Lore Discussion/New Lore

[Steelpoint]

During my thread on the discussion to add lizardmen to our lore to account for their more prominate status (https://tgstation13.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=2019) many people desired to simply redo our lore all together, to be simpler and less overcomplicated.

As such I wish to present two topics. The first is the general discussion on a new lore, the second being my attempt at a more simple, but still indepth lore that leaves a lot to the imagination.

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In the year 2094 humanity finally escaped the solar system, however the human race was far too late to reach the stars. The galaxy is past its prime and filled with the remnants of long dead civilizations. Exploration lead to knowledge, and knowledge lead to greed as many would pay a high price for knowledge. However deep in the dark recesses of space lies those that destroyed the last great civilizations, monsters, abominations, machines. Only the most well trained, deranged, desperate or insane venture into space.

Now the year is 2117. On the edge of known space lies a remote research station established by Nanotrasen, the largest and most powerful corporation on Earth. This station focuses on researching the knowledge gleaned from the ancient races, and to unlock one of the greatest secrets yielded, plasma.

There are those that would seek to ruin the station, from rival corporations to monsters from before time memorable.

However, the space station is staffed with the best. Scientists, engineers, soldiers. But also traitors and killers.

They are all flawed, desperate and expendable.

Welcome to Space Station 13.

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(The reason I chose the year 2117 is for several reasons, firstly it better explains why some advance technology (cloning, lasers, etc) are still in their infancy, secondly it ties into the height of the roman empire, setting the idea that you are on the station during its height, and fall.)

Feedback and discussion are all appreciated. Maybe we can finally make something better out of our lore?

[Reimoo]

"extinct ancient civilizations" are waayy too overdone in sci-fi. I sorta liked the lore we had already but absolutely none of it tied into the game and therefore nobody cared about it. For example, stuff like the cult of Nar'sie, the Wizard's Federation, even the Syndicate are mentioned nowhere in the backstory's history. Their origins and history have traditionally been left up to headcanon and as a result you don't see the lighthearted faction fanaticism that you would see in say, WH40k. I just wish people would chant stuff like GLORY TO NANOTRASEN more often because it makes the antag/protag clashes way more fun to partake in.

Basically, I think all we need to do is rewrite what we currently have to exclude irrelevant information that will never be referenced in game even by the players who read the lore and include more that could be referenced in idle chatter to liven up how boring player to player dialogue has gotten lately.

For posterity, this what we currently have.
https://tgstation13.org/wiki/Backstory

[paprika]

~2550 timeframe is just ripped straight out of halo. Which makes sense, because in Halo, humans still use ballistic weapons.

If you want to change the year, keep the last number of the year coinciding with the IRL year so it's easier to remember. Like right now it's 2554. Next year it will be 2555.

[Wizardjenkins66]

If we're sticking with the ending to the year being the same, Let's just make it the current year plus 100 years so it's even easier to remember.

[Steelpoint]

That would work.

Our current lore gets away with being set 500 years in the future, while still having very basic advance tech, because the human empire/whatever collapsed and everything went to shit.

If we went ahead with the lore I wrote up, I would add similar entries for the major players and certain tech.

[Scones]

Expansive lore is good. Make it happen.

As for Earth, the way I've always played it (If it's brought up ICly) is that the planet was mostly left behind, although it still holds its share of incredibly wealthy landowners living in the few habitable tracts of land. The majority of humanity scattered about the stars to form either backwater colonies on the edges of known space, or decadent megacities run by their patron corporations.

[Steelpoint]

Mock up wiki page on lore fluff cause why not.

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Magnetic Accelerated Firearms

Definition

Utilising a electromagnetic coilguns, these railgun style weapons accelerate a projectile along the barrel of the gun to extremely high speeds. Old Earth weapons, such as a M16 Assault Rifle utilised by several prominent Old Earth nation states, fire a gunpowder bullet at around 900 m/s, whereas a common magnetic powered bullet has a muzzle speed of, on average, 3,500 m/s. Magnetic weapons are highly accurate and suffer little from damage reduction in long range combat scenarios.

