Shared SciFi Universe

[Grillytilly]

I've been working on this pretty detailed science fiction universe for a while. I think it's pretty interesting. I used it for my recent story "The Pilot and the Princess". If any other authors are interested in placing stories in that universe I wouldn't mind.

I don't see this as a chain story. Each story would be separate from each other and each author could do their own thing with their own characters.

So let me know if anyone is interested and I can start placing details here to flesh out my vision for the universe and what the rules are. And if a shared universe is a bad idea, let me know that too. I have about five stories of my own in mind for this but I'd also like to see where other writers could go with it.

 

[hylas_]

This sounds potentially interesting! I'll take a look at the story sometime and decide. (won't have time the next few days, so, patience please!). Post a link please, for convenience?

 

[AlliaPotestas]

This sounds fun... I like the idea there could be occasional overlaps, but I don't know how others would feel about that. I'd never actually mess with anyone else's characters, and I'm not talking about chain stories but I like the idea that in a shared fictional landscape a character of yours might get a passing reference in mine, say as a neighbour or co-worker...

I suppose my other thought is how bothered you might be if your imaged universe evolves into something quite different. In order to tell their stories others will need to make assumptions, create laws, establish societal protocols which might be a world away from your intention...

 

[HandsInTheDark]

Shared universes are always fascinating ideas. But when I've seen it tried commercially, it has not worked. I don't know if that's a law of the universe or just a bad sample, but my instinct says that each author will add details to the base setting, and inconsistency will appear. You need a ruthless editor in love with the setting to control the writers, for a chance at success.

I'm fond of Tolkien and have a fairly intuitive grasp of his how his setting works. I've seen fanfics attempt to borrow his world. Tolkien has likely hit some pretty high RPMs in his grave. And that was for a detailed setting with lots of backstory. When it's tried for something inconsistent and absurd, like Star Wars, the results are just painful.

If you go for it, expect to be in contact with the other authors about daily. It's likely to be a lot of effort, cf. herding cats.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

From what they OP said, it wouldn't be his characters, just the universe they live in. You would develop your own characters with regards to the universe. Your series of stories would be like a TV spinoff set in the same place and time.

 

[Grillytilly]

The link to the story is here:

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-pilot-and-the-princess

I'll list some of the basic ideas below:

I guess the first question to tackle is are the people humans originating from Earth or not? This is something that should never be answered in story. We should leave it vague and let the reader make up their own minds. That said, there is an Earth. This universe is set at a time period when everyone has lived with humans inhabiting many different planets for as long any anyone can remember and as far back as they have documents. It has just always been that way in their minds. But Earth is out there and people do live on it. Characters should never travel to Earth or mention Earth or go looking for Earth. It isn't a big deal. Think of it like when people migrated out of Africa. Eventually they forgo they came from Africa.

Are there aliens? Yes. A group of humans way out on the very fringe of where humans have been able to get to have encountered a group of humanoid aliens. From a distance they look human but up close you can tell that their skin color is wrong, they have pointy ears, and their facial bone structure is just a bit off. So far, the vast majority of humans don't even know that aliens exist yet and word doesn't travel that fast.

Robots? Yes. Robots look human with fake fleshy skin. From a distance they look human but up close you can tell they are a robot. Robots store a lot of information and they know all the current languages.

Clones? Yes. Clones are genetically engineered humans that they make a lot of copies of for certain things. When a war happens, most armies are 99% clones because leaders don't want to send their own citizens to die. There are also clones that are basically sex slaves. Because of Lit rules, I'm saying that a clone needs 18 years to grow in their tube before they are developed enough to wake up and move around. Clones are preprogrammed with all human languages. The legal status of clones is different in each system. Some places they are not seen as human, only biological robots. On other systems they are allowed to do pretty much whatever a human can do except vote. The vast majority of clones share nearly identical dna. All soldier clones will look alike and they will be given a three digit hex number for identification. If a clone is number 10 of their clone batch they would be called 00A. If a clone is number 2578 then they would be called A12. Female clones often have physical features that customers request. However, even though they might come with blue eyes or green eyes, all the other dna will be the same.

