I got a faction.
The Accord
A group of 505 scientists, with 100 people and a leader for each branch (Bio Tech, Software, Engineering, Robotics, and Development)
They commonly use the internet, and have their own personal communications network. They are extremely close allies with the Cyber, have good relations with the Church of Progress, ignore the Vault Kingdoms, and harbor a mutual (well, as mutual as the Inquisitors can hold with something they are only basically aware of) grudge against the Inquisitors to the point of regularly, actually CRUCIFYING them. Daily. They have no problem with sentient AI and are accepting of Wastelanders
All members have a really coushiony life, and tend to be naive about the outside world (including the leaders), and never venture outside, instead using holograms.
The group is one of the most technologically advanced out there, and love white, minimalist curves
They make their home in an underground facility beneath Stockholm, Sweden
They are neutral in the Church vs. State Conflict
edited 23rd Jan '16 11:17:31 PM by ThisGuy481
Full-Conversion Cyborg
Rogue A.I.s should be present.
Flesh is a design flaw.
Lord of Fungi
I'm interested. I already have some ideas after reading the OP.
EDIT: I didn't check the thread dates. Is this still on? If not, sorry for necro.
edited 19th Jan '16 2:14:39 PM by georgiano
“Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty.” ― Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune
Hot-blooded Catholic Space Nazi
Still on, but I'm worldbuilding for the long haul. I'm probably going to go on and off from month to month.
"In the grim darkness of the future, there is only war."
Lord of Fungi
It's cool. I'll keep posting ideas as they come to my mind.
Here's one:
The Anima Ascendancy
An organization descending from powerful old world Biotech firms. The Anima are a group consisting of a few hundred scientists ruled by a "High Ascendant". Whereas the Church of Progress deifies technology, the Anima still sees it as a tool to be exploited, be it for creation or for destruction.
The Anima make their base in the partially rebuilt ruins of an old world metropoli. The Anima are also known and renowned by their access to limited but fully functional cloning facilities, and their "resurrection" techniques; where nanotechnology and cybernetics are used to turn corpses into labor drones.
The Anima have a decent military consisting of both clone soldiers and re-animated corpses used as cannon fodder or shock troopers.
They tolerate the Church of Progress, but they don't always see eye to eye. They aren't in any active conflict with the Vault Kingdoms, but occasional skirmishes over ancient relics tend to happen from time to time, leaving them at odds with each other. They are mostly indifferent about the Sons and Daughters of Terra and only have a level of wariness when dealing with them, as the mutants the Sons employ tend to carry harmful diseases. They really hate the Inquisition and believe them to be the "worst crime against humanity that has happened since the Dark Ages began". The Ascendancy relentlessly hunts Inquisition agents within its territory. The Ascendancy is quite open-minded with Automatons and Cybers, but only the former seem to reciprocate, while the latter have tried to keep the Ascendancy out of the Dark Realms... with varying amounts of success.
The Anima normally exchange the protection their soldiers can bring to the villages of the wasteland in exchange for resources: be it food, raw materials, or even corpses for their experiments.
They consider themselves a sovereign state, so that would put them on the "State" side of the State vs. Church conflict.
EDIT: This should be taken as WIP. I'm probably going to keep adding information over time.
edited 20th Jan '16 12:30:31 PM by georgiano
“Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty.” ― Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune
The Unlurking Sentinel
I really like this idea. The Cybers sound really cool. How can the internet be incorporated into their abilities? All that I can think of is the immense knowledge that the internet would provide (in between the lolcats and porn) could lend to a non-combat oriented character, having advantages wherever lore checks and technology and stuff would be involved. But if that's the case, than what are Techpriests for?
And also, YOU CAN PLAY AS A DEMON?!
Fun Fact: I came up with the "Unlurking Sentinel" name because I was intending to stop being a Lurker. I don't think it worked.
