Oceania: Difference between revisions
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Oceania has what could be considered a media democracy, a political system that combines a digitally-enabled direct democracy with a strong core belief in citizen journalism and political activism. For the most part, the nation otherwise functions as a standard democratic unitary state, however, there are no political parties beyond the associations and social networks to which a candidate is a member, all of which must be made public when they apply for candidacy. | Oceania has what could be considered a media democracy, a political system that combines a digitally-enabled direct democracy with a strong core belief in citizen journalism and political activism. For the most part, the nation otherwise functions as a standard democratic unitary state, however, there are no political parties beyond the associations and social networks to which a candidate is a member, all of which must be made public when they apply for candidacy. | ||
On each level, an election is direct to the people the elected official is responsible to. The mayory is elected by the citizens of a habitat, the governors are elected by | On each level, an election is direct to the people the elected official is responsible to. The mayory is elected by the citizens of a habitat, the governors are elected by the residents of their colony cluster and the president is globally elected by the entire population. | ||
During the process on all three levels, the candidates are narrowed down by gradual elimination of the lowest-placed or public bargaining until a majority can be | During the process on all three levels, the candidates are narrowed down by gradual elimination of the lowest-placed or through public bargaining until a majority can be established. Thanks to network technologies, however, a process that would ordinarily take days or even weeks is narrowed down to an electoral race of approximately 48 standard hours for most positions (and 72 for the presidential elections). | ||
=== Society === | === Society === |
Revision as of 14:25, 1 March 2011
Oceania
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Overview
Archetype: Loyalist PACT Spacenoids
Head of State: Prime Minister Roger Dalton
Government: Media Democracy
Political Alignment: PACT
About Oceania
"Oceania, a jewel of the galactic seas."
The Oceania is an Outer Expanse colony cluster founded by Indonesian mining interests that quickly rose to prominence as an important shipbuilding cluster and trade hub on the periphery of PACT space. Due to a lack of viable planets, nearly the entire 72 million people permanently in-system reside in space habitats located at Lagrange Points around the gas giant Pacifica.
History
Discovery Era [2078-2100]
Oceania was a system first charted and explored by Posthuman probes circa 2077. Originally believed to be the reformed remains of a star that went supernova several billions of years ago, indicators of Precursor intervention (mostly in miniscule pocket of functional Delta Dust locked into sub-atmospheric orbits) indicated the possibility that the system was manipulated to it current state but apparently abandoned before any viable or terraformable planets were created.
Despite a lack of livable space, several corporate interests, most notably Pacific Rim mining consortiums that had taken note of the abundant heavy metal and Helium 3 supplies the system held in its asteroid belts and numerous gas giants. The Indonesia and Australia were primary investors in the venture, while Singapore and New Zealand, eager to establish footholds off-world, bought in as secondary partners.
Within a decade years of its discovery, Oceania was quickly established as a logistical waypoint between the more distant colonies of the Outer Rim with a little under a hundred thousand colonists calling the system's first space habitat Pacifica-One home. For the next few decades, the population grew very slowly as the system remained mostly undeveloped by corporate interests.
Colonization Era [2101-2151]
It was only after the arrival of fleeing Transgenes, driven from Earth and denied entry into other Pac-Arm worlds, that Oceania's population swelled in size. A traditionally bioconservative Australia was reticent to allow potentially tainted Transgenes, any movement to bar them entry was vetoed by Indonesia and Singapore, which had long since embraced the advances of Chinese transhumanism. Everyone was welcome to Oceania.
Although the local shipbuilding industry was indeed more than capable of fulfilling quotas on building new habitats for normal immigration rates, migrants simply overwhelmed the industrial capacity normally available. Subsequently, many colonists made do by loaning ships from the government and using them as residences, or building their habs directly into hollowed-out asteroids.
