Vulgar Engines

Vulgar Engines

A game set in the far future, some time after the rise of a resurgent Neo Roman Empire and its conquest of much of the Solar System, which has imposed its New Latin, slavery and a permanent social gulf in the form of the Patricians of the Empire elite and the Plebeians who encompass all of common and foreign birth. An exodus of humans fleeing the repression and social stratification of the inner system settled around Jupiter. There they discovered the relics of the Visitors and their seemingly magical, reality-altering technology.

The Empire looms at its strongest, enormous and unstoppable, poised to crush the rebels beyond the Belt, but even stronger are the Vulgar Engines, the weapons of those free people who reject the Latin language and its speakers.

The Story So Far

At some point in the late 22nd century, the collapse of major eco-engineering projects on Earth spurred a mass migration into space, towards the terraformed Mars and Venus, and the heavily-built Moon. The failure of projects such as the South Pacific Borehole and the Sahel Condenser resulted in strange weather and massive tectonic activity that crippled many of the developed nations. Traditional axes of power were sundered and national lines that had gone minimally changed in centuries were redrawn in radical new ways, while the New United Nations struggled to maintain some semblance of order in those tumultuous days, collecting emergency rights and a standing army of its own as the era grew ever more tumultuous.

As humanity relocated to space, new identities and nationalities formed in the cosmos. The Moon gave birth to the notions of Lunarians, people born on Mars. Martian colonists became at first Martian, and then Tharsian, Olympian and Hellasian. Venus saw the rise of nations in the Mare Ovda and the Ishtarans of the continent. As these groups diversified, so did their needs and wants. Scarcity of certain resources and disagreements over terraforming, the acceptance of ever-growing numbers of Terran ecofugees resulted in the people of Tharsis, the most powerful of the Martian city-states and several of its allies to declare war against the increasingly repressive NUN and its peacekeepers in order to take complete Martian sovereignty at gunpoint.

Tharsis eventually lost the war, despite the ruthlessness of its leaders and the resolve of its people. The deployment of weapons of mass destruction- asteroid KKVs- against many of the Earth's oldest cities prompted the creation of substantial and ultimately reckless emergency powers for both the NUN Secretary General and his Brigadier General, effectively co-opting military control of many Earth-based nations in order to win the conflict against Mars. These privileges became permanent due to continued guerrilla warfare on Mars and Venus, and terrorist attacks on the Earth itself, and ultimately enshrined in law when Pierre-Cesare Languedoc, a national of the Gallic Republic and former Brigadier General during the Tharsian War, was elected to the office of Secretary General.

A shrewd but hardline statesman, Languedoc implemented a number of harsh policies that limited the capability of the colonies to wage war, via active disarmament and the enforcement of punitive conscription against aggressive nations in order to limit their manpower. His initial economic policy was egalitarian and liberal, allowing for a resurgent economic growth within the Solar System at large. He was re-elected several times, making increasingly bizarre legislation as time went on, such as allowing individuals to willingly sell themselves into indenture to other legal persons, expanding the reproductive privileges of men and imposing a Latin-derived constructed language of his own creation as the new international lingua franca. His eccentricities grew more severe as he aged, blamed by some on mental illness or degeneration caused by some side-effect of his longevity treatments. Despite this, there was very little resistance when he finally proclaimed himself Emperor Petros I of the Neo Roman Empire under his Aquitani Dynasty.

Society was restructured, with the officials of NUN member states and their families granted status in the patrician class so long as they swore fealty to Petros and the Empire, while all others would become plebeians. Criminals serving sentences would be made slaves, and their terms would have to be paid in labor. Structured as an administrative republic with a vast bureaucracy grandfathered from the NUN's own, the new society discriminated immensely in favor of western men who did not have any genetic or physical deviations.

In response, there was a mass exodus of people to the Moon, and the other planets of the system. The assassination of Petros I resulted in a minor succession crisis that allowed large numbers of people and materiel to be smuggled out past the asteroid belt and towards the Jovian orbit and beyond, but this gap was temporary. Eventually his shrewd and contemptuous youngest son was crowned as the Emperor Hector I, and the stability of the Aquitani Dynasty was all but assured. As the Roman Empire consolidated, the net closed and many escapees were trapped.

