2 months only to transport people on Sirius and another 2 to come back. With tickets sold out for years, the risk was to get stuck on the planet, liking it or not, for not less than 5 years.

This would have also been something that people had to consider before accepting relocation.

Another negative aspect was the environment. Many of the colonists would have been already coming from a harsh youth in temporary accommodation and installations. Having being able to enjoy the surface only in the latest few decades, to go back into a non terraformed planet was not appealing.

To counter these concerns raised by the potential colonists, the government started the effort to terraform the Sirius Outpost immediately, but with only one Tug the operation would have taken a while. As the shipyards were all busy refitting the class Elysium freighters for more important missions, the build of new Tugs would have not been possible till the end of the government cycle in 6 years' time.

The new Elysium class Freighter was the first step of the massive expansion of the civilian fleet promised by the Nationalists. Many believed that while the military was finally looked after, the civilian fleet was left rotting and undeveloped for too long.

The Elysium was used as the banner of such a campaign. While the truth was that the freighter was projected carefully and it managed to last long because of that, the Nationalists spun the narrative that our freighters were built in the early 2100 and now had more than 70 years under their belly. They were consuming more fuel than the one needed and their old armor required more Duranium than necessary.

A new class was then designed and all freighters were ordered to refit by the end of the year 2173.

Furthermore, all fleets were expanded from 4 to 5 vessels, which was the strategy of the early days of the Democracy and it was changed under Ertegün but criticized ever since.

Quote

UNEC Elysium-I class Freighter 40,000 tons 133 Crew 474.3 BP TCS 800 TH 844 EM 0
1054 km/s Armour 1-104 Shields 0-0 HTK 63 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 7 Max Repair 50 MSP
Cargo 25,000 Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 8
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Small) (9) Power 843.8 Fuel Use 2.18% Signature 93.75 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 653,000 Litres Range 134.6 billion km (1477 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

After having discussed the logistic, the government wanted to ensure that exploration would have been again the cornerstone of the Federation. With military plans and ambitions finally aside and the renew and strengthen of our defensive fleets, it was time to set foot deeper in the galaxy.

The expansion of the Survey Fleet would have played a central role in this and plans were made to expand the number of Promise class up to 20 units along with the impressive number of 28 Twilight class.

As expansion and exploration progressed faster, in 2172 another Ruined Alien Settlement was discovered on the newly discovered Gliese 257 System. Having already dealt with similar situations, the government ordered exploration to continue and marked the site as temporarily not relevant.

Meanwhile, on the 21st of December 2172, the jump into the Ross 619 System revealed the first Earth-like planet to be discovered. Potentially, the planet did not need any terraforming to be colonized, and to make it absolutely perfect it needed only a slightly warmer temperature.

The first years of 2173 were spent expanding the number of automated mines on the Sirius Outpost. The goal was to have enough minerals to produce basic stuff directly on-site and also to ship minerals back on Earth which was starting to suffer the depletion of minerals in Alpha Centauri mining complexes. Thankfully, on the 3rd of August, a sensational discovery happened. The jump into the previously unknown system of EG372 revealed to be a potential mining Eden. Besides the 2 Planets and 29 Moons, the system had a remarkable amount of 666 Asteroids within.

The only known system with so many asteroids so far was Sol.

Shortly after the discovery, operations of refit and upgrade of the Military fleets were completed and the Defensive Fleet Alpha and Beta were reorganized to include the new designs and ships. Eventually, one was sent to Sirius to provide protection in the system.

(https://i.imgur.com/iROfUM6.png)
Sirius Defensive Fleet Alpha OOB

(https://i.imgur.com/pGTEEQz.png)
Sol Defensive Fleet Alpha OOB

On the 2nd of October 2173 the discovery of a connection to EV Lacartae from DEN 1048-3956 redesigned space as we knew it. Apparently, there was a loop connecting the Andromedae Arm with Sirius one. The discovery puzzled the Scientists as a new concept of dormant jump points started to be openly discussed in the scientific community. The theory was that some jump points could have been opened only from one side and they could not be detected and therefore used until that side would have been discovered. With this new knowledge exploration of the nearby systems became even more important.

As theorized, in 2174, a new loop from the Andromedae Arm was discovered but this time it led to the Luhman 16 arm via Epsilon Indi through another dormant jump point. In only 2 years Lacertae became then the system with the most strategic value of the known space, even more than the Epsilon Indi one. In fact, its position was central respective to the whole Federation Territory and it was also close to the highly valuable EG372 System which in time would have been hopefully become the main source of minerals for Earth.

Meanwhile, operations to collect minerals in Alpha Centauri completed, and plans to move the mines elsewhere had to be drawn. With Alpha Centauri-A II as the best candidate due to having deposits of all TN Minerals, the government allowed a different strategy than the one used before.

As Alpha Centauri and Ultima Centauri were effectively a dead end, it was decided to use the Osiris class to build a gate network opening the system to the Civilian Sector and exploitation as well.

The civilian would have then been tasked to move the majority of the installation from the asteroids to the planet, incurring virtually no effort from any federation ships. This would have resulted in a massive save of fuel, personnel and it would have stimulated the civilian presence into the systems. If all would have gone as planned this should have also attracted some investors and potential growth in taxes and wealth.

With the plan drafted, to start it would have been necessary to relocate the tenders. The problem was that the Herald class Tug was still busy in moving all the terraforming stations from Mercury to Sirius. As the limited amount of tugging machinery was already discussed and with the completion of the freighters upgrade, the government finally decided to build and design a new Herald class Tug.

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UNEC Herald-I class Tug 11,500 tons 86 Crew 351.3 BP TCS 230 TH 750 EM 0
3260 km/s Armour 1-45 Shields 0-0 HTK 44 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 19 Max Repair 100 MSP
Tractor Beam
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Medium) (5) Power 750 Fuel Use 1.73% Signature 150 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 341,000 Litres Range 309.3 billion km (1098 days at full power)

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

As the end of the legislation approached and with all plans set in motion, the government started to look at the exploitation of the new ruins in the Gliese 257 System. The proposed operation, called Black Swan due to the connection with the Cygni system, would have started as soon as another important matter would have been solved.

In fact, since the uncovering of the installations in Struve, nothing was done to actually plan what to do with them. The most important discovery was the weapons that would have to be analyzed by the scientists on Earth. To do so, we should have brought them back first. Thanks to the new Elysium-I class, a return trip to Struve from Earth was finally viable.

All freighters were then ordered to start bringing back all the alien technology and installation starting from the particle beams. Once on Earth, a team of Scientists disassembled the alien weapons and found some very valuable information that would have cut our efforts in researching the 2 respective techs by 94%.

(https://i.imgur.com/raFOnoC.png)
Known Space 2177

On the 1st of January 2177 elections were then due in all Federation’s planets. The past six years were characterized by a crescent Republican sentiment mounting through the population which was also starting to realize why the Federation as it was conceived would have not worked in the long run.

The limitation in resettling, the weight a planet with minerals could impose on those without, high unemployment rates and many other causes were also responsible for a shared vision of independence in some planets more than others.

With the parties busier in discussing if we should have gone to war or not, soon everybody detached from the real issues on the territory. The Federalists' form adopted, unfortunately, did not account for the most important component Democracy was bringing in. In the old Democracy, people represented people in a way that everybody felt personal but on a collective scale, while in the Federation model people represented planets where the collective scale was replaced by a group of people, a very specific group of people to be honest. And therein lies the rub…

How could the government keep planets united under a flag if every Senate representative was trying to bring the water to their wells only and without caring for the implication of that on other planets?

As said this question resulted in two answers: those who said they were better off alone and those who believed a restructure was needed. Having the Democracy already “failed” maybe a hybrid between the Democracy and the Federalism could have been the solution. A new Republic with Democratic powers and Federalists ideals was the answer.

Soon the election turned then to be a referendum for Humanity to stick together or simply part ways.

When the first results started to come in, plans were already in motion on Mars and Sirius to present their separation motions. Mars had an incredible amount of people that needed a job and the potential to grow larger than Earth. The mineral situation was the same as Earth and considering both depended on other colonies, Mars felt that it deserved the chance to have part of the manufacturing sector to be relocated from the capital which was, on the other hand, always short of workers.

Sirius, instead, had access to military forces, all TN minerals were present on the planet, and thanks to the first intake of colonists it did now also have a decent amount of population.

By the time all senators were elected, everything was drawn and ready to be put for discussion.

(https://i.imgur.com/BP4Uqqq.png)
Elected Seats 2177

As the new Senate formed, talkings started between factions to form a majority in the house. The 2 main factions of the Separatists and the Republicans were fighting to the last seat and for almost a week the situation was pretty clear: Sirius and Mars wanted out and the government wasn’t ready to concede two colonies to leave at the same time. Furthermore, to have Sol “contested” by two powers wasn’t even considered.

Negotiations then revolved around getting Mars back on board and may allow Sirius to go his way. Mostly, to get Mars would have also meant investing much less in terms of resources as the planet was one of the first colonies and the amount of infrastructure and economic requests as damage reparation advanced by the Martian Federal Government were simply insane.

To agree in staying, Mars demanded the dismissal of the Federal System and the institution of a Republic as the latest attempt to make things work for the sake of humanity. The government found the request acceptable but there was still the Sirius matter to sort out.

The vote had to take place anyway and if the Separatists, even without Mars, would have the majority, then the Senate would have been forced to deal with that.

(https://i.imgur.com/1upwlzu.png)
Possible Coalitions 2177

Finally, at the end of an exhausting week, votes were cast and with only 1 vote difference the Senate approved the motion for Sirius to leave the Federation. With satisfaction and to the general amazement, the separatist delegates left the house immediately communicating that their demands would have followed as soon as they would have reached Sirius unharmed.

The Senate needed then to ratify a new motion to make the new government legit as such a situation wasn’t constitutionally regulated. General chaos and protests followed the departure of the separatists' exit from the Senate with people talking over each other, Martians rethinking their strategy and threatening again to leave when Admiral Lahab Mansoor, leader of the Republican party, asked to be heard.

Only him, known to be courageous and decisive could have tamed such a wild crowd. His dogmatic and inflexive tone, after only a few words, managed to get the attention of all the remaining Senators. In a speech that would have touched topics such as unity, pride, and courage of the human race the Admiral proposed to go on with what was agreed. The republicans were the second faction after the separatists and having lost by only 1 vote they deserved the chance to govern. Furthermore, the promise made to the Martian people had to be respected and fulfilled to avoid further divisions.

What left of the government then decided to move on allowing 1 year for a new election campaign to be undertaken. A new Republic would have been formed after that and life would have resumed as it was before this nefarious day. The current transitional government would have managed only the treaty with the Sirius Separatists in the attempt of getting the best deal possible.

As the Sirius Separatists delegates reached their colony, they found the Navy waiting for them. Fearing the worse, only a bunch of them attended the meeting while the others were ready to flee. With surprise, they found out that the whole fleet stationed at Sirius was backing the separation. Under Federation rules, the fleet was tasked to serve and protect the Sirius Outpost Federal Government and Population, therefore, to carry on their duty regardless of the events was the right thing to do.

Obviously, all those who had families off-world were given the choice to go back to Sol Navy Command.

The Military garrison was disbanded shortly after and replaced with a Sirius Police Force entirely composed of Sirius residents. With the majority of the people coming from a military background due to the early years of military exclusivity, it wasn’t hard to find Crewmen and Soldiers to fill the ranks.

The next step would have been to claim was due from the Federation.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on November 26, 2020, 11:05:25 PM

So now a colony has declared independence - that's a plot twist to be sure! :o Hopefully this is not an omen of things to come as humanity fractures into small system-states and eventually gets overrun by some opportunistic NPRs.

Will you now be playing as both factions or does Sirius now become a NPR with a certain amount of ex-Federation assets transferred over?

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Sirius Treaty
Post by: Froggiest1982 on November 29, 2020, 02:13:02 AM

2177 – The Sirius Treaty
Disclaimer: For RP and AAR purpose, while I will still be managing the Separatists, there will be no info on their policies, researches and strategy in general. This decision is due to the fact that this is the story of the main race and I think it will be more interesting for the reader to not knowing what humanity is facing as it will also reflect the uncertainty of the main characters while the story unveils.

As internal politics and issues got sorted, The Federation started negotiations with the Sirius Separatists. Initials demands were quite steep but it was clear that Sirius delegates did not want to be involved in a civil war which, despite the new acquired Navy, would have seen them in clear disadvantage.

Initial requests included: Access to all technology and military designs, exclusivity on the Sirius Mining Rights which included the Santana Ores Civilian Mining Colony, a non-negotiable 5-year truce, enough infrastructure to support self-sustenance of the colony.

If everything else could have been arranged, the number of infrastructures requested was beyond tolerable. 4 Shipyards, 2 Naval and 2 Commercial, 250 construction factories, 150 between fuel refineries, ordnance factories and fighter factories, 10 Research Facilities, 200 Maintenance Facilities, 10 Ground Force Construction Complexes, 1 Naval Headquarter and 1 Sector Command.

After 4 months of bargaining, a compromise was finally reached.

Sirius would have then obtained 2 Shipyards of the maximum tonnage, 1 Naval and 1 Commercial, 150 Construction Factories, 36 between refineries, ordnance and fighter factories, 5 Research Facilities, 150 Maintenance Facilities, 5 GroundForces Complexes, and 1 Naval Headquarter.

The main concern for the government on Earth was on the militarization of the Sirius System. For this reason, not only all the military infrastructure included in the deal were reduced as less as possible, but even the data on the alien technologies were excluded from the treaty.

Ultimately, the goal was to allow Sirius to survive without threatening the Federation in the short term. They were still human after all and deserved to be helped and not abandoned.

During the year leading to elections, all that was discussed was if Earth should have or not reclaimed the lost colony. Obviously, the treaty imposed a 5 years truce, however, contracts are made to be broken or at least that was what the militaristic side of the government thought.

Besides, it was to be expected that the newly formed Separatist Government on Sirius would have not just been sitting there watching and the large military requirements were a clear statement in this direction.

With Sirius gone, the Federation was left without a reliable source of minerals. Operations in Alpha Centauri were still far away from being of effective value and some minerals were to be monitored closely to avoid bottlenecks in production or research. Neutronium, Mercassium, Sorium, Uridium, and Gallicite were all getting close to critical levels. The big blow was the amount of Automated Mines which were shipped over Sirius and that would take a few years to replace.

It was calculated that 388 auto mines were invested in total on the Sirius Outpost which meant 7 years of production and over 90,000 tons of Corundium and 90,000 Credits. If we added all the other infrastructures it was clear that, even if shrunk to the bare minimum, the treaty still costed humanity more than they could afford. It goes without saying that the possibility of a civil war would have brought only more impoverishment if conflicts would have really broken between the 2 parties.

Operations to replenish the fleet started immediately with the Construction of 2 May-I B, 4 Danilov-I B, and 4 Patriot-I PD. As it may be needed to move the fighters close to the action, research started to develop Space Carriers. 4 More Army Infantry Brigades were ordered to start training to ensure Earth could deploy extra defences on all colonies avoiding any weak point to be found in case of attack.

Meanwhile, political leaders started their campaigns from Earth. As known, Admiral Lahab Mansoor would have run for the presidency for the Republican Party.

(https://i.imgur.com/xIaYJaF.png)
Lahab Mansoor Profile

Against him, the Democrats proposed Sol Sector civilian administrator Hahn Myung-Sok, which gained the respect of many during his spell as Earth Governor.

(https://i.imgur.com/hvnuSpp.png)
Hahn Myung-Sok Profile

The Federalists, which could still count on many supporters, proposed the candidacy of General Pyung Chung-Hee an energetic and optimistic natural-born leader.

(https://i.imgur.com/ivIaUkK.png)
Pyung Chung-Hee Profile

The election would have taken place on the 1st of January 2178 and the winner would have been elected chancellor for the following 4 years as per new Republic laws and constitution.

The Republic was a government whose authority was based on citizen voters, which were represented by elected or nominated officials chosen in free elections to be part of the Senate. The number of seats would have been determined by the number of eligible voters and it was capped at 2,000 seats. The most important figure of the Senate would have been the Chancellor which would have been elected directly from the people. After the election of the Chancellor, a majority would be needed to rule and only the coalition of powers with the 50%+1 seats in total would have been allowed to govern and present motions while to reform the constitution the motion would have to be approved by 2/3 of the Senate.

