So I started a faction called the Helios Technocracy, a semi-Democractic technocracy/republic in collaboration with a friend of mine, and I just wanted to show everyone a little bit of lore regarding the Glitch in the Technocracy. So basically, there's this one kind of Glitch model called 'XM1A', and they were created by a yet-to-be-named Earth military pre-Earth destruction. I'm voting Japan, my friend probably wants Russia, but it doesn't matter. So anyway, the XM1A's had tiers, each tier named after a planet in the solar system (plus the sun). My friend's character, Helios Alpha, and another friend's character, Helios Omega, were packed aboard escape shuttles, deemed unfit for combat by the military, but some technical difficulties caused the shuttle to malfunction. Cut off from any form of aid, the skeleton crew promptly died (punpunpun), and the shuttle was derelict for a long time before being found by a spacer with an aptitude for robots named Max (one of my characters). Max had two Doctorates and a Masters degree, but times were hard for him and his family, so he was a scrap hunter. Having found the two deactivated XM1A's, Max took 'em back home to work on them, add some minor improvements to the processor, upgrade the hardware, etc... but it was advanced stuff. So he did what he could and, before activating the XM1A's, he reprogrammed them to serve him, as well as renaming them to something more fitting with Max's religion; Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. Omega did not activate on command, however, but Alpha had no problems for many years. Now imagine lots of adventure montages, Chewie-and-Han style, replacing Chewie with a pretty badass-looking Glitch. Lots of those happen, no details because I'm on a time constraint. So at some point, Max is disgusted with the current empires, dominions, factions, defense forces, and generally every faction except maybe Tallest Tree. He feels something needs to be done, but he has no idea where to start. Alpha chimes in that maybe they should start their own faction, and Max agrees uncertainly. After making some calls and deliberating with friends, Max is voted leader of the new faction, a faction soon to be named the Helios Technocracy. He changes his name to Lorem Maximillian after his favorite book character from an old Earth novel, and goes forth to change the universe. Skipping a lot of minor irrelevancies, the Technocracy gains a hold of a fabrication facility, the only one of its kind in the universe (to the best of their knowledge), a relic of ages past, capable of supplying arms and armor of any kind so long as raw materials were pumped in and blueprints supplied. The planet is dubbed Helios Prime, new members are recruited, and we've been kinda stagnant since I had IRL things to do for about a week. But I'm back, and I'll make it up somehow to those patient members who stuck with us. Sudden change of topic, here's the military structure: Lord - Almost exclusively a member of the council of twelve, a Lord's roll is to engage in heavy melee by teleporting to the front lines and unleashing hell with his two-handed weapon or weapons. They are in command of any squad they choose, so long as another lord does not have a claim to it. Lords do not necessarily command from the front lines. Some prefer the safety of a pressurized steel bunker, or maybe the comfort and luxury of an orbiting warship. Hellion - Officers of the Grand Army, their role is to give commands to the soldiers from the front lines and make sure their objectives are completed. Standard weapons include a machine pistol in one hand and a sword in the other, a dual combat specialization. They also serve the added role of the political officer, carrying out their Lord's secretive orders in silence, and enforcing their will on the front lines if necessary. Hoplite - The rank-and-file soldiers of the Helios Technocracy are bedecked in light crimson armor, a backpack full of provisions, and a concussive rifle affectionately named Hekatebolos (far-thrower in Greek). Some specialists carry grenade launchers, sniper rifles or (very rarely) handheld AP/HE missile launchers to add versatility to a squad. Specialists to be named later. Aaaaaand here's the XM1A structure (there are only two XM1A's according to my friend, and they're supposed to be inherently better in almost every way than the newer XM10's) XM1 "Solar" - Leaders and elite troopers, the Solar-class XM's are one of a kind. And there's two of them; Alpha and Omega. XM2 "Mercury" - Miners, in short. They supply ores and raw materials to the fabrication facility on Helios Prime to make the gears of technocracy turn smoothly. XM3 "Venus" - Scientists. They strain the sciences in every direction, the sciences upon which the Technocracy was built. XM4 "Terra" - Builders. They create wonderous spires and castle-facilities for lords, utilitarian bunkers for front-line worlds, or for peaceful worlds with no military installations. XM5 "Mars" - Supersoldiers. The Mars-class units are without compare (to the best of the Technocracy's knowledge), capable of tracking and firing upon dozens of targets with acceptable accuracy loss and commendable kill ratios. XM6 "Jupiter" - Navymen, usually ship captains. They can take direct control of ship systems in order to use them more effectively and efficiently than many others could. XM7 "Saturn" - Explorers. They take to the oceans of space, charting all they can and sending important information to the Technocracy's relay stations. They double as naval scouts in wartime. XM8 "Neptune" - Mech pilots. They can mesh with mech interfaces directly, making them lethal on the battlefield or useful for lifting heavy, dangerous loads in the fabrication facility. P.S.: All these jobs can be taken by other races, but they don't get the fancy 'XM' title, and in RP they're generally "not as good" as the XM's are at any respective job. No XM would be able to hold the position of Lord, except Alpha and Omega. Only biological races would be able to hold the position of Lord, unless of course there's some exceptional XM that deserves it. P.S. again: We ain't racist. The Technocracy will take all races. ALL OF DEM. So long as you pass review, you should be able to hold any position. If you read this far (or simply scrolled down to the bottom), thanks for reading at least some of my rambling. Any thoughts on this would be appreciated. Hopefully they're constructive ones, but if you wanna verbally punch me for putting this in the wrong section or something, or for being a writef*g, be my guest. I love insults. If you wanna join the Helios Technocracy, keep an eye on the factions area of the forum; I've been told we'll be added when Kazyyk has some spare time. Cheers, Eric