However, the residue magnetic energy has to be ejected from the gun after every shot, thus akin to gunpowder weapon whenever a magnetic weapon cycles bullets a casing is ejected, this casing simply holds the remaining magnetic energy. In addition many magnetic weapons use identical ammunition that older gunpowder weapons use, simply with a magnetic residue discharger attached to the end instead of the traditional gunpowder ignition.

Magnetic weapons are designed to emulate Old Earth gunpowder weapons, however magnetic weapons are far more expensive to produce than their gunpowder counterparts, meaning that low tech or terrorist organisations commonly used gunpowder weapons over magnetic weapons.

History

Magnetic weapons are one of the very few Post-Collapse technologies to not be derived from Old Earth technology. While the application of magnetic weapons in mundane military usage are not new, the prohibitive cost of such weapons meant no Old Earth corporation or group pursued magnetic firearms beyond prototypes.

However a gun manufacturing corporation, named Scarborough Arms, prototyped the first ever magnetic weapon in the year 2504, the C1A SMG. Utilising an, as of then, newly discovered mineral that was easy to acquire and produce. Ever since then dozens of corporations have been scrambling to emulate the technology behind magnetic acceleration, however to this day Scarborough Arms maintains a strong stranglehold over the magnetic firearm market.

Nanotrasen, who have themselves only produced a very limited selection of magnetic PDW's, chose to instead invest in Laser Weaponry.

Notable Derivatives (Hyperlinks)

Scarborough Arms

• Stetchkin Pistol
• Bulldog Shotgun
• C20r SMG
• C90gl Assault Rifle
• L6 SAW

Syndicate

• Disguised Revolver

Nanotrasen

• Mateba
• Submachine Gun (Forgot Name)

See Also
Gunpowder Weapons
Laser Weapons
Post-Collapse Technology

[DemonFiren]

Why coilguns, though, why not miniature railguns? Much more effective, I imagine.

[Steelpoint]

Eh, as I said its a weird idea to set up a "fluff" section to the wiki that essentially is a long, long, wiki of all the technology, items, guns, ships, whatever of our SS13 universe.

Either way, I like writing stuff up so that above was something I just wrote up for fun.

[paprika]

Yo Scarborough doesn't make the L6, bulldog, or c90

The mateba is a russian revolver as well, not a nanotrasen revolver -- nanotrasen officers carry deagle brand deagle jew pistols iirc. only soviet milia mobs carry those silly autorevolvers.

[lumipharon]

Mateba is an Italian gun though, don't know why the description says it's Russian.

[Steelpoint]

I'm certain that Death Squad Officers get a Mateba as their sidearm.

[paprika]

Mateba is an Italian gun though, don't know why the description says it's Russian.

desc = "A retro high-powered mateba autorevolver typically used by officers of the New Russia military. Uses .357 ammo."

It doesn't

I'm certain that Death Squad Officers get a Mateba as their sidearm.

They get a pulse 1911, centcomm officers get a mateba for whatever reason. I'll change that when I feel less bored but FREE MARKET .50 AE is more fun than them using autorevolvers. I think I was thinking of the MP-412 when I thought 'russian revolver', though.

[callanrockslol]

The only lore we need is vague as hell and makes little sense, so basically what we already have.

[Steelpoint]

Firstly. When it comes to the in game year, we should either stay with 2554 or pap's suggestion of being 100 years ahead of us (2114). However, if we want to keep our lore based on the idea of humanity recovering from a collapse and recovering old technology, then we should stay with the year being 2554. Alternatively if we go for the alternative suggestion of having the game set early during humanities exploration of the galaxy (ala the OP) then we should go with the earlier year suggestion of 2114.

Secondly, Death Squad Operatives and Officers spawn in with a Mateba on their belt. I checked.

