FederalSpace:Peoples

History

The quick-and-dirty history of the setting. Play "spot the borrowed inspiration" as you read along! :)

21st Century Cyberpunk and the Eugenics Wars

As the 21st century goes along, Earth becomes more and more cyberpunky, as new technology completely fails to resolve many of the big social problems that date back to the 20th century of before. All the cultural divisions finally bust loose at the end of the century in World War III, which is one big war and whole bunch of little ones. This is our Eugenics Wars parallel, and maybe the subsequent conflicts can still be called that.

Long story short: The bad guys win.

Commentary

Shadowjack: I always did like the name Eugenics Wars. It has such a lovely dated but historical sound to it, like "the Great War" or "the Crusades."

s/LaSH wrote a good bit, pointing out that, in the old Trek continuity, the Eugenics Wars were really fought not so much about genetic engineering, but about the idea of placing one people above another—genetic engineering was merely the tool. In a letting like Federal Space, where gene-splicing is an established and accepted technology, and most of the societies are arguably multi-species, the technological conservatism implied by TNG doesn't really apply. Genefixing ain't the enemy, it's the people who try to use it to force society into particular forms…

The Terran Empire

This brings us up to about the mid-22nd century. The United Earth Government, which eventually becomes just the Terran Empire, pacifies the globe, and conquers space, using the new space technologies that were developed just before the Wars. Imagine the Empire as a mix of what little we know about the canonical Khans, and the Evil Mirror Universe Federation. Brutal military force, chaotic social situation, lots of runaway genetic engineering to manufacture warrior races and sex slaves and biowarfare critters. The first contacts with extraterrestrial intelligence occur during this time, and go about as well as you'd expect from Space Nazis. The Empire's borders are rather porous, with people escaping to form their own little free colonies beyond the frontier… and then the Empire expands to absorb them. But what with all the escapees, and the Empire's own internal politics, lots of people disappear Out There. Eventually, the Imperial capitol even moves from Earth, and it's just The Great Galactic Empire.

And then something causes the whole thing to fall apart. Probably several somethings, ranging from economics issues to civil war, but I also like the idea of something like a Berserker or Planet-Killer device suddenly blitzing through, or a supernova disrupting warp travel, or something else big and scary. In any case, the Empire collapses, and we get our Long Night scenario. This is about the start of the 25th or 26th century or so.

Commentary

Shadowjack, responding to s/LaSH: Having the "Big Collapse" event be a semi-Singularity is an interesting idea… I know I'd been thinking along the lines of either "big supernova disrupts warp travel" and "planet-killer machine from elsewhere shows up and eats several important worlds."

The Triplanetary Confederation

History doesn't stop during dark ages, it just isn't recorded as well. Various pocket empires arise, more isolated colonies, more alien contacts. Stuff changes. Now fast-forward to the late 27th century, where three worlds have formed the Triplanetary Confederation.

Analogy to characters: Bones is Earth, a lot of history, a lot of old memes, always the first to worry about the dangers in new technology, but there to help all the same. Kirk is Centauri, aggressive, capable, alternately forthright and sneaky. Spock is Hephaestus, struggling with two natures, but primarily thoughtful and logical.

World One: Earth

United now under a much more peaceful and democratic government that has successful restored and rebuilt devastated Earth. They're saddled with a load of guilt for inflicting the Empire on the rest of the universe. (Real-world inspiration: I haven't seen a lot of the 1960s German SF program Raumpatrouille Orion, but I know of it. A story I've heard, though I don't know how true it is: The space patrolmen seem to argue a lot, why? Because the Bundeswehr encouraged this among its troops, as a counter-reaction to the militarism and unquestioning obedience that the Wehrmacht and SS attempted to inculcate. This analogy seems as good as any for explaining why Starfleet seems to have a loose opinion toward chain of command.)

World Two: Alpha Centauri

Our source of boundless can-do, no-nonsense frontier spirit, and maybe the source of our Confederation's trust in government institutions—they built them themselves, of course they trust them! (A bit of that 1950s-1960s American civic duty ideal.) A random idea which is a footnote in Centauran history, but might stand out for us: some of the early colonists tried to gengineer a way for women to grow as tall and tough as men, hoping this would eliminate gender inequality; whether it did or not, the trait breeds true, and easily spread to other worlds. (The only reason for doing this is so I can have a less gender-segregated military without having certain people grumble about physical requirements. ;) )

World Three: Hephaestus

Hephaestus was another name for Vulcan, so we know which world this is! A planet with a population dominated by H-class genetic upgrades, an early attempt at a "strong genius" model, marred by emotional instability and some other quirks. In the isolation of Nightfall, they had some massive wars, until a couple of the geniuses worked out an artificial philosophy and set of rituals that spread and brought peace. The "Prime Logic" and "IDIC" philosophies will become well-known outside their planet—though many H-class upgrades don't follow it, it's a common stereotype.

Commentary from LordDraqo Perhaps the organizers behind the establishment of Hephaestus decided to use lojban, or its equivalent as the societies primary language. A language which has led to the members of the society thinking in terms of predicate logic.

Commentary

Pilgrim: They also probably diddled their brains and that of their kids to improve memory, mathematical ability and to harmonize the frontal lobes (executive functions) with the hindbrain (how things actually get done). The down side of this, is that when a Hephastan loses it, they really lose it.

Shadowjack: Good description of what's probably going on—and is a good demonstration of the "can't do just one thing" principle.

The Federated Worlds

Our Triplanetary Confederation works out a new kind of FTL drive, the transwarp drive (today just "warp drive"), and starts exploring. At first, they're just following up their old trade contacts, but the Confederation picks up allies, and soon there's a move toward a new kind of interstellar government. Worried about a repeat of the crimes of the Old Empire, the wrangling over a new constitution continues for years.

But they finally sign the document, and the new Federated Worlds are founded, a cyberdemocracy dedicated to the principle that all life-forms have a fundamental right to existence in their own terms, and that governments are instituted among sapients to secure an equitable compromise for all within their sphere. (Or some such language; I'm not an expert in interstellar treaty law, so I probably can't phrase it properly.) And this young federation is a smashing success.

That brings us up to the present day, 2809 CE, shortly after the Federated Worlds' Centennial celebrations. The last war with the Cronan Empire was decades ago, the old space exploration program has been reactivated, and the government is involved in a top-down reassessment of internal programs. Stuff's changing, except the stuff which hasn't, but life goes on.

The Others

But they aren't the only new government on the block:

The Orion Alliance

A mercantile trade and defense alliance, grown into a group of federated states. In some aspects, it clings to ancient traditions; in others, it blithely charges forward down new paths. A mirror image of the Federated Worlds. Sometimes they are partners, sometimes rivals. (If you like, you can think of the Alliance as the U.S. and the Fed as the E.U., though that's a gross simplification, of course.) In fact, because of the dispersed nature of space, in places the two governments overlap, with worlds switching allegiance from time to time, or existing side-by-side.

The Great Galactic Empire

…is what they call themselves. Everyone else thinks of them as the Cronan Empire. A fragment of the old Empire still survives, centered on the world of Cronos, and with a resurgent, feudally-inspired culture, they're back in the Great Game, hoping to reclaim lost territory or colonize new. These are the Klingon / Soviet Union analogs.

New Byzantium

Our Romulan analogs, and also our Space Communists / China in Space. Formerly isolationist, now hoping for new blood and ideas, a small but powerful polity with lots of transhuman aspects, and lots of little intersecting social groups and concepts of public face that make it tricky for outsiders to quite grasp what's going on.

The 'Borg Hives

Several of these, actually, mostly way out in the deeps beyond explored space. People who modified themselves and their society so heavily that they may no longer be human, and now exist in such a web of telecommunication and body-modification that each hive is practically a single "person." A couple are aggressive like the TV shows, but others are introspective, or even friendly—though disturbing, for how far they differ from human norms, and yet how close they can still be…

And More…

Plus various pocket empires, like whatever we'll name our Cardassian analogs, and a myriad of isolates, including no doubt a few nuts who base their culture off of Greek mythology, Nazism, cowboy movies, or Edgar Rice Burroughs novels. If it works for them, it's hard to criticize…

All of the larger nations have a mix of races, species, and cultures within them, often on the same worlds. And there are, of course, alien, or alien-dominated nations, as well. I'd like to work the Kzin / Lyrans in there somewhere, the Gorn are a must, the Tholians would fit the "freaky alien space horde bent on devouring us out of existence" role nicely, I wouldn't mind sticking the Hivers and the K'Kree in there on the side… there's room, Space is Big. And don't forget that the aliens may well have para-alien genemods, alien-animal uplifts, and AIs of their own—and humans living among them, playing the "obligatory non-alien part" on their media shows, etc.

It's a big, wide, wonderful galaxy out there.

The Interstellar Nations

A running theme is that humanity has choices. (This is why I've banned Alien Space Gods, so our successes and our failures can be our own.) Thus, while the different cultures are different, and there are definitely places you or I may not want to live, there are good people everywhere, and the successful cultures do function.

Commentary

JohnBiles: The Federation rewards Compassion, Duty, and Tradition.

The Orions reward Ambition, Creativity, and Energy.

The Galactic Empire rewards Bravery, Loyalty, and Strength.

A Federation firefighter runs into a burning building because he can't stand to see people get hurt. Further, he's promised to save people from burning buildings, and after all, this is what firefighters DO.

An Orion firefighter runs into a burning building in order to test his new firefighting equipment which is going to make him a pile of cash if it works. Can't let the competition get a leg up on him.

A Galactic Empire firefighter runs into a burning building because he does not abandon his fellows to die alone. He will save them or die with them.

Sabermane: I had an idea on that, when I was considering my own Trek-redo. Basically, mankind builds these gene-mods, and we use them for a while. However, since we're being jerks we pissed them off and they responded by firing off a few nukes and saying "see ya, jerks!" Sadly, the newly free gene-mods weren't that great at working together anyway, and so they rapidly split into fragmental empires after the death of their rebel leader Khan...

