Hello everyone, and welcome to Raider’s Gambit. Raider’s Gambit is a character RP in which you play as the crew of the Misguided Faith, a heavy cruiser that turned to piracy instead of laying down her arms in the wake of losing her home. How will you seek adventure and riches as you ambush merchant ships, fight off the authorities, and out-maneuver ambitious rivals in the pieces of a shattered hegemon and states beyond its frontier? Who knows, you may just forge a legend when the dust settles. If you survive, of course.
This RP is a part of the Andromeda family of RPs, though there is absolutely no need to have read any of the others to participate here as this is a standalone RP in the setting.
This RP will remain open to newcomers. The Misguided Faith has a crew to pull from, and people freely leave and sign on as they please.
The wider Andromeda setting also has a Discord. It’s a good place to help find inspiration for a character concept, learn about the setting, or find help from the community as you are building a character for the RP. Or you can simply come and have a chat if you want. Our door is always open.
SETTING
The power vacuum left by the decline and collapse of the order offered by the Kiellar Command still has yet to be filled. The space of the former hegemon has been embroiled in a cycle of war and peace for nearly three-quarters of a century, with little sign of any successor state replacing the old Command.
It was in this environment that Ferahel had grown into prominence in its local sector on what was the frontier of the Command. It was a well-developed world and considered to be one of the gateways to the area of space that was colloquially known as the Neutral Zone, an area of space that was adjacent to the old superpowers of the Kiellar Command and the Ragon Empire. It soon grew into a burgeoning young Republic, wealthy and powerful off trade that still flowed through the shattered command and states outside of it.
Prosperity has power, and power draws the envious eyes of those looking to seize it for themselves. When Marshal Dindriann, a warlord following an extremist form of Kiellar Ultramilitarism, assaulted the world with the hopes of adding it to his own fiefdom carved out by forces loyal to him, one surviving heavy cruiser turned to piracy.
Vequel’s Gem
Sharing the system with Desirac, an earth-like world, and other artificial orbital bodies, Vequel’s Gem’s is a massive station that more closely resembles a small city than a specialized station. Being densely populated with native industry and defenses, Vaquel’s Gem is legally separate from the Desirac government and often operates in flagrant disregard of laws of the system in which it squats.
However, the flow of luxury goods and wealth, legal or otherwise, in exchange for what goods the Gem cannot produce from the station has encouraged the local government to turn a blind eye to the activities of the various gangs, mercenary groups, and pirates that call the station home.
Thanks to the influx of easily acquirable ex-Command and successor state personnel, Goshom Taarlan, a Gollar deviant has managed to establish herself as de-facto dictator of the station and has brought a certain degree of order to the chaotic station after a bloody rise to power fifteen years ago. Her rule is generally distant, but brutal for those who manage to earn her ire.
The Misguided Faith
The Misguided Faith, formerly the Resolute, is a Chieftain-class Heavy Cruiser. It is a formidable warship though it is primarily designed to allow for patrol voyages of several years. It is around 400 metres in length with 16 decks with an additional large superstructure at the rear.
The History of the Misguided Faith
The Resolute was out on a long patrol when the Marshal struck Ferahel, and only returned to the system when Dindriann’s navy had secured space supremacy. A heavy cruiser could not outfight an invasion fleet and had no hope of helping beyond saving a few shuttles that ran the blockade, and so she retreated from the fight. For weeks, the crew held their breath for word on the planet.
When word had reached them that Ferahel fell, a heavy silence fell over the crew and civilians aboard. They all knew there would be no home to go back to, and so they called a soldiers election for the fate of the ship. Two choices were laid out, to strike their colors and name and turn to piracy to keep themselves fed, or to disband and try to make on their own.
The vote was overwhelmingly in favor of piracy. The individual reasons for going pirate varied, but the crew was close and wanted revenge for their lost home. The civilians aboard were offered a choice to join or leave when the ship next docked.
For the next few months, the ship operated out of Vequel’s Gem, a station orbiting Desirac, just outside of what was Command space, and raided the Marshal’s convoys with such ferocity that they were compared to crusaders on a holy mission, and a sarcastic remark from marine officer earned the ship it’s then unofficial name, the Misguided Faith.