As a result of the vote, the Republican candidate and leader was elected Chancellor of the New Republic with a bit more than the 38% of the preferences. Immediately after, the Federalist candidate could count on 33% of the preferences. With surprise, most parties could count on a very similar amount of seats in the Senate.

(https://i.imgur.com/aai1jFC.png)
Seat Distribution 2178

(https://i.imgur.com/UzUbbUQ.png)
Chancellor Election 2178

The 2 main factions emerged from the election were the Interventists or, as they called themselves, the War Party and the Nationalists.

The War Party wanted to scrap the treaty and attack Sirius while most vulnerable. Their tactic was strike first, strike hard. It was noted that currently, the forces were balanced, but in a few years, the gap could have been increased thanks to high military output the Republic could display. This would have also ensured that Sirius would not have been able to increase their military capabilities.

The Nationalists had a similar view on the Sirius Treaty. For them to take back the colony was paramount, however, to respect interstellar treaties and accords was also a priority. Eventually, the people on Sirius would have to be reintroduced into the new Republic and with a backstabbing reputation that could have been harder than already was. For the Nationalists the attack on Sirius would have been possible then only after 2182.

One thing was for sure then, either now or in 5 years the Republic would have been at war with the Sirus Separatists.

(https://i.imgur.com/aaLkSnt.png)
Possible Coalitions 2178

With the official winner of the War Party, preparations started to get the Navy ready for battle. Admiral Mansoor summoned the war council for the 1st of February 2178. In the meantime, he would have started looking into the production, research and military-industrial plans.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The new Republic and the fratricidal war
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 02, 2020, 08:31:27 PM

2178/81 – The new Republic and the fratricidal war

Due to the plan of betraying the Separatists, the Chancellor decided to use his constitutional powers to change the media freedom of the ex Federation. Even if the new system could have been controlled, the government needed to ensure that the population would have not been fully aware of a few things. One was the real nature of the treaty, second, the war should have been portrayed as going well regardless of the real result and losses, and third was who attacked first.

Admiral Mansoor drafted a new regulation which would have obliged all the media platform to run the agencies through a new department created ad hoc for the legislation. In what could have been easily called censorship the government also replaced all those who were not complacent with the new directives.
As preparation for the war to retake Sirius started, all the exploration surveys were ordered to halt. All ships would have been still tasked to complete scanning of all existing systems, however, jump into a new system through unexplored jump points was forbidden.

While all the military programs started during the transitional government would have been completed the Admiral and President Mansoor ordered a new different Sirius class to be built. While the Sirius was perfect as a support vessel to transport ordnance, fuel, and supplies to another world equipped to receive them, it wouldn’t be helpless in space. This new ship would have functioned as support vessels for the ships in the Sirius system if and when needed.

Quote

UNEC Destiny-I class Support Vessel 24,999 tons 222 Crew 924 BP TCS 500 TH 1,250 EM 0
2500 km/s Armour 1-76 Shields 0-0 HTK 73 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 10,023 Max Repair 39.0625 MSP
Magazine 1,000 Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 2
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive (Low Fuel) ( 8 ) Power 1250.0 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 156.25 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 5,198,000 Litres Range 478.2 billion km (2213 days at full power)
Refuelling Capability: 60,000 litres per hour Complete Refuel 86 hours

Sting Anti-Ship Missile MK2 (166) Speed: 24,433 km/s End: 10.6m Range: 15.5m km WH: 3 Size: 6 TH: 105/63/31
Ordnance Transfer Rate: 40 MSP per hour Complete Transfer 25 hours

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

During the planning of this new ship, it became evident that a fully functioning Carrier would have also been too hard to produce. The options were then 2: either giving up the carrier project or accept to have a light carrier to operate fast long-range fighters.

The second option was the preferred one but it would have required the design of a new fighter bomber and long-range missiles.

The Admiralty decided then to produce a missile frigate to compensate for the impossibility of carrying the fighters all the way to Sirius. A new Series of missiles was designed to work with the new vessel.

Quote

Danilov-I M class Missile Frigate 12,000 tons 168 Crew 1,415.7 BP TCS 240 TH 862 EM 2,760
3593 km/s Armour 6-46 Shields 92-460 HTK 93 Sensors 6/6/0/0 DCR 17 PPV 75
Maint Life 4.98 Years MSP 986 AFR 145% IFR 2.0% 1YR 66 5YR 991 Max Repair 107.81 MSP
Magazine 500
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (4) Power 862.5 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 901,000 Litres Range 16.7 billion km (53 days at full power)
Delta Shields (Medium) (2) Recharge Time 460 seconds (0.2 per second)

Hammer Box Launcher (50) Missile Size: 10 Hangar Reload 158 minutes MF Reload 26 hours
Area Search Fire Control FC58-R100 (2) Range 58.5m km Resolution 100
Hammer Anti-Ship Missile (50) Speed: 23,620 km/s End: 38.2m Range: 54.2m km WH: 8 Size: 10.00 TH: 86/51/25

Commercial GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 25.7m km Resolution 100
Commercial EM (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km
Commercial TH (1) Sensitivity 6 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 19.4m km

Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The new Danilov Missile Frigate would have also displayed the first series of shields. The priority of the ship was to have enough alpha strike to pass through enemy point defense, to achieve that no anti-missiles countermeasures could have been installed. Surely it would have been possible but it was decided to invest in protection instead.

With the plan to attack Sirius before 2182 and the Patriot-I BS needed to guide the strike force ready in March along with 4 of the Missile Frigates, the government decided to launch operation “RETAKE” in July, leaving some time for the crew to practice.

The Strike Force build by the would have been as follow:

Sol Strike Force Alpha
May-I B class Destroyer: UNEN Hailey, UNEN Pope
May-I BL class Destroyer Leader: UNEN Leftwich
Danilov-I B class Heavy Frigate: UNEN Danae, UNEN Dauntless, UNEN Dundas, UNEN Exeter, UNEN Gloucester, UNEN Penelope, UNEN Phoebe, UNEN Scarborough
Danilov-I M class Missile Frigate: UNEN Simoom, UNEN Sleuth, UNEN Trenchant, UNEN Vulpine
Patriot-I BS class Corvette: UNEN Eclipse, UNEN Undaunted
Patriot-I PD class Corvette: UNEN Esk, UNEN Exmouth, UNEN Opportune, UNEN Plover, UNEN Radiant, UNEN Tara, UNEN Ulster, UNEN Vigilant, UNEN Violet, UNEN Wren

The mission would have been led by Medal of Honor Commodore Philippine Barbier and Rear Admiral Sevastian Tkachyov.

On the 8th of July 2181, Strike Force Alpha broke Earth’s orbit destination, Sirius. The plan was to jump into the system, send the Missile Frigates ahead to surprise the Separatists who would have been not aware of the new ships and try to negotiate a surrender without the need of invading the planet.

The Date was picked to ensure that Sirius Separatists' outpost would have been at the closest possible location to the Sol jump point. This would have allowed lesser time travel and fuel consumption.

The Strike Fleet arrived in Sirius on the 24th of July 2181 at 8:13 am.

(https://i.imgur.com/3PZTcs7.png)
Arrival to Sirius

The mission included 3 waypoints. The Alpha position was to be reached by the whole Fleet. Once there the Missile Frigates would have moved into Position Beta achieving attack position prior to moving in to strike point followed by the rest of the fleet. We knew that shielded ships would have been detected earlier but we would have counted on it as we wanted the enemy fleet to come close and possibly into missile range.

Furthermore, assuming fighters could have been built by Sirius Separatists and with the sensor fighters having only a 0.9 billion kilometers range, we could have been expected a minimum attack range to be set around the 450 million kilometers mark.

(https://i.imgur.com/kuWFBcc.png)
Danger Zone

On the 26th of July 2181 at 3:28 pm, Sirius authorities contacted the government asking for explanations for the 15 Ships directed towards the planet at 500 million kilometers distance. Based on their report we could assume that they still weren’t been able to see almost half of our ships in the system.

At 8:46 pm, as we reached the 450 million kilometers mark we received further communication threatening to launch fighters to intercept what considered hostile ships if the course would have not been reversed immediately. With our sensors still blank, all missile tubes were ordered to be loaded and active sensors were being switched on, as there was no point in hiding our intentions anymore.

On the 27th of July 2181 at 1:38 am we reached Position Alpha and the Missile Frigates were ordered to move to position beta. One Patriot-I BS was aggregated to provide sensor support and act as the eyes of the sub-fleet.

(https://i.imgur.com/SLRXeXX.png)
Position Alpha

At 10:50 am, Position Beta was reached, and both formations were then ordered to close in as per the original plan.

(https://i.imgur.com/cNzN5H2.png)
Ready to Move In

A few hours later, at 6:41 pm, the Separatists Fleet was finally spotted in intercepting course towards our missile frigates. All contacts were known which meant the Separatists did not have increased or upgraded their designs during these years.

(https://i.imgur.com/ZuII57Q.png)
Contact

At 7:10 pm, knowing the PD capabilities of the enemy, a full 25 volley per ship was ordered to be launched. The order was justified as a test of our own PD capability at expense of Separatists. Describe such action and sanction it as a test was seen as horrifying in many crewmen. The targeted ships would have been the ones in higher tonnage: UNEN Brinkley Bass, UNEN Haynsworth, UNEN Ingraham, UNEN Andromeda, UNEN Nottingham, and UNEN Plymouth. In case of success, we could have expected a high number of casualties.

As ships started to fire the Admiral was furious as no synchronization was allowed, furthermore, the different preparation of the crew resulted in even more different launching times. This would have allowed the enemy to counter our missiles better and consequentially the test of our PD capabilities would have been effective only in case of some hits while even in case no hits would have been scored we would have never known if due to a poor number of missiles per salvo or actual PD effectiveness.

(https://i.imgur.com/dN8LLhY.png)
Missiles Launch

A few minutes later, at 7:38 pm, as missiles started to strike targets the fleet was ordered to rejoin the main strike group.

The test went better than expected. Not only we could penetrate the PD defenses with most of the missiles but we could score some interesting hits. The data collected showed that our ships could have absorbed a fair amount of damage without exploding. As no ships were destroyed by our strength 8 warheads and knowing the aliens were on the strength 6 marks, we could have assumed that even more hits would have been able to be absorbed by our armor against the aliens.

However, the number of missiles got through the PD line of defense was concerning as alien missiles would have also been faster than ours, therefore, harder to be shot down.

(https://i.imgur.com/zIiY7HL.png)
Attack Report

While retreating, at 9:22 pm, the group spotted a fighter right in front of them with active sensors on. Even if not frightened by the fighters per se, the admiralty was puzzled on how they were able to pass between lines undetected, this has possibly highlighted an issue with our detection that should have been fixed as soon as possible.

(https://i.imgur.com/bm3sei1.png)
Fighter Contact

Only 4 minutes later, at 9:26 pm, 7 TH contacts appeared on the radar. As expected fighters did open fire. The missiles observed were faster than our Stings so without question the Separatists did research and develop new missiles in the attempt of catching us unprepared. Thinking that this would have been a good test for our shields the PD of the escort corvette was ordered to act only in self-defense. At 9:29 pm all missiles hit UNEN Trenchant with shields absorbing them all and holding at 54%. As soon as missiles hit the active contact and with that, the fighter disappeared.

(https://i.imgur.com/BeWnjIb.png)
Shields Test

Immediately after, the Sirius Separatist Navy acknowledging the superiority of the enemy, sent an unconditional surrender letter to Earth’s Admiralty which was accepted. The government contacted the Sirius counterpart asking for the colony to accept defeat. The response of the Separatists was unexpected. If Earth wanted Sirius back it had to be done by force.

The Strike Force was ordered back to Earth while Troop Transports started to load troops for the ground invasion. The space part of the Retake operation was concluded with success and all participants would have been awarded the operation badge once back on Earth.

The ground invasion started on 8th October 2181 at 7:29 am with 3 Army Infantry Brigades dropped on Sirius-A IV surface. As combat carried on during the following months, the Troop Transports were tasked to Bring backup from Earth.

Meanwhile on Earth elections were approaching fast and all the candidates were campaigning in Sol. As expected the main topic was the war and the peace. The War party kept calling the people on Sirius either Separatists or Rebels and pushing for the war to continue while the Nationalists were using words such as brothers or allies against the real threat: the aliens, pushing for hostilities to stop asap.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 03, 2020, 12:24:08 PM

Sirius really should have expected this, the poor preparedness of their fleet and lack of serious upgrades compared to UNEN is the sort of things heads will be rolling for, if Sirius somehow manages to defend themselves and stay independent without a fleet.

I see two major consequences coming out of this. On one hand, the willingness of UNEN to go to war with their own species to preserve the union (or whatever term you like...empire, perhaps?) will likely cast a pall on those who until now have had a more utopian view of human expansion. On the other hand, any future independence movements will know that they must be far more prepared if they want to stand against UNEN, perhaps even to the point of waiting until a war with aliens breaks out on the other side of the galaxy to break away. A really nefarious breakaway government might even provoke such a war...

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 03, 2020, 02:23:42 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on December 03, 2020, 12:24:08 PM

Sirius really should have expected this, the poor preparedness of their fleet and lack of serious upgrades compared to UNEN is the sort of things heads will be rolling for, if Sirius somehow manages to defend themselves and stay independent without a fleet.

I see two major consequences coming out of this. On one hand, the willingness of UNEN to go to war with their own species to preserve the union (or whatever term you like...empire, perhaps?) will likely cast a pall on those who until now have had a more utopian view of human expansion. On the other hand, any future independence movements will know that they must be far more prepared if they want to stand against UNEN, perhaps even to the point of waiting until a war with aliens breaks out on the other side of the galaxy to break away. A really nefarious breakaway government might even provoke such a war...

Sirius had 2 major issues while preparing for war. One was wealth which was depleted fast and impacted production of fighters, a new missile Corvette, and the new missiles. This last part was the most important. When the 6 ready fighters broke Sirius orbit, they had loaded only the new available missiles (7) leaving the 166 existing Stings on the surface. This limited their offensive capability quite a lot.

Second, not being able to see the bulk of the fleet, they moved in to attack the advancing frigates which they assumes being put upfront only because of the shields and could not imagine the missile surprise.

Once alpha strike hit and with the rest of the fleet in sight it was clear that they had lost air superiority because you need to remember that as Earth new the Navy of Sirius, so did Sirius know the one on Earth. All transponder signals were new but of the same classes, meaning that Sol Alpha Fleet was still anchored on Earth and potentially could have join the fight if required.

The problem for Earth is that war is far from over because ground invasion it's not going as they expected. Sirius did organize a full Police Corp and few companies of tanks and mechanized infantry, supplies are depleting fast and enemy is dug in. Reinforcement are months away and election is behind the corner. What if pacifists win the election and force a truce?

The admiralty is pushing for war to continue as they want to seize the Navy on Sirius, rest, reload and move against the aliens as soon as possible. They confident and hungry for war. By the time they are able to move in Altair another 4 or 8 Missile frigates will be ready, the question is: will it be enough? Me as player don't think so, the problem is that I am not in charge!

The military effort has also stopped the civilian expansion, Alpha Centaury it's not ready to support Earth yet and operations have stopped entirely, this resulted in a mineral crisis with 3 TN minerals now completely absent on Earth stockpiles. This will take 2 or 3 years to rectify.

On the political note, the Republic guarantees unity, so unless a rebel movement arise, we should be safe from other civil wars as rebels will eventually refurbish only the political side.

Finally, admiral Mansoor have to watch out Philippine Barbier: she is got now 2 important field badges, 1 medal of honor, and a war won under the belly. She is a rising star and quite bright too. A change of leadership might be inevitable at some point and that might also change the Republic's priorities.

The occupation of Sirius would also mean dealing with unrest and hostile population, as you can guess this does not cope well with "democratic" systems.

Well I have pretty much spoiled the next update, so I guess I'll have to come up with something ;D

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The political guillotine
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 03, 2020, 06:14:35 PM

2182 – The political guillotine

On the 1st of January 2182 election was then due for the second time in Republican history. The past four years were characterized by the war against the Sirius Separatists.

The focus on the war left many aspects of day-to-day life undiscussed and unresolved. The problem was the all oppositions were following the government committing the same error of not addressing these crescent issues. The opposition was in fact focused only on peace talkings.

With the parties busier in discussing if we should have continued the war or not then, soon all the people starting to feel again left aside and federalists thoughts came back hard on people’s mind. The TN mineral crisis on Earth would have not been resolved soon as operations on Alpha Centauri were abandoned. The good news was that the gate network was built and potentially ready to be used. Thanks to that the civilian fleet did move quite a few Automated Mines on the planet surface but no ships were built or tasked to pick up the minerals yet.

