Caliburn Star

Ghost Whistler · March 10, 2010, 06:09:07 AM

I'm not in the mood for oriental space opera today, so here are some other ideas i've written and stored on google docs for another setting. Arthurian/Tolkienesque space fantasy presented, inexplicably, as written:

Dwarven history dates from the time of their liberation from the Elves who once held them as thralls to work the land for them. Their messiah ias the god of stone, Zadakh. Now they exist in their clanships; great vessels of stone threaded with mithril circuitry. These circuits connect them with the vessel's totem, itself an avatar of Zadakh. Through these totems, the lore of their people is kept and the day to day functions of the clanship are administered. It also allows Zadakh to bless any Dwarf coming of age that they may bear their own Mithril circuit tatoos, allowing them (painfully at first) to connect to the clan totem. Thus dwarves combine technology and spirituality as part of their cosmology.

In ancient times the Elves were a cruel race itself dominated by the Shadow. It was during this time, and thus under the spell of evil, that they kept the children of Zadakh as little more than slaves to toil in their mines, building their grand imperial infrastructure. In time some (though not all) would overthrow the stain of darkness and become the Free Elves of today (just as their dark brethren remain). This empire was known as the Thornian Reich as the elves were beguiled by the power of the Shadow.

To free themselves from the Shadow, the elves were assisted by the natives of the primal hyperspace wild we called Otherspace that make up the Parliament of the Wild. Entities as old as time planted within the refugees living seeds to purge the curse of the Thorns instilled by the yoke of the Shadow. Now the elves still bear the fruit of these ancient seeds from birth; great p[owerful living roots grow within and around them. As alien as this is to behold, it is the source of their power and freedom.

In freeing themselves from the dominion of the Shadow, the first of the free elves took flight into Otherspace. Here they took refuge amid the impossibly ancient native entities of this place and grew strange. Some of their kind linger within, haing become too accustomed to ever leave. This is the danger of Otherspace, yet it is the binding phenomena throughout the stars. Without it space travel would collapse.

The mortal kingdoms were unified by the High King, Uther Lionheart, who brought the disparate Starholds of man together under one banner. He remains in power, a thousand years hence, on his throne of immortality. This machine, ancient and pwoerful, was his greatest discovery on an ancient world. Powered by Caliburn ore, the same source as that which fuels the Excalibur drives of the Starholds, the throne sustains him for as long as it can be found. Caliburn is mined across the stars and is the source of the kingdom's expansion.

The Starholds are themselves the product of a great mortal diaspora from a place and a time believed lost in the distant past to the Shadow. Each is a titan in space; a floating citadel and kingdom in miniature - the home to one of the kingdom's great lords. It is their own fief to rule in the name of the king under his law. While Starholds differ, each houses a mechanical leviathan that drives it: the Excalibur drive, and engine dependent on Caliburn ore. Consequently each also holds a potent industrial infrastructure (few Starholds possess much natural beauty) where Caliburn is refined. The law of the kingdom, as codified in the Avalon Covenant, decrees that each liege lord - each ruler of a Starhold - must tithe a portion of his Caliburn to the throne.

The Morrigani are a race dimly related to the Shadow; they thrive on death and misfortune. Their world was taken over by Mordryn's heathen Warling forces and those Ravenlings (aka Morrigani) not sworn to his service are now outcast. Mordryn is the only known heir apparent to the Caliburn throne of Man; he was the greatest of all the king's star knights before the agents of the Shadow turned him against his family and his people. He is now their greatest enemy and is believed, by the kingdom's scholars, to be an avatar of an evil god known as Loki, the father of the great Wolf whose maw howls in the dpeths of Otherspace, waiting to consume unwary travellers.

Benoist · March 10, 2010, 10:37:17 AM

That's interesting.
I came up with a very similar idea for a Sci-Fi game I'd like to run.
Great minds think alike and all that jazz, heh?

Ghost Whistler · March 10, 2010, 11:36:54 AM

Thanks.

As a westerner i can't always get into the oriental mindset, and i really like the idea of western european mythology/tolkein fantasy being physically manhandled into science fantasy. The more brutal the genre blending, the more interesting the results can be. There's also a hint of BSG about it; Starholds are the refugee fleet on an enforced diaspora. In fact i started thinking about how one could make the ridiculous ship sizes in Roge Trader work for an rpg (the idea behind 100,000 crew sized shps wasn't designed with the rpg gamer in mind).

Caliburn Star

Ghost Whistler

Benoist

Ghost Whistler