By the 2120's, Oceania had become a vibrant and multicultural center of commerce and industry with a growing biotech field, in part due to deliberately unrestrictive laws in regards to transgenics and genetic engineering. With the majority of the population eventually adopting a template better suited to zero-g and spin-gravity life or giving one to their children, Oceania became an open market for firms suppressed by Straus-Kasserism on Earth. By the end of the decade, a little under a quarter of the population were using the Natural Diver transgenic template, a modified Alpha-type adapted to zero-gravity environments.
While many Outer Expanse states suffered abuses at the hands of Core interests, Oceania had escaped mostly intact and prosperous because of the high profitability the local He-3 harvesters and heavy metals and an aggressive negotiation style in its loaning of mining rights.
Because of these slightly underhanded tactics and its control of a catapult hub, corporations that weren't domestic often had to compete with one another to get contracts and permissions. Oceania's ability to negotiate itself into a position of relative safety was one of the reasons that they never saw any reason to secede and tensions never really fermented to the boiling point as they did elsewhere. Oceanians were perfectly happy with following the dictates of Core ethical standards (for the most part) and enjoyed trade with the rest of PACT.
Breakdown Era [2152-2180]
Shortly before the Breakdown, Oceania saw the introduction of the Artificial Diver bioroid, a nominally genefixed growth-accelerated human with network implants, intended for menial work and service labor in the larger hab structures. Designed to eventually integrate into society as citizens, Artificial Divers were designed to bolster the population, as well as to harmlessly disseminate zero-gravity adaptation genes among the baseline population.
Core reception was unfavorable, but a non-factor as the Breakdown quickly swept over the Pac-Arm. Oceania left was alone to define itself while it labored to rebuild its catapult node. Several of the companies that had previously withheld support where pushing for full integration, with many N-Diver and baseline families adopting A-Divers wholesale, and several biotech firms that had withheld support for the project were actively assisting a wider transhumanization of the population in the wake of potentially permanent isolation.
The Oceania that emerged from the Breakdown-induced isolation in 2162, having repaired its catapult successfully at great expense, was one that was rather different. Swelled by the addition of nearly twenty million bioroids and now more heavily transhuman than ever, the population of Oceania was ready to return to PACT.
Certain bioconservative factors such as São Galvão were reticent to resume association with an extremely transhumanist state, but the general atmosphere in PACT was receptive, if cool. As reconstruction continued in the Pac-Arm and Oceania made itself known as a staunch supporter of its fellow colonies, relations returned to normal.
ZOCU War Era [2181-2188]
Against expectations, Oceania threw its lot in with the Core during at the onset of the ZOCU War instead of joining the Zodiac Outworlds. This was for a variety of reasons, but the central theme understood by analysts was a lack of incentives to cut ties with the Core. Kanon wanted its transgene-biased aristocracy against the dictates of the UN charter, Haraway sought self-determination and freedom from EU exploitation, but Oceania had no similar plights or wishes. It was left alone to its own endeavors and made a contributing member of PACT.
Moreover, its extremely liberal transgenics program clashed with the ideology of castes and genetic aristocracy, and general transhuman superiority that many of the Outworlds espoused. The Divers (which later became general slang for any gravity-adapted Oceanian), forming the majority of the population were barely a generation and a half removed from Baseline humanity and had no reason to retreat from it.
Despite this, Oceania remained mostly inactive during the war. It acted as a ship depot, refueling station and staging ground for the assaults pushing around the blockade zone at Horizon to attack ZOCU worlds, but never engaged in any of the major battles of the war. Well-protected by its in-system fleet and buoyed by reinforcements from the NorPac and ASEAN space fleets, it remained inviolate for the entirety of the conflict.
The Oceanian Navy made a few tours of duty with the Australian and Indonesian space fleets scouring the tradelanes for ZOCU commerce raiders, having also notably participated at the disastrous Battle of Rapture.
Postwar Era [2188-2195]
The colony received some recognition for its support during the war, the four nations that had founded the colony allowed it to peacefully gain independence while retaining its affiliation to the Core and PACT.
Entering the Postwar Era as one of the leading nations in the PACT frontier, Oceania is now pushing ahead and making its own destiny. Old grievances can be set aside to rebuild anew and the Divers continue their old way of life, settling the fringes of space one habitat at a time.