More effort would have been required also to produce fuel with refineries on Earth now out of Sorium and consequential shut of the refining efforts resulting in unemployment mounting up every day.

Mars, Luna, and Mercury kept growing but no new jobs were created for them and the percentage of the population turning into criminals started to spike considerably. Rumors have it that pirates were also starting to appear in the Sol system. While the government and Navy did not have any actual proof of that, there were mounting concerns pretty much everywhere with fees going up and pricing increasing across all the board.

The above did not help the already difficult position many were in as credits weren’t easy to earn on any colony.

The Sirius matter did impact the Republic more than it was estimated, at least on the economic aspect. Furthermore, refugees coming from the Separatists Colony confessed that the last few years were quite harsh on Sirius-A IV. Given the complete absence of any sort of economy on the planet, the government ran fast out of money, and without the support of the Republic, things started to spiral down fast.

Criminal syndicates were controlling all the market which was mostly left out of reach of all primary goods forcing people to use the black market often and often. Some have admitted to turning their wives as a guarantee for payment with the women turn into prostitutes until the husbands were able to pay back their debt. As war erupted and with the police busier in defending major cities, the situation became even worse.

A period of great decadence would have awaited humanity regardless of the outcome of the war.

All candidates were the same as the previous election with the difference on the increased prestige of Admiral Mansoor which thanks to the new media system and news coming from the front always more bright than they actually were, started to be seen as a hero by many and as a foe by as many.

As much as the media could portrait the war as a success, a lot of families started to do not hear back from their dears at the front. The army command tried to pin the guilt on the logistic and communication departments which were overloaded by requests. As that wasn’t working as thought, the narrative shifted over the Separatists being able to disrupt communication in and out the planet's surface. Ultimately, due to security reasons, it was told that the soldiers were forbidden to communicate from the front.

Obviously, the story that everything was going well and no casualties were reported after months of the war did not last very long, and with the first list of casualties being released by the authorities so the first pacifist movements started to appear in every colony.

(https://i.imgur.com/3ZX7Yhu.png)
Candidates Prestige 2182

When the first results started to come in, the republican and federalist candidates were pretty much always tied. The election would have most likely been a close one and that could have not been good considering the amount of trouble everywhere that was awaiting the winner. Humanity would have required strong and firm leadership, a clear and undisputed winner able to make the necessary changes to turn things around.

(https://i.imgur.com/d2scY74.png)
Elected Seats 2182

(https://i.imgur.com/G8NUNrO.png)
Chancellor Election 2182

As the new Senate formed, talkings started between factions to form a majority in the house. With the Federalists being the faction with most seats in the house and having been able to elect a Chancellor even if only by a handful of votes, they were tasked to lead the government for the following 4 years.

The choice was between embrace Federalism again or to clash the separatists once and for all and move on with a new Unite Human Galactic Republic. The 2 main factions, the War Party and the Federalists were then left fighting to the last seat and in the end, the only possible solution to have a functioning government in a few days was to agree to a secret vote. The problem was that many of the Federalists elected seats were actually supporters of the War Party and they refused to vote for or against the Federalist option openly.

The anonymous ballot would have guaranteed to them to keep their seats in the party but to vote for what they really thought was needed.

(https://i.imgur.com/gkrasTR.png)
Possible Coalitions 2182

As the last votes were getting cast, victory was already in the hands of the War Party. The Senate ratified then a new motion allowing the war to continue.

With all urgent matters settled and with a double stain on his persona: the lost election, and the hiding of casualties from devastated families; Admiral Mansoor was forced to leave the leadership of the republican party and also of the navy. He was recognized as a very important asset for the whole navy and so it was decided that his experience would have been better served at Earth’s Flight and Combat school.

Evidently exiled from the political scene, humiliated publicly, and stripped by all powers, Admiral Mansoor accepted his fate with dignity and professionalism as it was expected from a person of his rank and integrity. At the end of the day, the Admiral always tried to do what he thought would have been best for his people. However, with doubt history would have been as kind to him as he could have possibly hoped.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Vasious on December 03, 2020, 09:11:22 PM

Really enjoy the narrative thus far.

One quick question, I did not quite follow.

What leverage did Sirius have for Earth to cede a bounty of facilities to the

2 Shipyards of the maximum tonnage, 1 Naval and 1 Commercial, 150 Construction Factories, 36 between refineries, ordnance and fighter factories, 5 Research Facilities, 150 Maintenance Facilities, 5 Ground Forces Complexes, and 1 Naval Headquarter

Assuming they were not already what was present on Sirius and I just misunderstood, but it seem like Earth agreed to ship all that to Sirius in addition to acknowledging their Independence.

Did Earth get anything out of it, in exchange or was it just a concession to game play by giving Sirius enough to be a functioning faction?

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 03, 2020, 09:39:30 PM

Quote from: Vasious on December 03, 2020, 09:11:22 PM

Really enjoy the narrative thus far.

One quick question, I did not quite follow.

What leverage did Sirius have for Earth to cede a bounty of facilities to the

2 Shipyards of the maximum tonnage, 1 Naval and 1 Commercial, 150 Construction Factories, 36 between refineries, ordnance and fighter factories, 5 Research Facilities, 150 Maintenance Facilities, 5 Ground Forces Complexes, and 1 Naval Headquarter

Assuming they were not already what was present on Sirius and I just misunderstood, but it seem like Earth agreed to ship all that to Sirius in addition to acknowledging their Independence.

Did Earth get anything out of it, in exchange or was it just a concession to game play by giving Sirius enough to be a functioning faction?

It's a bit uncertain, but I believe Sirius had a large chunk of the navy defect to them, which meant that UNEN couldn't immediately deal with the problem. Additionally the pro-independence political faction had influence over the election results and could force the concessions in order to decide the election.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 03, 2020, 09:41:13 PM

Quote from: Vasious on December 03, 2020, 09:11:22 PM

Really enjoy the narrative thus far.

One quick question, I did not quite follow.

What leverage did Sirius have for Earth to cede a bounty of facilities to the

2 Shipyards of the maximum tonnage, 1 Naval and 1 Commercial, 150 Construction Factories, 36 between refineries, ordnance and fighter factories, 5 Research Facilities, 150 Maintenance Facilities, 5 Ground Forces Complexes, and 1 Naval Headquarter

Assuming they were not already what was present on Sirius and I just misunderstood, but it seem like Earth agreed to ship all that to Sirius in addition to acknowledging their Independence.

Did Earth get anything out of it, in exchange or was it just a concession to game play by giving Sirius enough to be a functioning faction?

I am playing with my government file which is possible to be downloaded on this forum or in my signature.

The above is important for what I am going to write.

As the government rolled the SEPARATIST event due to an election, Earth was forced to find an agreement and allow Sirius to leave as this was the popular vote. That was impossible for me or the government to avoid.

Earth could have opposed the event, however, as per my in-house rules I would have applied a Civil War penalty to the race which would have caused massive disruption in all colonies with a massive amount of casualties and loss in constructions.

Now the answer to your question from the narrative point of view

As Earth was facing multiple colonies' requests to leave the Federation and due to the win of the Separatists Party during the election, the politicians were forced to allow at least one colony to leave the union so that everybody could really feel that the Federation had an actual reason to exist.

When Democracy was replaced by Federalism, it was ensured that planets would have been looked after by the central government while guaranteeing independence.

When Sirius asked to leave, the colony should have been paid off as an ex part of the Federation. The minerals used that were mined from Sirius, taxes paid overtime, people, and more.

The amount paid by Earth was what Earth valued Sirius as a colony of the Federation and to oppose reaching a deal would have only made things harder with the other colonies which would have seen the new government like a paste and copy of the previous one.

Sirius's mistake was to leave by slamming the door behind. If the politicians would have been savvier they would have worked on a trade deal rather than push for a truce. This would have ensured the following: The wealth problem wouldn't have been there increasing the chances of strengthening the military, the presence of Civilian Companies and Fleets in the system would have limited Earth's Naval operations and options because Sirius could have retaliated hard on them and even if recalled, this would have rang a bell to Sirius' Navy which would have known trouble was coming increasing their reaction time.

Eventually, Sirius Civilians would have also travelled freely to Sol witnessing the militarization and spotting the new frigates, again triggering an alarm.

On the political side, a trade deal would have made extremely happy the Industrialists which would have never sided with the Military limiting the War Party chances of getting enough power to declare war.

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on December 03, 2020, 09:39:30 PM

It's a bit uncertain, but I believe Sirius had a large chunk of the navy defect to them, which meant that UNEN couldn't immediately deal with the problem. Additionally the pro-independence political faction had influence over the election results and could force the concessions in order to decide the election.

This helped too.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Unending Thunderstorm
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 08, 2020, 04:27:22 PM

2182/5 – The Unending Thunderstorm

Chancellor elected Pyung Chung-Hee was allowed by the War Party to lead the government even if his win over the preferred Republican candidate was only by 0.13% of the votes.

The intention of the government was to close the Sirius matter as soon as possible and a debate on who was the rightful winner of the election would have only slowed down operations. The move of replacing Admiral Lahab Mansoor at the head of the party was then to be seen also as to facilitate transitioning of power.

At the moment of the election, the General was still fighting at the front and an urgent dispatch was sent to ensure the safe extraction of the new Chancellor.

(https://i.imgur.com/vGrwtVN.png)
Pyung Chung-Hee Profile

However, the militaristic line was allowed to pass only at one condition: the new Chancellor would have had free reins in conducting a thorough audit of all matters of the state. Chung-Hee started immediately and it took him almost a month to compile a full report. Once completed, results weren’t publicly released firstly because they showed a complete lack of management of the state resources and secondly because it was agreed so.

Apparently, the findings in EG 372 were below average with only one site recognized as valuable over the available 700 bodies. Asteroid #25 had accessibility 0.9 to 220,618 tons of Neutronium, 13,433 tons of Vendarite at 1.0 accessibility, and 301,401 tons of Uridium at 0.9 accessibility. Across the system, there were also other sites that could have been exploited but nothing really worth the effort. Obviously, the push for the gate network before the survey of the system was a big mistake, and considering it took 4 years to complete the project it was logical to keep this catastrophic failure hidden from the population.

The road to Gliese 257 was also ready to be used for more than 2 years and operation black swan could have been launched anytime if it wasn’t for the government's interests in keeping all the available troop transport to help with Sirius Separatists Outpost invasion. Again, the information was kept secret with the Scientists Faction that was quite upset of knowing they were lied to, as it was inquired many times to report status and an ETA for the operation to start and it was always answered that logistic preparation was still ongoing.

As known, operation in the Centauri Systems could have been started anytime and 1 mining outpost was already active in the system but the logistic operations were far from optimal.

The government used the minerals destined for the extra freighters to build more warships. This resulted in the old liners that were running the asteroid operations to take over the new Mining Outpost mineral transport. The problem with that was that with an annual capacity of 15,000 tons and a current output generated of over 26,000 tons, Earth was missing deliveries for over 11,000 tons of TN minerals per year, minerals that would have needed now more than ever.

New Harvesting operations were also planned to start in both Ultima and Alpha Centauri and yet again nothing was done.

The only consistent findings of the report were on the exploration side. Apparently, the government kept the promise of not jumping into any new system as agreed, however, it was also agreed to exploit and potentially secure some important systems so that we would have been ready to start exploring as soon as the war would have been over. In particular, the system of EV Lacartae was marked as a priority. It was then with great disappointment that the complete lack of any effort towards this goal had been undertaken over the years by the government.

Unfortunately, due to the great mineral crisis and the negative trend of the ground invasion of Sirius Separatists Outpost, there wasn’t much to be done to rectify the issues if not waiting and hope for a positive resolution of the war.

The report had also a minor section dedicated to the piracy claims reported in many systems. Over the years only 2 Civilian Companies were operating for the Democracy first and for the Republic now passing from the brief spell of the Federation. Until now it was believed that all the other attempts were simply failed, bought by the bigger entities, or even been sabotaged by them.

Eventually, evidence showed that these companies were forced to close due to the disappearance of their ships. The complaints were reported several times and no judge had ever allowed a full investigation to be launched on the matter.

Interview with the few owners that were possible to be found showed a consistent pattern: as soon as the company was big enough to launch ships and had started to be sustainable all its ships were missing within a month. The ships to disappear first were always the liners to Mars or Sirius and never the one running through Luna or Mercury. Once the liners were gone the empty freighters were targeted.

This last piece of information was the clue: somebody did not want to alert the authorities.

If the liners and the people on board were almost all unregistered most of the time, there was little if no concern at all when entire “batches” of people were missing. Especially when new colonies opened and with an intake of 30 to 40 million people per year, to keep track of everything and everybody was almost impossible.

The situation on the minerals though was completely different. After part of the inventory on Earth was found wrong/missing by almost 20% by the Zorlu administration of 2125, strict controls on all mineral transport were introduced. The Zorlu protocol, as we know it today, was pretty much perfect and completely automated system. Each mineral package was assigned a unique code which was registered at production, then at load and unload, and finally once at the warehouse.

The peculiarity of the code was that if the serial was unique the status code was the same, therefore if anything would have gone missing then it would have been easy to understand where and consequentially to find out why.

For instance, a new Sorium Package was ready to be delivered and coded with a unique serial 152364-SO. The last 2 letters were to identify the Mineral, in this case, Sorium. The code would have been generated by the Zorlu Protocol and assigned the code P for production. The package P-152364-SO would have been scanned by the courier and the system would have then generated the L status for picked/loaded: PL-152364-SO. Once at the destination, the scan would have generated the U code for unloading, then the T for transport to the depot, and ultimately the S for stored. If all went well the stored package would have then been PLUTS-152364-SO.

It is worth note that the words PLUT and PLUTS were also introduced into the day to day language and slang and are still used nowadays. As you know a PLUT is something shady if referred to as an object or an insult if we say it to someone: "you are a plut!", something incomplete or worthless. Pluts were instead all the minerals and it was mostly used by merchants at the beginning. If you saw a "we accept pluts" sign back then it meant that it would have been possible to barter minerals for goods. While today the concept of PLUTS has disappeared, we still call someone a plut from time to time.

So if the missing package would have been the PLUT code then it would have signified that the package was stolen on the way from the Starport to the Depot and the Police would have been involved and tasked to find the culprits. With all the roads full of cameras it would have not taken much for them to find and recover the stolen goods.

Back to the missing freighters then. It is obvious that if several PL codes were suddenly missing something must have happened on the way to the starport, therefore, in space. This would have resulted in the involvement of the Navy. Now a missing shipment may have been passed undetected but the report showed that more than 50 freighters were going missing over the past 40/50 years. At an average of 25,000 tons per shipment, we were looking at roughly 1,250,000 tons of minerals.

Maybe the first 10 or 15 missing ships and shipments would have been classified as an organic error but 50 would have been sooner or later picked up by any of the controllers.

It was then reasonable to assume that the freighters were targeted empty for a reason and this reason was to do not raise too many questions. Also, it was no coincidence that only small companies were targeted as the big ones had too many political ties to let the matter slide easily.

The Chancellor recommended that a formal investigation should have followed his report and that it should have been kept secret to increase the chances of finding out what was really going on.

Meanwhile, newly appointed Grand Admiral Kinugasa Hirohisa was tasked with looking at the reports from our recent fight against the Sirius Separatists’ Navy.

Contrary to some of his colleagues, the Admiral believed that the PD effect was more than satisfactory. In fact, Earth’s Navy could count on more PD ships than the one used by Sirius and if required every ship's laser weapon could contribute to the PD barrage as well. The concerning point was then only on the missed detection of the fighters and the general range of detection of the Navy.

The Admiral suggested that the government should have invested in a new series of Passive Sensors either more technologically advanced or simply more powerful than the ones currently in service and in a new Active Sensor able to detect fighters at a reasonable range. The government agreed on researching new passive sensors and to consider building bigger ones as well once the research would have been completed. As changing the sensors on all ships would have been too expensive both in terms of time and costs, a new ship was designed with the intent of providing better detection capability to the whole fleet.