Magic Power? Yes. Humans have evolved to the point where they are just beginning to tap into the dark energy and dark matter of the universe and manipulate it. It isn't something that is well understood and some people don't even believe in it. Which brings us to..

Religion? Some places have a huge pantheon of gods, like the republic, and some only have one god, like the Musal. Some people are godless and they are called Awakened ones and they believe in morality but not divines. Some believe in nature gods while others believe in personified gods. It is open and random with many varied teachings so you can have one religion say you can't have sex with robots and a character is all repressed about it and it's taboo while another religion says its find so on that world it isn't a big issue.

Human aren't all unified. In the distant past, each system was completely independent from all the others because they had to be. But that was ok since humans got really good at terrafoming planets to be very similar to Earth. Travel between systems took longer than the life span of a human and if you wanted to send a message to another system you had to rely on radio or use your own faster than light ship.

Eventually the ftl got faster and faster so that going to another system would be like a trans pacific flight today. Sure you can do it but it is expensive. Most people don't eve do it. It takes a long time.

There are several major groups of humans but there are also a lot of independent systems. For every two systems in one of the big alliances, there is at least one completely independent system.

The major powers at the time period I want to set the universe in are The Republic and their Soci worlds. The Musal. The Mantis. And the Krypts. Beyond the Krypts is The Empire but they are so far away that characters should know it exists but shouldn't really know anything about it similar to how Europe knew that China was out there somewhere but they didn't have a lot of information about it.

The Musal have a very strict religion that basically teaches them to kill everyone who isn't Musal. A world is a Musal world if they follow the Musal religion but they aren't in one big political union. They go to war with each other just as much as they go to war with everyone else. On most Musal words people are impoverished while a few are super, super rich. Crazy things like slavery are legal but even with that organized crime is rampant.

Krypts are more egalitarian. There really aren't many super rich people and no one is really that poor. Krypts worlds are in loose alliance with each other. Generally, they don't go to war with each other or with each others but Krypts systems tend to harbor a lot of pirates and mercenary groups. Krypts scavengers tend to show up after a space battle to salvage anything they can and bring it home to sell or recycle.

The Mantis is a Federal system. Each world is equal at the federal level but the federal government can only pass certain kinds of laws. It is more like the EU than the US. They have a pretty good economy and they operate a lot of trading hubs. They really believe in free trade and education. But they aren't perfect. There is a constant tension between how much power the federal government has and the power on each system.

The Republic is the really complicated part of the story. While the other groups all have their own complicated history and culture; they are pretty stable for the moment as to what they are. Unlike them, I plan to have the Republic go through a massive change as my stories progress.

In the distant past the Republic was one system. When ftl got fast enough for other systems to attack each other, the republic was conquered by one of their neighbors. Eventually, it rebelled and became independent. After a series of long wars with their old rival they eventually came out on top and then their rival became a client system to the republic. The rival world did not become part of the republic. They were conquered territory and all the people living there are not citizens.

Because the Republic was able to get rich on the backs of their former overlord they tried this again. They conquered several other systems around them under the pretense of fearing being attacked first. That class system remained in place for a long time until the Republic found itself in a way against another big power. In order to rally their conquered worlds to their cause, they offered full citizenship to them if they won. The Republic did win and for a time all the worlds were equal.

Then there was a split and a small minority of systems separated and they claim to be the real Republic but everyone else just calls them rebels.

Then there was a little independent world that came to the Republic for help. This little world wasn't on the Republic's boarder but the people they wanted help from were. So the Republic said they would offer help. This was the beginnings of the Soci worlds. These are worlds that are not part of the Republic but the Republics gets to boss them around. Not all Soci worlds are equal. Some are friends of the Republic and so they get better treatment. Others are former enemies of those Soci friends that got bullied into uneven peace treaties once their enemy became a friend of the Republic. There is a complicated system of status among the different Soci worlds with some being better than others and multiple layers to everything.

The Soci aren't allowed into the Republic. The Republic goes to them, not the other way around. Everything is done on the Republics terms. If two high status Soci worlds go to war then the Republic sits it out. If a high status worlds attacks a low status world, the Republic sits it out. However, if a low status world tries to defend itself then the Republic steps in to maintain the status quo.