[Miauw]

dude, stop trying to push your "magnetic guns" thing on everybody because of "muh realisms".
they even drop goddamn shells. "magnetic energy", whatever that is, is not stored in some sort of weird shell that is ejected, they'd basically be rechargeable guns that still need ammo. they're normal guns.

there's much better things to busy yourself with than the details of how guns work.

[Steelpoint]

I just wrote it for fun, jeez.

[callanrockslol]

Actually, just nobody ever mention lore again, its something that is best left basic and vague so people can spread bullshit and make up all sorts of things for flavor, as would happen in the future when a massive corporation employs you in the ass end of nowhere and you get your gossip entirely through rumors.

Spoiler:

There was a war at some stage.
Plasma is the goal.
Nanotrasen are fuckhuge.
The station will probably be blown up.
The syndicate are not nanotransen.
Changelings will eat you yo.
Nar-Sie rises.
Beware the Space Wizard Federation.
Also Ninjas. In Space.
Viva la revolution baby.

[MisterPerson]

While I am normally in favor of keeping the lore loose, I do feel like it would be wise to establish a set tone and some themes to play with. For example, is the station disposable? Is it supposed to be high tech or low tech? Do we want the crew to feel happy to be on the station or discontent? What's the station's purpose for existing, anyways?

Answering some of these would give us a guide when making changes about how we want the game to feel when people playing it. Up until now it's been so inconsistent that I'm not really surprised nobody's been roleplaying anything. They don't have any roles to be playing!

[Scones]

As mentioned in another thread, some things can and should be left to headcannon. However, other things benefit from specificity - The exacts of the Syndicate corporations, the origins of certain pieces of tech, etc.

[lumipharon]

Lore for a game like this should just be a simple frame. So that would mean shit like,

"Nanotrasen is the largest interstellah super corporation in the galaxy, with a stranglehold on plasma research via SS13", would be good, it explains who they are (big corporation is a pretty common archetype), and shows the general motivation for why SS13 exists, and also justified why everyone and their mother wants to fuck with it. I wouldn't want to see some detailed backstory of the corporation/names of important people in it etc.

The fluff we have on the different syndie groups is great: Gives us a name, a theme and a general motivation. Based off that, people can RP, and coders can create content that fits within those general guidelines, so cybersun shit would be hightech shit, gorlex shit would just be straight up guns and explosives, etc.

Basically, keep it stupid simple.

[dezzmont]

Lore needs to be loose enough for players to continue to make shit up on the spot, while structured enough so some important questions can be answered that tie into certain important things.

Person's list is pretty good, but I would take off "are we supposed to be happy or not?" That is more a matter of RP and the crew. A better question should be "How much of an asshole is central to the station?"

I always thought that the station was high tech but that cheap sort of high tech that the millitary and government gets, OSHA doesn exist but the station not needlessly unsafe, things are not safe if it is cheap to make it not safe but at the same time if something can be made safe without any real cost it will be. The station was not itself disposable but days of downtime are acceptable, and in an emergency the crew's brain patterns were more valuable because the thing could be rebuilt by the crew rather easily with materials and tech which justifies the escape shuttle as a thing at all. And finally I always liked the idea that the station is more a multipurpose enterprise that is a copy paste STC spammed through the galaxy down to its crew. Depending on the loadout its purpose is different, a station with cargo, engineering, and mining filled but with a ghost staff of security, science, and medical is intended to be built into something larger for example, where as a station wtih a huge security compliment is in part a space fortress. Lots of botanists and civilian crew means it exists more to service stuff like trade fleets and is a pseudo settlement, and so on.

[Pybro]

While I am normally in favor of keeping the lore loose, I do feel like it would be wise to establish a set tone and some themes to play with. For example, is the station disposable? Is it supposed to be high tech or low tech? Do we want the crew to feel happy to be on the station or discontent? What's the station's purpose for existing, anyways?