Quote

Paladin-I S class Recon Frigate 12,000 tons 309 Crew 1,784 BP TCS 240 TH 862 EM 4,140
3593 km/s Armour 5-46 Shields 138-460 HTK 51 Sensors 200/200/0/0 DCR 20 PPV 0
Maint Life 4.91 Years MSP 1,729 AFR 115% IFR 1.6% 1YR 119 5YR 1,783 Max Repair 200 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months Morale Check Required

Ion Drive (Ship) (4) Power 862.5 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 815,000 Litres Range 15.1 billion km (48 days at full power)
Delta Shields (Medium) (3) Recharge Time 460 seconds (0.3 per second)

Anti-Missile Search Sensor AS6-R1 (1) GPS 16 Range 6.4m km MCR 574.5k km Resolution 1
Area Search Sensor AS55-R100 (1) GPS 5600 Range 55.4m km Resolution 100
Anti-Fighter Search Sensor AS43-R10 (1) GPS 1600 Range 43.5m km Resolution 10
Long Range EM Sensor EM25-200 (1) Sensitivity 200 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 111.8m km
Long Range TH Sensor TH25-200 (1) Sensitivity 200 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 111.8m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

On the 28th of March 2182, ground reinforcement from Earth finally arrived on Sirius. With supplies extinguished for over 4 months, the situation was almost out of control. However, thanks to the constant economic pressure the Sirius Government was under, except for 25,000 tons of military units, nothing was available to be sent to the enemy troops either. This new intake of soldiers would have maybe enough for Earth to win the battle on Sirius-A IV. However, new supplies were tasked to be produced on Earth in the eventuality war would have last for longer.

At the beginning of 2183, with the conflict still going on the Surface, Earth’s supply companies were ready to be delivered at the front. The impressive amount of 1,600 supply trucks would have been loaded and delivered on-site asap. The Army hoped that this should have sufficed to finally defeat the few remaining Separatists Units. With millions of dead on both sides, an entire colony economically and socially disrupted, and Earth’s civilian policies halted in the past 6 years, it was evident that both governments underestimated the gravity of the events.

Eventually, after another year of the war, Sirius Separatists Government decided to strip the population of all they had left to resupply the few units remained in the attempt of slowing the invasion down and keep the enemy at bay. They were firmly intentioned of keeping the war of attrition to go for as long as possible. The plan was to wait for a change of the government or intentions on Earth. What the Separatists did not understand was that Earth committed already too much time, resources, and lives to simply withdraw at this stage and even more supply companies were being prepared at the capital for a final push to conquer the planet by the end of 2184.

That was the deadline the Republic set prior to moving into more drastic measures. The Admiralty was, in fact, already planning a full-scale bombing of the surface in an operation which would have been called “NO MERCY”.

With scientific effort entirely focused on the new sensors, it was also decided to increase the ability of cloaking of our ships. The reason was then the Discovery Scouts were in need of a refurbish. New less thermal emitting engines, longer-range sensors, and EM cloaking technologies were almost ready to be produced and fitted into the 2nd generation of Republican scouts. As to have all installed together would have taken too long, it was opted to use only the engines and sensors while the cloaking would have been used later in another project the Navy was working on in secret.

Quote

Discovery-IJ 2185 class Scout 7,000 tons 122 Crew 603.8 BP TCS 140 TH 109 EM 0
2232 km/s JR 1-25(C) Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 32 Sensors 120/120/0/0 DCR 5 PPV 0
Maint Life 6.63 Years MSP 1,069 AFR 78% IFR 1.1% 1YR 42 5YR 632 Max Repair 120 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Commercial Jump Drive (7k) Max Ship Size 7000 tons Distance 25k km Squadron Size 1

Discovery Ion Drive (2) Power 312.5 Fuel Use 7.83% Signature 54.6875 Explosion 5%
Fuel Capacity 416,000 Litres Range 136.7 billion km (708 days at full power)

Medium Range EM Sensor EM15-120 (1) Sensitivity 120 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 86.6m km
Medium Range TH Sensor TH15-120 (1) Sensitivity 120 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 86.6m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Eventually, by August 2184, all Geological Survey Vessels completed the mapping of the known space while the Gravitational Survey of the galaxy was still ongoing and it wouldn’t be completed earlier than the end of 2185 or even 86.

Finally, on the 28th of December, as the Colony on Sirius was not defeated yet, the full Strike Force on Earth was ordered to park on Sirius-A IV orbit. 3 days later, the operation no mercy was launched. Missiles would have been used only as of the last resource and in case the Sirius Government would have decided to do not surrender within the end of June. The Batteries of all ships started to become a persistent noise in the atmosphere. Later, one of the survivors would have said that it was like witnessing and hearing an unending thunderstorm.

On the 12th of February 2185 at 4:00 am Sirius Government sent an unconditional surrender dispatch to the Republic Army Command on Sirius. After 4 years the war was finally over and Sirius was officially occupied. Another war would have now started, the one to convince the inhabitants that Earth was not the enemy or the oppressor but the savior from the economic disasters that happened before the war. A new Occupation force was then started to be trained on Earth to pacify the planet.

To Transport the troops efficiently a new Station was designed as well. Meanwhile, troops on Sirius were rearranged to include 4 Army Occupation Forces and 1 Army reservists for a total of 215,000 tons of troops.

Quote

UNESS Apocalypse class Troop Transport 103,772 tons 366 Crew 1,877.8 BP TCS 2,075 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s No Armour Shields 0-0 HTK 220 Sensors 8/8/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 11 Max Repair 80 MSP
Troop Capacity 100,000 tons Cargo Shuttle Multiplier 10
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Standard GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 29.6m km Resolution 100
Standard TH (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
Standard EM (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes
This design is classed as a Space Station for construction purposes

On the 13th of April 2185, the damaged fleet of Sirius reached Earth’s orbit to repair and start rebranding. The Sirius Separatists had in fact renamed all the ships seized during the rebellion and the UNEN wanted them back as they were before the war. In particular, to have some of the Early Corvettes built-in 2100 back felt good and helped with morale.

With the end of the year and election approaching, the government dismissed all pending operations to focus on campaigning.

Off-Topic: show

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 08, 2020, 10:51:56 PM

Sounds like there may be some space pirates afoot...always an exciting wrench to throw into the works! ;D

The troop transport station is an interesting idea. Does Earth in this timeline subscribe to a doctrine of large container stations towed around by tugs, or is this a new experiment by the military? I'm afraid my recollection of the human commercial fleet is not very good...

Quote

NOTES: I have tried to increase the world-building with notions of daily life and references to past events. I hope you can all appreciate and the more we can see the Humans evolve the more we can add to these things.

Such things are always very much appreciated! ;D

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 09, 2020, 02:27:14 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on December 08, 2020, 10:51:56 PM

The troop transport station is an interesting idea. Does Earth in this timeline subscribe to a doctrine of large container stations towed around by tugs, or is this a new experiment by the military?

To increase the troop transport capacity from 50,000 tons to 100,000 would have implied to retool one shipyard and expand it and consequential time waste.

This decision was purely made by me to experiment and also to move as many troops as possible to meet the "bugged" criteria of occupation. This will be the greatest drawback of this campaign I am afraid as it will be fixed by steve only on 1.13.

I am planning to do some DB edit if required to facilitate surrender.

So I am using what is reported here: http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?topic=12035.msg142470#msg142470
Fixed bug that meant that strength required to force populations to surrender strength was 100x more than intended.

The current strength of Sirius is 19,375 which means I have to meet the real requirement of 193.75 which I did immediately after the war. I still like the idea of Stormtroopers patrolling the surface and pacify region by region in this case I am allowing 1,937.5 total. After the first delivery, I am at 1,550 so getting there slowly.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 14, 2020, 01:28:55 AM

2186 – The Second Federalist Mandate

The Republican party orphan of a leader decided to approach the heroin of the Republic Rear Admiral Philippine Barbier. She was well known and respected in all the colonies and her prestige would have helped in bringing some extra votes.

(https://i.imgur.com/sDERK8T.png)
Philippine Barbier Profile

Luna’s administrator Daphne Meijer was the choice for the Democrat party. She was a very focused individual, very observant and focused. Unfortunately, her arrogance was something many people couldn’t cope with leaving her prestige quite low if compared to her adversaries. With her 31 years old, she was also the youngest of the lot. The intent of the Democrat party was probably to build and support a figure which could be a credible contestant in 5 to 10 years.

(https://i.imgur.com/0gNk5nv.png)
Candidates Prestige 2186

With the war officially over, the main topics on the electoral stage were if and when to deal with the Aliens and the expansion of the Republic. However, with Sirius still under the occupied status, only the residents of Earth, Luna, Mercury, and Mars were allowed to vote.

The final results were in as usual only a few hours after the sections closed on the 1st of January 2186. With 411 seats the Federalists were by far the most voted. Immediately after there were the Militarists with 295 seats.

(https://i.imgur.com/EWD3kfr.png)
Elected Seats 2186

Thanks to the great Federalists support, the Federalist candidate General Pyung Chung-Hee obtained a second mandate as Chancellor of the Republic. If the first mandate was by the zero points something percentile, this was by a more comfortable 3% with an overwhelming 40% of the preferences. Even if not enough for a clear win due to the outstanding result of Rear Admiral Barbier, the number of votes received would have been enough for the General to have his authority not challenged by the Senate.

(https://i.imgur.com/EihCrWD.png)
Chancellor Election 2186

As the discussion started to find a majority in the Senate the Federalists tried immediately to seize power rallying 921 seats to support their claim. Opposing the Federalists there was the War Party. Rear Admiral Barbier could count on a great deal of respect over many Senators. Her campaigns and successes cost her an illness diagnosed her on the 17th of December 2185 right before election night. The serious medical problem managed to bring even more sympathies to her cause as many saw her as the perfect woman ready to die for her country.

Her plan was to have a military-led government which would have been kept under check by the Federalist's Chancellor along the lines of the previous mandate. Philippine's intention was then to firstly undermine General Pyung Chung-Hee status of Chancellor to the one of a simple inspector, something that would have benefited her in the next election, and secondly to ensure the War Party could have dictated the policies of the following 4 years of government. Her paranoid character over the alien menace was somehow masked by her heroin’s reputation and mistaken for serious concerns over the matter. As soon as she finished to work the floor, the Federalists could tell that there was not much they could do to stop the Militarists. The final count was then ratified at 960, more than enough for the War Party to rule.

(https://i.imgur.com/5Lkp0xI.png)
Possible Coalitions 2186

A joint communication by all the factions was sent to the media immediately after the new coalition was sworn in. The message was to clarify the role of the Chancellor over the ruling coalition. As results of the agreement in the Senate then, the Chancellor’s prestige was hit hard as many started to see him just as a patsy of the Military. Regardless of the public opinion, the Federalist Chancellor and majority still wanted to propose a constitutional change. In their opinion, the situation on Sirius-A IV was anti-constitutional and the imposition over the colony to do not participate in the general election by the central government did in fact just certified that.

In front of the constitution, all Humans were having the same rights but it was now evident that this was not true. To avoid any problem a change would have been required before people would have started to appeal to the courts all around the Republic.

A change to a limited Civil Rights version of the constitution was then proposed and put up for a vote. The proposal was agreed by 1088 Senators and therefore approved with immediate effect. The change wasn’t received well by the Democratic forces as it was noted that the Civil Rights chart was ranging from matters such as personal liberty and privacy. To change it only for the vote was a bold move. The worry was that a form of slavery or sort could have been resurfaced somehow or even that people could have been started to be prosecuted due to their differences on matters such as political views or religion.

As a matter of fact, though, this Republic was now very different from the old Democracy of 2100. The militaristic and expansionist focus of its ideals, the limited Civil Rights and the ironclad Police Internal Affairs department were only a few of the differences. After a brief spell of total liberty, the media were almost silenced by the everyday censorship of the government representatives and even when something was discovered the State Controlled Justice System ensured that those who had to walk free could always go unpunished.

Meanwhile, the War Party was preparing a strategy to face the aliens in the Altair system. The first problem was logistic. A new Jump Tender able to help the military fleet in transiting into the enemy territory was required. The finest engineers on Earth were tasked to build the new Hercules Military Tender Class.

Quote

Hercules-IJT class Jump Tender 7,000 tons 188 Crew 856.1 BP TCS 140 TH 431 EM 0
3080 km/s JR 4-250 Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 37 Sensors 8/8/0/0 DCR 4 PPV 0
Maint Life 2.87 Years MSP 1,105 AFR 98% IFR 1.4% 1YR 197 5YR 2,962 Max Repair 402.8 MSP
Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 12 months Morale Check Required

J15000(4-250) Military Jump Drive Max Ship Size 15000 tons Distance 250k km Squadron Size 4

Ion Drive (Ship) (2) Power 431.2 Fuel Use 81.06% Signature 215.62 Explosion 11%
Fuel Capacity 1,336,000 Litres Range 42.4 billion km (159 days at full power)

Standard GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 29.6m km Resolution 100
Standard TH (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
Standard EM (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

The Second Problem was the range so a refuel would have been required on Sirius prior departing to Altair but fortunately, Sirius Prime was already equipped to handle such a task. The new military operation would have been called “Showdown” and it would have been launched as soon as the tender and the Paladins would have been ready. The ETA provided by operation command was late 2188.

All focus switched then back to get Sirius-A IV fully back into Republican’s control.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 14, 2020, 03:29:59 PM

Quote from: froggiest1982 on December 14, 2020, 01:28:55 AM

As the discussion started to find a majority in the Senate the Federalists tried immediately to seize power rallying 921 seats to support their claim. Opposing the Federalists there was the War Party. Rear Admiral Barbier could count on a great deal of respect over many Senators. Her campaigns and successes cost her an illness diagnosed her on the 17th of December 2185 right before election night. The serious medical problem managed to bring even more sympathies to her cause as many saw her as the perfect woman ready to die for her country.

Her plan was to have a military-led government which would have been kept under check by the Federalist's Chancellor along the lines of the previous mandate. Philippine's intention was then to firstly undermine General Pyung Chung-Hee status of Chancellor to the one of a simple inspector, something that would have benefited her in the next election, and secondly to ensure the War Party could have dictated the policies of the following 4 years of government. Her paranoid character over the alien menace was somehow masked by her heroin’s reputation and mistaken for serious concerns over the matter. As soon as she finished to work the floor, the Federalists could tell that there was not much they could do to stop the Militarists. The final count was then ratified at 960, more than enough for the War Party to rule.

Now we have a divided government of quite byzantine nature, it seems like. Even though they took the Chancellorship the Federalists do not have the majority in the parliament, this should be quite fascinating although the Chancellor will have to work with much energy to defend the integrity of his office. Candidly, I also wonder if this could lead to some tensions between the ground and naval forces due to the conflict between the General in the Chancellorship and an Admiral leading the opposition, given the rather divisive issues of the day.

Quote

A joint communication by all the factions was sent to the media immediately after the new coalition was sworn in. The message was to clarify the role of the Chancellor over the ruling coalition. As results of the agreement in the Senate then, the Chancellor’s prestige was hit hard as many started to see him just as a patsy of the Military. Regardless of the public opinion, the Federalist Chancellor and majority still wanted to propose a constitutional change. In their opinion, the situation on Sirius-A IV was anti-constitutional and the imposition over the colony to do not participate in the general election by the central government did in fact just certified that.

In front of the constitution, all Humans were having the same rights but it was now evident that this was not true. To avoid any problem a change would have been required before people would have started to appeal to the courts all around the Republic.

A change to a limited Civil Rights version of the constitution was then proposed and put up for a vote. The proposal was agreed by 1088 Senators and therefore approved with immediate effect. The change wasn’t received well by the Democratic forces as it was noted that the Civil Rights chart was ranging from matters such as personal liberty and privacy. To change it only for the vote was a bold move. The worry was that a form of slavery or sort could have been resurfaced somehow or even that people could have been started to be prosecuted due to their differences on matters such as political views or religion.

As a matter of fact, though, this Republic was now very different from the old Democracy of 2100. The militaristic and expansionist focus of its ideals, the limited Civil Rights and the ironclad Police Internal Affairs department were only a few of the differences. After a brief spell of total liberty, the media were almost silenced by the everyday censorship of the government representatives and even when something was discovered the State Controlled Justice System ensured that those who had to walk free could always go unpunished.

A chilling turn of events, one would prefer not to live under such a society moving in this direction...

Quote

Meanwhile, the War Party was preparing a strategy to face the aliens in the Altair system. The first problem was logistic. A new Jump Tender able to help the military fleet in transiting into the enemy territory was required. The finest engineers on Earth were tasked to build the new Hercules Military Tender Class.