Shadowjack: This could serve as another version of the Collapse of the Empire. Heck, given how many worlds there were, there are probably at least as many versions of why the old Empire fell…

The Federated Worlds

Brainstorming

• AI-assisted cyberdemocracy, with a Council and a President.
• Individual worlds have lots of freedom, so long as they hew to "universal principles" of the rights of lifekind, e.g. human rights, environmental conservation, etc.
• While our economic definitions don't exactly apply in an interstellar society with AI, fusion power, and rapidfacturing, the Feds are socialist-ish.
• Suggestion: people draw some sort of basic living stipend (a stock holding?), lots of public housing, etc.; colonists reinvest into developing a new world, then have the option to buy back into the core system, or retain economic independence.
• Division between "Core" worlds, which are developed and settled, and have technologized luxury (well, lower-middle-class comfort, at least), and "Frontier" worlds, which have sacrificed that to try to build their world into their way of doing things. (Isolates are an extreme example of this.) The Fed permits and even encourages this, so long as you're reasonably democratic and play well with others…
• Constant tension between the sheer weight of Earth's history and population, and everyone else.
• Current arts and culture are in a phase of rediscovering and reclaiming "traditional" pre-Empire art; a lot of emphasis on personal performance and hobbies.
• The Starfleet is an arm of the civil government (albeit a heavily-armed one), and associated with the other stellar organizations; analogous to Japanese SDF. Something like this:
  • Federation Council.
    • Justice Administration.
    • Diplomatic Administration.
    • Worlds Welfare Administration.
    • Federal Space Administration.
      • Department of Colonization and Terraforming.
        • Colonial Rangers.
      • Department of Transportation.
        • Merchant Space Fleet.
        • Bureau of Starports.
      • Department of the Star Fleet.
        • Core Fleets.
        • Frontier Fleet.
        • Star Fleet Marine Corps.
        • Strategic Space Command.
        • Fleet Surgeon General.
      • Department of Survey.
        • Deep Space Scouts.
        • Scientific Survey Bureau.
• Federation controls or tightly regulates most interstellar capacity, but is required by law to provide access to the citizenry. System ships can be privately owned. There should probably be interstellar carriers… Explains why a starcruiser may get passenger or cargo duty now and then.

Random Action Table (1d6)

1. Consider old Terran philosophy.
2. Try to reach a compromise.
3. Beam down a probe.
4. Check the database again.
5. Set phasers to stun.
6. Offer to help.

Commentary

Albert: Set it up so that to be a "Core World" it has to be fairly simple to get a modest amount of shareholder stock. Perhaps it's something you're given by the government at the age of majority, perhaps one of the requirements for a child permit is setting aside a large enough seed investment that by the time the child grows up the portfolio can be expected to be big enough.

Your Core Portfolio cannot be taken from you or given up. It's enough to live off of, if you're willing to live simply. Very simply. If you want more, figure out a good you can help produce or a service you can help provide.

There's a government ministry dedicated to making sure Core Portfolios remain able to do what they're supposed to do. When the economy is good, they investigate cases of abuse. When the economy tanks, it's their job to see that people don't starve while things work out.

People are less willing to tolerate shitty working environments, and more people are willing to try out career experiments. Overall effect is that the economy tends to be far more stable and growth-capable.

Out on the frontier, groups that exploit the existence of local poverty dread the day when a world decides put itself in order and join the Core Worlds. How do you arouse proletariat passions/exploit the working classes/represent the downtrodden/preach forced humility when "being poor" means that their food is on the bland side and that their internet connection isn't quite up to handling streaming video? Do you mutter about the complacent bourgeois/lazy bums/cultural traitors/fallen apostates and move on to the next world, or do you try to do something to stop it?

Shadowjack: Veeeeeeeeery interesting. And promotes interesting, realistic, and sympathetic conflicts between different classes and worlds, without providing obvious "good guys." "Come on, guys! We agreed to build this colony the way we like it, and now you want to give up and join the Core? We gotta stick to it!"

The idea of child permits actually feels a little outdated in a setting with easy transport to other worlds… on the other hand, a world's ecology is delicate to manage. It is a way to emphasize responsibility for one's offspring—and presumably, if there are commercial bioroids, the engineering company has to provide them a portfolio as well, held by the government in trust until the period of indenture has passed. The politics of this will no doubt be strange…

Albert: It's one possible solution I've come up with to the whole "how do you provide a safety net without it turning into bread and circuses" problem. (Because this grumpy sorta-conservative is well aware that a safety-net is needed. "The poor you will have with you always" and all that.) Hmmm . . . it probably has to be a thing of "would-be parents must have enough to seed a Core Portfolio before having a child", because otherwise you could run on a platform of promising a really high Core Portfolio minimum, all paid for by the government.

The other solution is a deal where you trade X months of labor (with free room and board) for a self-powering mobile home that can grow food, clothing, and basic medicine, and it's up to the government to make those months of labor do something useful. It's for a more libertarian/independant setting, though.

[Shadowjack: A government labor arrangement is another thought for the mix. There's a lot of necessary scut work for a society, even after automation; it could be treated like jury duty. "Time for your week of service!" "Aw, crap, again?" "It's a civic duty!")]

Anyway, one implication is that people must be prevented from having children until they seed the Core Portfolios. Probably via long-term contraceptive implants. Could be a reason for otherwise prosperous worlds to avoid Core membership, if there's widespread resistance to that level of social control over the consequences of life.

Shadowjack: It is a bit creepy, or at least feels so from my cultural background… but is it too creepy for the Federated Worlds? I'm not sure. It is fair play for all the cultures to have some alien warts.

Shadowjack: If anyone remembers the video game Flashback, there's an amusing sequence where the main character—to get cash—applies to a series of "job terminals". Show up, do a day's work (which in his case involves lots of running and shooting), get paid. I could see a computerized government like the Federation having open contracts for a lot of work: "Wanted today—six people to do garbage pick-up in the San Francisco area. Will train. Pay, etc." So if you feel like working today, you take the contract, download the instructional module to your comm, and set to it. Tomorrow you may do something else. Jobs that require training are for people who want to do something full time.

simontmn: I think for a "real humans in space" setting it's a good idea to consider the general political ethos. I appreciate you wish to avoid the Communist-totalitarian implications of a non-utopianist Next Generation setting; I think that's easy enough to do by simply ignoring all TNG-on Trek material… The politics of TOS was broadly liberal-humanist, so that gives a baseline; Democratic and Libertarian ideas of the 1940s through 1960s. The Federation is Good; Abraham Lincoln is a folk hero*; less advanced cultures should be protected from hostiles (eg Klingons), but not forcefully colonised. Political questions will likely concern the degree of centralisation in the Federation vs planets' rights to govern their own affairs. Questions like the rights of androids and regulation of mind-body transmission also seem reasonable. But only use stuff that seems like fun, of course.

• Also, America and the American political tradition must have continued to be dominant in your future Earth timeline; while also returning to a more traditionalist (pre 1968) ethos. That seems a bit unlikely to me right now starting from where we are today, but should be workable.

Shadowjack: Assuming American dominance in the setting—"Earth" culture might be a broad mix of many cultures. Though American is easy for me to import, being one myself. :D

Though it's not necessary to go alternate history; the political pendulum ever swings back and forth, and maybe the groups that helped found the Federated Worlds had similar ideas.

Some of my sketches, I've been basing Terran civilian clothing on Chinese and Indian designs—when it's not the universal "trousers and t-shirts" kind of outfits.

John Morrow: Re: White Man's Burden complaint.

That was actually pretty common in the original series, where it wasn't uncommon for them to talk about how they solved problems like racism long ago in the Federation. In fact, part of how the original show maintained the optimism was that they illustrated the social problems of the period less as internal problems of the Federation than as external problems that other civilizations encountered by the Federation had problems with and needed help with. Your skepticism about the "White Man's Burden" is why that perspective is so difficult to recreate without turning into a parody. People who are confident in their society and way of doing things do feel justified in helping others who are less fortunate but in a world that values multiculturalism and lacks confidence in its own authority and nobility, it seems antiquated and silly. Where Kirk once lectured both Bele and Lokai about racism in Let That Be Your Last Battlefield from an "above it all" perspective, how many people would now argue that Kirk doesn't have the authority to tell an oppressed minority to get over their hate?

So maybe if you want to recapture the optimism, you need to consider embracing the "White Man's Burden" perspective without less cynicism and make your Federation a place where people have worked out most of their differences and have gotten over them, either by all agreeing on the same thing or by learning to live and let live. And by virtue of having solved those problems, they have the moral authority to lecture others about them and to take an idealistic stand. Think of Star Trek as a sort of post-angry culture where people don't worry about small risks and quirks but about big issues and problems and where they believe others can do the same. There is a section in Space 1889 that talks about Victorian values as both virtue and vice (e.g., valuing "Progress" produced both the virture "Concern for improvement" and the vices "Disregard for foreign values, tendency to meddle"). I think that could be a useful way to look at the Star Trek attitude, as well.

Shadowjack: Food for thought.

John Morrow: It may not have been clear but my point is that I don't think the current tone of the United States is one of the sort of self-confident optimism seen in the original series. Your own skepticism about the "White Man's Burden" approach to solving problems (despite the fact that Kirk frequently took exactly that approach in the original series) illustrates that. So that runs up against your point about how Star Trek "often functions best as analogy for and social commentary upon our own times." The two are no longer in harmony with each other, which means you are going to have to pick one or the other or find some middle ground between them that's simultaneously both but neither.

JohnBiles: Given the whole 'mining past culture' thing, I'd suggest that Federation atheists refuse to answer to the term 'atheist' but insist on being identified by the philosophical tradition they've adopted which guides their action in a secular manner. So on their census forms, under 'Religion', they'd put 'Stoic' or 'Epicurean' or 'Cynic' or 'Platonist' or 'Enlightenment' or 'Neitzchean' or 'Existentialist' or 'Nihilist' or 'Capitalist' or 'Communist' or 'Hippy' or 'Saffron-Brodiest' or 'Transhumanist' or whatever. After all, 'Atheist' tells you what someone doesn't believe in, but not what they DO. And I'd expect lots of people to be reviving and experimenting with older philosophies. Lots of older religions would also be revived; the religions which dominate the 20th century would still exist, but not be so dominant as today.

The Alliance would be similar, but all the philosophies would be more up to date.

