|
The year is 2303AD – everything changes, yet all remains the same. Mankind has reached the stars – it is has flourished in the 200 years since Alcobierre’s theories of the late 20th century were converted into a working star drive. However, the human race is still fragmented into nation states, finely balances, but with dominant power today the Third French Empire, wracked by internal intrigue and politics. Powers find themselves forced to co-operate and ally to meet the huge costs and danger of colonising strange new worlds, but remain jealous of the riches and secrets they hold. Greatest amongst these treasures are deposits of tantalum, the metal critical to stardrive components, yet apparently scarce throughout human-accessible space. Exploration of the stars has brought many surprises, but perhaps most significant has been the prevalence of life on other planets. Contact with intelligent life has only recently been made, but friendly relationships with several starfaring races have now been established and humans are rushing to bridge the enormous cultural gulfs. However, five years ago mankind’s fears were realised and a hostile intelligent alien species known as the Kafers were encountered. The Kafer War saw the near destruction of humankind before the combined fleets of the star-faring nations were able to drive them back into their own space. The year 2303 sees a period of consolidation and rebuilding. No-one in the French Arm has remained untouched by the aftermath of the conflict, and these pages detail life on the planet Wunder, a barely habitable glacier planet orbiting the primary Berthier in the French Arm. Wunder was established initially as a German colony on the back of orbital survey results suggesting substantial finds of tantalum. British and French colonies quickly followed with a rush of colonisation like a modern-day gold rush. Unfortunately, the initial survey results were proven inaccurate, and Wunder proved to have no tantalum, only to be relatively rich in other metals. The British and French settlements collapsed, and now Wunder has only a single colony, supported by British and German mining concerns, serving as a hub for various remote mines. |
|