Now only rarely are people allowed to leave beyond the orbit of Mars, banished by decree of the Emperor over some slight. What lives beyond the Belt is a fraction of humanity, exiled or escaped from the Earth. A disparate, disorganized mish-mash of cultures desperately surviving by din of being ignored, for over eighty years since the declaration of the Empire.

Or it would have been, until the discovery of the Visitors and their relics. Now the exiles lead a tremendous technological edge and possess superweapons of tremendous power, with the potential to overthrow the Imperial order.

The Solar System

Mercury

Mercury is the energy capital of the Empire. Its orbit is bristling with arrays of solar collectors and particle accelerators that produce vast amounts of antimatter, the Empire's main strategic advantage over the exiles beyond the Belt. Crawling cities scrape the surface, processing the regolith into thousand-ton iron billets that are fired into orbit via railgun and collected for various construction projects.

Venus

Venus is a fortress, beneath a massive orbital shade that acts as the main fleet headquarters for the Empire's operations in the Mercury-Venus region. The planet itself is placid, bountiful ocean with a pair of continents named Ishtar and Aphrodite. Colonists, predominantly from East Asia and the Pacific Rim settled these mountainous lands and built arrays of terraced farms on the acidic but fertile soil. Later Imperial developments resulted in the creation of luxurious canal cities on island chains in the shallows for the pleasure of the patricians.

Earth

Earth remains the capital of human civilization, however battered. Boreholes carved into the Pacific, Siberia and la Plata regions resulted in major tectonic shifts that destroyed many coastal and island nations, forcing their people to migrate into space. Eastern Siberia, Scandinavia and Canada are the current breadbaskets of the planet, with the increased temperatures turning them into temperate zones with active watersheds. The orbital elevator is still a patchwork project, consisting of 'trees' of solar collection stations at the ends of a number of tethers built at equatorial regions.

Rome was made the capital, with the Emperor having seized the Vatican and much of the surrounding city to use for his pleasure and that of the patricians, while the city proper has expanded to grotesque proportions. Vacuum magrails connect it directly to the orbital elevator in North Africa.

The Moon

The headquarters of the Imperial Navy and the center of industry. Most people live in capped boreholes carved into the lunar regolith, vertical cities that descend dozens of miles downwards through lattices of skyscrapers and terraces.

Mars

Rocky and boreal, Mars has a breathable atmosphere and wintry weather patterns that generally do not lend themselves to colonization. Despite this, a few billion people live beneath domes, mostly members of the exiled Pan-Arab diaspora. Reckless resource exploitation by the Empire has resulted in a slow reversal of terraforming. Mars may return to being an airless desert in around a century if the pace of surface mining doesn't slow and measures aren't taken to reverse the damage.

The Belt

The battleground of the Empire and the exiles it deems 'barbarians'. The people of the Belt sought freedom long before the NUN became the Neo Roman Empire, and have provided a bulwark for the outer system by taking the brunt of Imperial aggression. A few possess Visitor technology and activator genes through various backroom deals with Jovian nations.

Jupiter

The heartland of free human civilization is exactly as harsh as astronomers believed, although many of the Galilean satellites are host to prosperous and safe societies safe from Jupiter's vicious radiation storms. From archeological evidence it's likely the Visitors once had a research station here, possibly built to observe a fledgling humanity.

Saturn

Safer than Jupiter and just as wealthy in volatiles for fuels and weaponry, Visitor colonization was more sparse- likely for the reason that it would be easier to detect. A large cache of relic exists on Titan, making it a hotly-contested planetoid.

Uranus and Beyond

Human attention to the planets beyond Saturn is extremely sparse, with a few small colonies here and there. Pluto is the site of an Imperial surveillance observing the Oort Cloud and likely the Outer System as well.

The Oort Cloud

Vast and empty, data taken from a cache on Jupiter suggests that the Visitors accidentally left large numbers of inert probes in the Oort Cloud. Although a risky investment, it may be possible to launch expeditions into the cloud to find these, giving the discoverer potent boosts to their research and Visitor materials supplies.