Shadowjack: Genetic engineering: …I'd add in the issue of responsibility. If you splice up a race of bioroids programmed as sex-slaves, who need special pills from you to survive… you're an asshole, because what happens to all those people when you die, or get bored of them? So the Federation in particular has a lot of these offshoot minorities from the fallen Empire—parahuman colonists, obsolete bioroids, and odd traits which happened to breed true—because they'll make the extra effort to see that these people can survive and find something to do with their lives. Gengineering of new species is disliked, because you'll be held responsible for the newbies…

Shadowjack: While the Federation Diplomatic Corps should be far more competent than the Corps Diplomatique Terrestriene (they'd have to be), I do think that Retief is the one they all secretly wish they were.

The Orion Alliance

Brainstorming:

• A republic with AI advisors, with a Parliament and Prime Minister or Ministers.
• Corporate capitalism, complete with well developed mass media, etc.
• Reduced social programs and lax regulation of business, in order to encourage business. Greater individual liberty than the Federated Worlds, but also great social inequality—the poor are poorer.
• Less conservative technologically, but also less stable—more boom and bust cycles.
• Colonies tend to be for business first, and ideology only much later.
• Army and Navy are traditionally-structured militaries, but compete at times with the private corporate fleets.
• Great music, food, and drink!

Random Action Table (1d6):

1. Light a cigarette.
2. Offer money.
3. Offer sex.
4. Apply overwhelming force.
5. Bluff.
6. Damn the consequences and do the right thing.

Commentary

Shadowjack: One reason for the Orion Alliance is to let them serve as mirrors to the Federation. Anything which doesn't work for the one, I can try out on the other, but both can be "people like us." It's also inspired by fandom arguments along the lines of "Who would win, the Colonial Marines from Aliens or Starfleet Security?" and "The Federation is Communist propaganda!"

Another reason is to let me do stories about capitalism and greed without having to invoke a race of short greedy scheming moneylenders with big ears and noses who covet gold. Which for some funny reason seems distasteful to me. (Which is a shame, because the Ferengi episodes on DS9 were generally great fun!)

Devin Parker: I love having that cultural counterpoint present. It reminds me a lot of Austrin-Ontis from the Star*Drive setting for Alternity...which also has an Orion League...hmm.

Shadowjack: You know, I've never looked at Star*Drive. *adds to the round-to-it list*

Albert: Okay, we can tell that Federal Space is more easy-going than the Orions, and probably a better place to be "poor" in, but what are the Orion advantages? More social mobility? A higher "average" standard of living? Technology that tends to remain about a generation ahead? In other words, what distinguishes this from "My Little Telepathic Pony and the strawman Eagleland IN SPAAAAAAAAACE!"

LordDraqo: I see the Orion Alliance as lazzaie fair capitalism with the volume-dial set to "high." Of course you have more social/economic mobility, as anyone with the capital to do so can set themselves up as a business. Corporate entities would tend to become powerful, and I can see interactions between Management and Labor as common.

Shadowjack: Well, maybe not high, but higher.

Fasth: Here we have a political minefield, yes? Perhaps the best would be to accentuate the differing philosophies and their effect on the individual rather than make a maniphesto about the greater efficiency of the laissez-faire capitalist state. The Orions are more fun. More hedonistic. More swashbuckling, cigar-chewing, babe-getting, bar-brawling individualists than the Feds and their duty-ridden sense of communal spirit. I think their hats have broader brims as well.

Shadowjack: What he said. The Orion's have drive. It's bad if you're poor, but if you're successful, the sky's the limit.

The Federation tends toward caution—they are still very hesitant to poke their noses into another planet's business. While if the Orions see something they see as wrong, they'll obknock all over their asses—so they've had spectacular failures, but also spectacular successes. I imagine a good story could be had where both Federation and Alliance ships respond to a distress call from some neutral world—both governments want to help, but they differ in approach.

An individual in the Alliance has more personal liberty than in the Federation. They've got a broader right to bear arms, and lots of independent media—but also lots of powerful corporate interests, who use those rights too, and more effectively than the individual. Lots of social strain there. You'll see this in the economy, too; there are stronger boom-bust cycles in the Alliance, while the Federation prefers stability.

Oddly, the Alliance is more unified culturally; Federation colony worlds tend to spin-off their own subcultures, while Alliance colonies are more tied to the whole, perhaps because their colonies are more profit-based than ideological. And it's easier to market mass culture.

The Federation's in this thing where they're mining pre-Empire art for inspiration, trying to reclaim Earthling art—all those string quartet revivals, and Picard's hoarded copies of Dickens and pulp novels—while the Orions are cheerfully making new, loud music and media. If you want good food, good music, go to Orion space; Yoko Kanno does the soundtrack. If you want tradition, find a Federation planet; the first music played on a newly-christened ship is always "The Blue Danube."

I tend to draw the Orion Alliance uniforms and equipment looking a lot like in Aliens, and I think of the cities like those in Bubblegum Crisis, so think of Weyland-Yutani or GENOM doing business in the Star Trek universe. That's the downside of the Alliance.

CasperLions: I'd say the big secret is that the Orion Alliance has a social welfare system almost as good as the Fed's...it's just being poor sucks in the Alliance. Every (Orionite? Oriono like Angeleno? Orionian?) knows it does. That's because they value the finer things in life, which is to say they live in a consumer culture that caters to base gluttony and sloth and make people obsessed with getting the luxuries that money can get (ironically, due to less restrictions and less trade regulations many food/drug type luxuries are available - in some form at least - quite cheaply). That's the consumer-culture-capitalist secret to getting people from a fat wealthy nation to be motivated, by playing on their greed and their desire to not work. People ignore the fact that they could just not work by becoming obsessed with working hard (or at least getting clever and trying to scam/trick people and take risks) now so that some day they can earn the right to relax in the corporate-packaged sort of retirement/vacation/"high life" they imagine.

The Fed on the other hand probably dealt with the early lethargy of it's welfare state by placing higher restrictions on various things and activities taken for granted, encouraging people to become productive (and after that people become proud of being productive and a form of patriotism rises around the subject). The loop probably works like this - the Fed tarrifs space-ciggs and so on in order to have the cash to provide everyone with education tailored to their talents/inclinations, thus encouraging the development of happy productive people.

Alliance citizens see economic freedom as ultimately being the freedom to pursue happiness, and their appreciation for that economic freedom develops into a sometimes arrogant patriotism bordering on the fetishistic.

Fed citizens see a nurturing/uplifting society and the opportunity to do meaningful things with their lives as the source of the freedom of the pursuit of happiness, and that breeds a contentment/appreciation of their role in the great machine without needing a clearly defined sense of patriotism separate from their feeling of life fulfillment.

It's all very subtle in how it's actually induced, though, seeing as both come from the same general point and time of origin. The Fed isn't a communist utopia and the Alliance isn't a libertarian wet-dream, at least not in flashy ways. Both are essentially stratified societies where patriotism and specific socioeconomic (occupational counting as economic) standards are closely tied, preventing class wars or neo-aristocracy or anything like that. An Alliance slacker will complain just like someone today, but they're proud of their right to slack and furthermore have the desire to do more (and probably will), out of the collective peer pressure that they get a higher paying job so they can have a house in the space suburbs and 2.5 space kids.

A Fed slacker will complain just like someone today, but they're actually frustrated at themselves for not having the courage to take up the various educational/occupational opportunities that have come their way; their silent patriotism being the overwhelming desire for a standard of self-satisfication/fulfillment that would baffle even the most rugged Orion individualist.

A countercultural, radical, subversive in the Fed would be a hippy type who manage to combine that same desire for fulfillment with a rejection of the omnipresent authority that makes such an encouraging society possible.

A radical in the Alliance would be someone that combines their focus on individuality with an extreme focus on personal survival. Selfishness is almost a virtue (in that it encourages people to be productive), but the traditional family/friends/community/corporate feelings of loyalty are expected in a small way at least as part of the general cultural background. Really hardcore dog-eat-dog cyberpunk dystopian types are not any more well-liked than we like survivalist gun nuts today. Even the commercial/cultural image of the rugged individualist is a good consumer (er, citizen); loner street samurai are considered immoral scumbags even if religion/traditional values are not an overt norm (good-neighborism, the ideological motif of not letting your liberty infringe on your neighbors, is still valued is the point).

That's what this all makes me think of, anyway.

cmdicely: The idea of laissez-faire capitalism with the volume dial set to "high" and an increased degree of socio-economic mobility doesn't really strike me as particularly credible. "Anyone with the capital to do so can set themselves up as a business" is a recipe for fairly rigid economic stratification.

Mr. Teufel: You need a mechanism where those at the top are as likely to fall as those at the bottom are to rise. Maybe there's no such thing as "limited liability". If your company goes bankrupt, you lose everything, and your shareholders incur debts. It would work with the whole individualist concept.

Shadowjack: I agree [on the point of economic stratification]. That's why I wouldn't turn the dial up myself to super-high. Just pretty high, compared to the Federation; I bet the Alliance Trade Commission is very busy (no doubt pressured by the other corporations to keep others from getting too far ahead). I kind of think that all of the interstellar governments have pretty heavy social programs by our standards, to maintain social stability. But the Alliance has much lower standards, to encourage people to go out and work.

MadDogMike: Just a couple of thoughts real quick. If the Orions have a looser reproduction policy than the Federation, one way you could get some tension is the Orions being more expansionist to deal with their extra population. Might also work as a "safety valve" for the poor and disaffected; have somebody invest "start-up funds" (possibly with government subsidies) into forming colonies which the poor can take up and effectively get a higher lifestyle with the potential of going even higher thanks to being in a "new market", while the sponsors/government get an eventual return on investment from paying back the loan/taxable population increase. This also provides the possibility of Orion worlds on the fringe the Feds might visit in various straits, from happy and well-off to miserable and under crushing debt due to the failure of the colony (either of which might present issues to Fed planets nearby of various sorts; "Orion pirates" might be caused by the latter while the government as a whole is reasonably legit). I would say to make things less black and white that the Orions (minus corrupt individuals and mistakes, of course) aren't actually conquerors as they expand; they work on the principle of "space is so big there's plenty of room to grow". The Federals could still complain about the Orions growing faster than is wise (and possibly running into threats faster than the Feds), while the Orions bring up the Federals dictating fundamental things like childbirth as a horrible flaw. Shows both sides of the issue without necessarily having either be "right".