So we have two different Republics happening at the same time. We have inside the Republic where everyone is equal with an equal vote, fair laws, checks on government power, and good public services. However, for the Soci worlds, nothing is really fair, even for the highest ranking of them. Some worlds have democracy but the Republic can alter their election outcomes. Some have monarchy but the Republic can execute the king for treason to the Republic and install another king if they wish. Soci worlds are treated the way Europe used to treat colonies or Rome used to treat their Soci cities.

Soci worlds really like to go to war with each other and they grow crop after crop of clones to do just that. Sometimes it is just to save face. They aren't even fighting over anything. No territory is going to change sides. It devolves into a dick measuring contest. The battle is fought only so one side can claim bragging rights. People often watch the battles on tv for entertainment and the rules of war have changed so that it is easier to have a camera broadcast the action. Most people don't see the clones as human and war never comes to their home towns. The battles are fought on uninhabited planets that were terraformed just to have a staging area for war.

Eventually, people in the Republic will become outraged at the use of clones this way. They will call for an end to clone warfare. However, the Republic army is in a real war with the Musal at that point and can't really go stomp on the Soci to tell them to quit using clones that way.

That is when a character I'm calling the Imperator steps up. He has a privately financed army of his own soldiers. He has his own fleet. He will go world by world and get the Soci to agree to end cloning. The government of the Republic agree and the Imperator goes off to end the clone slaughter as well as clone slavery.

So is he the good guy? Readers will have to make up their own minds. When the Imperator goes to a Soci world he doesn't just sit down with the leaders to talk. He invades with his military, that are only loyal to him, not the Republic. Then he replaces the government and has that new government swear loyalty to the Imperator. Through being loyal to the Imperator, the worlds gain a higher treaty status with the Republic and they are ever closer to that valued Republic citizenship.

Back in the Republic some people start to get really concerned about the Imperators tactics. They realize that while each Soci world on their own could never challenge the Republic, all of them in a great alliance could crush it. They start making moves in the Republic to strip the Imperator of his legal permission to do what he's doing and brand him a criminal. However, they are too late. By the time word travels that the imperator no longer speaks for the Republic, he already has a huge fleet and vast resources.

So, the Imperator takes his fleet and while the Republic fleet is still off dealing with the Musal, the Imperator conquers the Republic. Then, he does to the Republic the same thing he did to the Soci worlds. He has all the elected representatives replaced and has the new government swear allegiance to him.

So now the Soci and the Republic all have the same status. They are equal. The Soci are very happy because all the social changes many had wanted for a long time were coming about. They had access to Republic systems and Republic markets. Slavery becomes illegal. They could now all vote and they were being reorganized as Republic systems.

Citizens of the Republic are not happy. They see all this as their vote becoming meaningless. Their government has no more power and the Imperator is basically a Dictator.

People debate and split on if they think the Imperator is right or wrong. The Republic and Soci are at the point of civil war with each other while the Imperator has to defend his new kingdom from the actual Republic fleet when it returns home. Then the rebels get in on it and we have a three way war inside the Republic while they are being threatened by the Musal from outside.

And in the middle of all this, of course, characters have a lot of fucking going on. I think the beauty of this is that each world could have its own culture and way of life. There are big things happening and they might affect the lives of the characters and they might not. There is no set of good guys vs bad guys. Everyone is different and that is just how it is. Sure the Musal are really close to being just out and out villain but not everyone on a Musal world is evil. Not everyone on a Mantis world is good. It's complicated and that provides a lot of detail for characters to have interesting histories and back stories.

On a side note, I was also thinking of using this universe to also launch a bronze age type story. The idea for that would be that the a group of humans and a group of aliens all crash on a planet together. The Earth flora and fauna as well as alien flora and fauna thrive side by side. The humans and aliens live side by side as well but they lose all their technology. They have to go back to smelting copper and eventually they forget they came from the sky.

I think it might be interesting if people called the aliens life forms elves because they were spelling alien phonetically. Eilien Life Form would then be an ELF. So humans and all their various ethnic differences along side elves with ethnic differences of their own. Could be interesting.

Anyway, that's what I have as of now. Sorry for the long post. Let me know if anyone is interested and what stories you want to work on.