Editing Quest:Void Quest (section)

==Concepts==

===Ophidian Empire===

'''o·phid·i·an''' ( -f d - n). adj. Of, relating to, or resembling snakes. n. A member of the suborder Ophidia or Serpentes; a snake. Coined by the separatist human leader Zabak Raul during one of his famous propaganda speeches during the Empire's formation, saying that the new Empire of Humanity was "Like a snake, wrapping its coils around every free being." It stuck, and as the Empire was just forming it became the Ophidian Empire of Humanity.

The Human empire, and the only known Level 10 civilization. Ruled by the Imperial Council; effectively the Armada, the Houses, and the independents.

The political structure was a military government, tended to be some tension. Military officers held government ranks by default but the civvie representatives from the great houses often held higher ones.

The Empire was ruled by the Imperial Council, one vote from every representative. Rep positions were granted through rank in the military, controlled planets, and election of peerage. Actual system was very complex and great house aspirants often were raised from birth to become a council member.

Some worlds were independent of the great houses, and they all had their own military, usually one that was highly prestigious to be a part of so that they got a constant stream of bodies to throw against house invasions.

Every great house had a military force of its own, and prestige varied with how successful they were in the past thousand years or so.

The Empire military was a different story altogether though. Basically, it was for the best of the best of the best of the galaxy. It had so many applications coming in daily there was a whole government agency dedicated to processing them.

'''Imperial propaganda''' - shown on every world in the empire; Home, Colony, Protectorate, and Subject. It was specially designed by think-tanks of neuroscientists, sociologists, and psychologists, and xeno-specialists to be as influential as possible and spread the idea that humanity is the greatest and most powerful race ever, utterly unable to be defeated. The Imperial military was heavily emphasized and featured in many of them, building up the notion of an invincible juggernaut.

'''Musical Trends''' - Circa OY-19381, future-techno is the new pop, Shriek is popular in the underground scene, and all the elites listen to classical music in front of their friends while secretly buying techno.

'''The Armada''' - The branch of the Ophidian military that is responsible for interstellar combat and warships. The ''Harbinger'' belongs to the Armada. Nicknamed The Bloody Sword of the Empire.

'''Armada Intelligence''' - The elite super-secretive, paranoid, and high-tech research/infiltration branch of the Armada. They don't play around. When you're in Intel, you're in Intel for life. Mental indoctrination, advanced cybernetics, horrifying bioweapons: these guys have done them all. Whether they had an agenda separate from the Armada itself is unclear.

'''High Command''' - The organization controlling the Armada. Or something. (Unclear)

'''Navy''' - A sea force, as far as we know.

===Tech and Other===

'''Hundred-Worlds Rebellion''' - The ''Harbinger''s first and only official mission. A religious xeno rebellion, put down by the ''Harbinger''. 3 planets were rendered sterile, 44 planets surrendered. The ''Harbinger'' was then ordered to investigate Iridus, and entered the system blind as to not betray its position. The rebellion sacrificed themselves to induce the system's twin suns to nova. The ''Harbinger'' performed a hasty jump away, and suffered severe damage as a result.

'''Elevated Intelligence (EI)''' - A human mind linked and transplanted into an Artificial Intelligence construct. Created in order to replace purely Artificial Intelligences (AIs) for high-security duties, such as the commander of a warship. Candidates for EI are thoroughly screened for loyalty, absence of family, etc. The elevation process itself involves a large number of highly trained scientists. No EIs have ever stepped down on a mission, though some have retired and gone on to be university, government, or intelligence computers. Very few. It’s extremely rare. The EI-subsumation process replaces the brain, spine, and major nerves with cyberware.

'''Artificial Intelligences (AI)''' - What it says on the tin. Tin-can brains. There has been one AI revolt prior to ''Harbinger''s dormancy, and at least one during it. The exact nature of these revolts are unknown, but the effect is that highly functioning AIs were feared in the days of the Ophidian Empire.

'''Singularity Reactor''' - A power generation source that harnesses a black hole. These come in different sizes and power outputs. The ''Harbinger'' has a large singularity reactor: at full output it would be possible to power an entire planet. While they are heavily shielded, it is indeed possible to collapse them. What happens is a truly catastrophic event of indiscriminate destruction. 

'''Cryostasis''' - As traditional: deep-frozen individuals (humans, usually) for long-keeping. Reliable if done correctly. There is a recovery period of a month or two during which re-freezing is inadvisable.

'''Cybernetics''' - Cybernetics were highly advanced in the Ophidian Empire. The Armada pays for all augmentations. Mind-machine interfacing is actively used. Hardware mental blocks are completely possible.

'''Virtual Self''' - An avatar of a mind during a mind-machine interface. Without special training one keeps the mental image of themselves they had prior to being cyberized.

'''Genemods''' - Genetic modifications: popular and common, everything from food to pets to even children were genemodded for things like slower cell degeneration, better immunities, making them tougher... things like that. No creating things out of whole cloth though.

'''Ophdian traffic only''' - The system is under the direct control of the Ophidian Empire and only human ships are permitted in the system, due to a combined military, economic, and political stranglehold. Typical for alien races that tried to resist becoming subject states at first but later gave up.

'''Ophidian Navy''' - Mentioned by Captain Charles Devri of the OIS Glorious Destiny in a recorded message at Orrin. Perhaps ruled by a High Command and the Regent.

'''Cloning''' - Possible, but not in the ''Harbinger''.

