DragonStar5E.Setting
The Grand Alliance has fallen and from its ashes has arisen the DragonStar Empire! Ruled over with the metallic fist of the Emperor Mezz Thorne, the Red Age has burned for twenty years. Imposing his will over the galaxy with his Unhuman Storm-Legion Army made up of Orks, Hobgoblins and evil Men from Wildspace, the Emperor is slowly extinguish the light of freedom.
BRIEF HISTORY OF THE DRAGONSTAR EMPIRE
Almost 2,500 years ago the Core Races started exploring beyond the confides of their own planets, seeking out new discoveries out in the gulf of space. Most believe that it was either the gnomes or goblins who were the first explores, both driven by their insurmountable curiosity and drive to explore. Whoever were first, soon Dwarves, Elves, Gnomes, Halfling and Humans were explore the void of space through the use of the StarCaster voidships. These fantastic artifices allow a voidship to ‘teleport’ vast distances across space in an instant.
One of the first discoveries was that life was plentiful out in the vastness of the universe. Most star systems seem to include at least one inhabitable planet or moon, many had multiple ones in fact. A second important discovery was that many of these worlds were so similar and were inhabited by similar species who all spoke similar languages! Oh Humans were common on most worlds but so were elves and dwarfs, dragons and goblins! Third they all seems to worship the same gods. They might have had different names but they were the same gods! It has been theorized that the gods are responsible for these… consistencies, that it was they who first set these conditions in motion.
In those early days there was no organization to this push into space, each exploring out into random directions out from the Core Worlds into Wildspace, but soon these explores starting encountering various darker forces. The first and most menacing were the Ork Stellar Khanate hoards. These first encounters lead to the First Unhuman Wars as the Orks attacked into the Core World space. A great alliance was formed under the direction of the Celestial Elf Collective that defeated the Ork armada and forced them back far into the Wildspace regions. With the danger past, the Celestial Elf Star Lord, King Gillathan de’Moonsilver proposed and was the driving folk behind the formation of a Grand Alliance of Worlds for the mutual defense and betterment of all member worlds.
So formed the Grand Alliance ruled with respect and honor for a thousand years, expanding outward and taming much of the Wildspace around the Core Worlds. All was not peaceful though as the Ork Star Khans tried invading two more times (the Second and Third Unhuman Wars) but overall this age was peaceful and prosperous. Various regions of space where explored and settled by the races, bring in many new intelligence species into the Alliance.
But nothing last forever and as time wore on decadence and deceit infiltrated the grant halls of the Alliance Congress. Explores discovered the Dark Nebula and encountered the Mind Flyer’s empire (the Shadowed Veil) and their slave armies (which lead to the First and Second Hateful Wars). The criminal organizations known as the Nation of the Bloodless (vampire count crime lords who dominate the Dread Sun Worlds but crime throughout Known Space), the Obsidian Cartels (specialists in grand larceny, assassination, and fencing), the Hidden Exchange (focusing on smuggling and slave traders) and the Black Skulls (pirates) twisted their ways into the houses of power and sponsored all kinds of shadowy trade and crime. A small insignificant merchant cartel called the Trader’s Guide gain great influence some years ago within the ‘invention’ of the Warforged, using them as slave troopers and laborers, allowing them to quickly dominate all trade in the Outer Expanse Worlds. The Banking Union gain incredible power by seizing various financial institutions within the Core Worlds, while the Blade Consortium, a group of sell-swords and mercenaries, gained control (through backdoor, illegal dealings) of most of the Alliance Military contracts, both the supplying of weapons and troops for the Army and Navy.
The folk from the Expanse sector worlds became increasing unhappy with the laws and regulations from the Core Worlds, with no benefits seen out on the rim and for the first time in almost a thousand years, talk of rebellion spread. Budget cuts from the government had limited the Alliance Navy armada and increase lawlessness and piracy stoked unhappiness and dissent. Adding pressure to the situation a splinter group of Ork Star Khan established a small pocket empire just outside the Alliance boarders and begins raiding into different region within the Expanse Worlds. The final straw was when the Trade Guides, using its’ newly created Warforged Army, seized control of a number of worlds within the Outer Expanse Sector along an important trade route. The Grand Congress argued and debated as the people on these worlds struggled against the ruthless Guide and their army. Finally the Alliance acted and sent a part of the Alliance Navy to free the worlds and arrest various member of the Guide. With the backing of the Obsidian Cartel and the Banking Union, the Trader’s Guide declared their independence from the Alliance. A large chunk of the Alliance Navy, now under the control of the Sword Consortium, mutinied and joined the Trader’s Guide rebellion. Thus began the Forged Wars, so named for the fact that most of the armies that fought for the Traders’ Guide were made up of Warforged.