Shadowjack: A justification for the old "Orion pirates" line—nice. And this sort of real but not-rigged politics is good thinking.

Shadowjack: Genetic engineering: I figure the Alliance is more laise-faire about the whole thing, but also has strong currents of public opinion that go back and forth; probably an "indentured servitude" option in there, I need to think about it.

John Morrow: One idea, then, is to get rid of your Orion Alliance and put it back into Federal Space and create a "Blue State"/"Red State" dichotomy within your Federal Space. The urbanized core worlds are more socialist and socially liberal while the more rural frontier worlds are more capitalist and traditional. This creates tension in the Federation Council, which shifts back and forth between the two approaches as one group or the other gains control and with each trying to push their sensibilities on the other. This would allow a mixed crew approach. Maybe your Orion Alliance is a part of the Federation, an alliance of worlds within rather than a separate government outside. If each world has it's own government that can vary quite a bit, that gives you room for your California fiscal crisis as a local matter.

Shadowjack: By now, I'm too beholden to the idea of the separate government and culture to abandon it… but I do like the idea of different regions within the Federated Worlds. We know there's the original core, and the area bordering "the Badlands", so what else is there?

The Great Galactic Empire

• Great Houses (derived from former military corps of the empire). Each house has its own traditions and holdings; technologically-assisted feudalism.
• A Senate, with elected Emperor.
• Lots of military tradition, but not necessarily militarized or autocratic—too much competition between houses for that.
• Great emphasis upon honor, duty, and glory—always strive to do better, to qualify for a greater oath to a greater patron, and to attract greater clients. Violent. Lead from the front.
• Glorious colorful banners, capes, swords; black helmets and gas masks in battle.

Random Action Table (1d6):

1. Challenge them to a duel.
2. Praise their abilities.
3. Follow orders to the letter.
4. Gengineer a solution.
5. Ask your brothers and sisters for help.
6. Attack!

Commentary

Lonewolf23: My favorite differences [from the Star Fleet Universe / Prime Directive setting] involve the Klingons, actually. Instead of Space Vikings, they're more like Space Soviets: a strong, militaristic empire with a lot of client races, a centralized economy, and a social emphasis on service to the Empire. Prime Directive Klingons don't charge at you screaming like banshees with their Bath'leths held high; they charge at you with Disruptor rifles blazing, with their Hilidarians (large lizard-folk) and Slidarian (bear-ape like humanoids) subject races charging in front of them.

Oh, and all of it uses Old Trek style, so expect gold-clad Officers, Green Orion Space Babes and Smooth foreheaded Klingons.

Shadowjack: SFB was an inspiration. And yes, these are the smooth-headed Klingons, with that sardonic look Kirk came to hate so well.

Slidarians: there's a use for the uplifted bears from Transhuman Space! :D

Shadowjack: My "Great Galactic Empire" is arguably a liveable place—the Great Houses care for their vassals, and it is possible for any man to carve out a piece of territory for himself if he has the wit and strength to try. Perhaps some people from the Federation immigrate there and swear their sword-oath to the Emperor, seeking adventure and glory that they can't find back at home.

I wouldn't want to live there, though, even if I did get to wear a cape.

JohnBiles: The Great Galactic Empire could divinize its past emperors like the Romans did and worships them as the official religion which is the badge of loyalty, but you're free to follow whatever private faith you want. The official religion would also teach that dying in battle is the best way to get into a good afterlife.

JohnBiles: The Galactic Empire endorses the warrior virtues. It is a land of HEROES. When an Imperial sees a giant space amoeba eating people, he charges in to help. When he sees someone being raped, he cuts the offender's head off without a second thought. When the Empire needs someone to hold the gates until the giant space squid killing machine can be assembled, they practically have to hold a fighting tournament to determine who gets the honor of it.

The Empire protects its own. Join the Empire and you know you will be safe. You'll be expected to help fight for the Empire and pay taxes, but you know that you are protected. And any subject of the Empire who shows the Imperial virtues can rise to the top.

Honor doesn't just mean being touchy, it means the word of an Imperial is his bond. He needs no contract law because he will punish himself if he breaks a promise. It means if you give him a job, he will do it or he will die.

Of course, this is all the ideal and no one ever perfectly lives up to ideals. But at heart, there is a lot of nobility in the ideals of the Empire.

LordDraqo: Honor = the courage to fulfill freely accepted obligations Courage = the willingness to endure discomfort (pain/death?) to achieve a goal.

These seem like very worthwhile cultural motifs for the Galactic Empire. Honorable does not mean stupid, though it does mean persistant.

Susanoo Orbatos: Hmm here's the key point though though, the basic premise of the Empire vs the Federation and the League is its explicit rejection of Democracy. The Emperor and the Great Houses rule because they do it better than you. The inherent flaw of Monarchy in modern day is that the Monarchs aren't superbeings who are smarter more divinly inspired and so on.. but in a world where there are multiple clades of human life it seems like moding for "super rulers" would have a certain amount of logic.

Though perhaps the "Super governor" build might work better for the Romulan analogue... [Shadowjack: Yes, it does.]

Scarik: I think in this case the Empire is a pure meritocracy.

In the Alliance you run for high office and use your skills and contacts and cash to put you at the top.

The Feds use comprehensive tests and then elect their leaders to limited terms.

The Empire forces heroes into leadership positions. You have no choice, if you are a hero you must serve at the helm. Once chosen you can not be unchosen and any failure could result in death or worse dishonor.

Shadowjack: Genetic engineering: I imagine that the Empire cheerfully gens up new models when needed, and discards the old ones. Brrr.

Myth: Darwinism and genetics seems an interesting combination, too. The Mirror Universe (at least in TOS) seemed quite concerned with personal success. If they are consciously working to find the most successful genes for rulership, then that's a slightly different spin on the "personal success at all costs" thing. Perhaps there is no Emperor, and the whole Empire is in a 300-year competition to see who's the best sentient for the job.

Individuals with poor gene combinations would be killed off (or, more correctly, individuals who have been killed off are judged to have had poor gene combinations). Perhaps successful individuals would be cloned. Perhaps succesful individuals from outside the Empire would be gene-knapped, either for cloning or for combining with other favorite genes.

To avoid the Khan/Aryan thing, have it understood that these are individual gene combinations they're looking at, none of that master race stuff. Perhaps they're recovering from some early-Empire "cheaters" who used gene-modding and/or tailored cloning, rather than true "survival of the fittest" natural gene combinations/evolution. (You can have both the "Eugenics Wars" and the "Clone Wars" in their past, for instance.)

Shadowjack: I think of the old houses of the Empire actually having their origins in old armies/navies. If you think of how many services an established military provides to its personnel, particularly the old systems that do their own recruiting—and if you think of how the role of the Army has evolved places like the Russia and China today—you can see where I'm going with this. I almost think of the Armies in Ender's Game, each with colors and mascot. Salamander Army, Dragon Army, Tiger Army, Horse Army… all under the Emperor. (Who's probably elected by the houses…) Shimmering banners ripple in the wind of the Great Square and the Triumph Dome.

Court intrigue. Capes. Dagger fights in the grounds behind the barracks house. Angry torchlight mobs when the Generals go too far, and screaming, cheering crowds when they bring victory.

Lots of struggle and infighting to gain social position, but a successful man writes his own ticket. Respect given not just to warriors, of course—doctors and technologists are important, too, but the doctor should go personally into plague territory to perform his research, and the technologist should be willing to test his own equipment.

One big problem with the Empire is that it spends almost as much time fighting itself as anyone else. Another big problem is that it can be rough on the peasants, especially if you're in the territory of a negligent House. AK-47 justice is only fun if you're the one with the AK-47.

Archer: Lets say the Imperials were genetically engineered to be the fist of the Terran Empire. The Empire raised them in an artificial warrior culture and encouraged them to think of themselves as seperate from normal humans, in an attempt to make them more willing to put down civillian uprisings. But as the Empire began to crumble and they spend more and more time running from hot spot to hot spot, out of touch with their superiors, their concept of honor began to evolve. Then came the day the commander of an expeditionary force decided the Empire's orders were no longer honorable. Within an hour, the Imperial commisars were out the airlocks and the force's ships had scattered, spreading a message of revolt. The surviving rebels fled into unexplored space, and their commanders became the founders of the great houses of a new empire. Between the fighting and the loss of the core of its military, the empire they had served did not long survive their departure.

mindstalk: Imperials as old warrior caste, and genetic engineering: without going too THS, there's still probably a lot of cultural room based on personality tweaking. More testosterone or something -> more aggression. More oxytocin -> more bonding, especially pair bonding (see prairie and meadow voles.) Manufacture of high-functioning autists and savants, or ability to get logical or artistic talent to order. No race of supergeniuses (yet?) but a bunch of effective caste ability for a society that chooses to go that route.

The New Byzantine Sphere

Brainstorming:

• Roman Republic? "Athenian" cyber-assisted democracy, with completely anonymous posting? Single-party state?
• See previous economic caveat, but these are our Space Communists. Everyone works for the state.
• Society to us would seem a strange mix of fragmented and homogenous:
  • Everyone born and raised in public creches, to ensure equality of opportunity. You select your own parent-mentors when you reach the right age.
  • Everyone belongs to multiple social groups, with privacy defended fiercely—you can gain social advantage by figuring out just who someone is friends with, so there are intricate social masks, and even spoofing by pretending to attend a group you're disinterested in… Lots of odd to us concepts of where the public and private spheres lie—possibly a person has multiple private spheres, kept compartmentalized from others. ("I didn't know you belonged to a band." "You had no need to know. I trust you with this part of me." "I accept your trust. No one shall learn of this from me.") Very Vancian, in some respects.
  • Careful distinctions made between mating, householding, sex, and love; you may be "married" to one person for the sake of appearance and property holding, and have a couple of regular sexual partners elsewhere—or even belong to a swinger's club—but your romantic confidant could be someone else entirely. And if they are your spouse or sex-partner, it's impolite to say so.
• Wide use of personal augmentation, paired with the principles of "with great power comes great responsibility" and "subtlety trumps blatancy." Top Byzantines are the smartest, healthiest, sexiest people you've ever met—and have a workload to match. On duty, they're expected to wear the uniform and blend in; in off hours, they really cut loose. Bottom-tier proles have minimum required service?
• Non-expansionist, but uncompromising on security.
• Long policy of isolation now being abandoned in the hopes of attracting new blood and ideas. Approached with the gritted-teeth attitude of taking cough medicine—they hate this, but they know it'll make 'em better. Privately, many welcome the change (and many others want to sabotage it).

