Enemies

SHADOW are a collection of factions scrabbling for control of the ruins of a fallen empire. For the Alliance, they represent the dangers – and the potential – of space beyond Alliance law.

Nearly two centuries ago, the Alliance encountered MOTHER. MOTHER, like many empires, ruled through domination, manipulation, and spectacle; powerful and cruel, paranoid and brittle. This proved to be its undoing, as MOTHER soon tore itself apart under the weight of its own contradictions – leaving a ruined mess of war-torn, ungovernable space right on the Alliance’s doorstep.  

SHADOW is the codename given to MOTHER’s survivors and successors, who struggle for control of what remains. 

Within SHADOW-space, you may find: imperial remnants turned into mercenary companies, fanatical lost-cause cults, scavengers, nomadic traders barely getting by, and – above all else – many, many bands of criminals, pirates, and raiders, notorious for preying on Alliance shipping lanes, neutral colonies, and each other.

Alliance politics have stymied previous attempts to intervene  in SHADOW’s affairs – but for the brave, the remnants present both risks and opportunities, to help the needy, build peace, make alliances with different groups (and play them off against each other), or simply gather the fruits of wild and ungoverned stars. 

Diplomacy will see complex plots, under the table deals, and promises built on (dis)honour and (dis)trust rather than the letter of the law. Combat will see you in skirmishes with raiders who fight dirty, and who might have nothing to lose. Bio-med will see you fixing the consequences of desperate science without restraint, and hunting down dangerous unethical projects carried over from the age of MOTHER. Engineering will give you access to all sorts of black markets, and will truly demonstrate what necessity and a box of scrap can do. All roles will see you navigating complex, chaotic, and ever-changing situations, which will make you think outside the box and on your feet: trusting a firm handshake, while dodging a knife in the back.

SHADOW is many things: brutal, desperate, hungry, vicious. To the galaxy at large, it is a problem best avoided or contained. Will you follow in their footsteps, or help SHADOW to draw the fragments back together and build a new future from MOTHER’s ashes?

MOSAIC is  a phenomenon in and around Alliance space: a new biological mystery with unpredictable, often terrifying, effects.

The existence of MOSAIC is highly classified information within the Alliance. Even more classified is this: the Alliance has few facts and too many questions about what MOSAIC is, let alone what it’s capable of. MOSAIC forms have only been identified within the past decade, as plant-like growths, interlaced structures, and swarms of unknown and assimilated lifeforms that emerge at seemingly random times and places. Wherever MOSAIC manifests, the world changes: climates shift, systems fail, and people disappear – or are altered, nightmarishly, in mind and body alike.

Countering such a profound threat is among the Alliance’s highest priorities.

Is MOSAIC one mind or many? Would we recognise it as a mind? What does it want? Does it have capacity for hatred, or is it driven by pure instinct: which would be worse? Is it one phenomenon, or multiple interlinked phenomena? Are we seeing the full extent of what it is, or is there more to come? Can it understand us – and would we want it to?

These are just a few questions pondered by the brightest minds of the Alliance. Although the phenomenon is currently concealed from the public, the crew of the Ardent have been briefed to be extremely vigilant for MOSAIC activity on their travels. Remember that anything you can learn, no matter how seemingly inconsequential, might be vital to the Alliance’s future.

Diplomacy will see you trying to understand a mind (or no mind, or many) from first principles, breaking ground with a true first contact whilst working with others to contain threats. Combat will see you tailoring your strategies on the fly in response to all manner of biological threats, which adapt as quickly as you can adapt to them. Bio-med will break new frontiers for science as you deal with something truly alien, and manage its effects on your crewmates. Engineering will cross the line between biological and mechanical as they get to grips with assimilated components – and protect their tools from the gooey and the gruesome.

No discovery is made without fear, but MOSAIC is something else entirely. What are you prepared to sacrifice for knowledge?   

The criminal organisation known as CIRCUS roams at large through Alliance space, bringing the deranged artistic “visions” of its founder to life – at any cost.

CIRCUS is more than a collection of reprobates and renegades: it is a commitment to high art, without restraint. It is also a cult of personality centred on its mysterious founder. CIRCUS has spent decades evading Alliance law enforcement between “Expressions”: that is to say, the unveiling of their phantasmagoria to a delighted (read: captive, horrified, ungrateful) public. Notions of the public consenting to, or surviving, such events is irrelevant compared to the opportunity to be a part of CIRCUS’ performances.

This must be brought to an end – if the Alliance could only catch up to them.

The LEADER and their assistants share an almost unbelievable criminal record: theft, kidnap, illegal substance distribution; acts amounting to torture, manslaughter, and murder on a massive scale; participation in black markets and general racketeering all over the galaxy. There’s little chance of being attacked by CIRCUS in a direct ground assault or naval skirmish, however. If you do run afoul of CIRCUS, you’re much more likely to wake up kidnapped, pumped full of narcotics, and pushed into a series of violent challenges broadcast to the whole galaxy, all to the strains of an avant-guarde string quartet. As to how these hit-and-run contests fit the LEADER’s vision; who’s to say but they? Their visions shift like the solar winds – but no matter how convoluted or sadistic the scheme, the emphasis is on them, them, them and whatever they’re currently obsessed with.

CIRCUS isn’t in the Ardent’s remit, but there’s every chance that CIRCUS will take an interest in it. After all, exploiting the Alliance’s flagship exploration programme is a sure-fire way to claim the spotlight, and using the rare resources and brilliant minds onboard to devious ends wouldn’t hurt either. The Ardent will need to keep its eyes and ears open for interference from CIRCUS’s (absurd, but very real and very dangerous) antics.

Diplomacy will see you attempting to parlay with the dazzling, the deranged and the desperate, who may yet prove amenable if you can get on their level. Combat will see you battling freaks and atrocities tailor-made for the limelight; if you’re lucky, you won’t be doing it in a gladiator ring. Bio-med will be dealing with known science but applied in strange and terrifying ways; they did WHAT with the antimatter? Engineering will see you under unique pressure, managing Alliance tech with the safety off and often deployed directly against you as deliberate, fiendish puzzles. 

Despite the name and the surreal motif, CIRCUS is no laughing matter. Dare you face down the LEADER (artist, visionary, maniac) and their entourage of lunatics?