Enter Senator Mezz Thane, a fiery haired half-elf sorcerer senator from the Outer Expanse Worlds who through clever manipulation, got himself appointed the new Grand President of the Alliance, with the promise of ending the wars with the Trader’s Guide and bring peace to the Galaxy. One of his first acts was to make peace with the Ork Star Khan Grummire Skinflayer to bring a large chunk of his army into a newly formed Strom-Legion Army to be used against the Traders’ Guide and their allies. After five some years of all-out war, both sides were nearing exhaustion when the Grand President was able to cripple the rebels at the Battle of the Spear-Cluster Worlds, but this battle also cost the Alliance most of their main ships of the line (built around the old Celestial Elf Armada core, and as such goodly aligned races).
The Alliance was exhausted and their resources spent from this war. As such it was vulnerable to manipulation from within as Mezz Thane had planned all along. First, the Grand President manipulated the destruction of Alliance’s main law and peace enforcement guild, the Knights of the Radiant Light, a goodly aligned order of warriors, wizards and others whom all pledged to work for the betterment of the Alliance. They had come to suspect a hidden darkness behind the Grand President’s action, but to late did they wait to act. Branding them traitors whom caused the Forged Wars, he had most of them killed or arrested and the order disbanded, their property seized. He then pushed through the Alliance Congress a resolution declaring himself Emperor and the formation of the Dragonstar Empire with the promise of stability, peace and most importantly, law and order. One of the first acts of his reign was the destruction of the Trader's Guide and the freeing the Warforged but the Emperor also instituted a number of laws restricting their movement (effectively banishing them into the Expanse) and job opportunities.
Unknown to the citizens of the new government, Emperor Mezz Thorne is really an old red dragon by the name of Mezzadrom. The power mad dragon has instituted many changes throughout society such as the formation of a semi-secret secret police called the Imperial Special Police Directive (ISPD) made up mostly of Drow and huge military expansion through the Imperial Navy and Storm-Legion Army. The Grand Congress was reformed into the Imperial Senate, staffed by the Emperor’s cronies, and the Emperor has launched a massive expansion of the borders into the Wildspace region. He has ruthlessness crushed any dissent within the borders of the new order with the aid of the ISPD and its new Lord Marshal, the Blackguard Ember Husk (unknown High Elf paladin of the old Knights of the Radiant Light, corrupted in some way by the Emperor to serve as his main warlord). The new age of might under the Emperor’s banner had begun… the Red Age.
Religion of the DragonStar Empire
In ages past, across Known Space, the Core Races inhabit countless worlds all having their own gods and goddess, deities and the divine that they worshiped. Scientists, theologians and archmages had tried to come up with a logical explanation as to not only why they found so many of the same races on so many worlds but also that the races had similar linguistic traits and deities. Eventually, a prominent religious leader proposed a theory: all the gods of every religion were the same, just different aspects of the twelve "True Gods". Some deities have elements of two or more Deitypes. These twelve Deitypes seeded similarities all across the life-supporting worlds of the galaxy. This theory led to a new religion that formed the basis of an emerging unified interstellar culture. This religion is called the Universal Church of the Twelve.
The Universal Church recognizes twelve ‘true’ gods, split or organized into four groups of three gods each – those that ‘lead’ (the Father, the Judge and the Destroyer) those that ‘act’ (the Lovers, the Warrior and the Reaper), those that ‘know’ (the Magnus, the Merchant and the Trickster) and finally those that ‘create’ (the Mother, the Stormlord and the Smith). The gods and their basic Domains: The Father (Heroism, Light, Order, and Strength), the Judge (Balance and Protection), and the Destroyer (Chaos, Curses, Deceit and Fire). The Lovers (Beauty, Good, Life and Protection), the Warrior (Fortune, Life, Strength and War), and the Reaper (Darkness, Destruction, Evil and Secrets). The Magnus (Fortune, Knowledge, Magic and Secrets), the Merchant (Fortune, Deceit, Trade and Travel), and the Trickster (Deceit, Earth, Knowledge and Science). Mother (Beasts, Nature, Water and Wilderness), the Stormlord (Air, Life, Water and Weather) and the Smith (Crafter, Earth, Engineering and Metal).