Opinion on the faction I came up with? (Check again, I updated them to make them more three-dimensional and less of Sues)
edited 21st Jan '16 9:33:28 PM by ThisGuy481
The Unlurking Sentinel
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
It's pretty nice. Their sheltered nature would prevent you from playing as one, but they would be amazing as NP Cs. Perhaps there could be an encounter that would allow us to enter their base at some point? That would be cool. ![[tup]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Thumbs_up_emoticon_3268.png "[thumb up]"){kind=small}
Yeah, I was actually planning on playing as all 5 of their leaders (Though the one I would actually really do anything with at the moment would be Heidrun Ahlstrom)
The Unlurking Sentinel
Okay then. This is the point at which I admit to being closeminded. I'm very inexperienced concerning Forum Roleplay, and I didn't consider that it's possible for a character or characters to play a meaningful, interesting, and enjoyable role in the story without necessarily having any possible experience in the actual world, and very little skill in dealing in it physically. As I write this, it becomes more obvious how obvious that should have been to me.
I found some songs that fit the factions, and my faction-hopeful pretty well
The Accord - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcoqR9Bwx1Y
Inquisition - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBG3Lu2flG0
Wastelanders - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcgJnbCul-0
Church of Technology - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77MzPshseR0
The Cyber - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dw4WAhyi1uY
Also, I'm upping the number of people in the Accord
edited 23rd Jan '16 11:17:20 PM by ThisGuy481
The Unlurking Sentinel
Aww man, is this dead too?
Fun Fact: I came up with the "Unlurking Sentinel" name because I was intending to stop being a Lurker. I don't think it worked.
Hot-blooded Catholic Space Nazi
Well, it kind of is dead, but it might come back to life if I'm interested again. There are a lot of things that require my attention, there are books I would love to read, stories I would like to write, and lots of other stuff that I want to explore.
Don't lock this up, this one will get back.
Note: I'm back, now I'm going to continue world-building this place. After editing the first factions, I'll be sure to add your other factions too.
edited 26th Feb '16 10:19:37 PM by Victor_Skye
"In the grim darkness of the future, there is only war."
World-building/Interest Check Thread
Exposition
Long ago in the Age of Progress, mankind, an unholy synthesis of the rising ape and the fallen angel, was stirred by the magnificence of the world around him. How noble in color was the blue sky, how massive was the endless ocean, and how beautiful was the vast landscape. A burning ambition seized humanity that he was compelled to tame the lands, the seas, and the skies. Thus was born ancient civilization, fostered from man's campaign to dominate his environment.
Unlike most of the creatures that dwelt in the land. Mankind was bested in almost every way in terms of sheer physical ability. The lion was the king of the beasts that could turn courageous men into a happy meal. The fish could swim all over the ocean. The eagle could soar above the heavens. The only unique trait that man possessed was his intelligence.
Despite the odds of the wilderness, mankind with his intellect overthrew the savagery of nature through the Dark Arts of Technology. With this, man did conquer the lands, the seas, and the skies.
However, that same technology that once enriched ancient civilization has turned against them one day in the form of the Great Plagues of Technology.
Some say that man gave the living machines a "spirit" in which they could experience the same emotions humans have, as a result they gained free will and rebelled against their masters. Some say a gigantic war was waged and the whole Earth was subjected to the wrath of technology. Some say that nature was oppressed for far too long by men, so she rose and destroyed civilization with her massive tidal waves, catastrophic earthquakes, and punishing climates.
But some say, that it was a mix of all of the aforementioned disasters. There are legends of other plagues with significance, but they have not survived into mainstream literature as of yet. All forms of media are regulated by the technophobic Inquisition, whose duty is to protect mankind from the unknown dangers of technology.
If the past did hide a great tragedy then the present is filled with a horrifying travesty that contains a picture of savage monsters ravaging the land, bandits and warlocks alike pillaging the poorly defended villages, and an endless series of conflicts sparked from territorial disputes from warring Vault Lords.
Men are commonly found to be ignorant of their glorious legacy and they spend all their lives fighting starvation, disease, wars, and their cruel Vault Kings who impose upon the populace impossible taxes. It is rare to find those who could read or write, and those that could practice the splendid arts of calligraphy and literature were considered prophets in their communities. For these exotic talents of intellect is believed to be a magical power that they have heard of but never seen before.
The people now live in an era of suffering which they never deserved themselves, but this was the consequence of the foolish acts of their ancestors. Inside each man, woman, and child is a faint voice that screams of the afflictions that burdens them daily. No one is spared from these penalties, even Kings must face the challenges of ruling a state or fall prey to predators of his own court.
