Armen Raspagius Velgid
"Of course we had no idea at the time that we were being manipulated. Most of the information is not available to me, but I think we were being watched from at least the time we achieved spaceflight, maybe before, and probably influenced from then as well.
"As you know the two continents on Meriscane had been unified under a single government each about five hundred years ago, and the two governments settled their differences a hundred years later and formed a single world-wide government. It was not long after that that we developed interstellar drive and sent out missions to the three systems within range which we thought would have planets able to sustain life. When I say within range I mean within a viable travel-time; as a journey took many years there was no point in sending expeditions if the crew would be too old to do anything when they got there. Of course I know now that your ships make that journey in a few days at the most. The new worlds were viable, if a bit bleak, and colonisation went on at a good rate. The adventurous, the disenfranchised and the criminal set off to get a fresh start, leaving Meriscane with a much more tractable population.
"As part of the colonisation effort naturally we needed a decent army. We needed to keep order on the colonies for a start, and sometimes more colonists were required than could be supplied by volunteers alone. Once established on the colonies some settlers resented the resources of their new homes being shipped away for the benefit of Meriscane and occasionally caused trouble. Furthermore due to the travel-time there was not much scope for rotation of army units between the colonies and home and units sometimes forgot their duty and identified too much with the colonies they were stationed on. So there was also the occasional military rebellion to put down. All this meant that our army was used to internal security operations but not to full-scale warfare.
"After a century or so of this we were contacted. Just a single ship, but big enough and advanced enough to give us the message. When we saw the ambassadors we were astonished to find they were just like us. Of course now I know that people like us are 'Standard', unexceptional, but then that was a great surprise. They established an embassy on Meriscane and were very friendly and helpful in trivial ways. They were allies, or subjects, of the Idirans, but we did not know that at the time. I suppose the Idirans used them because they were Standards; the news that there were starfaring crabs enormously more advanced and powerful than us might have been too much of a shock at that stage. As would the fact that we were not as important as we had thought and were instead very small fish in a very large pond.
"By the time of contact the Popular Party had been in power for forty or so years, their only rivals the Party of Permanence crippled by disunity and recurring scandals. With hindsight that was probably the work of the ambassadors too. The Populars were keen on colonisation as it drove the economy and provided a humane way to deal with weeded-out dissidents, and when they announced that a fourth system was now in reach thanks to certain tweaks to our star-drives kindly supplied by the ambassadors there was no opposition to occupying the habitable planet in that system. Unlike the other colonies that planet, Sladden, already had inhabitants. We were told that it had been colonised long ago by someone else and since pretty much abandoned. The planet was resource-rich, already partly developed, and had a convenient ready-made supply of workers who would welcome the attention of a new proprietor.
"They didn't, of course."
From an interview with Armen Raspagius Velgid, ex-member of the ruling council of the Meriscane Confederation, while in exile on Dibaldipen Orbital.
"As you know the two continents on Meriscane had been unified under a single government each about five hundred years ago, and the two governments settled their differences a hundred years later and formed a single world-wide government. It was not long after that that we developed interstellar drive and sent out missions to the three systems within range which we thought would have planets able to sustain life. When I say within range I mean within a viable travel-time; as a journey took many years there was no point in sending expeditions if the crew would be too old to do anything when they got there. Of course I know now that your ships make that journey in a few days at the most. The new worlds were viable, if a bit bleak, and colonisation went on at a good rate. The adventurous, the disenfranchised and the criminal set off to get a fresh start, leaving Meriscane with a much more tractable population.
"As part of the colonisation effort naturally we needed a decent army. We needed to keep order on the colonies for a start, and sometimes more colonists were required than could be supplied by volunteers alone. Once established on the colonies some settlers resented the resources of their new homes being shipped away for the benefit of Meriscane and occasionally caused trouble. Furthermore due to the travel-time there was not much scope for rotation of army units between the colonies and home and units sometimes forgot their duty and identified too much with the colonies they were stationed on. So there was also the occasional military rebellion to put down. All this meant that our army was used to internal security operations but not to full-scale warfare.
"After a century or so of this we were contacted. Just a single ship, but big enough and advanced enough to give us the message. When we saw the ambassadors we were astonished to find they were just like us. Of course now I know that people like us are 'Standard', unexceptional, but then that was a great surprise. They established an embassy on Meriscane and were very friendly and helpful in trivial ways. They were allies, or subjects, of the Idirans, but we did not know that at the time. I suppose the Idirans used them because they were Standards; the news that there were starfaring crabs enormously more advanced and powerful than us might have been too much of a shock at that stage. As would the fact that we were not as important as we had thought and were instead very small fish in a very large pond.
"By the time of contact the Popular Party had been in power for forty or so years, their only rivals the Party of Permanence crippled by disunity and recurring scandals. With hindsight that was probably the work of the ambassadors too. The Populars were keen on colonisation as it drove the economy and provided a humane way to deal with weeded-out dissidents, and when they announced that a fourth system was now in reach thanks to certain tweaks to our star-drives kindly supplied by the ambassadors there was no opposition to occupying the habitable planet in that system. Unlike the other colonies that planet, Sladden, already had inhabitants. We were told that it had been colonised long ago by someone else and since pretty much abandoned. The planet was resource-rich, already partly developed, and had a convenient ready-made supply of workers who would welcome the attention of a new proprietor.
"They didn't, of course."
From an interview with Armen Raspagius Velgid, ex-member of the ruling council of the Meriscane Confederation, while in exile on Dibaldipen Orbital.
Please click below to go to the page you are looking for.
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden.html Overview and planetary data for Sladden
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-0.html Mini-campaign rules
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-1.html A game played using MDRG
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-2.html Another game played using MDRG
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---interlude-i.html Background to the Meriscane intervention on Sladden
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-3.html A game played using FUBAR
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-4.html Outline of a game that has yet to be played
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-5.html A game played using FUBAR
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---interlude-ii.html Background to the Meriscane intervention (continued)
http://www.spodilicious.com/sladden---chapter-6.html A game played using Blast Pistol