The Second Problem was the range so a refuel would have been required on Sirius prior departing to Altair but fortunately, Sirius Prime was already equipped to handle such a task. The new military operation would have been called “Showdown” and it would have been launched as soon as the tender and the Paladins would have been ready. The ETA provided by operation command was late 2188.

All focus switched then back to get Sirius-A IV fully back into Republican’s control.

This ought to be fun.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 14, 2020, 04:07:50 PM

The Republic has now 3 very big problems.

1. Due to the constitutional change, in Sirus and potentially other colonies, something nasty is about to happen.
2. The military operations focus on Altair has again postponed the search for possible(?) Pirates/Terrorists in the Republic Gate Network Territory.
3. The Navy really thinks to have the upper hand against the Aliens but the truth is that to be dangerous UNEN have to be close range and we all know the power of AMM spoilers spam

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 14, 2020, 06:24:23 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on December 14, 2020, 03:29:59 PM

This ought to be fun.

Quote from: froggiest1982 on December 14, 2020, 04:07:50 PM

The Republic has now 3 very big problems.

1. Due to the constitutional change, in Sirus and potentially other colonies, something nasty is about to happen.
2. The military operations focus on Altair has again postponed the search for possible(?) Pirates/Terrorists in the Republic Gate Network Territory.
3. The Navy really thinks to have the upper hand against the Aliens but the truth is that to be dangerous UNEN have to be close range and we all know the power of AMM spoilers spam

Very fun. ;D

Title: Re: Aurora – Revenge is a dish best served cold
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 16, 2020, 04:31:55 PM

2186/9 – Revenge is a dish best served cold

On the 21st of March 2186, the population on Sirius-A IV finally surrendered effectively joining the Republic again. Terraforming operations started immediately to make the planet more pleasant and able to host life without the need for any installation. As the colony was very different from the original Military Outpost, it was decided to rename the Planet Sirius Prime. A law to rename all planets with colonies outside of Sol was also drawn. As per this law, the first colony on each new System would have assumed the status of Prime. Any other colony would have been renamed as per the following:

Second: Duime
Third: Terime
Forth: Qurime
Fifth: Quime

The only requirement for a body to gain the status of Colony would have been to be inhabited by Humans.

Finally, after almost a decade, the situation in Alpha Centauri was under study. A new Sorium harvesting operation was required by the Navy as the war against the alien would have most likely consumed part if non all the fuel reserves on Earth. As the situation was different than the one in HH Andromedae a new plan was studied. The plan was to install a refueling station on the Mining Outpost located in the system and get the tankers to do the yearly round trip from the harvesters to the planet’s surface. Another tanker, bigger than the Trafalgar would have then been tasked with bringing the fuel from the Alpha Centauri system directly to Earth.

Quote

UNEC Juggernaut-I class Tanker 10,000 tons 48 Crew 234.6 BP TCS 200 TH 150 EM 0
750 km/s Armour 1-41 Shields 0-0 HTK 25 Sensors 8/8/0/0 DCR 1 PPV 0
MSP 14 Max Repair 22.5 MSP
Lieutenant Commander Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 3 months

Commercial Ion Drive MK2 (Medium) (1) Power 150 Fuel Use 1.73% Signature 150 Explosion 3%
Fuel Capacity 6,921,000 Litres Range 7,220.5 billion km (111428 days at full power)
Refuelling Capability: 60,000 litres per hour Complete Refuel 115 hours

Standard GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 29.6m km Resolution 100
Standard TH (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
Standard EM (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km

This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes

Once completed the first phase, the Centaur Mission would have been then officially started. The second phase would have consisted of extending the mining and harvesting operations to Ultima Centauri. In fact, using the fuel and the infrastructure on the Alpha Centauri Mining Outpost would have been possible to run a small cargo line to transport the mineral stockpile from Ultima Centauri back to Alpha Centauri. The existing line between Alpha Centauri and Sol, once expanded, would have instead provided the necessary link back to Earth completing phase two and the operation in general.

Once fully operational, the 2 systems would have provided the Republic with 6,000,000 to 12,000,000 liters of fuel and access to all TN minerals for centuries at a good level of accessibility.

(https://i.imgur.com/Ncl95Kb.png)
Badge of the Operation Centaur

The over 300,000 tons of mineral stockpile were still not enough to solve the Republic Neutronium problems though. It was then decided to start also the operations on Asteroid #25 located on the EG 372 systems which thanks to the gate network already built would have not been hard to set up. The asteroid was renamed EG 372 Mining Outpost and 150 Automated Mines were allocated to the operation. To move the Automated Mines on-site the government decided to use the same strategy used over the Alpha Centauri Mining Outpost. The civilians would have done the heavy lifting and a series of civilian contracts were released by the transportation department.

Eventually, the only outstanding matter for the government was to secure the EV Lacertae system. As there was no way for our logistic efforts to reach the system it was decided to tow the only Commercial Tender left idle and anchored on Earth’s orbit. As soon as the towing would have been completed a plan would have been required to colonize the strategic system. The current ETA was in September 2186, however, it was also decided that all the colonizing efforts would have been drafted by the next government.

As gravitational survey operations were almost completed for all known systems it was decided to send some scouts to explore the inner part of the Sol – EV Lacertae loop in the attempt of excluding any other hidden connections to know systems and a potential dead end. The departure of 2 of the new Discovery classes was ordered and executed immediately destination NN 3076 where many unexplored jump points were waiting to be explored.

(https://i.imgur.com/UoYKlkD.png)
Known Stars inside the Sol – EV Lacertae loop

On the 4th of December 2186, the UNEN John Moresby was the first ship to jump into a new system in almost a decade as the latest system discovered was the empty LP 816-60 on the 23rd of July 2177.

A few days later, on the 9th of December, the UNEN Lafayette Bunnell reached the second jump point on the NN 3076 systems and jumped into the completely unremarkable WISE 1322-2340 system. As no news was received by Naval command on Earth by the John Moresby, on the way back to Earth Commander Eric Sterling, captain of the Bunnell, was asked to investigate the matter further. The jump led to the NN 3820 system where 9 Planets, 50 Moons, and 12 Asteroids were waiting to be surveyed. Out of the 9 Planets, 3 were a colony cost 2 worlds. Unfortunately, wrecks of what looked like the UNEN John Moresby were floating around the orbit of NN 3820-A III.

All recordings were recovered from a safe distance and urgently transported back to Earth. As recordings and readings were analyzed something became immediately obvious. The Altair aliens were also present in the NN 3820 system. What was not clear was if the 2 systems were connected in any way and if the general behavior of the aliens would have applied in that system too and therefore they would have most likely stayed there without wandering around.

However, the discovery did not change the strategic position of the Republic as to liberate Altair was paramount to ensure the safety of Humanity. One thing was to have aliens 5 or 6 jumps away from sol and another was to have them potentially knocking at our doors. Furthermore, the size of the enemy forces in the NN 3820 system was still unknown and until we would have found out exactly what we were dealing with, to be concerned would have been premature.

The UNEN Tsotha-lanti Intelligence Ship was then tasked to use the Spy 6 missiles to determine the number of enemy forces. Operation “Crow Nest” was drafted and ordered to be launched on the 21st of February 2187. The operation was a paste and copy of the already successful Russian Roulette of 2169 on Altair.

Meanwhile, everything was getting ready for Operation Showdown to be launched as soon as the Military Tender would have been produced and positioned on the Sirius Altair Jump Point. The following ships were assigned to the task force:

Sol Strike Force Alpha
May-I B class Destroyer: UNEN Hailey, UNEN Pope
May-I BL class Destroyer Leader: UNEN Leftwich
Danilov-I B class Heavy Frigate: UNEN Danae, UNEN Dauntless, UNEN Dundas, UNEN Exeter, UNEN Gloucester, UNEN Penelope, UNEN Phoebe, UNEN Scarborough
Danilov-I M class Missile Frigate: UNEN Seneschal, UNEN Simoom, UNEN Sleuth, UNEN Stygian, UNEN Tradewind, UNEN Traveller, UNEN Trenchant, UNEN Vulpine
Paladin-I S class Recon Frigate: UNEN Able, UNEN Victorious
Patriot-I BS class Corvette: UNEN Eclipse, UNEN Undaunted
Patriot-I E class Corvette: UNEN Esk, UNEN Exmouth, UNEN Opportune, UNEN Plover, UNEN Radiant, UNEN Tara, UNEN Ulster, UNEN Vigilant, UNEN Violet, UNEN Wren[/size]

While the following were assigned to support the assault:

UNEC Trafalgar-I class Tanker: UNEC Trafalgar-I 001, UNEC Trafalgar-I 002, UNEC Trafalgar-I 003
UNEC Destiny-I class Support Vessel: UNEC Destiny-I 002
UNEC Destiny-I class Support Vessel: UNEC Destiny-I 001

Training exercises would have been undertaken while waiting to increase the crew response time and efficiency.

On the 6th of February 2188, Commander Charlene van der Merwe and the UNEN Tsotha-lanti came back from her mission on NN 3820. She was bringing very good news as apparently the system was only lightly guarded by one orbital station and some ground units.

(https://i.imgur.com/QjHq0xe.png)
Crow Nest Operation Report

Especially the info on the Akil design was really appreciated by Naval Command. To know that such signature was most likely to be of a station could have helped with our plan of attack in Altair. The Commander was awarded the Crow Nest operation’s badge and also the Medal of Honor for the valuable information retrieved.

While the Chancellor was on the way back from the ceremony an explosion hit the convoy killing instantly half of the security details. In the attempt of fleeing the scene, General Pyung Chung-Hee was hit by an unidentified sniper. The Senate was immediately put under heavy guard and all the Senators not in the session were isolated in secure locations. After a few hours of general panic in the streets and poor media coverage due to the general scarcity of official news, the government released a statement:

BREAKING NEWS

"Today at 6:14 pm, an identified terrorist group, known as the Warriors of the Democratic Freedom (WDF), conducted an operation with the intent of killing our Chancellor and head of the government General Pyung Chung-Hee. The attempt has been successful. We repeat: the Chancellor is dead. The Senate has been put under heavy surveillance and all Senators have been moved into secured locations and from there they will convey to elect a successor. The Republic never dies."

As the Federalists were still the majority in the Senate it was logical for them to try electing another member of their party as Chancellor, however, it was noted by the militarists that such a person did not go through the vote and the Barbier should have been nominated Chancellor instead. In fact, while in the old democracy the president was elected by the Parliament, the Chancellor of the Republic was elected directly by the people. After a few days of intensive meetings and compromises, a majority was found to put Philippine Barbier in charge of the government for the remaining mandate period.

Part of the agreement was that she would have not been nominated as Chancellor but only as Regent and Inspector of the Republic. The irony of the matter could have not been overlooked. It was evident that the Federalists were striking back at her for the treatment of the departed General and all the prestige that she gained during this time as leader of the Republicans was wasted in a fraction of a second as soon as her position was publicly released and known.

Once in power, Barbier’s paranoid character got the better of her judgment. In what would have been described as a general mistrust of every advisor and member of the cabinet, she sent a private letter to all the planets administrators asking to report any suspicious activity. The first to reply was the tough risk-taker Long Qiong An, governor of Sirius.

In summary, Long's report was insinuating that the WDF was most likely formed on Sirius as retaliation for the occupation and general condition of the colony during the Separatists' government spell. Furthermore, he believed that because Earth wasn’t supporting the crescent unemployment present in each colony, these were providing fertile ground to the terrorists for recruiting new members. Long’s plan was to build some “labour camps” which could have been used for either mining or manufacturing. These camps would have allowed the Republic to increase its workforce, reduce unemployment, and potentially silenced all the Republic’s opponents.

Intrigued by the project, the Chancellor approved to commence experimentation on Sirius Prime before exporting the model to other colonies. What Long did not mention was that such camps were indeed forced labour camps that he wanted to use to confine all remained Separatists in the area. Also, due to the recent intervention on the constitution, legally there would have been nothing to avoid this to happen or be banned by the central government.

In less than 6 months, 4,000,000 people were rallied by the Occupation Forces on Sirius Prime and relocated to 40 Forced Labour Mining Camps by direct order of the Sirius Prime Administrator on behalf of The Republic's Chancellor. As free immigration from other colonies was still allowed, Long signed a motion to block all colonists to relocate on Sirius Prime effective immediately claiming that the colony could not have supported them due to the unfinished terraforming operations and scarcity of infrastructure. With installations actually available for another 50 million people, probably the real intent was to slow down the news from spreading.

Eventually, though, the news reached Mars and Luna. Their Governors, anxious about getting rid of millions of unemployed people and the problems that would have been coming with that, wanted into the program immediately. Regardless of the constant letters and pressures, the Chancellor decided to wait for the first reports before making any decision. Long’s real plans would have then been safe for a little longer.

As new elections approached, people were pleased with the number of improvements the government managed to achieve during the previous 4 years, and with preparations for war slowed down by the Tender production delayed due to mineral shortage, the Republic focused its efforts even more on exploring deeply the Sol – EV Lacertae loop and activate the Centauri System mines along with the ones on EG 372 Mining Outpost. Perhaps, the effects on voters' perception of the Military could have then been altered positively by these recent events, however, the rumors on what was happening on Sirius and the odd behavior of Regent Chancellor Barbier would have been something to deal with care while campaigning for all Republicans representatives.

(https://i.imgur.com/9SLczdm.png)
Known Space 2189

Title: Re: Aurora – Revenge is a dish best served cold
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 16, 2020, 05:12:16 PM

Quote from: froggiest1982 on December 16, 2020, 04:31:55 PM

2186/9 – Revenge is a dish best served cold

With a name like that you know we're in for a fun time.

Quote

A law to rename all planets with colonies outside of Sol was also drawn. As per this law, the first colony on each new System would have assumed the status of Prime. Any other colony would have been renamed as per the following:

Second: Duime
Third: Terime
Forth: Qurime
Fifth: Quime

A clever system, unique compared to the traditional route of secundus, tertius, etc. but still easy to comprehend.

Quote

On the 4th of December 2186, the UNEN John Moresby was the first smeg to jump into a new system in almost a decade as the latest system discovered was the empty LP 816-60 on the 23rd of July 2177.

One of the interesting things with this political story is how many things we usually take for granted can be stopped or stalled by the political machinations. How unusual to play a game of Aurora and just stop exploring new systems for a decade!

Quote

However, the discovery did not change the strategic position of the Republic as to liberate Altair was paramount to ensure the safety of Humanity.

Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! ... ;D

Quote

While the Chancellor was on the way back from the ceremony an explosion hit the convoy killing instantly half of the security details. In the attempt of fleeing the scene, General Pyung Chung-Hee was hit by an unidentified sniper. The Senate was immediately put under heavy guard and all the Senators not in the session were isolated in secure locations. After a few hours of general panic in the streets and poor media coverage due to the general scarcity of official news, the government released a statement:

BREAKING NEWS"Today at 6:14 pm, an identified terrorist group, known as the Warriors of the Democratic Freedom (WDF), conducted an operation with the intent of killing our Chancellor and head of the government General Pyung Chung-Hee. The attempt has been successful. We repeat: the Chancellor is dead. The Senate has been put under heavy surveillance and all Senators have been moved into secured locations and from there they will convey to elect a successor. The Republic never dies."

:o :o :o :o :o

This certainly has the potential to upset the military plans to take Altair from the aliens. Among other effects of course.

Quote

In less than 6 months, 4,000,000 people were rallied by the Occupation Forces on Sirius Prime and relocated to 40 Forced Labour Mining Camps by direct order of the Sirius Prime Administrator on behalf of The Republic's Chancellor.

The dark turn previewed in that other thread comes to light. I can't help but think that this sort of move would only motivate more terrorist activities rather than helping the situation at all. It may take some time to reach the rest of the populations, but surely the activists on Sirius know what is going on and will use it to their advantage.

On the whole it seems like things are getting more complex across the board. Future governments will have to navigate the troubled waters ahead very carefully or the Republic may find itself in quite dire straits.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 16, 2020, 07:29:28 PM

We have 4 main storylines opened:

1 - Pirates, are they there or not? If not where are all the civilian ships?
2 - Terrorists, is this an isolated incident, or something even bigger is being planned? Would slavery limit their operations?
3 - Is the Militaristic Republic going to be in charge long enough to subjugate the Aliens and the increasing Rebelling Population?
4 - Is the Barbier really another Caligula or her paranoid thoughts will soon stop?

Who knows what the RNG will roll...

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 07:51:42 PM

Even after reading this whole thread i still have no idea what is going on...