Politics
Oceania has what could be considered a media democracy, a political system that combines a digitally-enabled direct democracy with a strong core belief in citizen journalism and political activism. For the most part, the nation otherwise functions as a standard democratic unitary state, however, there are no political parties beyond the associations and social networks to which a candidate is a member, all of which must be made public when they apply for candidacy.
On each level, an election is direct to the people the elected official is responsible to. The mayory is elected by the citizens of a habitat, the governors are elected by the residents of their colony cluster and the president is globally elected by the entire population.
During the process on all three levels, the candidates are narrowed down by gradual elimination of the lowest-placed or through public bargaining until a majority can be established. Thanks to network technologies, however, a process that would ordinarily take days or even weeks is narrowed down to an electoral race of approximately 48 standard hours for most positions (and 72 for the presidential elections).
Society
Oceania's culture is intensely metropolitan thanks to a heavy influx of transgenes from various PACT states, with clear Indonesian, Singaporean and Australian influences in the architecture, religion and language of the people. Because the transgene migrants came from various PACT states, there's a strong vein of American-style melting pot cosmopolitanism, with ethnic districts in cities and ethnic colonies spread out throughout the system.
Networks and Media
Network technology is not only important by profoundly essential to their culture, in part due to the distance between colony clusters and also because of a general lack of real environments to explore. Saturated with mass media, augmented reality and virtual reality, everything seems to move incredibly fast, from the development of new ideas to the formation and dissolution of popular opinions. Policy regarding media in the colonies could be likened to free market liberterianism, where there is very little control in the marketplace of ideas and citizen media is often the deciding factor in the political process.
Lifestyle
Although updated with new materials such as carbon nanotubes and advanced laminates, the majority of the populace live in habitats similar to those initially proposed by physicists and engineers over a century and a half before Oceania was colonized. Variations on the cylindrical O'Neil Cylinder and Standford Torus are the most popular and most common in-system.
Nomadism is and remains an oddly popular ideology in the asteroid belts. Colloquially referred as Fishers for the original tugboat miners who dragged asteroids to Pacifica during the mass building of habitats in the early 22nd century, they remain an extremely large and visible minority in the Oceanian population. Partially because of the initial housing shortages during the migration waves from the Core, some settlers had resort to living in hollowed out asteroids and retired ships.
Over the course of a few years, some refugees took to their temporary lifestyles very strongly, leading to the creation of a whole counterculture movement. These groups became nests for ZOCU sympathizers, and one of the leading fronts on the Oceanian anti-war movement. Although most eventually would settle down in the habs, some transgene settlers simply preferred the isolation or exiled themselves from society out of safety, while others enjoyed living in outer-system communes alongside their fellows.
Major Settlements
Lacking colonizable landmass, Oceania has a number of notable habitation clusters in-system, consisting of large numbers of space habitats localized at one of the Lagrange points in the orbit of the gas giants Pacifica, Sumatra and Aotearoa, as well as numerous habs dispersed in the asteroid belts. With a growing population of 72 million, the clusters are constantly expanding and building new habs at the various zones. It's eventually hoped that the Oceanian government will eventually gather enough support from abroad to begin construction on a Bishop Ring-type megastructure in order to create a permanent home for the population, although popular and official opinions are that such engineering projects are grossly beyond the industrial capacity of most of the power blocs combined (were that sort feat of diplomacy even possible).
Pacifica-1 "New Auckland": New Auckland is located at the L1 point, New Auckland is a massive fleetyard and farming site that makes abundant usage of the solar energy provided at the cusp of Pacifica's magnetosphere. These facilities are crucial to the systems sustainability and production capacity, and provide the core of their heavy infrastructure. New Auckland's inhabitants are mostly multi-national transgenes migrants and bioroids who keep the industry afloat, as well as poorer working-class baselines.