Men live in underground cities called Vaults and have complex tunnel networks to reach other vaults. This is necessary because most people are not equipped with biochemical suits needed to counteract the planet's poisonous atmosphere. They travel underground through the use of construction vehicles called Terraformers that drill holes through the ground and are able to set up facilities provided that there are enough construction materials available.
A secret war is waged by the Inquisition that is dedicated to destroying the remnants of technology and the Church of Progress that seeks to spread these vile contraptions among the populace all while seducing them with power.
In the open, peasants are conscripted into their Lord's army to fight in wars that caused by petty squabbles and land grabbing among the nobles. The people are ready to rise in open rebellion, and with many of them armed with technological artifacts from the past they have the potential to overthrow their feudal lord through force.
Outside of the Vault Kingdom lies an even greater threat. A band of mutant warlords have united under one banner to merge into a new political association, the Lords of the Wastelands, and they seem keen on invading the Vault Kingdom and taking back some of their lands from the untainted humans.
After a thousand years of slumber, the Dark Realm of Cyberspace has been awakened by an expedition lead by Techpriest Edwin Cage when they were investigating a lost underground city that was told to contain a great evil force that was so powerful that it preoccupied most of our ancestor's attention. In the olden times it was called the internet, but after it became artificially intelligent it was now known as the Dark Age of Cyberspace. When revived, the malevolent entity activated all machines that had Wi-Fi and slaughtered the entire group of archaeologists.
The Automatons are a race of sentient machines that live in floating battleships far from the reach of humans and mutants from the ground. They still face threats from the sky which come in the form of storms of acid rain and flying monsters such as dragons. Their entire race is dying out since they have lost the factories needed to replenish their numbers whenever one of their battleships are overwhelmed by the dangers of the planet.
These and many other factions are vying for supremacy of the planet, but are merely trying to see another day in their miserable lives. Men live below shit and have only recently remembered their glorious legacy. Mutants have undergone a genetic mutation so profound that they can adapt to the toxic environment of the planet. The internet wants to take over men's lives as it did in the past. The Automatons must find ways to reproduce or they are fucked.
It is known that nothing is more dangerous than a cornered animal, for the creature knows that it will die if it does not kill. In this planet, everybody is a cornered animal, and the only solution to the problems they see is the elimination of their enemies. They only see blood and that is what they will get.
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." -Arthur C. Clarke
Welcome to the Dark Age of Technology where you'll play as a tech-user in a world where seven technological disasters have nearly caused the extinction of mankind. People's understanding of technology has become limited because they've lost the knowledge that deals with that subject. Technology is so powerful and mysterious to the people in this world that they consider it as a sort of inexplicable magic.
You can be a Techpriest that spreads the worship of technology or an Inquisitor that destroys technology. A cyborg that guards the supercomputer that houses the remnants of the internet (Recently called the Dark Realm of Cyberspace, BECAUSE IT'S COOL). A biologically augmented Paladin who fights for the post-apocalyptic Vault Lords. A warlock that terrorizes the populace because he's simply more powerful than others.
Yes, you can choose one of the above.
Characters
Warning: Loads and Loads of Characters
Don't worry, I don't expect you to read it all. I just want to establish a bit of background information for each characters so I'll have an idea on how this roleplay would work out.
-An elite group of soldiers that are appointed to keep the peace in the Kingdom.
There are two divisions of the Inquisition according to their philosophy. The extremists believe that technology is so dangerous that it should not be developed at all, trapping humanity in Medieval Stasis. The moderates believe that technology is dangerous, but it must be released to the public bit by bit until they get used to it.
Recently, there has a split in the Church of Progress due to differing opinions on how power should be distributed among the clergy and the followers. The Mercerists lead by the prophet Mercer believe in establishing a system that concentrates all the religious power in the hands of one man, thereby making a monarch in the Church. While a collection of different denominations called the Progressives that hold diverse beliefs about the origins and usage of technology.