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 16, 2020, 07:54:56 PM

Quote from: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 07:51:42 PM

Even after reading this whole thread i still have no idea what is going on...

If you ask me anything I will be happy to provide you with some answers.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 08:10:49 PM

do you have it so that your simulator is basically running elections and those elections influence your game? Cause thats what it seems like.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 16, 2020, 08:38:33 PM

Quote from: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 08:10:49 PM

do you have it so that your simulator is basically running elections and those elections influence your game? Cause thats what it seems like.

Yes, that is correct so I do not play Aurora directly and I let the RNG unfold the story for me.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 09:12:19 PM

Oh. Ok then. That makes a lot of sense. I just cant figure out how the darn thing works. Does it only work for Microsoft Excel?

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 16, 2020, 09:45:11 PM

Quote from: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 09:12:19 PM

Oh. Ok then. That makes a lot of sense. I just cant figure out how the darn thing works. Does it only work for Microsoft Excel?

No, only for Libre Office. On the first page of the tool, you can see all info (including the download link for the libre office IT'S FREE ;D ).

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: RougeNPS on December 16, 2020, 09:52:29 PM

Figured it out. Libreoffice needed an update or a dozen...

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Dangerous Turns
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 20, 2020, 05:50:54 AM

2190 – Dangerous Turns

Thanks to the attack on NN 3820, Philippine Barbier could count on enormous support from the majority of the population. Not only her fears over the alien menace were revealed to be true but another vessel lost after the UNEN Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld on the 2nd of December 2141 was something the population wasn’t expecting.

(https://i.imgur.com/4n6bg5R.png)
Pollings Elections 2190

The Barbier and the Militarists campaigned hard on the matter and one of the documentaries over the lives of any of the 122 souls lost in the attack were screened every single day and shown at many rallies. War was the only solution and if we had forgotten we were at war.

The Federalists had 2 cards to play. The first card was the opportunity of choosing a new candidate due to the early departure of the previous leader and Chancellor Elected and the second was to actually blow the wind of the winning side but on a different tune. The party approached one of the greatest minds of our time, Professor Shiomi Tokimasa, asking her not to focus on an unlikely win, but to lead the coalition to a new era and a possible majority in the Senate for the second time. They wanted her to talk about how science was helping us during these difficult times and how much she had contributed to the everyday life of all citizens. She would have also supported the Barbier’s view on all the political matters proposing the same solutions but with a different angle.

(https://i.imgur.com/we03K8r.png)
Shiomi Tokimasa Profile

The Democrats kept grooming the young Meijer waiting with patience for this wind of war to set before starting seriously to try getting back the democratic views and way of life to the electors.

All pollings were showing that the Nationalist Party would have hardly got any seat in this round of elections and these were the votes all party were after. The Nationalist sentiment was squashed over the years by rebellions, aliens, and general Militaristic view of the Republic. Based on some research it appeared that many of these people would have either not voted or most likely voted for the Trade or Scientific party. On election night, while receiving first official ballots results, both Democrat and Federalist candidate conceded victory to Philippine Barbier which was elected for the first time true Chancellor of the Republic.

(https://i.imgur.com/pSHF7Xv.png)
Chancellor Election 2190

Unfortunately, the same did not happen for the Militarist Party which regardless of the good performance saw itself ending up only as 3rd party behind the Scientists and the Industrialists. The victory of the Scientists was a first since 2100, date of which we officially started our race to the stars. The number of votes that Shiomi Tokimasa could bring on the table was unprecedented for any candidate.

(https://i.imgur.com/ZL5Jvmb.png)
Elected Seats 2190

As soon as the results were confirmed, Chancellor Barbier asked the Scientists to support and form a Science Military led coalition capable of dealing with the Aliens and bring peace back to the Republic. The problem was that the Scientific Community wanted to convey first with Professor Tokimasa which opinion was not only respected but also highly regarded. Knowing that she ran for the Federalists, Chancellor Elected asked and obtained that first choice should have been the Chancellor’s prerogative. If after that a different majority, higher in number, could be formed than she would have accepted the Senate Decision.

The 2190 Senate landscape was very interesting. Even if no Nationalists were officially been elected, the National sentiment was still present in many of the Senators. The Industrialists as well, remembering the old times when they were in charge would have most likely made an attempt to seize power. Ultimately, the Federalists were the one more dangerous due to their connection with the Scientists Leader Professor Shiomi Tokimasa. At the end of the first round of consultations, Chancellor Barbier could count on 1,327 votes. An extremely large number.

Shiomi, which was running her own consultations was running around similar numbers. 1,317 with all the Scientists, Industrialists, Pacifists and Federalists. The only way she had to win was to pinch some of the Militarists, but which one? She asked for a recess, approved by the Senate, of one day. Out of the 440 Seats, the Militarists did have some from the Sirius Sections. As widely known, the Navy conduct during the fight on Sirius, was more a sort of experiment on the life of the brothers in arms which were defending the Separatists Colony at that time. Even if at war everything is allowed, it was true that Earth did not have respected the truce.

Such cowardly manoeuvre was never fully digested by many representatives of the Militarist Party. Once talked to a delegation, the Tokimasa managed to get 25 Senators on board for a total of 1,342 seats. With the new majority deal signed off, on the 2nd of January 2190 the Senate ratified a new Federalist led Government headed by Chancellor Barbier.

(https://i.imgur.com/cDSfuHo.png)
Possible Coalitions 2190

Full of rage and obfuscated by her paranoia, Philippine decided to ask for council to the Administrator Long. Touched by such trust received from the Chancellor, he confessed that his plan was to use his “Labour Camps” as a mean to eliminate all his political adversaries and possible sources of trouble and malcontent through the population. She then asked if he wanted to try to export his views on other Colonies and what would have been his price. Long asked for the Sol Sector Governorship as a guarantee that his plan could be carried safely and undiscovered.

As a new round of nominations would have been needed, Chancellor Barbier asked for a few weeks to arrange something. After all, there was also a war to fight and to win first.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 20, 2020, 11:17:08 AM

The political intrigue gets greater after every election now! I do not think Chancellor Barbier can keep this underhanded dealing out of sight for too long, sooner or later there will be repercussions and likely some sort of conflict following. We can only hope it turns vio---erm, I mean, does not turn violent, yes, that's what I mean, no one is spoiling for a dramatic civil war plot line here, no sir... :P

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 20, 2020, 01:01:23 PM

I am getting the feeling that most will be decided by the war. If it goes well then the Barbier would have 2 possible fates: The Palpatine or the Caligula one.

The new automated mechanics are now limiting my "powers" so I have to cope with the events and the RNG.

On the other hand, if war turns out to be a disaster then we are going to witness an "enything can happen Thursday".

I am really giving little to no chance of winning though...unless my PD starts to shoot down missiles at a ratio of 3:4 and my shields manage to absorbe anything between 20 to 30 detonations per interval. As a player I will still consider a win to come back with half of the fleet with the tail between her legs.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Showdown!
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 27, 2020, 02:41:23 AM

2190 – Showdown!

Before starting to plan the invasion in Altair, the chancellor started to move around all administrators to free up the sector governor slot which should have been given to Long. With the current Sol’s Governor reaching his 64th birthday it was decided to retire him with all the honours and facilitate the transition. Even if Mishe Pletnyov was extremely respected as governor, the government knew that to keep the peace between the Chancellor and the Federalists house something was to be conceded otherwise everything would have become extremely hard. Long Qiong An was then nominated Sector Governor and started immediately to talk with all the colony administrators introducing the new Chancellor Policy regarding the labour camps.

(https://i.imgur.com/sAGAfxY.png)
Long Qiong An Profile

With unemployment going through the roof and many dissidents in the street, the news was more than welcomed. Construction started immediately on Earth to “accommodate” 50 million people. 25 would have been specialized in construction and the other 25 in mining. The mining ones would have been taken from the prison population so that some pressure on these infrastructures would have been able to be released. The prisoners would have been then shipped over Alpha Centauri Mining Outpost which would have been renamed Alpha Centauri Mining Penal Colony. Mars and Luna did not have the infrastructure needed to start the program right away but Earth offered to help to send part of the new labour force to the colonies along with a basic mineral stockpile to be decided based on the requirements in terms of extra camps needed.

On the 15th of January 2190, the UNEN Adrien de Gerlache jumped into the 2 unexplored jump point in EQ Pegasi as a continuation of the Sol – EV Lacertae loop exploration. The First Jump revealed the uninteresting Scholz’s Star binary system while the second ended up in Ross 695 another small and uninteresting system. So far, to do not find external connections to the loop was still very good news.

Meanwhile, the Military Tenders on Earth were ready to be deployed. An executive order from Naval command arrived as soon as the ships cleared the docks. The Supply vessels were ordered to drop ordnance, spare parts and fuel to Sirius to ensure the Starports were ready to receive the Strike Force. Tankers were ordered to wait on the Sirius Altair Jump point as first emergency refuel station.

A month later, with the tenders in positions, The Strike Force fleet was ordered to break Earth’s Orbit and officially start operation showdown. Phase one would have consisted in reaching Sirius to Refuel, rest and debrief the crew. Once ready ships would have moved on to Sirius Altair Jump point and jumped into Altair systems in smaller groups. Phase two would have then started following a similar layout of the one already used against Sirius’ separatists. The only difference was that ships would have been acting together to take advantage of the full PD defences.

On the 29th of March 2190 at 2:01 pm, Showdown phase two officially started when the Strike Force Fleet rallied back after jumping into Altair from Sirius. Waypoint Alpha and Beta were set while Red Zone and Attacking Range references were set. The Red Zone was the area which we believed we could have been attacked any time by enemy missiles.

(https://i.imgur.com/cLcnlrn.png)
Fleet in Position, Waypoints Set

The fleet reached the Alpha Waypoint on the 29th of March 2190 at 7:31 am.

(https://i.imgur.com/o1HrUSr.png)
Waypoints Alpha, all clear

A week later at 10:01 am the first contacts were spotted on Altair-A IV orbit: 1 Sekhemkare and 2 Panehesy classes which moved immediately towards our fleet meaning that we were effectively been spotted as well. Due to that the Leader of the Fleet, Rear Admiral Viviana Agostini, ordered the Active Sensors to be switched on. While advancing without fear, our fleet noticed that after having closed range quickly the enemy started to retreat back to their planet probably scared by the dimension of our forces. Navy Command, which was following the events trough a network established by the Tender Ships directly to Sirius Prime, was already cheering for victory as if the Aliens had established our superiority we would have certainly been on the right path.

(https://i.imgur.com/grR6i5h.png)
Contact and retreat, easy win?

Strike Fleet reached position Beta on the 12th of April at 5:13 am and proceeded to Attack Range passing through the Red Zone, which was the area we presumed the Akir Stations could have been able to launch their missiles. While advancing the fleet could lock on on any specific target with contacts which were coming and going every few seconds. At 11:33 am while deep into the Red Zone contacts started to be a bit more consistent and 2 Akil, 2 Panehesy, and 1 Sekhemkare were now fully visible on Altair-A IV orbit along with the other Sekhemkare which was still retreating. Based on our previous report dated 2168/9 we knew that at least 30 contacts should have been orbiting the planet and Navy Command started to think that probably would have been wiser to send another scout in to establish that the tactical situation wasn’t changed prior launching Showdown. Eventually, at 8:13 pm we spotted multiple salvos of missiles incoming which were directed to our eyes.

(https://i.imgur.com/uxnByTZ.png)
Incoming

In the first wave, the UNEN Eclipse exploded with 85 people saved and recovered from the pods while 212 died, including Commander Martin Terblanche. The second wave saw the departure of the UNEN Violet of which 62 people could have been saved from the pods while 155 died including Commander Ines Cordero Serrano. As salvos kept coming in, we lost also the UNEN Plover and another 174 members of the crew, while 43 people including Commander Chou Na You were saved from the pods, and the UNEN Dauntless of which we could save 120 people from the pods but 262 including Commander Freya Lyons died in the explosion of the ship.

(https://i.imgur.com/KghNaMY.png)
First Losses

Meanwhile, the UNEN Leftwich was dead in space and all commanders on board evacuated including operation chief and leader Viviana Agostini. During the multiple hits, she injured herself and her long term health would have probably been conditioned. However, shortly after the evacuation, one of the engines was repaired permitting the ship to begin retreating with the others as in the meantime Navy Command acknowledge the mission as failed and ordered all ships to retreat back to Altair Sirius Jump Point.

(https://i.imgur.com/8HC42Xl.png)
Retreat

While retreating, UNEN Undaunted, already severely damaged, was reached by another salvo of missiles and exploded. 119 members of the crew managed to reach life pods and escape the massacre to be rescued shortly after while the rest of the crew, 178 people, died in the explosion, including Commander Rurik Cherkasov. With the UNEN Exmouth already dead in space, it was only a matter of time before another salvo of missiles would have reduced her to pieces and that exactly happened shortly after we lost the Exmouth. 78 members of the crew managed to escape and were saved from the pods including Commander Maria Vikstrom, while 139 people died.

Finally, almost at the end of a horrible day, the UNEN Ulster ceased to exist and only 37 people were saved from the pods leaving the remaining 180 dead, including Commander Gerodi Morello.

On 7th of May, all survived ships but the UNEN Able transited the Altair Sirius jump point. Stranded without fuel, all 309 members of the crew were declared MIA including the captain of the ship, Lieutenant Commander Fidel Alanis Ruiz. The Final numbers of what we remember today as the "Bloody April" were: 4 Patriot-I E, 2 Patriot-I BS, 1 Danilov-I BS, 1 Paladin-I S destroyed, and 1038 people KIA along with 309 people MIA.

(https://i.imgur.com/IBCtiab.png)
The UNEN Able and the rest of the wrecks in Altair, including the UNEN Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld lost on the 2nd of December 2141

It goes without saying that many people on Earth and also the other colonies were extremely unhappy with the outcome. The battle was badly lost and probably even the war if the Aliens would have ever decided to strike back.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on December 29, 2020, 10:52:01 PM

That's, uhhhh, not a very good result. Unless you're the aliens of course.

What lessons will Earth learn from this lesson? Will they even learn a lesson, or will political infighting obscure any sense of reason?

To my eyes it looks as if Earth suffered from not enough ships, period. Knowing that there would be 30+ contacts, a much greater numerical superiority was necessary to create 2:1 or even 3:1 odds, in tonnage at least and in numbers ideally also. Additionally it seems clear that not enough point defense is present in the Earth ships, an expensive lesson to learn but a worthwhile one.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on December 30, 2020, 04:46:23 AM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on December 29, 2020, 10:52:01 PM

That's, uhhhh, not a very good result. Unless you're the aliens of course.

What lessons will Earth learn from this lesson? Will they even learn a lesson, or will political infighting obscure any sense of reason?

To my eyes it looks as if Earth suffered from not enough ships, period. Knowing that there would be 30+ contacts, a much greater numerical superiority was necessary to create 2:1 or even 3:1 odds, in tonnage at least and in numbers ideally also. Additionally it seems clear that not enough point defense is present in the Earth ships, an expensive lesson to learn but a worthwhile one.

Agreed, just hard to talk some sense into this militaristics leaders.

As a player, you can spend literally 50 years begging some military investment just to end up with 15/20 years of military madness!

I just love it and the latest tweaks are even better.

The military is pbvi0usly going to analyze the battle but what they will learn (if they will actually do learn) it's unknown.

You know, real life it's plenty of these situations: what if Hannibal did cross the Alps? What if Hitler did wait for the winter to pass before launching red beard? What if Barbier did prepare a different strategy to prepare showdown? We will never know!

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Everyday life stories
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 10, 2021, 02:04:44 AM

Everyday life stories - 1 - Anonymous

I remember being probably only 5 or 6 years old when our president at that time, Danilov, announced his plan to conquer the stars. I was still in school and new programs were formed to learn about space. The funniest one was when they replaced the gym activities with the Zero Gravity exercises. Many of us were more interested in peeing in the chamber rather than learn how to move in it, once I also got suspended to take the challenge one step further and directly sh*t in the thing. My mother was so pissed that she threatened to send me at the scrap yard.

Yes, in 2100, the scrap was the worst you could do. After the 3rd world war and the nukes, despite the effort of cleaning the planet, there were still many places were all the radioactive metals and items were kept. Later we started to send them in space, but before that, somebody had to sort that poison and recover as many materials as possible. We were just run out of TN minerals, and hope to find others was extremely low.

