a.k.a. THE ALLIANCE
Age: Roughly 80 years
Planets:
Core Alpha (11 Billion)
Core Beta (4.5 Billion)
Oceana (1.5 Billion)
Twilight (350 Million)
Other Populations:
Matterhorn Station (6 Million)
Assorted Asteroid Colonies, Space Stations, and Colonial Frontier Settlements
Allies: Corporate Interzone (weakly aligned)
Enemies: Regency (a few open hostilities abroad, more of a cold-war in faction space)
Attitude:
Nothing gets in the way of progress. Open and friendly to outsiders, so long as you are willing to pay your way. Dissidents tend to just disappear. What the Government wants, the government gets.
Citizens:
Generally educated, and often tracked to certain specialties (Labor, Science, Technology, Academics, Administration, etc), citizens tend to be well cared for and happy. Of course, those who seem to express a protracted unhappiness are apprehended for evaluation, and sometimes, re-education.
History:
The political entity known as the Alliance was created in the same era of social turmoil that spawned the Coalition almost 250 years ago. Indeed, for nearly two hundred of those years, the Alliance and the Coalition were a single sovereignty, the Unified Independence Coalition. Originally one of several colonies that included planets, trade space, star ports, stations, and numerous resources, the UIC began a campaign to wrest its independence from the New Terran Empire. Hoping to avert the bloody civil war that could only follow a marked upsurge in various terror attacks on the inner planets of the Empire, the Emperor agreed to grant limited autonomy to the UIC interests under a provisional transition period that lasted a century. After that period of transition, the UIC states would formalize their independence, or return to the arms of the Empire. Independent states would further agree to a non-expansion treaty in which UIC member interests would forego colonial expansion in the unclaimed territories for an additional century.
While nearly a third of the UIC states returned to the Empire within the century long transition, those who remained formalized their independence, organizing themselves as the Coalition of Allied States. However, without a single unifying goal, the Coalition was plagued by factionalism and infighting. The most militant and vociferous of these factions seized the planet Dust, controlled its nearby gateway, and from their seized two more gateways adjacent on the gatemap. These independent groups declared the region under their control a Freespace, devoid of any larger, organized central authority, and they were more than willing to fight to emphasize that point. Without a significant military of its own to challenge these breakaway factions, the Coalition was powerless to stop them.
Those who remained in the Coalition of Allied States set about strengthening their infrastructure and securing their own military might. A growing, educated population noticed that without expansion, resources would become strained – enough so that within two or three generations, said resources could be depleted critically. Almost a century and a half after gaining independence, the Coalition realized why the Empire let them go so easily. Imperial projections must have noticed the increased resource depletion and the increasing costs of development and sustainability. The non-expansion treaty simply offered enough time for the Coalition states to realize their own folly and be damned by it.
Two ideologies formed the newest schism in the Coalition – those who wanted to break the treaty with Empire, and those who steadfastly insisted upon honoring it. In short order, a compromise was reached – Exploration, without Colonization. However, as initial reports of exploratory expeditions into the unclaimed territories seemed more and more promising, the debates began anew. But everything changed when quite suddenly the Emperor declared that at the decade’s end, he was placing himself into a period of protracted seclusion and setting up a Regency government to rule in his absence.
Backed by potent corporate interests, the pro-expansionists were elected into majority control of the Coalition government. Their first action was to use new terraforming technologies on an old, failed colony world. Since this planet was not technically in the unclaimed territories, the government claimed boldly that they were not in violation of any prearranged accords. The re-terraforming of Twilight, abandoned after being considered too inhospitable for civilized life, was a striking success. And this was just the beginning. When colony ships were outfitted, crewed, and set to be launched into the heart of the Frontier, the government’s minority factions were in an uproar. Likely spurred on Imperial agitators, armed insurgencies peppered the worlds of the Coalition.
Only too willing to learn from the lessons of the past, the Coalition government split into two distinct political entities; the ruling government declared itself the Alliance of Colonial Nations, and the minority faction was given the name Coalition of Autonomous States. The new Alliance government retained control of four planets – the seat of Government at Core Alpha, its sister planet, Core Beta, newly re-terraformed Twilight, and the water-rich Oceana. The Coalition government was granted the sister planets of the Rakhan system, along with the asteroid colony of Harlinn’s World.
That was all barely 80 years ago. Since then, the Alliance has relentless sought to improve itself. Militarily, academically, and culturally, the Alliance has made a game of competing with the Imperial Regency, and uses its knowledge of the past to build a stronger, better future. With by far the most prolific presence in Frontier space, the Alliance shuttles resources back and forth, entrenching itself into the minds of new and emerging colonies through relief and diplomacy. Impressively, the Alliance has proven itself an innovator of new technologies, modernizing Core Alpha into what it considers a “stellar jewel in the cosmos”.
General Reaction to Other Factions:
[Regency]
“At least in the past we fought the Imperium over territory and ideology. Now, though, the Regency fights us out of sheer spite and nothing more. What is it they hope to gain?”
[Collective]
“With ruthless efficiency even the Corporate agenda has to admire, the Collective are going to be trouble.”
[Coalition]
“A fading power, the Coalition is all that remains of our allies from long ago. Once the pinnacle of both technological and social innovation, they’ve since lapsed behind due to petty infighting, political corruption, and a criminal element that has bought itself into the highest echelons of the ruling elite. They should have joined us when we still wanted them…”
[Kokoran Union]
“Strange ones, those Kokorans.”
[Corporate Interzone]
“An unregulated economy without external controls invites not only corruption, but – potentially – a malevolent pursuit of profit. Perhaps that is why anything goes in the Interzone?”
[Freespace]
“Anarchists, Criminals, and Visionaries of the highest order. Let them have their day, because we are their future…”
[The Frontier]
“The boundary must be pushed, incessantly. The Frontier represents an undiscovered country that must grow, develop, and ultimately seek its place among the Alliance community… and in turn, a new Frontier as yet unknown to us invariably will reveal itself.”
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