Pacifica-2 "New Sydney": Situated at Pacifica's L2 Lagrange point, New Sydney is the administrative capital of Oceania, and much like its Earth-based namesake, a futuristic marvel of engineering, both inside and outside the dozens of O'Neil cylinders that comprise the core of the colony cluster. Approximately a third of the colony space located inside is urban sprawl and water features designed to emulate the feeling of a coastal 22nd century metropolis, although the look is described as gaudy by some. Colonists at New Sydney are multi-ethnic and multi-national, generally wealthy Indonesians and Australians, as well as Singaporeans and former residents of other PACT members.
Sumatra-2 "Barat": Barat is the center of Oceania's biotech and high-tech industry, and subsequently one of the smaller colony clusters. Plagued by repeat micro-Singularity events, it is the repository for the Delta Dust reclaimed from Sumatra. Most of the colonists are Fishers and Indonesian transgenes, as well as migrant workers employed in the high-tech industries.
Sumatra-3 "Timur": Timur is an important colony cluster that hosts a number of research facilities that tests new propulsion systems and engineering techniques. As a consequence of the research, the area is strewn with debris spread out over an area measuring a few hundred kilometers and millions are sunk into reclaiming and disposing of floating wreckage before it can become hazardous to the other colonies.
Sumatra-5 "Selatan": Selatan is the largest colony cluster in Oceania, comfortably located in the center of a 'trojan asteroid field' consisting of ice debris and silico-ferrous asteroids. It's believed these were formed by the destruction of an icy planetoid during the supernova that ravaged the original incarnation of the system.
Aotearoa-2 "Cook": As the nearest settlement to any of part of the colonized asteroid fields during most of the year, Cook hosts an extremely large Fisher population and is major spaceport for people hoping to join or explore the communes. It also boasts heavy industry comparable to New Auckland, in no small part thanks to the efforts of Fisher prospectors and wildcat miners hauling in asteroids laden with precious and rare heavy metals.
Oceania-0 "New Singapore": The only non-Island style colony cluster, New Singapore is a series of outer system habitats and space stations arranged around the safe zone near the main catapult lane. Foreign military forces from PACT and the UN, as well as trading cartels and foreign corporate interests generally keep their branch offices here unless they have a specific preference for New Sydney. New Singapore has the largest Baseline population in Oceania, but unsurprisingly also has a surprising number of cognitive-enhanced Omoikane-templated transgenes working in the offices, control rooms and laboratories of the cluster.
Oceanian Space Corps
Resources
Ship Listings, Corps Listings, Etc...
Equipment
Vehicles
Mobile Weapons
Statistics
History Path
Starting Values
1100 PIP, 300 CIP, 1100 Wealth, 200 Dust, 720 Population, 27500 Military, 60 Transgenes, 5 Logistics, 6 Morale, 100 Application, 100 Ship Application, 20 Fleet Doctrines, 40 SP
Modified Values
1508 PIP, 734 CIP, 1476 Wealth, 200 Dust, 720 Population, 27500 Military, 80 Transgenes, 5 Logistics, 6 Morale, 100 Application, 100 Ship Application, 20 Fleet Doctrines, 20 Doctrines
- [19 SP] 19 Transgene
- [10 SP] 20 Doctrines
- [10 SP] 20 Tech Indexes
- [1 SP] 10 CIP
- [720 Population +15%] 408 PIP
- [720 Population +20%] 424 CIP
- [720 Population +5%] 376 Wealth
