Soban
Convention Veteran
Ok, so I really like playing Separa'Shan as I'm sure many of you like doing so as well. However, while we have a cool look and a cool backstory, there has been a void in what has been happening with Essia and our culture since YE 30 or so. There are fragments, like ordering some guns, there is a small military base, and that there is at least one transport company that serves Essia. However, they don't really have much meat to them.
Therefore, I would like to expand on what has already been written and add more depth and flavor to the Separa'Shan. In that, I want the rest of the community to help to ensure that the new pieces of lore to help make a fun and interesting culture to play with. As with many of the things on this site, I don't expect that fun and interesting are going to be the same as realistic. I also expect that there will be a lot of little things that we will leave unexplained as hooks for future characters and adventures.
One of the things that I think is interesting about the Separa'shan is the fact that they were roughly at 1600's-ish technology when they were contacted by Yamatai. At that point in time, Nagashun was active. This gives a very different character to the idea of religion for Separa'Shan as their God is actually a diety-tier AI (One of surprisingly many in the setting). It also means that what happens also in many ways depends on what Nagashun wants to do.
There are a few ways that Nagashun can go. Perhaps Nagashun really doesn't wake up that often much less show off its power. Perhaps Yamatai helped to fix or replace the power core. And now that power core only gets used when Nagashun really needs to put on a God level display of power with most of the time it not being used. Alternatively, Nagashun was on its last legs and now is well and truly gone, having already passed away or will fairly soon. Perhaps Yamatai accidentally revealed that Nagashun wasn't really a God. All of them could have a serious impact on religion.
Another interesting aspect of the Separa'shan is the impact of Yamatai on Essia. Yamatai presents a fairly typical example of an Outside Context Problem for a 1600's tech level race. It would seem to me that the most likely (and least interesting) case is that the more technological and powerful group more or less paves over the group with the less power.
It's my theory that Nagashun is active, mostly through her high priest and her goal is preserving Separa'Shan as a distinct culture. Doing this by making most of the interactions of Separa'shan with the larger galactic community as peers rather then as low technological people.
Nagashun for those who don't know the deeper bits of lore about the Separa'Shan is a probe from an ancient race who terraformed Essia for colonization. It is my theory that Essia and the binary system that it is in is very rich in resources in useful bite-sized chunks as the motion of the stars prevented most planets from forming. Essia was made to be a very lush jungle world with not only a lot of resources but also a lot of biological diversity. It doesn't have ice caps and instead, the poles are mostly jungle and there is a wide belt of dessert around the equator of the planet.
So, my question is what do you think?
TLDR; How do you think the lore for the Separa'Shan could be improved?
I'm also considering writing a 'Red Dawn in the Jungle with Snakepeople and Catgirls' arc for Essia.
Therefore, I would like to expand on what has already been written and add more depth and flavor to the Separa'Shan. In that, I want the rest of the community to help to ensure that the new pieces of lore to help make a fun and interesting culture to play with. As with many of the things on this site, I don't expect that fun and interesting are going to be the same as realistic. I also expect that there will be a lot of little things that we will leave unexplained as hooks for future characters and adventures.
One of the things that I think is interesting about the Separa'shan is the fact that they were roughly at 1600's-ish technology when they were contacted by Yamatai. At that point in time, Nagashun was active. This gives a very different character to the idea of religion for Separa'Shan as their God is actually a diety-tier AI (One of surprisingly many in the setting). It also means that what happens also in many ways depends on what Nagashun wants to do.
There are a few ways that Nagashun can go. Perhaps Nagashun really doesn't wake up that often much less show off its power. Perhaps Yamatai helped to fix or replace the power core. And now that power core only gets used when Nagashun really needs to put on a God level display of power with most of the time it not being used. Alternatively, Nagashun was on its last legs and now is well and truly gone, having already passed away or will fairly soon. Perhaps Yamatai accidentally revealed that Nagashun wasn't really a God. All of them could have a serious impact on religion.
Another interesting aspect of the Separa'shan is the impact of Yamatai on Essia. Yamatai presents a fairly typical example of an Outside Context Problem for a 1600's tech level race. It would seem to me that the most likely (and least interesting) case is that the more technological and powerful group more or less paves over the group with the less power.
It's my theory that Nagashun is active, mostly through her high priest and her goal is preserving Separa'Shan as a distinct culture. Doing this by making most of the interactions of Separa'shan with the larger galactic community as peers rather then as low technological people.
Nagashun for those who don't know the deeper bits of lore about the Separa'Shan is a probe from an ancient race who terraformed Essia for colonization. It is my theory that Essia and the binary system that it is in is very rich in resources in useful bite-sized chunks as the motion of the stars prevented most planets from forming. Essia was made to be a very lush jungle world with not only a lot of resources but also a lot of biological diversity. It doesn't have ice caps and instead, the poles are mostly jungle and there is a wide belt of dessert around the equator of the planet.
So, my question is what do you think?
TLDR; How do you think the lore for the Separa'Shan could be improved?
I'm also considering writing a 'Red Dawn in the Jungle with Snakepeople and Catgirls' arc for Essia.