"That view of programming inherently flawed, for programming is an act of creation - and creation is always a thing of great importance. (...) Programming is the translation of thought into digital form, where it creates a new reality. Programming is the creation of new universes, each with its own rules, each with its own wonders. (...) Programming is digital thought, thought given new form, given a new form of independence. What is more spiritual than the creation of new universes by thought? What is programming other than a new form of creation, or imagination or spirituality? (...) A writer simply creates a copy of something that exists within his soul - yet the programmer creates something that exists on its own, that may change and evolve on its own. Never before has Man come as close to God; for, as God does, Man creates worlds from pure thought, worlds that have a life of their own."
-Excerpt From 'The Spirituality of Programming' By Jerry Payne, game: Infinite Ocean http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/555087
Factions:
-A feudal society that is based on the medieval ages. Their fortified castles are the ancient underground vaults constructed by men before the Great Plagues of Technology. The Vault King controls the largest and most prosperous of the 13 vaults while the other 12 are controlled by the Vault Lords with their respective houses. Many leaders inherit their position instead of earning it on their own, this worked out fine on most occasions they did not burden the people too much. However, sometimes a weak or foolish leader would take command and disaster would follow in the Kingdom, and there are many exceptional examples of such hateful leaders.
-Thankfully, the recent king has proved to be a competent leader that is able to marshal his forces in times of war and keep the Kingdom prosperous in times of peace. In spite of this, there is a political conflict between the Vault Lord and the Vault King on the issue of the spread of technology. Many are convinced that technology is a danger to society while others revere technology as a gift from their ancestors. Needless to say this has been a source of trouble among the populace and there have been numerous counts of battles between the pro-tech and anti-tech members of the Kingdom.
Note: The 13 vaults would stand for the 13 colonies that declared independence against the British Empire. The 12 vaults controlled by the Vault Lords would signify the 12 tribes of Israel.
- They ban technology altogether for being dangerous, this is the faction for the Inquisitors.
-An ancient cult that was created before the Great Plagues of Technology that regularly protested against the possible dangers of technology. Of course, they turned out to be right
-They are on the state side of the Vault Kingdom in the Church vs State conflict.
- Worships technology, the faction of the Techpriests.
-Scientific community goes bonkers and turns into a church that worships technology.
-They are on the church side in the Church vs State conflict.
The guardians of the Dark Realm of Cyberspace (Also known as the internet)
A society of environmentalists that seek to repair the damage done by their ancestors. They regularly interact with the mutants and are on good terms with them. However, their connection with the mutants causes them to be ostracized by the Vault Kingdom, who treat such actions with disdain.
A collective terms for the many mutants that dwell within the Wasteland. The mutated humans and animals are horrifyingly disfigured to the point that the average person would not dare grant such an ugly specimen an audience. They are known to be Demons to the rest, for they carry with them a host of diseases that could wipe out an entire community if it were to spread among the people.
-A race of free robots that have gotten used to the idea of liberty. Long ago their factories broke down and their numbers have been dwindling ever since. They still find it hard to believe that humans created them and tend to dismiss this as a myth, stating that they were created by the machine spirits.
Geography
12 Territories that are controlled by the Vault Lords.
(As in the 12 tribes of Israel. They will be under the Royal Houses of the Vaults.)
1 Territory that is controlled by the Vault King.
Which would make 13 territories.
(As in the first 13 colonies which made America.)
A place filled with so much toxins that people that venture there are turned into monsters. Needless to say with the superstitious attitude of the people, they think that this place is a hell of some sort. Actually, they aren't that far off. This is the hell of their times.
Religions
[[folder:Pantheon of Ancient American God-Presidents]]
The badass presidents are the ones primarily worshiped.
[[folder:Heroes of Progress]]
[[folder:Spirits of Technology]]
The Sun God that generates electricity for solar powered objects. Will be named after bright flowers
Hey guys, this is my first attempted RP so I'll have some difficulty pumping this up. I'm still exploring the internet in and getting used to communities, so I'll have a limited set of time to watch over this. Maybe in the future I'll have more free time to spend with you guys and I'll be able to polish the setting up.
Yes, I've made two references to Warhammer 40K in the "Dark Age of Technology" and "Age of Progress" but it was a pretty cool title so I couldn't let it go.
If you have ideas for this RP, post in a thing or two. As you can see this is a work in progress so I'll come back to this from time to time when I'm in the mood.
edited 3rd Apr '16 3:59:15 AM by Victor_Skye
"In the grim darkness of the future, there is only war."