Exploration Era
- Exp-1) World Type, No Suitable World (Go to Exp-2)
- Exp-2) No Suitable World, Build Our Own (+ 300 PIP)
- Exp-6) Precursor Relics, None (+100 PIP, +10 SP, SP limit for options increased by +5, may not spend SP on Dust)
- Exp-7) Feral Drones, None (+ 60 population, + 100 Wealth)
- Exp-8) Posthuman Footsteps, Untouched (+20 SP, SP limit for options increased by +5)
- Exp-9) Location, Hub (+ 60 Population)
Colonization Era
- Col-1) Axis Of Colonization, PACT Arm (+ 5,000 military, + 100 Wealth, + 100 CIP, + 100 Dust, go to Col-2)
- Col-2) PACT Colonization Authority, Outer Expanse (+ 120 Population, + 100 PIP, + 100 CIP, + 100 Wealth, + 10 SP, + 20 Transgene)
- Col-2B) PACT Transgenic Relations, Headcount Increase Exercise (+ 60 Pop)
- Col-2C) PACT Colonial Economics, Primarily Primary Industry (+ 300 PIP, +200 Wealth, + 120 Population)
- Col-2D) PACT actions during the Eridanus Campaign, Logistics Support (+ 2,500 military, +1 logistics, + 100 PIP)
- Col-7A) Local Affairs, Quiet (+ 60 population, + 100 Wealth, + 100 PIP, + 10 SP)
Breakdown Era
- Break-1) Economic Upsets, My Toaster Hit Singularity (+ 100 Dust, - 100 CIP)
- Break-2) Broken PACT, Road Repairs (+ 100 PIP, +1 logistics, - 100 Wealth, - 100 CIP, Go to Break-2B)
- Break-2B) Catapulted PACT Policies, Saved By The Catapult! (+ 60 Population, +5 logistics, + 100 Wealth, + 10,000 Military)
War Era and Aftermath
- War-1) Choose Your Side, Sign The PACT (+ 200 CIP, +200 Wealth, +10,000 military, +5 Morale Go to War-2) *Must be PACT arm
- War-2A) PACT World Politics, Transhumanize! (+ 20 transgene, +100 Wealth, + 100 CIP, + 100 application, - Morale)
- War-2B) PACT World Economics, Ignore the War (+ 200 wealth, + 120 pop, - logistics)
- War-2C) PACT World Military, The Fleet does the Flying (+ 2,500 military, + 100 PIP, + Fleet Doctrines, + Ship Application)
Current Era
- Cur-1) The Business of Government, Future Government (++ Morale, + Transgene)
Chaotic Events
- Hippies Under The Bed (+ 60 Pop, - 2,500 military)
Transgene Templates
Transgene Points: 79
- [19 -4] x3 (50%) N-Diver: +1 Enhanced Physique, +1 Enhanced Reactions, +3 Zero-Gravity Tertiary
- [9 -4] x2 (25%) A-Diver: +1 Enhanced Socialization, +2 Zero-Gravity Tertiary
- [28 -4] x1 (10%) Omoikane: +2 Enhanced Intelligence, +1 Enhanced Reactions, +1 Enhanced Socialization
Technology
Global Technology Level: 20
- Shipbuilding: +5 [25]
- Aircraft: +5 [25]
- Electronics: +8 [28]
- Beam/Pulse Weapons: +5 [25]
- Shields: +8 [28]
- Stealth: +8 [28]
- Transgenics: +0 [20]
- Civilian Tech: +8 [28]
- Materials: +8 [28]
- Mass Production: +2 [22]
[No Suitable World|Build Our Own] Shipbuilding +2
[Transhumanize!] Transgenics +3
[Ignore the War] Civilian Tech +5
[The Fleet does the Flying] Materials +5
[Future Government] Transgenics +2
[3 Index Points] Electronics +3
[3 Index Points] Materials +3
[3 Index Points] Shipbuilding +3
[3 Index Points] Civilian Tech +3
[3 Index Points] Stealth +3
[3 Index Points] Shields +3
[2 Index Points] Mass Production +2
Applications
- Shipbuilding VI
- Aerospace Construction III
- Mecha Construction II
- Ground Construction III
- Naval Armor VI
- Aerospace Armor VI
- Ground Armor VI
- Naval Propulsion IV
- Aerospace Propulsion V
- Naval Shields I
- Craft Shields I
- Railgun Fundamentals
- All deployments
- Particle Weapon Fundamentals
- Naval and Aerospace deployment
- Synchronous Fundamentals
- No deployments
- Belted Armor
- Depleted Uranium Armor
- Laminate Armor
- Scattering Fields
- Flash Fields
- Fusion Drives
- Fusion Powerplants
- Delta Jump Drives