Future History

The game world we are playing in exists in the far future, approximately 3600 years from now. Your characters were born, grew up and now live and work on the frontier of what is called the Third Imperium. It is the third star-spanning empire of mankind. The word Mankind (Humaniti) has a new meaning in this far future world.

Around 300,000 BC a mysterious race known only as “The Ancients” ruled this part of the galaxy. It is believed that they had a technology level well beyond anything that the Third Imperium currently has. For reasons unknown, the Ancients took population and genetic samples from Earth and spread them to many different worlds. The first human empire was founded by humans from a planet called Vland. This Vilani branch of humanity created a star empire that lasted 1500 years before the humans of Earth discovered space travel and the Jump drive.

The Jump drive is the technology that allows ships to travel quickly between stars. It operates by the manipulation of gravity to create a singularity that is then used warp into another dimension. The singularity can only last so long and the first Jump drives could only travel about 3.26 light years. As Jump technology matured Jump drives were created that could travel up to 6 times as far. However, no matter how far a ship Jumps it always takes the same amount of time, between 150 and 184 hours, or about 1 week. So whether you’re travelling 4 light years or 19 light years it will only take a week’s time.

When humans from Earth started to spread out to the stars they encountered the first human empire, often referred to as the Vilani or Old Empire. The Vilani Empire was 1500 years old by then and was in the midst of a long, slow decline. It was still huge and very powerful and was completely uninterested in the people from Earth and considered them barbarians that needed to be stepped on. The people from Earth, who came to be called the Solomani, quickly learned and adapted and soon had a fleet of starships that could challenge the old empire. They attacked and took the head off of the giant empire by attacking the capital system and then claimed it as their own. So began the Second Imperium or as it was called then “The Empire of Man”. The people of the Third Imperium refer to it as the Ramshackle Empire because it did not last long.

The Solomani took over governing the old empire but it was already on its way to collapse and the war had made things even worse. Within a few hundred years the empire collapsed catastrophically into what is called “The Long Night”; over a thousand years of dark ages. Technology was lost, trade disappeared and entire planetary populations were wiped out. A small group of planets called the Sylean Federation where the first to rediscover the Jump Drive technology and began to expand quickly. A few hundred years later they crowned the first emperor of the Third Imperium and declared Year Zero of the new empire. The year is now 1105 and there have been many challenges and triumphs for the new empire. The borders of the Third Imperium have expanded further than all the previous empires and many new branches of humanity have been discovered.

There are currently three human star empires; the Third Imperium (a mix of Vilani and Solomani humans and several alien races, the largest and most powerful of the human empires), the Solomani Sphere (a small empire of humans still loyal to the memory of old Earth) and the mysterious Zhodani Consulate.

There are also several alien races and empires in and around the sphere of charted space.

Aslan – A cat-like race of proud and noble warriors. There are a few Aslan that consider themselves to be Imperial citizens.

Vargr - A race that was genetically engineered by the Ancients from canine stock from Earth. They are the second most common species in the Third Imperium after humans.

Droyne – Droyne worlds are scattered in and around the Imperium and they don’t seem to form cohesive government entities like empires. Droyne look like large winged lizards.

Hivers – Hivers are the most alien looking of all the different alien species. There are very few hivers in the Imperium.

K’kree – This race looks like centaurs from Earth mythos. They are herbivorous herd creatures and seldom leave their own space.

Time Line

Terran/Solomani	Vilani Imperium	Third Imperium	Events
~300,000 BC	~300,000 PI	~-300,000 TI	Time of the Ancients
752 BC	922 PI	-5272 TI	Vilani Discover Jump Drive
476 AD	1 VI	-4045 TI	First Imperium (Vilani) established
2087 AD	1231 VI	-2431 TI	Solomani Discover Jump Drive
2113 AD	1247 VI	-2408 TI	First Interstellar War (Solomani vs Vilani)
2302 AD	1372 VI	-2219 TI	Nth Interstellar War ends
2317 AD	1383 VI	-2204 TI	Rule of Man (Solomani Empire)
2745 AD	1705 VI	-1776 TI	Collapse of empire, Long Night begins
4122 AD	2739 VI	-399 TI	Sword World colonization begins
4335 AD	2899 VI	-186 TI	First Sworld World Confederation begins
4491 AD	3016 VI	-30 TI	Future Emporer Cleon begins military campaign
4521 AD	3039 VI	0 TI	Third Imperium established
4635 AD	3096 VI	114 TI	Solomani Hypothesis proposed
4731 AD	3196 VI	210 TI	Vargr Campaigns
4901 AD	3324 VI	380 TI	Imperial - Aslan Border established
4941 AD	3354 VI	420 TI	First Survey of Imperium completed
5109 AD	3480 VI	588 TI	Sol/Earth system incorporated into Imperium
5110 AD	3481 VI	589 TI	First Frontier War (Imperium vs Zhodani)
5125 AD	3492 VI	604 TI	Civil War
5136 AD	3500 VI	615 TI	Second Frontier War
5145 AD	3507 VI	624 TI	Xboat system established
5225 AD	3567 VI	704 TI	Solomani Autonomous Region created
5321 AD	3639 VI	800 TI	Psionics suppression begins
5471 AD	3752 VI	950 TI	Solomani reintegrated
5500 AD	3774 VI	979 TI	Third Frontier War
5511 AD	3782 VI	990 TI	Solomani Rim War
5586 AD	3838 VI	1065 TI	Second Survey of Imperium complete
5603 AD	3851 VI	1082 TI	False War (Imperium vs Zhodani)

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