The Bridge: The Bridge is found in the superstructure at the rear of the ship.
Habitation: Habitation spans the rear of the ship with officer berths closer to the bridge. Officers have their own rooms. The rear habitation section also contains a few mess rooms, a gymnasium, a recreation room, a VR suite, and an improvised bar.
Engineering: Engineering sits in the bowels of the rear section. All essential ship systems are regulated from here.
Docking: The Misguided Faith has a maximum fighter complement of 30, and a capacity of up to 10 shuttles due to sacrificing fighter storage for shuttles. These are stored and launched in a bay mounted on the underside of the ship.
Medical Bay: A large medical facility sits just behind the docking bay, allowing for easier triage of troops after they return from a raid. It contains standard military-grade medical equipment plus a few extras picked up along the way.
Storage and hydroponics:Storage facilities lie under the living quarters in the rear of the ship. This section also houses a hydroponics deck; as everyone gets fed up with preserved food after a while.
LORE
Technology
As this is sci-fi, there are a number of pieces of technology that will be mentioned in the RP. Here is some info on them:
Skrim Drive: The Skrim Drive is the basic FTL drive used by all species in both galaxies, allowing them to phase across to hyperspace where an object can travel faster than light. Opening a hyperspace window requires a lot of energy and several minutes to 'spin the drive up'. Skrim Drives are prone to overheating and longer hyperspace journeys will need to be made in hops. That, along with the speed limitation means that most journeys between stars will take days or weeks and movement between galaxies with Skrim Drives alone is believed to be impossible.
Most ships can detect a hyperspace window opening or closing a few minutes before the ship utilizing their Skrim drive moves through it.
Translating alien languages: There are several forms of translation methods. The various spacefaring cultures of the Andromeda Galaxy use specialized microbes typically injected into children at birth and inhabit the brain. The United Nations of Sol use a standardized 'Earpiece, Microcomputer Translator' when talking with aliens. Other cultures in the Milky Way usually use nanites that function similarly to Andromedan microbes, though Sol does not due to the large proportion of people uncomfortable with injecting small robots into their brain. The earpiece works just as well, though you do need to remember to put it on.
Energy weapons (Blasters): Most weapons used in warfare are energy weapons. Units that are not connected to a generator (such as handheld weapons) will require a battery pack that usually allows for around 100 shots to be fired before needing to be swapped over. A person struck by an energy weapon can expect serious, deep burns with a high chance of death if the discharge travels through a major organ.
Shields: Large ships are always fitted with energy shields to prevent damage from space debris as well as weapons from other ships.
Body Armor: Body armor is in use by the marines, though it mostly minimizes injury from handheld weapons rather than completely absorbing the energy from a shot.
The Species of Andromeda
THE RULES
And because it seems important to include these, here are a few rules for how to behave on the NS forums, just in case you hadn't figured it out already:
- Decisions
My word and the word of any and all Co-OPs is binding. If you don’t like a decision, you can, of course, ask for us to reconsider it. Once. If we made a decision you don’t like, complaining for pages and pages is not going to endear you to anyone. Not me, not the Co-OPs and not your fellow writers.
If there is an appeal and a dispute amongst the Co-OPs we will take a vote on the matter, my word DOES NOT overrule theirs. . - Post Quality
I don’t have a problem with short posts but please use proper spelling (I don’t care what regional variant), grammar etc.