Nation Building

Assign your points to each of the categories until you run out. That'll give you the basis around which to write up the details of your nation.

Modifiers listed apply bonus points towards a particular rank, rather than directly modifying the Rank itself. For example, (Infrastructure +3) means that three bonus points are automatically added to the Infrastructure category, and (Growth -2) means that two points are subtracted from Growth. The player must make up the remainder to gain a new rank; if only part of the point cost is fulfilled; excess points are wasted.

Negative modifiers do not need to be bought up to zero, though values below 0 can be assumed to be particularly exaggerated.

Population

Commune (24 Points to spend): An isolated group with a few hundred members at most, with few aspirations on the outside world until they successfully built their Vulgar Engine. Prosperity and Visitor Adaptation are half-cost.

Minor Enclave (25 Points to spend): A small station with a few thousand aboard, potentially representing a small ethnic group or fringe ideology. Adds +1 to Prosperity.

Major Enclave (27 Points to spend): A large station with several thousand people aboard, the very largest a space station can get without substantially devoting itself to habitation. Adds +1 to National Advantages.

Minor Orbital (30 Points to spend): A station of import with tens of thousands of people aboard living in rotating habitation cylinders or a single large ring or sphere, designed to recreate the environment of the lost Earth. Modern designs might be more splendid and exotic. Adds +1 Wealth and +1 Infrastructure.

Major Orbital (29 Points to spend): A massive station with hundreds of thousands of residents living in a fully-formed terrascape with discrete towns and cities inside these spaces, a metropolis in space. The largest possible size without being dispersed, and adds +1 Wealth and +2 Infrastructure, but receives -1 to Prosperity.

Diaspora (27 Points to spend): The remnants of a culture and nation on Earth, banished to the stars or willingly escaped on their own with millions now living spread across several stations. -2 Prosperity, +3 Infrastructure and +2 Homeland Support.

National Advantages

Rank 0 (0 points): Your nation has no advantages. Everyone should have something to feel special about :(

Rank 1 (1 point): Your nation has a single National Advantage.

Rank 2 (2 points): Your nation has two National Advantages.

Rank 3 (4 points): Your nation has three National Advantages.

Rank 4 (6 points): Your nation has four National Advantages.

Rank 5 (9 points): Your nation has five National Advantages.

National Disadvantages

This field returns points, instead of costing points.

Rank 0 (0 points): Your nation has no unusual flaws, just the usual minor problems.

Rank 1 (+1 point): Your nation has a single National Disadvantage.

Rank 2 (+2 points): Your nation has two National Disadvantages.

Rank 3 (+3 points): Your nation has three National Disadvantages, plus one chosen by the GM (!)

Rank 4 (+4 points): Your nation is a hellhole; expect to get hammered by whatever the GM feels to throw at you. It is entirely out of your control at this point.

Prosperity

Rank 0 (0): Lacking even the most basic means to produce food and other provisions, and completely exposed to the elements. Your people desperately need to invade the Empire and claim territory, or starvation and ruination from cosmic radiation are all but inevitable. Raids on other colonies is a fact of life. Adds +1 Military Support.

Rank 1 (1): Your people live in austere zero-gravity shelters and subsist off of aeroponics and tasty chemical-laden rations.

Rank 2 (2): Your people live in spin or artificial gravity, eating tasty facsimiles of real food under an artificial sky. At this level population growth begins to hit positives.

Rank 3 (3): Your society lives in a comfortable, Earth-like environment within which your people may prosper.

Rank 4 (4): The people of your nation struggle to find reasons to actually invade the Earth, and live in splendid luxury. Adds +1 Wealth.

Rank 5 (5): Your society is a utopia where all needs are met and all wants are fulfilled. Unhappiness is abolished. Adds +2 Wealth.

Going beyond the maximum level has no additional benefit.

Wealth

Rank 0 (0): Yours is a pauper nation that was nearly bankrupted by its Engine. Wealth Rating 20

Rank 1 (1): Wealth Rating 45

Rank 2 (2): Wealth Rating 70

Rank 3 (3): Wealth Rating 90

Rank 4 (4): Wealth Rating 110

Rank 5 (5): A major trading power in the Outer System. Wealth Rating 125

Every additional Rank of Economy adds 15 to the Wealth Rating.

