What is it they say? Better late than never...
Backstory:During the mid 2020s it became apparent that neither pandemics, climate change nor terrorists was the most urgent threat to the western way of life. It started with semiconductors but soon spread to even more basic resources and goods. Shortage of critical resources all over the world became extremely serious as hundreds of millions consumers in China, India and South Americas begun living the same quality of life as the rest of the western world. In what is now called the great collapse of 2026, prices on Oil, transport, food and most goods started skyrocketing shutting down businesses and causing mass unemployment. November 2026 saw the Stock exchanges crash on a scale even worse then the great depression in 1929. The old economic system suffered a total failure, since it was built upon the false assumption of infinite growth.
That fantasy was brutally stopped by the very finite resources of our globe.
It turned out humanity had learned nothing from the history of the 1930s, so history was to repeat itself once more.
In the second great depression and the desperate times following we saw that populistic, nationalistic and radical leaders had little trouble to convince the population how other nations were to blame for their misery. The armies and armadas of USA, China, India, Europe and Russia all mounted desperate crusades to fight for the few last oil fields remaining in operation in South Americas and Middle East. Africa, India and China was also turned into major Battlefields in the struggle for precious metals and other strategic raw materials.
India and Pakistan both hungry for resources to supply it's large populations stepped up their rethoric and all out conflict broke out. China saw it's chance and crossed the border into India from the other direction, and in South America it was imperialism all over again as USA and Europe sought to secure oil while smaller conflicts between most nations erupted over what major power blocks they sided with.
It did not take long before the nuclear missiles also started flying, first only small tactical devices but gradually larger as the conflicts escalated and spread over the world.
When the world war finally ran out of steam (literally speaking) no nation had escaped impacts in major cities, and the little oil that was left had been burned almost to the last drop by machines of death and destruction. Most of the deaths however were not due to the nuclear detonations themselves, but due to the nuclear winter impacting food production causing mass starvations, as well as collapse of all existing logistics and infrastructure without access to cheap oil. It was pure luck that most of the vast nuclear stockpile from the cold war was impossible to use due to rust and old age, otherwise humanity as a whole or at least modern society would probably be extinct.
The worst impact was on already war-torn nations thus resulting in the diminishing of Brazil, India and China as influential nations.
Large parts of the middle east, South America, India and China is still radiated and uninhabitable, even if some efforts to clean up has been conducted.
The human population in 2030 was estimated less than half remaining compared to 10 years earlier, but no one can tell exactly.
From the ashes four major Powers remained:
Russia, With most smaller central Asian powers absorbed.
America, including Canada and central America
Europe, Most of the European nations as well as Israel
Pacific, A union of Pacific nations led by Japan and containing Korea, Taiwan and most of Southeast Asia
In 2037 the big turning point occurred, scientists discovered several special materials with miracular, almost magical properties. These were called "Trans-Newtonian elements".
Early indications were extremely promising:
Duranium. Much like iron/steel, but many times lighter and more durable. Promising uses in almost all fields.
Neutronium. A very dense material possible to use for orbital shipyards, construction tools, advanced armors and railguns.
Tritanium. Useful in missiles and in the construction of ordnance factories.
Boronide. The primary material used in the construction of power systems, fuel refineries, capacitors, logistics systems and Terraforming facilities.
Uridium. Opens up possibility of building Faster Then Light (FTL) sensors and fire control systems.
Corbomite. Used in financial centers. Might be possible to use for advanced future stealth and electronic warfare systems (countering uridium based sensors).
Corundium. Very useful for building mines, automated mines and energy based weapons.
Mercassium. Used for Research Facilities, infrastructure and life support systems.
Vendarite. Used in the construction of small craft (space fighters).
Gallicite. Used in trans newtonian wake drives for spacetravel at higher speeds (ship stops if engines are turned off), and crew is unaffected by acceleration forces.
Sorium. Possible to refine in fuel refineries to produce high energy fuel for Gallicite based engines.
Since these elements were located mostly in the core of the planet no nation could claim them, and due to the promise of a bright future unlocking room for endless expansion (and thus resources) among the stars all four major powers cooperated in quickly developing deep core mining technology. A new United Nations was set up in one of the few untouched cities with a working large airport, Dubai to act as a forum for diplomacy and peacekeeping, as well as coordinate these efforts.
It is called The Federation of Nations (FoN).
It's now January 1:st 2042 and large scale extraction has just begun in all major powers. Most of the conventional industry is made obsolete and needs to be upgraded to Trans-Newtonian standards. A new Radiant Dawn is about to engulf mankind as it harness the power and technology behind the Trans-Newtonian elements and ascends to the stars.
How this story unfolds is up to you, the players choosing to engage in the stories of one of the nations.
Can new homes and resources be found among the stars before history repeats itself and space and new resources are once again depleted on Earth?
Can mankind avoid yet again turning the even more destructive powers unlocked against each-other?
Are we alone?
What is this about? ( Introduction )Aurora 4x C# probably doesn't need a detailed introduction on this forum
. I will be controlling the simulation as the game master and interpret the orders delivered so you need no Aurora knowledge to participate, but ofcourse you can still join if you already have some knowledge or even alot. Or you can leave all the details to me or others and provide general orders, but rest assure we will have a powerful engine running in the background to deliver detailed results. This will be the first time I attempt something like this so please be patient and let's figure out how to best run a game like this together!
I plan to crosspost most of the big updates on both discord and this thread, but for details and flowing discussions I think discord is a better format. I'll ofcourse still read and answer questions on this forum but might not monitor it constantly.
Discord link ( more details on the game here, join to request a supporting advisor role or follow the story closer ):
https://discord.gg/85ypsdPeev