Random Action Table (1d6):

1. Say nothing.
2. Consult one of your secret clubs.
3. Say polite nothings with hidden meaning.
4. Make a gratuitous demonstration of your official resources.
5. Pass the buck.
6. Seemingly retreat, then take action a moment later.

Commentary

Susanoo Orbatos: I also like the conflict between genetics and the human spirit seems very trekish, perhaps the ancient super nobles would work for the Romulan analogue it seems a bit Roman to have "divine" nobles.. and abit Indian to have more genetically enforced Castes.

CasperLions: You could make the Romulans the "Emperor is the son of heaven" types. The Emperor doesn't have to do anything but face the sun, he's the platonic ideal of a meticulous social system that runs itself (well, with the help of the scholar-officials anyway).

I'd say you have enough bawdy Roman style noble houses in the Empire, so the Confucian "I got this bureaucratic position because I composed the best poem about warp-drives" might work better.

Shadowjack: Idea: secret biomods. Hmm. I'm thinking GATTACA. Ooh…

Susanoo Orbatos:' Re: "New Byzantium" for the name. Seems abit on the nose, maybe make them closer to Republican Rome than Imperial Rome to give a greater difference between them and the Grand Galatic Empire. Putting Republic in the name would also give another connection to China.

Shadowjack: Oo, Republican Rome. Nice.

Heh. "People's Republic of New Byzantium"? And why not.

The TNG+ Romulans always did seem a little Soviet to me. They had commissars at one point, didn't they? That episode with Troi, undercover…? Maybe it was the haircuts.

Susanoo Orbatos: How about The People's Republic of Bruti as an a reference to he who through down the Roman kings?

The Borg Hives

• The far end of the transhuman curve—people so self-modified that they hardly count as human.
• Born and raised in a web of rapid telecommunications (even implanted comms, sensory-sharing?), each "hive" reacts almost as a single personality, as emotional responses spread throughout the web, and anyone with a question can receive advice almost instantly. Some hives are aggressive, most are just absent, a few are friendly and interact with the more normal cultures. Because of this, hard to generalize…
• Bodies are just shells, to be adapted as needed for different tasks. Use of "zombie" bodies as bioshells when no longer needed; no distinction made between minds of different origins (human? AI? uplifted dolphin? non-uplifted housecat? all the same). Lots of robotics.
• Most live far beyond the frontiers, for the sake of privacy, or for esoteric reasons of their own. Some accept immigrants; some have emigrants.

Random Action Table (1d6):

1. Suddenly, the entire Hive's attention is focused on the situation.
2. Bring in a different shell.
3. Stare blankly.
4. Suddenly stop and do something else.
5. Odd emotional response.
6. For a moment, seems utterly "normal."

Commentary

David Rhode: The Borg as a concept I thought were very good. I've considered writing serious science fiction about electronically-integrated human mass-minds based on contemplation of cell phones. Consider how ubiquitous cell phones are... people carry them and use them in theaters, and have begun getting them for younger and younger children. I have seen people walk side-by-side, both yapping on cell phones to completely different people at the same time. As cell phones become smaller and smaller, and more and more powerful, and integrate into society at younger and younger ages, who's to say that eventually it won't be an electronic implant into children at birth (or earlier)? Such individuals may never develop anything we would recognize as an independent personality or social consciousness. The resulting gestalt entity might well be a completely alien mentality.

Shadowjack: This is a wonderful way to get a "hive mind", without taking it literally. An entire society of absent-minded cell-phone users… Not that far-fetched, but very, very alien.

David Rhode: Seriously, the Borg had better technology, why wouldn't they always start off with the best weapons and defenses they had available, instead of leaving themselves completely open at first contact? Isn't it just as easy, nay, easier to analyze someone's weapons while they are bouncing off your shields rather than vaporizing your innards? And on a related topic, I don't think 'adaptation' is as easy as they made it look. Again, a modern analogy: consider how easy it is to find answers to questions via Google. There is lots and lots of information on the internet, and if you can find it, you can learn all kinds of things. But, there is a great deal of difference between looking up and relaying information, and understanding and applying it. And what if the answers aren't there? The hardest thing to do on the internet, and the thing that earns the most kudos, is Creating New Content. I would think that a mass mind based on storing and sifting information would have a very difficult time inventing and innovating.

Shadowjack: Yeah, I'll be ditching the "hyper-adaptable" routine. In fact, it seems that a Borg Hive might be slower to adapt, at first, because it would have trouble perceiving new trouble and agreeing upon a course of action. Only once consensus was reached would they spin-off.

On the other hand, thinking of them as societies turns it back around—those groupings which do adapt to a problem will split-off from the main hive. You might see, under crisis, a hive splinter into multiple organizations, and later the survivors reform.

s/LaSH: Let me be honest: A lot of this sounds exactly like what I proposed a while back for a rebooted Trek, although mine had no aliens whatsoever, and was exclusively about posthumans. This accounts for my interest, because this is going further and fleshing out a very interesting scenario.

Key to my scenario, however, were the Borg, humanity's first experiment with transhuman mind structures. Borg Corporation produced the greatest developments in history with their think-tanks, and kickstarted the great human diaspora, first through warp drive, then through transwarp corridors (in this interpretation, possibly system-to-system transporters). This created the colonies that eventually became the recognisable Trek races.

But then the Borg-we-made became the Borg-we-fear, claiming that they were better, that people were happier like them, and Connecting people to their network by force, and all over the galaxy, colonists human and posthuman alike rose up and fought them. Resistance was futile; the Borg controlled the high orbitals and the paths between worlds, and could easily have glassed their enemies. But they didn't. They withdrew, destroying their technology behind them.

This caused an end to the First Interstellar Era. Without the Borg transwarp corridors, interstellar travel slowed to a warp-speed crawl, and it took centuries for people to put the pieces together again. This did mean there was no parity between original Trek and my version - the timeline put Kirk in the 27th century, although I'm sure some corners could be cut. The other thing that happened was the Borg were still out there, as a sort of historical bogeyman that hadn't been seen for centuries.

The idea was, the Borg would eventually return, but not as unintelligent drones completely undeserving of their fearsome reputation. They would return as glimmering beings of resplendent might and fearsome knowledge; one Borg mind could control an entire warship, a sleek and beautiful thing like a poem written on space. The Borg Drones we saw on TNG would be either historical artifacts or broken attempts by various races to adapt Borg remnants to their own ends or, perhaps, a Borg garbage scow designed to clean up small things like planetary civilizations.

But the Borg would also be very strange, and decidedly imperfect, particularly in their interaction with the younger races. They kept on advancing in their own empire-beyond-space, and a single Borg with an agenda for the 'throwbacks' could cause all manner of trouble for the more-numerous but less-advanced cultures of the Alpha Quadrant. They can fill in for god-beings and, ironically, the Q continuum, to a certain level.

I didn't like the original Trek interpretation of the Borg; they were a caricature of transhuman philosophy, a sign of deep conservatism amongst TNG-era writers (see also the Federation's stance against genetic engineering in DS9). I much prefer scifi that isn't a milksop to modern sensibilities, proclaiming small-town sentiment to be the peak of moral development; that's very much the opposite of what Roddenberry had to say, I think, and his successors did him wrong. Federal Space is clearly much more open in that regard, which makes me happy. By all means, feel free to ransack my ideas.

[Shadowjack: I agree with your analysis there—the later series grew increasingly and unfortunately "conventional." And I shall ransack as I please, thank you!.]

(An alternate interpretation is to replace Borg Corporation with some kind of 'Ancients' created by humans during the 21st century, and have the traditional Borg as just another one of their projects - but having the Borg as the Ancients solves the issue of "Why did the Ancients collapse/leave?" by saying "Because they were kinda a bunch of dicks", or at least "We disagreed with their philosophy on the future course of humanity", and gives them the mental capability to create technologies that modern races simply can't fathom, thus allowing a rapid diaspora followed by a slow reunification process.)

Shadowjack: Now this is another interesting alternate—not for use here. But I find myself noting the points of similarity. Having the Borg being an offshoot of the original Terran cultures, for example—that's important to me, because it emphasizes their humanity. But they've been gone from home for a very long time…

I think that "Borg Corporation", in Federal Space, was probably an early social clade, possibly dating from just before the "Eugenics Wars" period. Originally incorporated as a company (probably a stakeholder enterprise or high-tech co-op), and dedicated to pushing the new technologies as far as possible, they would have been one of the first groups to colonize Out There—away from the Empire—and they shared their developments with others. We can see how this meme-set of "universal technology!" has mutated and changed in their descendents' aggressive recruiting methods… Heh. I just realized that I just wrote how Microsoft has sometimes characterized the Open Source movement—"They're trying to assimilate our codebase!" :D

Myth: What if these Terran-made Precursor Borg developed a virus? Something designed to auto-assimilate new beings into the Collective, but with a fatal flaw that slipped past QA? This we get slow, stupid Borg like those 50's sci-fi rejects we saw, rather than the glorious transhumans who developed the Warp Corridors that used to tie the galaxy together? They're still out there, but Alpha Quadrant is quarantined, and we'll see them only through some sort of remote-projection technology that is safe for them to use.

Shadowjack: Well, it'd be more of a social virus than either a physical or computer one. It would make sense that some of the early encounters could be with the less successful Hives, though! By Borg standards, those guys might be thought of as equivalent to terrorists or psycho killers—not part of their concept of polite society.

Ragnarok_Engine: Something mentioned in passing in the Culture books that always fascinated me: the classic Borg/Von Neumann plague is referred to as an Aggressively Hegemonizing Swarm and is not tolerated. Some more intelligent Swarms, however, are amenable to diplomacy rather than requiring destruction. If such a Swarm can be convinced to alter its recruitment strategy so that it will only absorb sentients or their property if it gets consent, it is reclassified as an Aggressively Proselytizing Swarm and is perfectly welcome in Galactic society. :D

In addition to being reasonable, lends itself well to cartoons/running jokes.