The Lovers are the patrons of the home, cute kittens & puppies, and True Love. Their priests are guardians, protectors, and keepers of the hearth. Elves where her first born and most favored.
The Warrior is the patron of war, fighting, mercenaries. The Warrior is patron of the Orks, Half-Orks Warforged whom he favors. While there are individuals of the other races who are better warriors, few overall excel at the violence output of an orkish mercenary company.
The Reaper is the patron of suffering, random violence, and destruction. The Warrior alternates between allying with the Lovers (to protect them) and the Reaper (to sow destruction). The Reaper favors no race but those drawn to darkness worship him.
The Father is the bringer of justice, order, civilization and holding the chaos at bay, patron to leaders and nobles everywhere. Most of the origin myths have the Father (and the Mother) creating the worlds from the raw chaos. He is the oldest of the gods and nominally the head of all gods. When the Father created his race, he made the Giant and the Goliath, larger and more impressive than all the other races. He is also favored by the Githzerai for their adherence to order and opposition to chaos.
The Judge is a protector of the innocent, punish of the guilty, and the one to see that all the universe is in balance. The Judge wanted Humans to be the most capable of handling anything and made them the most flexible.
The Destroyer is a random element of the chaos from which the Father formed the universe. The Destroyer's goal is to return the universe to the chaos from which it came. The Reaper may want inflict suffering, the Destroyer does not care. The Destroyer made no races but some have come to worship him and his aspect of destruction.
The Magus is patron of magic, knowledge, secrets and patron to Dragons and Drakes along with the Aasimar, Dragonborn, Changelings and Rakasha. The enmity between the Magus and the Trickster is as deep as the hate between Father and the Destroyer. The Trickster is not only a god misdirection but also of knowledge and science. While the Magus wants knowledge to be doled out to those who have earned the privilege, the Trickster wants knowledge to be free to all. The Trickster is a thief, stealing from the Magus and spreading the knowledge about. Gnomes and Goblins are his favored. On many worlds, as knowledge advances the Magus and, by extension, the Dragons fade away. Not so in the Empire. As the Trickster steals, finds, or creates new ideas the Magus matches him, teaching his patrons and priests a counter or more impressive version. When the Trickster mixed alchemy and steel to make guns, the Magus taught the Dragons magic of fire, ice, and lighting. When the Trickster and the Smith constructed ships capable of flying to orbit, they found Space and Star dragons gliding on the solar winds. When scientists built artificial habitats to colonize other worlds, Magus cursed all the races to sicken in the places not blessed by the Mother (the exceptions being Dragons and Dwarves). When the Trickster uncovered the secrets of the atom and built weapons, the Magus taught a few Dragon leaders the spells to shatter entire worlds. The Merchant is the mediator of knowledge, and indeed all things, the patron of travelers, explorers, teachers, and (of course) merchants.
The Merchant has invented a few things (like money), but prefers to trade the secrets of others. Ratfolk and Vishkanyas are his favored.
The Mother is the patron of nature in its wild state, untamed animals, and patron to the Rootwalkers. Mother wants to nurture, provide for all and is still a little rough. Because of the Magus curse, every world has large areas of untamed wilderness. Wolfen and Thri-kreen where her first children.
The Stormlord represents control over nature without destroying it, taming the wild without losing its essence. He has taught the elves how to bio-engineer living things, without destroying them. He is also the patron of the Goliath and Shifters.
The Smith is patron to the Dwarves, the Warforged, engineers, mechanics, and the Unborn. The Smith and his priests take all the wild, crazy ideas of the Trickster and builds practical, usable items. He uses magic and technology in equal measure. He also represents the tearing apart of Nature, rebuilding it in his own image. For this the Mother resents the Smith for destroying her creations either for parts or as a consequence of other processes.
There are still those who cling to their old native “gods” but most residents of the Empire see this as foolish or quant. The Universal Church tends to have a very unfavorable outlook on these worshipers and will not allow them within holy ground. This is fine with most as the Universal Church tends to be large structures where all 12 gods have a place within. Worshippers of the old gods of good or evil are often uncomfortable with this lax attitude.
