Thursday, April 14, 2016

Dark Orbital Setting

I'm thinking one of the settings I will be releasing for StarCluster 4 is Dark Orbital. Dark Orbital is a repurposed colony ship from earth, a gigantic fusion slow boat which spent centuries already in transit. It has been changed from a colony boat carrying some twenty thousand refugees from earth into a static habitat for millions circling around the star Cry-In-The-Dark.

It has changed a lot - the old living quarters which used spin gravity are all converted to grav plates now, no more coriolis force. The rich still live here - the richer you are, the more towards the outside your "house" is. The richest have private zero-G docks beneath their housees. The spokes are decked over and lots of poor people live in the "flats". Each flat has a mirror flat above it, and you can jump from the highest buildings in one flat to the roofs of the highest buildings in the mirror. Some of the old giant fuel tanks have been converted to grow greenstuff, while others have been converted into water tankage. The gravity profiles follow the inner skin of the tanks, with air in the middle. It's a big thing to go to the beach for a little recreation! Still others are dark and empty, and the poor kids play in them, in zero G.

The cops are corrupt as hell. Everyone knows it and everyone hates them. If you can't avoid them, you pay them off. Different gangs control services. The uplifted Hyenas control garbage collection, for example. Modern medicine is for the wealthy. The free clinics are vehicles to control the poor. Outdated and outmoded medicines and practices are dispensed here. Body Modification is a big cultural thing among the non-wealthy. Only wealthy people look really human.

So this is essentially a cyberpunk dystopia. I'm thinking this would be a lot of fun to play in!

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