17th Parallel Bar Being Built

[Aileron]

Alright, the plan is to have a 17th Parallel Bar topic up next week. Here is the rules and settings, copied from one of the previous bars:

 

Thread posting Rules:

1. No post containing the actions of any other member

2. No destroying the bar

3. No character superpowers (I'll decide what is and is not a superpower)

4. If the previous post has broken any of the rules, ignore its entire contents.

 

Back history:

Since the development of the ZTT drive in 2675, mankind has spread through a small portion of the galaxy, colonising almost 400 star systems. As is usual in human history, conflicts between nations over resources and ideologies escalates into war and then dies down, waiting for the next conflict. The Station Reaches, located in the Tau Ceti system are a leftover from one such conflict. Designed as forward detection posts to locate incoming warfleets and warn the defending forces of their arrival (ZTT drives cannot function near a gravity well), they were scrapped when the Cetan economy could no longer support them and it became apparent that they were never going to be used. Today, the reaches fill a variety of functions, the ones nearer the two inhabited worlds mostly have been converted into microgee manufacturing centres, producing high-tech consumables at a much higher standard than the few remaining robotic factories on the surface. Those further from the planetary markets, such as the curiously named "17th Parallel" station, serve primarily as refuelling and resupply bases for the extensive asteroid mining operations in the system, with several of the larger stations also acting as ore refineries. There are still several stations which were abandonded that are inactive to this day, many of these have already been stripped of any materials of any worth but prospectors can still find a few items which may have some small value if sold on.

 

The current political climate among the human worlds is one of rising tension, the three largest nations; The Terran League, The Ithkul Imperium and The kingdom of Exis vie constantly for supremacy doing everything short of declaring open war in order to gain an advantage over the other two. Industrial espionage and sponsored piracy are the norm in the frontier systems and it is a hard trader indeed that manages to survive in these regions without serious firepower.

 

Nations of Humanity:

 

The Terran League - Centred on Earth, the League is the oldest Nation in existance and is also the wealthiest. The secure core world trade routes provide massive benefits to a largely decadent and arrogant culture. The massive manufacturing capacity and research facilities of the Sol system alone are greater than that of any 6 other systems, and it is primarily here where the Leagues advantage lies. The League has several nominally independant systems under its direct control and its political influence among the outer rim colonies is staggering. Earth, being of course the Human homeworld, demands, and largly recieves, a great deal of respect from much of the human population.

 

The Ithkul Imperium - The most overtly agressive of the great nations, Ithkul power is largely based on its massive space navy, and the fear this generates in the independant worlds bordering its space. The Imperium is, despite rumours to the contrary, a very humane dictatorship, with a perplexingly high standard of living for a nation that devotes such little effort in its economic activity. Several recent advances in asteroid mining techniques and space-surface tranist technology have gained the Ithkul a distinct advantage in colonising new systems.

 

The Kingdom of Exis - Religiously devout Exis is basically a massive police state. While its cons!@#$%^&*ution guarantees its citizens varied and plentiful freedoms, citizens exercising those freedoms have an alarming tendency to disappear or suffer fatal accidents. Exis is the largest of the great nations, directly controlling more than 50 star systems, but it is also the most insular. Almost no trade goes through any Exis controlled space, only a few exotic luxuries and high-tech devices which support the lifestyle of the Aristocracy. That being said, the prices the aristocrats are willing to pay for such goods is enormous and the profits very handsome, if you're willing to ignore the means by which they were obtained.

 

The Kanatis Alliance - A small group of 6 systems located at the frontier between Ithkul and League space, the Kanatis Alliance has had to be extremely resourceful in order to prevent being absorbed by either of the two great nations. With the highest general level of technology and education in human space, the Alliance is ruled not by a central government, but by all its citizens, who determine policy via neural implants, with appointed subsections of the population electing to specialise in the administration of certain enterprises. such as transportation or defence. Apart from the citizenry of the Alliance, the other strata of the Alliance population are the Soldiers. Soldiers of the Alliance are not considered human by the rest of the galaxy (and rightly so, their genetic structure is more than 20% artificial), grown in exowombs and maturing in only 5 years, the Alliance soldier is genetically and cybernetically enhanced for combat. It is these soldiers that provide both its main source of defence (although citizens acting in the capacity of soldiers are not uncommon) and its main source of income (mostly through mercenary work for one of the great nations). Soldiers consider themselves completely expendable next to that of non-soldier citizens and are willing to go to great lengths to ensure their safety.