'Late Sunday morning, on a world on the borders of Federal Space:

• knock knock*

"Yes, how can I - SWEET HOLY KRSNA!"

"Greetings, fleshy sentient. Have you ever considered joining with the Transcendent and Luminous Glory of the Many?"

"Er, no. No, I'm perfectly happy with my clade. Um, thanks for stopping by, though."

• synthesized sigh* "Very well. May I present you with a copy of our complementary holozine, "The Observatory"? It includes a commcode for the Mother Brain, should you ever decide to shed your disgusting fleshy envelope and join us in eternal digitized splendor."

"Yeeeah. Thanks. Have a nice day, now."

Shadowjack: Another Borg thought: While I'm banning personality upload, the Borg might have developed the knack of live sensory interface to a high peak. This explains the expendability of "drones"—they're just shells, being borrowed by whatever part of the Hive needs to use them at the moment. Useful corpses are recycled as shells—you don't want to waste that brain, after all.

yorrick: My problem with the Borg when I watched them on the series--aside from the same sorts of issues you mentioned about their use of technology--was that you had this civilization that supposedly absorbed the best qualities of the alien civilizations it encountered, and they all looked like albino cyborgs? Really? I wanted to see some unusual looking aliens strapped with Borg comm/control gear. I mean, there was no need for them to all look physically the same unless humanity was the perfect form. Or if the special effects budget was limited. :)

Which is just a way of saying the Borg appearance was a metaphor for their overall homogeneity, and that overwhelming sameness just didn't jibe (for me, anyway) with a highly adaptive species and civilization. They should be colorful. Their ships should look different from each other, at least in different sectors.

Shadowjack: Different Hives have different looks. A single Hive may extrude wildly different varieties of craft for particular purposes. Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence drew a comparison between human artifacts, like cities, and the reefs produced by coral polyps; it seems to me like the Borg would accentuate that resemblance.

Fringe Worthy: How's this for a Random Borg concept:

We have the Borgstrom colony worlds. [Gregor: Borgstrom?! This puts an entirely new spin on those guys that I hadn't considered.] A bunch of smaller ones, and some more advanced. Some of them having much concentration in cybernetics and medical gear.

We're not sure why or how, but that sector got hit by a set of plagues. Something in the worlds ecosystem? Automated biowarfare systems from a killed world seeing targets again? A Failed (Targetted to another species?) nanotech uplift system? Anyways, the results were hideous.

The desease(s?). It was a long incubation, then a fast burn attack. Flesh would just rot away. One of the few techniques that would work would be to just remove the rotting area. It was running rampant through the area, systems collapsing.

One advanced world refused to go down, they decided to do whatever was necessary to live. Cut and cyber. You have too little for a full person, attach it to another. Senses gone? That's fine, keep the body living, the mind can be wired to concensual reality. They can do their duty via remote access.

They fought things to a steady state. they sacrificed, oh did they sacrifice. Many of the people are barely people, almost more just organic controls for machinery. But they can serve, they can live, they have value to the whole and themselves.

Now, from the outside, they others civilizations were stuck on containment and one way aid. Plague ships were hunted down and turned back or destroyed. How could you tell the heathy for now but contaminated versus the untouched?

So the Borg have built themselves up, a civilization of the sick, damaged and mad, repairing and replacing themselves, more machine then flesh.

And now, they are still angry for the rejection, even if it was required, and they are feared... For what happens if they are still sick. The plagues do spring up, not quite in the way they should.

And the worst thing that can happen to a colony? A collection of Borg cubes come, blockading them and advising them that the models and data show there will be a new outbreak here, and they will not permit the illnesses to spread. The colonies only choice is death or joining them. ( cept for those 3 worlds where the Borg left 3 years later. Hey, models are wrong sometimes )

And they are feared. For, do they follow the plagues, Are they a wellspring of more plagues, or do they bring the plagues?

( So, part Vernor Vinge Emergency, but without the HR from Hell, James Alan Gardner's Vigilant, and zombie plague horror. )

And the virtues as given the other Civilizations? Endurance, Pragmatism, Sacrifice.

Ragnarok_Engine: Re: Borgstrom. They started as a group of stranded colonists who were topologically identical to waffles!

Pocket Kingdoms & Isolates

• Isolates: Plenty of these out there—small groups who set out with their own power and equipment, to engineer their ideal society, away from the common crowd.
  • Hidden in asteroids, scattered on frontier worlds, sometimes just in private spaces within settled space.
  • Rely on being small and harmless for defense; some maintain relationships with the larger governments just in case, others try to go invisible.
  • Lots of these in and aorund Federal space, since the Feds don't mind; few in the Empire, because the local houses, or the Emperor, want control. (However, some cadet branches are practically isolates themselves.)
• Pocket Kingdoms: Generic term for independent worlds, and small interstellar polities, whether they're actually kingdoms or not.
  • Lots of these are dictatorships, I mean, People's Democratic Republics. The rest tend to be complicated but well-populated worlds, which endured the Nightfall and decided they liked independence.
  • Many are neutral, or fall into client-patron relationships with the larger nations. The Empire tolerates 'em if they pay tribute; the Orions cheerfully make trade or perform military interventions; the Fed tends toward formal diplomacy with limited trade ties.
  • The Badlands are a region of particularly balkanized and shifting allegiances, which is a constant source of diplomatic frustration.
  • A number of these worlds spawn pirates, privateers, and space vikings, though these are generally quite localized problems; anything gets big and problematic, one of the big nations sends in a fleet.
• New Byzantium can be considered one of the most successful pocket kingdoms, since they maintain an active interstellar presence beyond their sphere.

Aliens

I do like me some alien aliens, but too many of them interacting with humans, and humans become just a drop in the ocean… One compromise might be that it seems there are lots of sapients out there, but they tend to be scattered—the dense and complicated human-dominated space is typical of aggressive species, and passive species pretty much stick to one world. You might encounter a few visitors from anywhere, but rarely interact with the full cultures…

• Uplifts — Neo-dolphins in particular appeal to me, and there may be some other uplifts here and there. The old Terran Empire experimented with a lot of these, and then killed off the useless ones, but some have still held on… and new ones may have been created.
• Free AIs — There are some weird machine intelligences out there.
• Kzin / Lyrans / Aslan / etc. — Our "cat-like" race of carnivores, and their genetic variants. Aggressive; lots of fighting. Might steal bits of Vargr culture from Traveller, as well, like their flexible concept of social status.
• Hivers / Puppeteers — More Niven influence, and I do like Traveller's Hivers. They'd fit in just fine.
• K'Kree — So would Traveller's K'Kree.
• Tholians — Because talking killer crystals are awesome. (And steal from some other Trek aliens: "YOU UGLY BAGS OF MOSTLY WATER.") I suggest letting them have emphasizing stargate technology for travel, rather than warp, just to be different—and they supposedly arrived from far away originally, right? One massive teleport mission.
• Gorn / other lizardy folk — Inspired by Murry Leinster's fun story "First Contact", I suggest our Gorn analogs turn out to be one of the closest and friendliest alien species to humans—we understand each other well. 'Course, this does mean there are also easy conflicts, but nothing's perfect.
• True Andorians — Our Andorian analogs, whatever they are, are probably genetically-engineered by some other species, to better interact with humans. Heck, maybe the Hivers?
• There's something that lives in certain gas giants: big, serene, and difficult to interact with. Since we have rather different living requirements and sensibilities, we usually ignore each other.

Commentary

yorrick: Yeah, the idea of genetically modified humans fits so well into what Star Trek actually portrays--lots of humanoids with funny foreheads who are a lot like people with a few mental/physical quirks and somehow eat the same food as we do.

Shadowjack: That's the idea. :)

Ragnarok_Engine: If you lean back towards "stealing blatantly" from Trek rather than "strong inspiration", I'd follow the lead of SFB and include the Trek cartoon in your canon. Another militaristic race for the Klingons to face off/make uneasy alliances with, a race of weird methane-breathers coming out from under the thumb of colonialism and mistrusting outsiders, more blatantly non-human looking Federation crew members... What's not to like?

[Shadowjack: Indeed!]

Hell, I was always extremely amused by the lethal blood feud betwen the Lyrans and the Kzin (Mirak) in SFB. The two races looked very similar to outsiders, but woe betide you if you suggest to a member of either race that they might be related.

[Shadowjack: Which in this setting they would be—the parent species, whichever it is, made their own genetic variants…]

The Federation never had a whole lot of direct contact with either empire, but Klingon diplomatic records indicate that every attempt between the Lyrans and Kzin to come to a face-to-face accord has broken down into hand-to-hand combat. Official Klingon Diplomatic Service protocols state that if ever at an event where both Kzin and Lyrans are present, never stand directly on the sight-line between the two diplomats. :D

yorrick: Idea: The future space empire used Neanderthal DNA as the basis for its super-soldiers or slave laborers or whatever, due to (a) their physical strength and durability and (b) their genetic code just different enough from ours to make biological attacks and gene hacking less effective at first.

But some of those Neanderthal warriors learned that their distant ancestors were exterminated by the ancestors of humanity, and when the Empire collapsed they created their own militaristic society based on the premise that humanity is the Ancient Enemy that committed genocide. Some individual humans may be okay, but as a species you just can't trust them.

Shadowjack: YojimboC posted an informative explication of what is known of actual Neanderthal/Cro-Magnon relations, which unfortunately isn't actually relevant to this page, so I didn't post it. I do think that this idea would make for a reasonable isolate community, somewhere. There are echoes here of things like neo-Pagan groups and the Basque separatist movement. Elsewhere, there would simply be resurrected Neanderthals (or a few genes) mixed in with the other races, and no particular prejudices either way.

Gregor: listing aliens from Diane Duane's trek novels: Naraht (the Horta member of the crew); the Hamalki (crystalline-looking spiders from Wounded Sky that were very badly rendered as the Traveller on the ST:TNG episode "Where No One Has Gone Before"); the Sulamid; the Ornae, Lahit, and the ";At" (who I believe originated in a Zork-like interactive fiction game well before Doctor's Orders was published);etc.