My childhood wasn’t different than the one of many others. My dad was a scrappy and my mother already wrapped her mind around the idea that he would have lived probably 40 to 50 years in total, the latest 2 most likely in agony by the radiation poisoning. Today when it rains I still think or dream about him. Every night, when he came back home he had these long showers because my mum wanted to ensure he wasn't poisoning us going around all dirty and dusty. He had life insurance, like all the other scrappies, provided by the company he was working for that would have granted us some credits at his departure but many of them would have still go bankrupted at payday even if my father life was worth less than the number of minerals he would have salvaged in a month. Because of that, my mother was also working in one of the new Naval Yards. She thought that would have been the only future possible. Looking at things today, she was probably right. It always puzzled me as to how my dad managed to land such an amazing woman. I wish I would have been that lucky.

All I remember of those years were the continuous promises of the President, the discoveries of many TN minerals in other Sol System bodies and the endless projects made to bring Humans on other celestial bodies in no time. It wasn’t healthy. By words, the world was moving at the speed of light but effectively we could see no real improvement to our lives for decades. When you are a kid, you don’t fully understand that your mind has been brainwashed with bs and by the time you are 19 and able to be your own man it’s too late. You realize it would have been better to study more and look for a real job instead of dreaming for the stars, after all, they weren’t as they pictured them or at least not yet.

So here I was, 19 years old on the 26th of March 2112. Danilov was gone and Ertegün was now president. Many thought he was useless and just living off Danilov plans, I couldn’t care less. In the night, under the proper conditions, I could see the lights of our new warships and shipyards. Cargo Shuttles looked like many small fireflies, transporting people up in space and back down on Earth. It was magical, yet useless. Don’t get me wrong, I did get laid quite a few times because of the spectacle but, besides that, it did not benefit me at all. At least not immediately. The news was that Mars now had enough Oxygen to breathe on the surface if it wasn’t for the ridiculously low temperatures and no water. However, my mum had just run away with my father's insurance money and I was most of the times without a credit. The Government was running a Mars colonization program and the pay wasn’t bad. I heard that conditions on Mars weren’t superb and that the government infrastructure was worse than the scrappy accommodation villages. However, I did grow up in one of them and I’ve found it hard to believe so I enlisted and embarked for Mars shortly after. Oh boy, I was wrong!

The place was a shi*hole but the governor was something. Melisa Zorlu was stunningly beautiful, smart, and cunning. When a few decades later she became president I wasn’t surprised. Still, Mars was sh*t. The job was easy: build more infrastructure for more people to come. Then more people arrived and more infrastructures were built. After the first intake of colonist the government changed the policy to favour families, so what started as a sausage party with pretty much no women worth of that name, soon became a hunting ground where each married woman had a husband and another 4 or 5 men courting her from day to night trying to get laid.

I am sure the Martian Police was very busy and probably some officer did also intervene quite a few time to suppress brawls started because two men were trying to fu*k the same woman that was also the officer's wife at the end. That kind of busy.

I left Mars only 8 years later. Like many others, I was almost forced back to Earth by the promises of the new Federalist President Abba. I was an Earthling (a person born on Earth) and National sentiment started to spread fast on the off-world colonies. Suddenly the parents of the kids born on Mars or Luna assumed that they and their kids deserved more and priority should have been given to their needs rather than keep importing strangers. Surely it was just the beginning, but you could see where this was going and so I thought that it was time to go back home. I was 27, still unmarried, but at least I wasn’t broke like when I left. When I arrived on Earth it was chaos. People were on the streets marching against some sort of constitutional change proposed by the new Government and it had something to do with the Justice System but I was only thinking of having a bit of fun after 3 months in cryosleep to be bothered by that political nonsense. Obviously, a year later I left Mars, they managed to warm the planet and have access to water. To go back wasn’t an option so I decided to apply for a job in one of the many Business Centers that were built while I was away to counter the increasing unemployment.

With my low skills, I could land only a low-grade job but that is where I met my wife. As I said, I wasn’t lucky as my dad was, but she was a decent woman, had a good position, but more importantly she knew how to keep a man. After she died, I was told that others knew her skills and that she kept busy while I was away or she was at work, but if I have to be honest I always knew and as long as everything was quiet and fine at home I never mentioned it nor cared.

The years from 2125 to 2134 were probably the best years. Zorlu was president and even if all the people that were on Mars in the firs years knew that she had a very particular taste when it came to sex, she was still a great leader, probably the best we ever had. I still remember the sky in the night during that period. The dark side of the moon was no more. You could see all the little colonies on the dark surface as tangible proof of our achievements as a species. So much happened back then, from the PLUTS crisis to the first human ship in another start system. Everybody important was so focused on space while we common folks were still struggling to make a living like after the war.

It was during an unusually cold summer night that while having dinner with the kids, my wife and I openly discussed the possibility of leaving Earth, in my case again. The opportunity came along shortly after that, with the financial centre where we were both employed that was selected to be moved on Luna in a big government fund economic program aimed at increasing the quality of life on the colonies. The government would have provided tickets for the whole family and some relocation funds equal to 6 months pay. We left Earth on the 2nd of May 2130 and we would have never come back.

An illegitimate election, a resignation after 11 years of presidency, and a president assassination later we found ourselves facing the most unexpected threat: we weren’t alone in the universe and aliens were found in one of the new systems explored. Obviously, for us what happened on the 9th of January 2142 was way more important than ET and the events of December 41, however, to know aliens were actually a thing started to corrupt many people minds with dark thoughts. Human supremacy, genocide, and more were constant talks in the streets. The economy was so bad that more the government decided to pour money into military spending, the more people kept talking. These were also the years that led to my retirement. The kids left already to study either on the new Luna academy or back to Earth. My wife worked for a few years more and joined me around 2160/61. Life and retirement were very different from what we pictured but to see the domes of Luna removed and a brand new blue sky was something we thought never possible when we were children and we would have died knowing that another future was possible.

Anonymous

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on January 10, 2021, 12:37:41 PM

Very touching personal story, there. Really captures the mix of emotions and themes in the everlasting march of human progress. Thanks for something different!

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 10, 2021, 03:41:31 PM

Thanks, this is what I like about Aurora, you can use it to write so many stories.

I always write some short stories while playing even by myself, it helps me to relax. I could keep playing and update but sometimes you need time to think, truly stop, and enjoy the moment.

I have a few stories that I am planning to post between an update and another. It will help me keep the updates frequent and the reader to understand what is going on a lesser scale of things. The next one will be the story of a (famous?) young Commander.

Just so you know the stories are coherent with the Aurora world. So, for instance, there was really a civilian colony ship leaving from Mars to Earth and arriving after 3 months at the same time the first constitutional reform was approved.

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Everyday life stories
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 10, 2021, 05:28:52 PM

Everyday life stories - 2 - Rear Admiral Alexis Citron

Personal Correspondence - Rear Admiral Alexis Citron 08/06/2160

Dear Father,

I finally graduated from the academy and awarded the rank of Lieutenant Commander. Unfortunately, the government decided to spend the majority of its budget to buy some sort of media corporations so it looks like I will be grounded for a while. It does not matter much because my priority was to make you proud and help you and mum with the payments.

The credits are not as many as I thought but here at the barracks the food and a bed are provided so I will send you as much as I can every month to help you. I cannot believe the government support is that low. We are the most loyal servants and we should get more.

How are you doing besides that? Is mum still not able to work?

I love you both and I hope to you hear back from you soon.

Alex

Personal Correspondence - Rear Admiral Alexis Citron 08/06/2170

Dear Father,

I was disappointed knowing you and mum would have not been able to attend my 10 years of service ceremony. I know that this new Federalist government it’s though when it comes to travel between colonies but I am sure I could have helped if you would have told me in time.

I wanted to talk to you both in person but I guess it will have to be by email now.

Just a few months ago, in April, I have been diagnosed with a rare infection. It is not life-threatening at the moment but the doctor says to don’t keep my hopes high in the long term. Scientific researches are all focused on military development and funds on similar cases as mine are very limited.

Now some good news: I will be promoted Captain in a few days. This means that I will be able to support you and Mum more, and hopefully afford to come back home soon for a visit. Tickets are still expensive but a friend of mine may be able to fit me in one of these emergency transport for a lump sum, I will let you know as soon as I will know more.

Love you

Alex

Personal Correspondence - Rear Admiral Alexis Citron 17/09/2172

Dear Mum,

Thanks for your kind words. Dad was always my hero and the news of his death has deeply saddened me. The Navy has been reviewing my position because my sickness will not make me able to pass the combat-ready tests and so I will not be dispatched on Sirius Military Outpost for now and maybe never.

I know I promised to come back and visit dad’s grave but I have been ordered immediately to Jupiter’s Harvesting facility and I will leave with a tanker transport today after have been given a 24 hours notice.

Francine is furious, she is heavily pregnant and the baby is due any minute now, but what can I do? These are the orders, you know how these things work, for dad was the same.

How is Dany? Is she still grieving? I know she and dad were very close especially after I left.

And what about you? How are you holding up?

Let me know if you need more money as the only good thing about this job was the extra bonus credits.

Leve you all

Alex

Personal Correspondence - Rear Admiral Alexis Citron 01/01/2177

Dear Mum,

How are you?

I am very happy. While the whole world is talking about Sirius, I have been given the opportunity of a lifetime and this separation it’s really coming as a blessing.

With all the qualified military personnel stationed on Sirius and joining the separatists, the Navy has been reviewing all positions, including mine. Thanks to my seniority I have been given the honor to command the UNEN Abu Abdullah Muhammad Ibn Battut!

I am not only finally commanding my own ship, but a scout ship. I will be traveling to unexplored Star Systems. This is why I have enlisted and I am finally able to fulfill my dreams. I wish dad was still alive to witness this day. I still miss him every day.

How was Dany’s wedding? She looked stunning in the video so I am sure she was even more beautiful live. George is a good guy and I am sure he’ll be a good husband and father. Well, he better be or he may have to answer to my crew now!

I am happy that you got to spend a bit of time with Francine and Mark. He is growing up so fast and I am missing so much of his childhood already.

I guess we will not see each other for a while now, we have been assigned to the Andromedae Arm and these missions are 3 to 5 years long. I will write as soon as I can, please do congratulate Danny and George again on my behalf.

Love you all

Alex

Personal Entry Log, Rear Admiral Alexis Citron - 01/06/2190

30 years today, was worth it?

Well, after reading this letter you will be probably the judge of that. All I can do is to leave you a small memory of mine that may justify missing the most important moments of my life.

It was the 7th of March 2177 when I ordered the ship to transit the jump point. You would have turned 6 in a few months and I already knew that I would have not been there. I tried to stay in touch as much as I could but communications with outer systems are very hard to come by.

It took only 5 seconds for us to transit the Jump Point but to me, it felt like 5 years. All the sacrifices, the missed parties, your mother’s tears, the friendships lost, and more were finally forming meaning and hopefully coming to an end.

I needed this system not to be empty or my life would have been empty with it.

When we finally reached Luyten 140-9 I was glad to see at least 2 planets orbiting the star. One was nearly habitable and the protocol imposed to visit and scan the world. I was excited. In all humanity, only 40 or 50 people had the privilege to actually be the first in traveling in a new system and even a few could have actually explored a new world for the first time.

This is why I decided to follow your grandfather's steps. He never managed to leave Earth and when I finally stepped on the Luyten 140-9-A II surface I know he was there by my side.

It was a hot archipelago world, the majority of the surface was water but there was so much “life”. Not the kind we were after, just animals and plants. Right before leaving this sort of whale jumped out of the water and started to fly. I remember closing my eyes while feeling the drops of water hitting my helmet and wetting my suit.

I worked hard and fought against all medical advice to be there in that moment and it felt like that whale was waiting only for me to come. It was my destiny and I felt like my life was fulfilled. I had reached the peak of my existence and I wish for you to feel the same one day.

As I said, I have lost the most important moments of my life just to feel alive in those few seconds. Not only the death of your grandpa, your auntie’s wedding, many of your birthdays, but also when grandma was taking her last breath I was still traveling trying to come back in time. You see my son, your dad has lived defying and mastering every physic’s notion but time.

Time will always win. I knew I did not have much of it and I had to make some calls.
My hope is that one day, when I will not be here as I wasn’t when you came into this world, maybe you’ll look at the stars you’ll still find a reason to forgive me.

I love you, my son.

Dad

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: nuclearslurpee on January 10, 2021, 06:37:26 PM

...damn. Heavy stuff there, Mr. Frog.

I demand you stop ~~tugging on my heartstrings~~ chopping onions in this thread and distract us with more glorious space battles and gratuitous killing of aliens!

This bit:

Quote

Just a few months ago, in April, I have been diagnosed with a rare infection. It is not life-threatening at the moment but the doctor says to don’t keep my hopes high in the long term. Scientific researches are all focused on military development and funds on similar cases as mine are very limited.

is striking. Even with all our modern TN tech advances, somehow the technology and research doesn't seem to go where it is needed most when it is needed that much. I'd hope humanity could do better in the future, but somehow I have doubts...

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 10, 2021, 07:12:39 PM

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 10, 2021, 06:37:26 PM

...damn. Heavy stuff there, Mr. Frog.

It's a wonderful love story with a happy ending. The guy has fulfilled his dreams! We obviously have a different path to happyness.

;)

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 10, 2021, 06:37:26 PM

gratuitous killing of aliens!

I like to think that every time I kill a bug there is a mama bug crying for it. It brings the killing experience to another level, almost worth it.

;D

Quote from: nuclearslurpee on January 10, 2021, 06:37:26 PM

Even with all our modern TN tech advances, somehow the technology and research doesn't seem to go where it is needed most when it is needed that much. I'd hope humanity could do better in the future, but somehow I have doubts...

If there is something we learned in 2020 is that there is always something new trying to kill us

:o

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Aftermath
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 11, 2021, 01:30:26 AM

2190 – The Aftermath

After the defeat in Altair, it was time for the Barbier to face the government. In an extraordinary session the Senate of the Republic repeatedly asked why, regardless of the assurance of the military, operation showdown was such a disaster. The following is the original speech of the president while addressing the senate on the matter:

“Colleagues, Senators, and citizens of the Republic. Today it’s a sad day but a sad day won’t crush our Republic. The Aliens may have won a battle but the war is far from over. Many of you are trying to find the classic scapegoat for the failure of the mission but I will not do that. I won’t throw to the wolves the already scarred souls of our Navy which have already seen more than a thousand of their brothers and sisters killed just a few days ago. What this Senate it’s calling a disaster we call information gathering. What this Senate it’s calling a failure we call growth. We will learn from our mistakes and we will prevail against the alien menace and when we will many in this house will have to hide their faces for the shame. I love the Navy, I love the Republic, and I love the freedom you all enjoying but with great freedom also comes a higher sense of responsibility not only in our actions but also words. It is with regret then that I announce that as from today 25th of June 2190 to talk using negative attributes towards our Navy or our Republic will be considered a crime. All those who will be found guilty will have to be condemned and detained in our new centres for a time to be determined by the gravity of the accusations. Special areas in the camps will be arranged for these criminals. I wish I could spend more time in this house with you today but I have unfortunately a war to win and today it’s not the time for futile talks.”

Many senators followed the speech with crushing applauses but Philippine still left the house under escort while avoiding multiple objects which were thrown at her persona from many other Senators. The same Senators wanted also to stop the newly announced resolution but a majority was already formed to support the motion. Obviously, the Chancellor had already a plan in case of defeat and she was only pursuing it. Once addressed the senate, the president met with the war council. The points highlighted were essentially 2. First, our Pd were less effective than the expected and the Area Defense which could have been set wasn’t actually executed. Maybe we could have intercepted more missiles maybe not, we will never know. The second point was that the enemy wouldn’t be able to shoot at us before 100 million kilometres.

Based on this information it was proposed to either increase our range of attack or to increase our PD capabilities. As both would have required a massive investment into military production and research, the President asked for another plan to be elaborated. The most interesting was one that involved only a small refurbish of our Navy. Basically, all ships would have required to install shields. Some would have lost some weapon capability or maybe a layer of Armour but this would have increased our chances to get through the Alien defences.

Eventually, deployment time could have been extended to ensure the fleet would have had enough time to deal with the enemy. To increase the PD capability instead, we could have used the existing ships in Sirius and on Earth. We would have used all our offensive and defensive capabilities but we would have also increased our efficiency. The president saw the refit of the navy as a good quick compromise that could have benefited the republic both on the long and short period so she ordered new plans for all existing warship to be designed and submitted for approval within the week.

