A Brief History Of The Terellian Empire

Solomani666

Mongoose
I have rewritten the Astron sector IMTU (In My Traveller Universe) where I have placed my Terellian Empire. There is a stable wormhole in the sector that (conveniently) ends in an empty parsec in the Spinward Marches. (Yes, they do have a massive 5 kilometer base there...)

The Terellian Empire started from a pre-Maghiz Darrian colony ship that (crashed?) landed on a planet inhabited by a race called the Gorm.

The Gorm are an extremely warlike race that managed to colonize a second system by sublight travel before blowing themselves up (down?) to tech level 5-6.

The Gorm eventually conquered the Darrians through sheer numbers and attrition and enslaved them. The Gorm bred the strongest males with the strongest females in order to create a better labor force.

Through careful social manipulations to create wars coupled with secret bio weapons research, and an army of children and teenagers that were bred and trained in secret, the Darrians, after many generations eradicated the Gorm on that planet.

Eventually recovering their TL16 libraries and equipment still left in orbit, they colonized several nearby systems but left the Gorm colony alone.

After colonizing half a dozen systems, they eventually encountered the Kzan. A deviant Aslan clan, the exact opposite to the Hfuah clan where the females were bred as unintelligent animals fit only for procreation and their males had taken over every aspect of clan life. The Kzan maintained a pocket empire of a few dozen worlds.

The Darrians were conquered and enslaved a second time by the Kzan for many generations, this time the males being bred as a labor force and the females being bred as technicians. Again the Darrians bred their own secret insurgent force consisting mainly of children and teenagers. After orchestrating a (pocket) empire wide economic collapse leading to civil war, the Darrians managed to liberate a dozen worlds forming the core of the New Terellian Empire.

Having hidden most of their TL16 technology away in caches and knowledge being passed on through the generations by secret orders of individuals with didactic memories, the Terellians were able to establish an effective defense from the uncoordinated invasion attempts during the Kzan civil war.

With Darrian still within the Kzan Empire causing havoc at every opportunity, the Terellian Empire was able to solidify, and with its TL16 knowledge, soon become a force to be reckoned with.

Shortly before the Kzan got their internal affairs in order enough to wage a serious offensive against the upstart Darrians, the Terellian Empire encountered the Saurons. A warmblooded reptilian race that are masters of genetic engineering and use living machines and starships. The Saurons were willing to join the larger Terellian Empire provided that they were able to conduct a eugenics breeding program on voluntary human subjects and take a genetic sample of all newborn Terellians for analysis. With the massive Kzan invasion fleet massing on their borders, the Terellian Empire agreed. Breeding a better Terellian and satisfying the Sauron curiosity was a win-win situation. The Saurons also knew that if the Terellian Empire fell, that their heads would be next on the Kzan 'chopping block'. The Saurons, released a bio-weapon on an ihatei encampment that caused all the Kzan to molt their fur temporarily then spread rumors that all Terellian worlds were now tainted with the virus. The ensuing panic was enough to halt the invasion.

Later they encountered a single lost colony of Humans from the second Imperium. An 'honor war' was fought resulting from a trade dispute over chocolate. The Chocolate War ended in the capitulation of the Terellian Empire and the Terrans, called "Alphas", to be granted a prominent role within the Empire. The Darrians, having been a hybrid race of humans were then considered "Gammas". There were few casualties on either side and rumor has it that the Saurons used their influence to end the war quickly. The Saurons show great interest in original human stock and of obtaining genetic samples from them.

Because the Terellians exploited economic forces for their liberation, a monetary economic system became taboo for them. Instead they adopted a resource based economy without money or cost. They build whatever they need to build based on resources, time, and the ability to do it.

Their society is a meritocracy where an individuals status and wealth are based on his or her contribution to the empire, planet, house, and family. Individuals of great achievement may be awarded with an additional name. The length of ones name is recognized throughout the empire as ones true social status.

They are a battle-hardened race of warriors. Because of resource abundance and sharing and everyone providing services as well as receiving services, the average Terellian has access to luxuries only available to the very wealthy in the Third Imperium. Based solely on the ability to access resources, an average Terellian of middle age would be a millionaire by Imperial standards.
 
I have been using Astron for a while as well, here is new campaign I have in that region:

http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/homage-to-peladon

Plus my players are in Ingo subsector there:

http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/traveller-beyond-the-frontier/wikis/ingo-subsector-i
 
Looks good. As noted in previous discussions (which got waaaaaaaay to bogged down in philosophy/economics discussions for an RPG setting), TL16+ allows you to handwave away most problems because you have essentially incorruptible AIs to manage things and you can make just about anything out of just about anything else...

One important driver on fleet designs will be the wormhole - does it impose a practical limit on the numbers or displacement of transiting warships? If so, that will skew fleet choices to "swarm of gunships" or "single superdreadnought" as appropriate.

Had you had any particular thoughts about the Saurons? One thing I've not seen for Traveller (which doesn't mean it doesn't exist!) that I keep meaning to write and post up somewhere is a set of rules modifications for bio-tech ships...
 
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