Edit: Ah, it most likely the Kobayashi Alternative that I was thinking of, and just the Ornae

jsnead: The Traveller route works well here - perhaps 200,000 years ago, some ancient species took humans from Earth (which is one of only a handful of worlds with intelligent life) and spread it across the galaxy. Vulcans, Klingons, Orions, Humans, & etc are all siblings, but they have been separated for a long time, long enough to develop their own cultures, which were made more alien to one another by virtue of the fact that the ancients genetically engineered some varieties.

Now, extend this a bit further to more than just humans. What happens if evolved intelligence is quite rare. So, the ancients to this with humans and with another species - a reptilian one (assuming wacky parallel evolution). This species was engineered & evolved into: Gorn, Cardassians (who might also be a human/reptile hybrid), Selay, Saurians (from TMP), Rigelians (the beaked Chelarians from TMP), Hunters (from the Gamma Quadrant, who then engineered both the Jem'Hadar & the Tosk.

Then you have a few oddities like the Founders, the crystaline Tholians and the silicon-based Horta (who might well be part of another silicon-based galactic dispersal, that also included the silicon creatures from Excalbia in The Savage Curtain. I think you could get the number of worlds that initially evolved sentient life down to half a dozen or so and posit an exceptionally powerful and widely traveled species that set out to spread intelligent life across the galaxy around 200,000 years ago.

You have Earth, Reptile World, & Rock Creature world as the most well known worlds.

Shadowjack: See how hard it is to get away from Alien Space Gods? :D However, this is fantastic demonstration of what you can get away with, letting each species do its own genetic engineering…

Meriss: The Trill. What seriuosly, maybe some nutjob wacko corperate headcase decided he didn't like talking to Computers all the time and genemoded a biocomp, then found out that only somone with a very specific body chemisry could use the biocomp. Bioroided the Trill and they and their biocomps are now breeding true.

Shadowjack: I really want to know what kind of ship the Gas Giant Zeppelin Squid flies. Or if they do.

Tom McCambley: These must be the Hoothi and their intergalactic space dirigibles!

LIfe in the Eight-and-Twenty

Commentary: A Galaxy Without Poverty?

Pteryx: Concerning Trekish optimism, there are two key things to keep in mind:

1) Replicator technology is assumed to mean the end of poverty, and 2) Humanity as a whole is assumed to have "grown up".

Mess with #2 too much and you start to lose the optimism, but #1 certainly has wiggle room. Replicators have to be powered by something, leaving energy as the only truly scarce resource left. There are certainly renewable varieties, but those aren't portable across space, while the sorts of energies we usually see featured in Trek are -- yet the scarcity of *ahem* antideuterium and dilithium crystals somehow doesn't result in the remnants of an economy, nor does the continued demand for hand-crafted goods (primarily seen in food in the shows).

Thus, what I find myself seeing is this: The majority of people stick to planets, where solar and wind energy and such aren't going to go away and thus you have endless replicator energy for those willing to settle for replicated things -- which in the end is no real hardship, just a luxury-free middle-class-esque lifestyle rather than what we'd call "poor". Then you have the likes of starships, which must rely on scarcer yet portable resources, and the people willing to deal with such a "less civilized" mode of living in order to bring the worlds things that can never be replicated -- knowledge, peace, friendship.

Shadowjack: This is trending in the right direction, though I've been very hesitant to permit actual "post-scarcity" semi-luxury. "I needed a job" is a very raw and real motivation, but on the other hand I don't think a "friendly" government like the Feds would permit people to starve for lack of money if it was at all feasible. (And I suspect the other governments would follow suit, if for no reason other than practicality—it's cheaper to prevent food riots in the first place than to deal with the aftermath.)

I agree that invoking "unbelievium" fuels just shifts things around rather than eliminating the issues. I'm taking the direction of, for example, Transhuman Space, where high prosperity is possible through advanced but conventional means. However, this is a good start of the theme: Pleasant but dull core worlds, less pleasant but more interesting frontier, and starships with limited but portable resources.

Lord Draqo: Quibble - the key to getting away from scarcity thinking is the idea that with sufficient energy anything is possible, and once you begin working with total conversion of matter (Matter/anti-Matter), you have the energy to accomplish just about anything. However this does not mean the end of an economy, you just have to recognize "money" as a symbol for energy expended to achieve/acquire a resource. People still need to expend energy (work) in order to get stuff. You just don't worry about folding green stuff in your pocket any more.

Shadowjack: That sparks an idea, to tie money directly to energy expenditure; it seems most likely to me for small, closed systems like space habitats, where every activity can be easily metered, but I could see a larger society using it, too, so long as it was well-networked.

Pilgrim:' Not bad. You're going to want to set up your antimatter factories somewhere though. You'd probably want them near a sun (intense energy) and probably above the plane of the ecliptic (in case things go seriously wrong). You might be able to transport antimatter in a series of relays, but I wouldn't want to be within a light second of the relay stations. On the plus side, you have a reason for space travel and convoys. Related, if you're willing to take the risk, and put up with the planetary blight, you could build a ring around the world (stolen from Dread Empire's Fall) that serves as gigantic particle accelerator for mass production of antimatter. Solar powered, conveniently located and hopefully failsafed to a fare thee well.

Shadowjack: Nice.

I understand realistically big rings are unstable, gravitically, but there's no reason we can't build a few Halo-style rings.

Deacon Blues: …Even presuming the ability to punch buttons in a computer and get anything you want, the following resources will still be limited:

(1) Time. …Which needs get prioritized? Is there a "queue" of demands that the ship's computer has to process? Will my request for a gin and tonic get pushed off for a few minutes if engineering is demanding some advanced widgets?

[Shadowjack: Yes. Definitely.]

(2) Creativity. Everyone can make all the clothes they need in a replicator. But how do you tell the replicator what clothes to make? Unless everyone's wearing the same uniform, someone has to come up with new fashion templates. Unless everyone's eating the same swill, someone has to come up with new recipes. Etc.

[Shadowjack: Very, very true. The human element remains important: those who create, or even those who select plans, have important skill.]

(3) Information. …How much of anything do you need? Does the ship need more Somethingium ingots or more ounces of Thatstuffinite? Are people more tired of the same bland outfits or the same bland food? This is the kind of information that prices would (theoretically) solve in a scarce-resource economy: more demanded stuff becomes more expensive until supply increases to catch up. However, even with the unlimited replicator, you might still find yourself with a surplus of one thing and a serious shortage of another - unless someone's tracking what you need.

[Shadowjack: The classic problem of a communist economy, but one that the right combination of computers and compromises might make a reasonable approximation of a solution. (Theme of this setting: there are always gaps.)]

(4) Power Source. I know next to nothing about Star Trek, but I presume that the replicator cannot generate whatever powers it. Otherwise, you have a perpetual motion machine, and as goofy as Trek is I don't think they went that far. So the power source for the replicator is now the most precious resource in the galaxy. That ship of yours has phasers, right?

[Shadowjack: A vicious, but appropriate, thought to end upon. War's not going away, but it's fortunately less common and less dangerous. Fortunately, my replicators can't do this. They can, of course, manufacture gasoline or whatever from the necessary hydrocarbons, and there is antimatter manufacturing for high-yield applications. But most energy itself comes from renewables and fusion.]

A Letter From Prague: Yeah. Just because the Federation is a post-monetary economy doesn't mean it's a post-economics economy...

Shadowjack: That triggers an interesting thought… While technically there's some medium of exchange, it's true that the individuals in some of these societies may not even know about it!

I'm tempted to call them "Work Units" and make all the Prisoner fans twitch. "Non-alcoholic vodka, 21 work units!"

Pilgrim: This might be getting away from the core concept, but have you considered agalmics? Its the guts of Manfred Macx's business in Accelerando and the basic idea is that Manfred is a super creative and synthetist. His fee for his work are the products and services of those he helps, resulting in all but unlimited air travel, some fiendish computer hardware, etc., etc.

Shadowjack: I'll have to look that up; Accelerando has been on the round-to-it list for a while.

Shadowjack: In the Federated Worlds, lots of dilettante artists and perpetual college students, working just enough to buy whatever new clothing or artwork or vacation they want, and then slacking off again. Not exactly the purposeful utopia of many people's dreams, but on the other hand, it's far better than starving. "There are always those who want to go down to Wall Street"—those people are the movers and shakers of society.

Shadowjack: I'm not sure I want a post-scarcity economy. :D Just a "high-industrial" one, i.e. there's more stuff than now, but I'm not sure I want the different society.

Part of the reason for this is: Trek often functions best as analogy for and social commentary upon our own times. That's why the crews in the series tend to be like "a bunch of Americans in space", because most of the audience is a bunch of Americans. Myself included. :D

I filed my taxes recently, and I'm wondering if I will actually get my refund from the state, because California is in financial crisis. That's a plot thread right there, I mean, that's powerful stuff, which people can relate to! But we can't do it in Trek-as-presented, because they don't ever worry about money.

Unless we go to another planet, and go all White Man's Burden on them. "You primitives still use money? Here, let us help you. We can solve this together." "Whattaya mean 'we', Earth Man? FEDDIE GO HOME!" *burns Federation flag*

So I kind of want to dial things back, and avoid actual post-scarcity. There's still business and working for a living in the Federation, it's just easier and more comfortable than now, is all.

Lifestyle and Fashion

Hats

A great many people approved of the assertion that hats are a necessity, some with highly amusing comments:

simontmn: I agree… Hats are what separates us from barbarism. This is why we've been barbaric since around 1958.

Gon: "When he lost his hat right after beaming down security ensign Smith knew it would be one of those away missions. If only he had stayed in bed this morning..."

Doctor,Wildstorm: Remember, any mission where you lose your hat is a bad mission!

Shadowjack: If I did this for outright comedy, you just know the Klingon warrior-types would get die Jäger akzent from Girl Genius. "Oh, ja, remember dot schmott guy from der Shtarfleet! Hoo-boy, vas he funny! All dot peace bizness. Ha, der High Council made him dance for veeks—I neffer laffed zo hard!" Since I'm going a little more serious than that, sadly no, but it's oh so tempting.

AimesJainchill: In addition to pockets and hats, we can't forget BOOTS. We must have BOOTS for the outdoors! With tread, and grommets! And kicking people!

Personal Relations

Doctor, Wildstorm: Just because a species isn't too human doesn't mean humans won't at least try to have sex with it.