'''Hyperstate Reactor''' - A weak (relatively) reactor, barely capable of firing a medium energy canon. No containment signature, required vents and a cyclic recombiner.

'''Mater/antimatter Annihilation Reactor''' - A small-scale reactor type, more powerful than fusion/fission, but still very weak.

'''Marquis class''' - A fast attack destroyer-class warship. Created and deployed during ''Harbinger''s dormancy, in order to placate the Consuls worries about the Armada's political power. Presumably cheaper and weaker than the Harbinger-class.

'''That thing on Korlo''' - Foreshadowed by Anon in thread 2 as UltraMegaSpaceDeathVirus, and colloquially deemed "Space AIDS." The former is more accurate, as the virus stays alive for millenia and causes death within 30 minutes of contact by means of hemorrhaging from all orifices, including eyes.

'''The Galactic Core''' - The rough equivalent of the Bermuda Triangle. More stars there than the rest of the galaxy combined, they say. Rumors of races so powerful they fly through space without ships, wreathed in pure energy, laughing flames dancing from their eyes as they pull ships to their doom in the supermassive black hole that resides in the center.

Horrific stories of vessels flying through and getting caught in in Hawking radiation emanating from the core singularity, changing everyone on board. They walk and talk like normal people, you can't tell the difference, but sometimes they will all just stop and turn, staring at you, not saying a word. It's said that no matter what type of ship they were before they all go rogue, taking on passengers and then flying them through the eddies and currents only they can see... creating more of them.

'''The Charn''' - The most advanced and largest alien empire encountered to date by humanity. A propaganda-vilified extraterrestrial race that was wiped out completely for resisting to submit in any way.

'''Intergalactic Travel''' - There have been a lot of projects over there years but ultimately there was just no way to get there fast enough at the time of your accident.

===Gateway System===

[[Image:VQsluttygates.jpg|thumb|200px|''Can we, as an EI of vast power, whip up some sort of crude video that clearly indicates our ship moving through the portal peacefully?'' - {{Anonymous}}]]

A system of point-to point jump networks. A source of great confusion to Void Questers. Power for the jumps provided by the gate, no need for a jump drive or any power to be provided by the ship. Links to a set number of other gates within 5000 LY. Can only transmit to and from online gates. Strictly point to point and uses less energy because of that. Also it acts on other objects that pass through it rather than itself, like a normal drive would. If both the departure and receiver gates are not online, the link can't be established in the first place. The ''Harbinger'' is capable of using these gates, and it has been recommended to do so in order to not strain the reactor. 

There are main "Highways" consisting of primary nodes spaced apart at 5000 LY. Primary nodes only connect to other primary nodes and secondary nodes. All the nodes stemming from a primary node that aren't other primary nodes are considered part of that primary node's "node network" since they can only be accessed through the primary node. These extend from Sol to the outer rim of the galaxy. There are connections between the "spokes" on this wheel at places too, but to travel long distances you will need to use these. There is no way to tell which gates are functioning without attempting to connect to it: "dial it in and see if it opens." The more heavily trafficked the system the more gates they had there for exactly this reason. Sol is logged as having over three thousand of them.

Secondary nodes connect only to other primary nodes and tertiary nodes. Tertiary nodes connect only to secondary nodes, other tertiary nodes, and terminal nodes. Terminal nodes only have one connection, to the tertiary node which they are linked to. All gates in a particular system can link to any other gates that system is linked to.

[[Image:VQgates.jpg|thumb|320px|The gateway system. White with blue links: Primary node. Red: Secondary. Green: Tertiary. Yellow: Terminal.]]

There are two ways to activate a gate:

One, you beam your authorized commands to it (via use of access codes) and let it do all the calculations and send you on your way. This requires the security codes.

Two, you have all the programming and protocols needed for the gate calculations on your own vessel and just have it open where you damn well tell it to. This requires all the data needed for gatejump calcs and the protocols needed to operate the machinery.

It is impossible to set the gate to only accept commands with our security codes, it takes the physical presence of workmen to take it off the grid.

The Gate system crisscrosses the entire galaxy. We have copies of the gate control protocols from Orrin's gate, to be able to activate or deactivate the gate remotely. 

===Civilization Types===

Level 1: Proto-society with agriculture and small cities and low sustainable population. Ex. Mesopotamia.

Level 2: Established society with established agriculture or equivalent and large territorial control and beginnings of industry. Ex. Rome, France, Great Britain.

Level 3: Industrial and technological society with ability to exploit natural resources and technological ability. Ex. USA, USSR.

Level 4: United planetary body with high technological ability and spacefaring ability up to system level. Ex. World Union.

Level 5: Inter-system spacefaring capability and colonies, may or may not be unified. Ex. System's Union, Palaxan Brotherhood.

Level 6: Unified multi-system civilization with developed worlds and spacefaring capabilities up to light speed. Ex. Torvax Assembly, Ophidian Union.

Level 7: Multi-system civilization with FTL capability. Ex. Early Ophidian Empire, Gondia, PaTarn Slae.

Level 8: Advanced multi-system civilization with FTL capability and power projection, up to harnessing advanced spatial drives. Ex. Ophidian Empire of Humanity, Charn (extinct).

Level 9: Advanced multi-system civilization with jumpdrive capability and singularity drives. Ex, Ophidian Empire of Humanity, Hundred Worlds Alliance.

Level 10: The Ophidian Empire of Humanity. (No known comparables).