 

The Independant Worlds - These worlds are many and varied, more on these as they come up.

 

There will be three changes in how the new one will be run:

 

 

 

First off, I will have plot related NPCs come in and out of the forum...I will create a dummy account...probably 17thRPGforumNPC...to define what they do, just so as to make things a little more interesting.

 

 

 

Secondly, you will be allowed to include the actions of another in your post PROVIDED your post is describing ship to ship combat and you do it in the following way: You and the person(s) you are combating have to meet in Subspace and replicate the encounter.

 

For example, suppose you and another person in the RPG are both flying in deep space, end up running into each other and fighting ship to ship. An option you can have is for the two of you to get together in some subarena in the zone, and slug the encounter out. If instead you were both on opposite sides of a large scale fighter battle, recreate the encounter in pub. If the encounter is two on one, the three of you get together and have a 2 on 1 duel.

 

After the encounter, the person posting may post a description of the replicated duel that occurred in the zone, including the other pilot's actions.

 

Now ofcourse you don't HAVE to do this, you can role-play ship-to-ship combat if you choose to...I'm just giving you another option. However, if you DO choose this option, it is required that you have the permission of all parties concerned before the encounter.

 

To this end I highly recommend that you NOT use customized fighters, but that is still your choice.

 

 

 

Finally, everybody will have something called RP points. These aren't stats, and affect nothing in any way. They are a lot like the points on Who's Line is it Anyway...they do nothing and mean nothing, or do they? You may decide for yourself if you wish to keep track of them or if you don't...but if you do I will keep track of faulty accounting practices.

 

RP points are rewarded to those who perform certain actions. Everybody starts the topic with 0 and gets them added on (or subtracted) every time they make a post with the following properties.

 

+1 - The post is in sentance/paragraph structure.

+1 - The post contains any interaction with another character or plot-related NPC.

+1 - The post contains some dialog.

 

+2 - Your character verbally insults another character or plot NPC.

+2 - Your character does a minor act of heroism.

+2 - Your character does a minor act of villany.

+2 - Your character tells a joke, or just says something funny in dialog.

+2 - Your character steals something that belongs to another character or plot NPC.

+2 - The post contains a humerous situation about the bar being indestructible.

 

+3 - The post contains a humerous situation, not involving the indestructible bar.

+3 - Your post contains any combat encounter.

+3 - Your character runs away from non-plot NPCs that would have a clear combat advantage.

+3 - Any problem your character solves by non-violent means.

+3 - Your character uses stealth rather than combat to get past NPCs. (This does NOT mean you tip toe down the hallway or "hide in the shadows"...a disguise, crawling through the ventillation ducts, or hiding in the back of a supply truck is more what I have in mind here. BTW, "hiding in the shadows" will be considered a superpower in most cases...the setting is the 28th century, guards are going to have flashlights.)

 

+4 - Your character defeats a plot-related NPC.

+4 - Your character advances the plot. (If it hasn't fallen apart yet.)

+4 - Your character gets revenge on another character or plot-NPC.

+4 - Your character gets in a perfect position to get revenge, but changes mind and shows mercy at the last second.

 

+5 - Your character tricks or betrays another character or plot NPC, or you change factions.

+5 - Your character performs a major act of heroism.

+5 - Your character performs a major act of villainy, other than betraying somebody.

+5 - miscellanious smart thinking award (you can't add this yourself, I'll edit and add this one if you do something clever)

 

-2 - I catch some bad accounting.

-5 - You use information from OOC comments or in-game events your character did not witness.

-10 - I have to edit your post.

-10 - The post amounts to a random list of actions designed to engineer a good RP result. (You won't get the bonuses either)

 

+10 - Awarded whenever the thread ends...given to all the good guys and gals, if by this time the character Dr. Blake is defeated, and the galaxy is safe.

-30 - If at the end of the thread the characater Dr. Blake is still alive and free and has succeeded in taking over the galaxy, all those who didn't join up with me will get this penalty.

 

(The reason for the discrepency is that I'm figuring 3:1 odds.)

 

All of these are !@#$%^&*ulative over a post, but each only counts once. If your post contains only two lines of dialog cracking two jokes, you get +1 for dialog and +2 for jokes, for a total of +3.

 

Again, keeping track of them is entirely your choice.

[flamingstarch]

phew!

[Aileron]

Oh....good point. It is a long read. Okay, everything in blue (except the stuff inside the quote) is completely optional and you can ignore it if you like.

[Trip']

Im sorry could u repeat that?

[Aileron]

The only rules you have to follow are in white.