Shadowjack: But the neo-dolphins will have beaten them to it, and can give advice on the best positions. "All you have to do is hold your breath for twenty minutes… oh, right. Human. Well, improvise.)

Myth: Also, I'm willing to enroll just for that Andorian soccer player. If we get paid, or get to wear hats, that's cool, too.

Shadowjack: I don't swing that way myself, so I'm glad to know the picture works. :) I did remember to use layers with the lovely lady, so she is available in several color-schemes… ;)

Law and Politics

Commentary

Wolfwood2: If it's an FBI game, let's talk about crime.

It's already difficult enough to hide in modern society. Anywhere not on the fringes, and everything you do gets logged somewhere. The FBI tracks crimes across interstate boundaries; presumably the sci-fi FBI tracks them across interstellar boundaries. But how do we give it that Star Trek twist? What can be done with a crime story that justifies all this setting work?

1) 'Is it a crime' crimes. The PCs are presented with a legal system sufficiently from the one they're bringing in that they aren't happy with it, and jurisdictional issues are unclear. Do they try to subvert local laws, live with them, or figure out a clever end run within the system?

2) 'Fled to Brazil' crimes. The criminal they're after has taken refuge with a local ruler and the PCs have to show why he should be extradited.

3) 'What just happened' crimes. The crime involves an alien type (as opposed to a modded human) and difficulties in communication are such that the PCs are having trouble understanding what the testimony means.

Any of that strike any inspiration? I'm trying to get at what makes an FBI game in Federal Space different from running just an FBI game.

Shadowjack: These are exactly the sorts of details I need to work out.

One of Matt Howarth's Keif Llama stories has a good setup: Keif herself, a "xeno-tech" (inter-alien relations facilitator), had the unpleasant job of escorting a bunch of alien kids on a field trip. Human kids, it would've been way below her pay grade, but alien kids, she gets stuck with it. The field trip is attacked by an assassin; she holds it off until it makes a mistake and is destroyed. After the debriefing, she's informed that she is "innocent of all charges"—what were the charges, she asks, puzzled? Turns out that one of the kids was nobility, and it's tradition on its world to assassinate the heir to the throne, so that the planet can remain a democracy. If she'd interfered intentionally, she'd have been guilty of a crime…

In another story, she's called in to find out whether a crime was committed by a human against an alien. The alien lacks the cultural and language context to explain what happened. The human seems nice, and insists he doesn't understand. It's not until she obtains video of the crime that it all comes together. (Child rape, as it turns out.)

The exact relationship of the Federation to its worlds is important.

Perhaps varying levels of interaction: Full membership, where you agree to abide by all Federal laws and grant all citizens particular rights. Partial membership, where you benefit from Federal defense, but aren't full participants. Trade partners only, where there's just an embassy. Contacts, who are left alone unless they request assistance. Various restricted zones.

Which crimes the Feds can investigate—what's considered a crime?

With as wide-ranging as the Federated Worlds might be, I could imagine that a team of troubleshooters essentially has to include diplomatic staff and legal staff. Is the local law at odds with Federal law? Or is it legal, and we now have to work around it? Are we caught by the language barrier? Perhaps they have limited diplomatic immunity, but have to obey certain restrictions to keep it. Perhaps they get granted temporary rank within that planet's rank structure—congratulations, Detective, today you're a General. Hmmm.

One idea I had for developed worlds, borrowed from Transhuman Space, was extremely rapid processing of certain paperwork. You could get a routine search warrant on minutes' notice, and public video databases are likely extensive. It could be a setting where there's more information than can easily be searched or scanned—the trick is knowing what to find. And, come to think of it, is video admissable evidence or not, given how easily it could be faked? (Perhaps it's permissable to start an investigation, but not sufficient to get a conviction.)

The courts are important, too. It might be fun to play with inquisitorial courts, rather than adversarial courts… a Judge who gets interested might request information from all angles of a case, bringing to light things that many people might wish hidden.

Hmmm. Federal-level crimes: brainstorming. Stuff like piracy, of course, though I suppose the Fleet handles that. Interstellar smuggling, kidnapping, terrorism. Corporate crime. Espionage. Government-scale crimes, like genocide or civil rights violations. Trafficking in restricted technologies, whatever those may be—WMD are the most obvious. Ordinary crimes committed on government property? Incidents involving diplomatic personnel? Any foreign incident involving Federal citizens? Crimes involving citizens of more than one world?

E.T.Smith: "Planet-crashing" comes to mind, outsiders sabotaging a world's infrastructure to artificially create a market for goods or eliminate competition. Sort of the reverse version of banned tech. "If the damn Feds wont let us sell fusion-powered toasters to the natives, we'll just have to bring 'em down to where they'll be desperate for a pack of matches. Should only take a couple rocks lobbed in from orbit, and we'll be able to unload two or three shipments before anyone back in the core notices." Sadly, I can easily imagine unscrupulous traders callously inflicting wide devastation just to turn a quick buck. Such tactics might be the hidden cause behind all the sudden plagues the Enterprise-type ships keep having to run shipments of vaccines to.

Shadowjack: You are an EVIL BASTARD. I LOVE YOU.

Suddenly, I've got villains for a great cops game.

Especially if they're smart and sneaky nasties—how do you tell if the planet is falling apart naturally, or because of outsider action? Time for some undercover action… wow.

Fringe Worthy: Actually: They don't have to collapse the planet. All they have to make sure they are first there, or prevent other people from finding out early enough.

So they are villains.. not by their actions, but by their timing.

Hey, you can even have the Socialist Menace! A bunch of anti-capitalists who do their best to find failing planets and delivering aid, and/or helping them help themselves before those bastards can do it themselves and charge for it. :)

Shadowjack: Marvellous! Applause!

s/LaSH: Speaking of anti-piracy measures, which governments are most likely to sponsor privateers, and how do their rivals react to this? I imagine that tremendous amounts of drama can be generated with a few 'neutral zone' areas and competing imperial interests...

Susanoo Orbatos: My thoughts ar the Imperials and League seem to have the individualic mindset to do so vs Federals or Repulicers who'd have similar groups but they are actively deniable agents of the government.

You'd also probably have many little "third world" types areas of a few worlds strung together that don't have the power or reach of the major guys but taking them out would be problematic those I'd think would be a hot spot of pirates.

Punkey: First, for your main Federation police agency, I think that it would make more sense for them to be structured more like the Naval Criminal Investigative Service or NCIS than the FBI. NCIS, despite being the primary investigative agency for the US Navy, is mainly staffed by civilians rather than military personnel, with people being hired from other federal agencies, military criminal investigative services and state and local police. They do more than just investigate murders and other felonies on naval bases, they're involved in anti-terrorism (NCIS were the first responders to the USS Cole attack) and counter-intelligence operations (many foreign agents have been caught as a result of NCIS operations). The FBI is a purely civilian law enforcement agency with no direct jurisdiction over military-related cases, and seeing how much of the setting involves militaries of one kind or another, it would make sense for the primary Federation-level law enforcement agency to have jurisdictional control over the Federation military. It gets players in on more Top Secret kind of incidents, plus, given how wide-ranging military operations and bases can be, it gives players and GMs more options when it comes to interesting interactions and confrontations with other nations.

On the flip side, I think that a more "gray hat problem solver" setting would work just as well as the Federation Cops. Think of them as a mix between your Splinter Cell-esque spy and heist group and a police investigative unit. They could work for any number of groups, a nebulous Federation-level diplomatic agency like their State Department or UN, an intelligence agency like the CIA or NSA, or some shadowy governmental conspiracy. At any rate, they work for a group that doesn't technically have jurisdiction over criminal investigations, but they're their organization's investigative group, looking into crimes, espionage or other threats to whatever group they work for. They're more willing to break the law (seeing as they're probably already doing so just doing their jobs), and quite possibly run into our NCIS-esque team on occasion. They're sent in when legitimate police would be unable to investigate, don't have the right tools or too many scruples to do the job, or when something needs solving and it kept hush-hush.

Shadowjack: Since this is an optimistically realistic setting, when black ops units appear, they get discovered after a while and shut down by the good guys. :D

I love the NCIS idea, though. Extending it into the Trek realm, you've basically got a group of after-the-fact investigators who double-check the actions of Starfleet explorers. The guys who have to clean up the mess when the planetary computer was phasered, who have to confirm whether or not it really was necessary to upend the entire caste system, who have to resolve the issues of a botched first contact. The mood of the Temporal Investigators from DS9 fits: "Kirk?! The man was a menace."

Religion

shadowjack: Religion's another one of the tricky elements that I'm examining. Roddenberry posed a future in which human religion barely exists, which seems really unlikely to me. And I'm an atheist.

mindstalk: Well, it's hard to say, since Trek-like is in a novel socioeconomic space. Closest Earth model to it is Europe... where religion is doing better than "barely exists", but does seem to be on the wane, and for purposes of public or political life often does barely exist. Individuals might think the First Cause loves them or hope for an afterlife, but they don't talk about it much or have it sway their politics. From different traditions, Japan seems similar (of course, they believe other wacky stuff, like blood type psychology), and while Korean Christians are a stereotype, the CIA has S. Korea has 25% Christian, 25% Buddhist, and 50% non-religious, though there's a shamanistic undercurrent not measured there.

Trek, and your Federation, are like super-Europe, Europe on steroids boosting drugs carefully tested for safety and efficacy, with more material security from want or fear, more displayed control over life, more advanced science. So saying "some people believe, but they're quiet, and a few people *really* believe but they're few, so to first order you can ignore it all" doesn't seem ridiculous. Perhaps people are more usefully described not by whether they believe in a god but whether they subscribe to "human rights" or to utilitarianism, whether their goals are to enjoy lots of pleasure or to leave an impact on the world.

Shadowjack: Good points.

Elsewhere

Commentary

Wolfwood2: Where is the frontier and what rumors are there about what's lurking out there?

Shadowjack: I haven't a clue, since I've been thinking along the lines of an "FBI agents" game. The Borg are out there, somewhere. Probably more lost colonies, more aliens. Maybe planet-killers and huge space constructs. Maybe vast sweeps of uninhabited rockballs.

One thing with dispersed space is that there aren't really hard-and-fast borders—there are unexplored worlds within Federal space, that no one's gotten around to checking out. Heck, parts of Federal and Alliance space may overlap.