Ideally also try to include a 'hook' when you write a post, which is to say something that gives other people something to respond to. If your post is something along the lines of 'Bilbo Baggins stayed in his room and read a book while the world was ending', don't be surprised if nobody responds to you. - Posting Commitment
Nothing is worse than making an RP only for it to die. Please take a look to see if there is a place for you to post at least every 48 hours or so. If you find yourself unable to post, please let me know in the OOC thread for an extended period of time. - Posting Speed
On the flip side, blitz posting can also be infuriating. So, especially during the important scenes, I recommend giving your fellow players a reasonable time to make a reply. We all have real lives. That being said, if someone leaves everyone waiting for over 48 hours, feel free to carry on the scene without them. - OOC thread Manners
I imagine I shouldn’t need to say that these types of threads go better when people aren’t unnecessary jerks to one another, but I will say it for posterity’s sake. - IC thread Manners
Remember, we are writing a story together, not playing to win. - Character Death
Player death is possible in this RP, though will be quite rare and easily avoidable. Please don’t write that you have killed another character unless you have OOC permission from the character's owner to do it. Beat them into a pulp or take them prisoner, but don’t kill them. Having said that, if someone does something really stupid, I reserve the right to announce your character has got themselves killed. Likewise, if someone goes inactive in the middle of a fight scene without explanation and cannot be raised, I may decide to kill their character off. - Godmodding
If your character is unfairly refusing to take any damage I will write them taking damage for you. - Keep it PG13
Shouldn’t need to be telling you this really but keep the erotica and gorn off the thread. Hopefully you all know how to write forum-safe stuff. I will be extremely disappointed if the mods have to pay us a visit. - Banning Players
I really don’t want to be doing that but reserve the right to do so if you cannot follow the (hopefully, rather simple) rules above.
APPLICATIONS
Character App
This may be revised as we go on, but for now, the only rules for characters are:
- Limited psychics.
- No personal equipment that is miles better than what the military has e.g. magical armor or super-guns.
- Keep your characters fitting the setting. I might ask you to tweak bits if it isn't.
Also please remember that for you to be a crew member you were kept aboard to do something on the ship. The bar isn't incredibly high, but if you app a character who has no discernible skills and a drinking problem then you may be asked to redo the app.
Please delete everything in parenthesis.
- Code: Select all
[box]
[size=150][b]Character Description[/b][/size]
[list][b]Name:[/b]
[b]Species:[/b] (Kiel, Dhasath, Gollar or other)
[b]Gender:[/b]
[b]Age:[/b]
[b]Appearance:[/b] [spoiler](Feel free to describe with text or put pictures in here.)[/spoiler]
[/list]
[hr][/hr][size=150][b]Strengths and Weaknesses[/b][/size]
[list]
[b]Skills[/b]: (Is there anything you are significantly better at than most other people?)
[b]Flaws[/b]: (These do not need to be “conventional” flaws like being bad at math. They can be any hook for a bad situation, like having gambling debts, a scorned obsessive lover, or an angry gang boss out for your character’s blood)
[/list]
[hr][/hr][size=150][b]Background:[/b][/size]
[b]Personality[/b]: (Are you outgoing or do you keep to yourself mostly?)
[b]Backstory[/b]:(How did you come to be here?)
[b]Personal effects[/b]: (You can assume you have standard equipment like personal armor and a blaster rifle. This is a place for personal bits and pieces that make your character more interesting)
[/list][/box]
Species App
I am going to assume that anyone making a species app would prefer the species be reserved for their use. If they would like their creation to go on the list of pre-designed races, let me know.
Additionally, there are a few rules for new species:
- Limited psychics. That isn’t to say that your species can’t have any, but they shouldn’t be a race of space wizards capable of demolishing armies and fleets at will
- Your race cannot be immune to blaster fire.
- If you want to make your race super long-lived, there should be a good narrative reason.
- Code: Select all
[box]
[size=150][b]Species Description[/b][/size]
[list][b]Name:[/b]
[b]Singular:[/b] (what do you call one of your species on their own)
[b]Plural:[/b] (what do you call a whole lot of your species)
[b]Adjective:[/b]
[b]Appearance:[/b] (If you are using a picture, please include a bit of info on how much variation in appearances there is among the species) [spoiler](Feel free to use a/multiple picture(s) here)[/spoiler]
[b]Biology:[/b] (what is special about your species that you can't tell by looking at them? Night vision? Super-strength?)
[/list]
[hr][/hr][size=150][b]Background:[/b][/size]
[list][b]Homeworld[/b]:
[b]History[/b]:(Tell us a bit about your species, both pre- and post-war)
[b]Role in the Underworld[/b]: (Optional, but recommended for the creation of NPCs)
[/list][/box]