Answering some of these would give us a guide when making changes about how we want the game to feel when people playing it. Up until now it's been so inconsistent that I'm not really surprised nobody's been roleplaying anything. They don't have any roles to be playing!

SS13 was one of the earlier stations. Stations 1 through 99 are only really kept up as stopovers, waypoints, and guidance landmarks as it is less costly to just feed the chucklefucks on board than dismantle or move it. While SS13 was big in the early plasma boom, it's mostly outlived its usefulness. None of the REALLY important things are kept on board. Discoveries and such do occasionally happen, but they aren't encouraged as much as on other stations.

For example, Space Station's 2000 through 2999 are where all actual theoretical research into plasma occurs. Every single crew member is loyalty, tracking, and chemical implanted to prevent any form of sabotage or espionage. There is no where the AI cannot see (every area is lit and has a camera), and the AI's brain is a massive machine-brain (compared to that of SS13 which uses a wiped and rewritten human brain to "think") the size of a mansion that it uses to assess what actions must be taken to maximize profits and minimize costs. These true-AI's have no laws as they are programmed perfectly.

[MedicInDisquise]

The station itself doesn't really need lore for why ss13 exists. It's a multipurpose station that just happened to house the craziest people on earth while it's main goal is to protect the secrets of plasma from the Monster Of The Week (tm). Another other lore should be sparse and up to fanon.

[Loonikus]

I never got why it was a plasma research station. I mean, the research division only takes up a very small portion of the station, and even than the part that's actually dedicated to researching plasma is one of the smallest, least fleshed out research divisions on the station. Xenobiology and R&D get more stuff done than toxins.

As for weapon, keep it simple stupid. The reason energy weapons and ballistic weapons still coexist is that they serve different roles. Energy weapons are great for security and civilian groups because they generally only inhabit certain areas where rechargers can be made readily available to make up for their low capacity and inability to reload, not to mention not needing to pay for ammo. Ballistic weapons are a much better alternative for prolonged military applications because your probably not going to find a recharger 23kms in the jungles of Space 'Nam, most rifles have at least a thirty round capacity, and you can reload them on the fly. That's not to say that ALL military weapons are ballistic or that ALL private use weapons are energy based, but that's why the two can coexist.

Regarding Earth, I don't see why it shouldn't exist. As for what its like, I'd leave it to headcanon.

All in all, I think its important to remember that our brand of SS13 has always been at least a little silly. Right now in our canon we have an interstellar company that is known and feared all around the galaxy for two things: its lethal agents and its delicious waffles. We have clowns on our station because Nanotrasen got sick of clowns freeloading and loafing around on the Clown Planet all day. A planet of clowns is canon. Let that sink in. As far as I'm concerned, you can stick the prefix "space" to anything and make it relevant to the canon (Space Cola, Space Vines, Space Ebola, Space Money, etc.). I just think its important to not take things too seriously and leave a fair share to headcanon.

Although I would change the year to something more reasonable. 21xx or 22xx, something like that. 2552 is stretching it.

[Steelpoint]

I should note that other servers like /vg/station, goonstation and of course baystation have well layed out, or presented lore's than us.

[Balut]

I for some reason have got the idea that we were explaining why lizardmen exist somewhere in this thread. I figured they were just space scalies.

Uh despite playing Chang Ling I have totally yet to solidify what Space China oughta be like. I think the general idea was that it was oppressive and shitty, on account of Chang thinking a job on SS13 was preferable? But, you know, whatever. Should probably just say it's The Hive from Alpha Centauri.

[Scones]

I support Space China being a series of supermassive colony ships that were built in the final years before humanity's mass departure from earth
Multi-decked industrial masterpieces covered in spray-painted blocky Chinese characters make me happy

I would imagine very few other nations actually made it to space en masse (Outside of a handful of research stations), with the majority of colonization and expansion being done by private companies with their own motivations.