Infrastructure

Rank 0 (0): You have the facilities to perhaps maintain and repair starships. It is incredibly unlikely that you built your own Engine- rather it was probably purchased or gifted from another faction. Construction Rating 20

Rank 1 (1): Construction Rating 45

Rank 2 (2): Construction Rating 70

Rank 3 (3): Construction Rating 90

Rank 4 (4): Construction Rating 110

Rank 5 (5): Massive, well developed planetary and spaceborn industry. Construction Rating 125

Every additional Rank of Infrastructure adds 15 to the Construction Rating.

Military Support

Rank 0 (0): Your people simply do not see the value in the deployment of weapons beyond your Vulgar Engine, or perhaps lack the desire to do so. Your non-Engine military is halved for your size.

Rank 1 (3): Recruitment and deployment forces is about normal for your size.

Rank 2 (8): Everyone fights! Nobody quits! Your non-Engine military is doubled in size.

Military Quality

Rank 0 (0): Your troops and crews are disorganized militias of extremely poor quality. The Empire laughs at your army of old men and mewling infants.

Rank 1 (1): Your troops are well-trained and coordinated, and can be counted on to get the job done.

Rank 2 (3): Very little ever goes wrong that can legitimately blamed on human error. Your soldiers are generally respected by the Imperials, who see you as showing your own lesser Roman virtue.

Engine Size

Rank 0 (0): Knight. A standard 'hero unit' vehicle, with 1-4 pilots.

Rank 1 (2): Dragon. A splendid starship or similarly-scaled unit.

Rank 2 (4): Leviathan. That's no moon!

Engine Complexity

Rank 0 (0): Your engine is a simple design. Its metric-adjusting technology is discrete and limited in scope.

Rank 1 (1): Your engine displays the basics of metric-adjustment technology borrowed from the Visitors, allowing for some control over a single physical phenomenon or a particular gimmick.

Rank 2 (2): Your engine's metric-adjustment is pretty potent for its scale and can affect a wide area.

Rank 3 (4): Your engine is especially advanced and can effect two types of phenomenon at once. Such machines are widely feared for their versatility, although conflicting systems may create weaknesses if their functions can only be accessed one at a time.

Rank 4 (6): Your engine's design is at the apex, with three metric-adjustment permutations or gimmicks that give it tremendous power and flexibility.

Homeland Support

Rank 0 (0): You are landless pariahs, without ties to the people living under the Imperial thumb. With the gulf of space separating you, espionage actions are likely to take very long or be very slow.

Rank 1 (1): You have some ties, either because very few of your people stayed behind or because you are seen as untrustworthy. Espionage is feasible and information trickles in occasionally.

Rank 2 (2): You have decent ties to several populations living in the Inner System. Your covert options may even include infiltrating the Imperial bureaucracy. Information about daily life in the Empire is common.

Rank 3 (3): Your networks are extremely well developed. You may covertly sponsor insurrections and terror attacks, steal information, sabotage public works and carry out assassinations.

Rank 4 (4): The people await revolution. Some go as far as sell themselves into concubinage with officials and members of the high court simply to position themselves better for you.

Visitor Adaptation

Rank 0 (0): These changes will take time. Your people only make use of Visitor technology within your Vulgar Engine.

Rank 1 (4): Some advances have begun to percolate. At this level your standard units have the same basic material composition and structure as your Vulgar Engine and incorporate Visitor conveniences like innertialess drives and artificial gravity.

Rank 2 (8): Your society casually incorporates advanced Visitor technology at all levels of design. If your Vulgar Engine possesses any metric alteration effects, your regular units may weakly incorporate any single of them in some way.

National Advantages

Activation Ubiquity

Activation factor for Visitor technology is exceedingly common in your population due to a variety of factors. In practice this means that Visitor technology almost never fails randomly due to the absence of activator genes, and you have a pool of skilled pilots and other crew to replace a lost Vulgar Engine and pilot.