While at first everybody seemed to agree, as soon as the resolution hit the floor, a massive amount of rejections were raised and the fleet restructure had to be put to bed for good. The Chancellor understood her majority was more volatile than expected and it was time to face her political adversary again: Shiomi Tokimasa. The Professor explained plainly that the Military had their chance and they failed, regardless of the propaganda. In her view the Chancellor had 2 options: focus her view and efforts on the internal politics and problems or find a new majority able to support her crusade against the aliens. After all, they seemed not interested in our territories and whatever they were guarding was something that we currently did not need considering we were doing fine without it.

Finally, from a scientific point of view, we had all the information and knowledge to let the alien be and move on. In the clear attempt of keeping the scientific interests in check, the Chancellor then pointed out that if it was so, then no efforts were needed to carry on Black Swan efforts in the Gliese 257 system. And exactly like in a chess game, Shiomi moved in to eliminate the source of the check by mentioning that the operations in Gliese could have been scrapped if there were no scientific advancement to be made same as the Navy if there was no war to fight.

The Chancellor backed off the topic then and promised to think over the proposal made by the federalist of focusing the government efforts into internal issues for the time being.

By ending the war, the only possible path to re-election was to end the mineral crisis as well. If Shiomi wanted her to spend for the people, she needed to ensure that the money would have gone in the right direction. The Chancellor had to accelerate the efforts in the Centauri Systems and possibly expand in Andromedae. Neutronium was the most wanted mineral so that should have been given priority. Now that she knew what she wanted she had to figure what could possibly be needed by the Scientists. The black swan was one goal for sure, but that was an approved plan and it wasn’t of much political value. Her head would have been another wanted thing, but the price tag for that was much higher. What would have been valuable yet expendable if everything went south?

They met again before the week ended and after have explained her plan the Chancellor asked what would the Federalist and Scientific union wanted in exchange. The answer was surprising. They asked for the whole survey fleet to be recalled and refurbished. Every ship had to be classified as a scientific vessel with proper equipment. Finally, the ships would have been able to search for minerals as for gravitational anomalies. We were talking of almost 50 ships, a module not researched yet, and thousands of minerals and credits. If almost everything could be done, minerals could not be spared.

Obviously, Shiomi was reading the same polls that Philippine was reading and to ensure that the Chancellor would have not been able to reach her goals was priority number one of the government. They were going for the kill.

(https://i.imgur.com/C5QdHfo.png)
Polls with a Mineral Crisis

(https://i.imgur.com/oWkiyDa.png)
Polls without a Mineral Crisis

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - Wake up calls
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 17, 2021, 03:11:46 AM

2190/3 – Wake up calls

The Chancellor was left with no choice than to accept. Everything was a matter of time. Within a year Vanya Nesterov would have completed the Research Lab upgrade that would have increased their annual output and with that also allowed the Science Department unit to be deployed still while the current government would have been in charge. This would have left Philippine with only 12 to 18 months to sort the extra minerals sources. The Tokimasa was pleased by the accord reached and informed the house that the Federalist and Scientist coalition would have been supported the Chancellor till the end of the mandate. With the crisis finally foiled, everybody went back to work.

The Chancellor also decided to finally launch Black Swan and get rid of the Ruins in Gliese 257. This would have also reduced the Scientist weight in the Senate as based on the pollings the possibility of Alien technology to be recovered and used was something giving a good boost of popularity to the movement. On the 25th of July 2190 then, a Troop Transport was ordered to leave Earth directed to Gliese 257. all our Xeno and Engineer companies were on board with 4 small supply companies. Another 2 transports would have provided one small escort contingent each that were originally trained to participate in the Sirius assault. For the Occasion, they renamed 234th and 235th Xeno Escort Brigades.

A project to actually colonize the system was also drafted as it would have been possible to have access to all TN minerals but Tritanium useful only for magazines and ordnance in general. After considering the Tritanium a not essential mineral, the Chancellor signed the order of colonization in line with her new civilian approach to politics. Gate Builders were tasked to form a permanent link with the system.

Meanwhile, civilian dockets and contracts were prepared to get Ultima Centauri up to speed. Now, all that was left was to wait and hope everything would have been ready before the Chancellor would have been forced to take upon her promises.

Right before the end of the year, Navy Command received a message from the Able. Lieutenant Commander Ruiz broadcasted live to all frequencies the emergency message. The signal was picked also by the media:

BREAKING NEWS – Paladin-I Able still alive and left behind enemy lines:

“This is Lieutenant Commander Ruiz speaking. Emergency Message for all Republican Personnel in Sirius, we are alive, I repeat we are alive. We need immediate assistance. Reporting no Fuel, heavy structural damages, low supplies. Sensors restored, no enemy in sight, we are all clear, I repeat, we are all clear. Position estimated 888mkm from Altair-A V bearing 298. We are adrift, I repeat, we are adrift. Immediate assistance is required. This is not a recording, we are streaming live”.

Even if the population wasn’t happy to learn that our people were left behind, this would have been an enormous chance for the Chancellor to gain popularity and possibly sell a successful story right before an election year. Suddenly, to recover the ship was paramount in the whole government. A mission was arranged in the matters of hours as there wasn’t any more time to waste. A tanker would have left Earth for Sirius immediately, refuel and then jumped into Altair with the help of one of the tenders. Once in Altair, operations to refuel the Able would have been carried. A month later, the Able was finally safe on Sirius Orbit’s and Lieutenant Commander Ruiz was awarded the Medal of Honor for the great courage and resilience demonstrated to save his crew. In one go the casualties of the war were lowered by 23%, making the defeat a sweater pill to swallow. As a result, the Chancellor popularity and prestige increased to the highest ever recorded.

On the Gliese Front, a nasty surprise was waiting for the landing party. Apparently, some sort of automated defences were present in the ruins and escaped the first sensor survey from orbit. With the all units under heavy fire and no real combat capabilities, a transport left quickly the planet in the attempt of bringing backups as soon as possible while the others recalled back all civilian personnel. The 124th Sirius Occupation Force was ordered back to Earth and Randevouz with the upcoming transport from the alien ruins. The operation would have taken almost 8 months and it took only a few weeks for the aliens to wipe out our 2 brigades. The opposition might have been tougher than expected.

2191 started with the complete plan of incarceration for all those people unhappy with the Republic. 2,000 tons of Duranium and 2,000 tons of Corundium were sent to both Luna and Mars. Along with that, 50 Forced Labour Camps were delivered and installed on each planet. These would have started construction of 100 Forced Labour Mines each which would have probably been delivered to Sirius once ready. The population was extremely concerned and some malcontent started to rise in many cities but the more it rose the more people were arrested and sent to the camps. Consequentially, resistance slowly faded away.

On the 28th of June 2191, the newly upgraded laboratories did not give the hoped results all the scientific community was waiting for and therefore it would have been taken more than expected to deliver the science modules for the new scientific vessels. Despite that, the party pushed for the prototype of the new engine and jump engine to be researched in the meantime. The chancellor was left with no choice but to comply with the request. Another blow hit the Scientist Party shortly after. The mission Black Swan ended up with the destruction of all ground forces involved. The Chancellor spun the narrative alleging that it was not possible for the Navy to wage war against the aliens if the Military asked due to Scientists fierce opposition, however, it was fine to do so to pursue their foolish scientific motives. After having recovered the 309 crew member of the Able, the losses of the Altair skirmish were only 15% of the losses in Gliese 257. The popularity of the party and the Tokimasa were highly affected by the events. Another Federalist lead in the Senate seemed extremely unlikely now.

New tech should have been researched and given to the Army to train and design something able to compete with the Alien Ground Forces. The Chancellor asked her older brother, Thierry Barbier, to help in developing a new powerful armour for the Army. He gladly accepted and started to work on the design immediately. It was time to acknowledge the Alien superiority and work to close the gap.

(https://i.imgur.com/bGz1Kk4.png)
Thierry Barbier Profile

As research labs were limited and all busy working on other projects, the Chancellor decided to invest in the construction of another 10 facilities. Such a wise decision was welcomed by many parties and seen with favour also from the Militarists’ political adversaries. Furthermore, with the majority of the systems already surveyed, it was decided to resume exploration of the Sol Lacertae loop to ensure no external connection was present and hopefully end the chain. The targeted systems were the ones around the newly alien-controlled system of NN 3820, O. Struve 547 and WISE 0038+2758. 3 of the available scouts were ordered to leave Earth’s orbit immediately. By the 15th of June 2192, the 3 new jump points were explored with only the LHS 2594 being of interest. The system had in fact the remarkable amount of 202 Asteroids and hopefully, some of them would have been rich in TN minerals. So far that branch did have only another interesting candidate, already surveyed, with as many asteroids, however, the findings were not superb. Maybe the 2 systems combined would have allowed for a small mining operation to be established. The GJ 1288-A I dwarf planet then would have been a good small outpost (only 59 million people were estimated to be able living on the surface) for the exploration to continue more easily.

When finally on the 2nd of April 2193 the research on the science module was complete, it was also time to recall the whole survey fleet and start operations for the refits. With months to the election, the Chancellor hoped to slow down retooling operations and be able to end the mandate with a surplus of minerals which would have helped her cause ensuring a Militaristic win.

Quote

Horizon-IJT class Science Vessel 7,000 tons 181 Crew 1,112.5 BP TCS 140 TH 74 EM 0
1500 km/s JR 3-50 Armour 1-32 Shields 0-0 HTK 47 Sensors 8/8/3/3 DCR 7 PPV 0
Maint Life 10.02 Years MSP 1,495 AFR 56% IFR 0.8% 1YR 27 5YR 406 Max Repair 100 MSP
Commander Control Rating 2 BRG SCI
Intended Deployment Time: 60 months Morale Check Required

Military Jump Drive (4x7k) Max Ship Size 7050 tons Distance 50k km Squadron Size 3

Ion Drive EP105.00 (2) Power 210 Fuel Use 4.89% Signature 36.75 Explosion 4%
Fuel Capacity 561,000 Litres Range 295.1 billion km (2277 days at full power)

Standard GPS (1) GPS 1600 Range 29.6m km Resolution 100
Standard TH (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
Standard EM (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
Gravitational Survey Sensors (3) 3 Survey Points Per Hour
Geological Survey Sensors (3) 3 Survey Points Per Hour

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes

Eventually, right before election day, Philippine’s brother Thierry completed the new armour research. Before updating the whole army, the Chancellor wanted to review the whole structure but with the election at door’s step, she decided to wait to have regained full powers before committing to any project.

(https://i.imgur.com/ZVYgoBY.png)
Pollings Election 2193

Title: Re: Aurora - A political story - The Democratic View
Post by: Froggiest1982 on January 20, 2021, 02:12:23 AM

2194 – The Democratic View

While campaigning in all colonies, Philippine Barbier realized that with the increase of liberty limitations and the expansion of the labour camps, a strong Democratic Sentiment was again surfacing within the poorest part of the population. A mixed Pacifist and Industrialist government was entirely possible and the formation of a Democratic Coalition after more than 50 years seemed highly probable. All the Chancellor could have done was to ensure her victory against the main Democratic candidate, Daphne Meijer. Again, the long term strategy of the Democratic Party revealed to be extremely savvy and Daphne, after a few decades of mentoring, was finally a palpable contestant for the lead. At only 38 years old, she would have been on the political stage for a long time with ascending popularity while Philippine was already at the peak and starting to decline. On the Federalist front, the poor management of the inexperienced Tokimasa, too interested in defending the Scientists views, would have costed a high price in terms of preferences. Eventually, after this election, a new leader would have been required to gain more support.

A series of policies were discussed by every candidate. The Barbier advocated for the institution of a national conscription program that would have been used to replenish the Army in the provision of the big update and restructure she was planning. Daphne Meijer, with the goal of ensuring the support of the Industrialist Party, proposed a series of consumer benefits to stimulate production and consumptions. The Tokimasa insisted for the formation of Civilian Academies to separate the Scientific and Humanistic culture from the current Militaristic Education System.

For the first time since its formation, the Senate would have reached its maximum representation level. The constitution, in fact, limited to 2,000 seats the Senate composition regardless of the amount of population. While some people felt less represented by this development, the government had to ensure that all operation could have been run smoothly, and having a capped amount of Senators would have probably been the best way to achieve that. Right before election night, the Government signed its latest motion, ratifying the decrease of the Defcon alert to Level 3, and the Training Level required by the new conscripts to be enlisted to level 4.

On the 1st of January 2194, votes were cast all around the Republic to decide who would have been in charge for the following 4 years. If the Barbier re-election would have not been in dispute, it remained to be seen if the Republican would have been able to assist her in pursuing their political agenda. As soon as first results started to come in, it became immediately clear that not the Meijer nor the Tokimasa would have been able to challenge the Barbier victory which, with the 41.60% if the preferences were confirmed as Chancellor on the same night. However, the Senate election went as feared by the Republicans with a surge in the Pacifists votes that resulted in the party being the second right after the Industrialists. The previous leaders of the Scientists managed to keep the third position but with almost half of the previous election seats.

(https://i.imgur.com/DbB9qLi.png)
Chancellor Election 2190

The Senate was then composed by 2,000 seats. 176 went to the Federalists, 509 to the Pacifists, 570 to the Mercantile and Industrialists, 342 to the Scientists, 189 to the Nationalists and 214 to the Militarists. As Chancellor’s prerogative and custom, Philippine started to look for a majority right away in the classic extraordinary session held after election night on the same day. The only “friendly” coalition, would have been the Nationalists. Their agenda would have worked well with the new political address of the Chancellor. The Barbier started in fact a new internal agenda which included the use of xenophobic policies towards the aliens to promote fear through the population along with the use of extreme measures of imprisonment to stop any form of rebellion or malcontent. All these were highly regarded by the Social Nationalist Movement. After the first round of interview, she managed to receive 1420 preferences, more than 2/3 of the Senate.

Satisfied with the result she proposed the new coalition as leader of the government. Before the vote, all opposition leader was asked to speak. With surprise, the first to speak was Shiomi Tokimasa and not Daphne Meijer. Here is the original speech:

“Dear Colleagues, Citizens and Senators of the Republic. Today we are witnessing yet another attempt to eliminate our democratic approach to live and think. In the previous hours, our delegation did support the Chancellor Elected Barbier in respect of our constitution and popular vote. However, we cannot be silenced or pretend to be silenced by a government based on fear and oppression. It came to our attention that the Nationalist agenda and the Chancellor agenda do not represent our ideals and we also believe being toxic for our Republic. It is with regret then that we are hereby withdrawing our support to the coalition in favor of a Democratic turn and leadership.”

For the second time in a row, the Chancellor was betrayed on the finish line. The final count was 1547 seats for the Democrats which would have granted them the control of the Senate and the right to govern.

(https://i.imgur.com/NbHDJ7v.png)
Possible Coalitions 2190

Even though, the Chancellor obtained for the Democrat to pass the motion on the Conscription. After all, the Barbier did campaign hard on the matter and the clear election win was something not possible to be swept under the rug by the new Majority. However, the list of concessions terminated there. From pretty much day one, the government dismantled the labour camps construction limiting them to the existing production and installations. A good chunk was already built anyway, and many of the Barbier opposers were already been “allocated” to the new structures and that’s why the temporary veto was accepted without too many complaints. The problem was that the government also refurbished all the current research projects to favour something more of democratic importance. Long term projects, such as the revamp of the shipyard operations, which would have increased the saving both in money and time by 20% was halted along with the research on a new Troop Transport Bay module.

However, the need of stronger Army, in light of the latest events, was recognized by the whole Senate and research to keep improving our troops were allowed and approved. The Brother of the Chancellor would have then been allowed to continue his efforts in the ground combat sector. Furthermore, the government liked the idea of the Barbier to extend the Republic domain in the Gliese 433 branch and gate builders were ordered to establish a network through the whole known extent up to LHS 2595, which with its 23.3 LY distance from Sol was also the farther system known to Humans.

MAP HD

Off-Topic: show

IMPORTANT

As my work on the Government File is completed (I have fixed another couple of bugs and balanced a few parameters) I am interrupting this AAR because it exhausted it's purpose. I will be working on the new I will release on 1.13 and probably play a couple of solo games just to relax. I may write an AAR of the new game so if in a couple of weeks 1.13 will still be not out I will have enough material to release regular updates.
Thanks for reading!

Aurora 4x

C# Fiction => General C# Fiction => Topic started by: Froggiest1982 on October 04, 2020, 11:19:32 PM