Adapted to [Zone]

Your people have become adept at exploiting the resources of a specific planet or region of space, such as the Belt, the clouds of Jupiter or the Martian wilds. Production via Infrastructure and Wealth are more efficient in relevant zones. In practice, similar environments (Jupiter versus Saturn) will provide lesser but still significant benefits.

Eminence Grise

Your diplomats are skilled and influential, your leaders loved and respected. The Empire accepts your diplomats and may even recognize your statehood, however temporarily.

Engine of Pride

Your Vulgar Engine is not merely seen as a machine, but an emblem of national might and features heavily in your propaganda pieces. Your unit morale is effectively unbreakable on battlefields where your Vulgar Engine is deployed, short of extreme casualties or the loss of your unit.

Frontier Fleet

Rather than a slow-moving habitat, your population is based on a fleet of starships that can move between gravity wells in a matter of weeks or months. While such ships are less durable than a single massive space station, you are substantially more difficult to siege.

Human Plus

Your population freely adopts transhuman technologies such as genetic engineering, cybernetics and pharmacopoeia to improve the state and function of the human being. The effect of this is dependent on your national statline, but in effect your strengths and national advantages are somewhat exaggerated in gameplay.

Prestigious Legacy

You are the successors to a particularly legendary polity or culture, such as China, Persia or the United States. This increases the effectiveness of Homeland Support and gives a semi-random drip of Wealth units from tourism that scales to Prosperity. Additionally, your claims to the ethnic homelands will almost certainly be recognized should you succeed in retaking them.

Load-Bearing State

Your nation are exceptionally important in a single function, allowing them limited immunity from sanctions or aggression because of this. In practice this requires the player choose a function (such as providing Helium-3 fuel) and a region (Mars and the rest of the Inner System, the Oort Cloud, etc) over which they are bearing loads.

Superior [Keyword]

Your country has a particular strength in one general field, improving their effective advancement level by one in it. Broad fields such as 'weapons', 'armor', etc are acceptable.

Visitor Reclaimers

Your people are experienced at looting Visitor artifacts and putting them to practical usage. Locating and harvesting Visitor relics is of greater benefit to your research apparatus than most.

National Disadvantages

Cursed by Space

Your people have been made sickly, weak and infirm by exposure to the rigors of prolonged habitation in space. In practice this has the effect of exaggerating the consequences of any other negative traits you have, as well as any low-rated statistics.

Client State

Your society is not sovereign, and lives under the thumb of another. You may be recently conquered by the Empire, slaved to the system of another exodite group. You provide 25% of your Wealth and Infrastructure production to your master, and your Vulgar Engine is almost certainly a secret. Cannot be taken with Engine of Pride and Rebellious Province.

Engine of Disaster

Something went wrong with your engine. It crackles, it howls. Pilots die frequently at the controls, or are driven insane with rage. Sometimes the plating buckles and twists open to reveal oozing viscera, tangled wires or furious plasma conduits. Your Vulgar Engine is functionally uncontrollable save for choosing when and where it will be deployed- but on the bright side is exceptionally difficult to defeat.

Inferior [Keyword]

Your country has a particular weakness in a broad field, such as weapons, electronics, etc, making them operate at one rank lower in that field.

Pariah State

Thanks to some past (or current) actions, your state is quite unpopular among the greater community of nations. Most others will treat you with suspicion and bad assumptions are paramount.

Rebellious Province

Your nation is not an exodite orbital or enclave, but one of the Inner System's provinces on the heartland worlds of Venus, Earth and Mars, or a satellite like the Moon or the Mars Trojans. This starts you in a state of war with the Empire, which will not accept your sovereignty unless absolutely pressed and leaves you effectively surrounded on all sides.

Sole Activator

Your Visitor Activation factors are held within the hands of a single family, perhaps even a single person. This means that their deaths would result in your tech level instantly regressing to Imperial norms, while much of your infrastructure may cease functioning.

Visitor Cultists

Your people do not believe in appropriating the tools of the Visitors for their own ends. You receive no benefit for looting relics for materials or technology to upgrade your Vulgar Engine, but begin play with knowledge of at least a dozen relic sites which you are compelled to defend. Holding these in the long term may provide benefits.