BSG (the show) vs Orion

Intro

This is meant as a page for new players who want to come onto the game and need some very basic information about how best to get started and get relevant history. This game is well beyond 900 days into play as of August 2017 and there is a lot of history. There are other pages on the wiki that can be used to explain topics more in depth, and as always people are always welcome to ask on channel. This covers the primary differences and what people need to know when considering apps. It also functions well as a survival guide for players old and new.

Main Points (The Story So Far)

  • The Wars: The First Cylon War was set before the BSG miniseries by 40 years. The Second Cylon War has already been fought and won ICly. It took roughly 18 months and was a guerrilla style engagement of hit and run tactics by the Orion Battlegroup and a supporting group built around several battleships known as the Baker Bay-Class Superdreadnaught. During the opening strikes the Cylons and Skinjobs completely nuked-out Gemenon, Tauron, Virgon (the planet actually broke apart), Sagittaron, and Canceron. Scorpia is considered a total loss due to the fall-out of the deobiting and impact of the Colonial Shipyards and debris. NOTE: Staff does not recommend attempting to create a PC from these locations as the PC would have to be fairly old and have quite a tricky background.
  • The Second Cylon War: The Second War opened much like the miniseries did, but the Cylons clearly intended to take some of the Colonies intact. The Orion had been setting up a military reserve on a potential new colony called Piraeus. After spending a few months in deep recon, the Orion Battlegroup began hitting targets and focusing efforts on Picon. Picon was the first colony to be liberated from under Cylon thumb. It became the headquarters for a mountain bunker command center called Site Anvil and commanded all active resistance forces on the Colonies, taking their orders from Orion. From here the Orion began hitting targets across the Colonies while it came out that the skinjobs were not in-fact Cylons, but were synthetic humans from an unknown past with ties to Piraeus, and made slaves by Model One. Over many months this realization spread across the skinjob Lines and they coordinated with the Orion for a massive revolt to coincide with a deep strike to the known Cylon homeworlds. This operation, dubbed 'Blue Axe', decimated Cylon logistical and warfighting capability. The Battle of Twin Rocks destroyed their ability to make war and it was immediately followed by The Battle of Bottleneck Nebula, the latter of which destroyed a large portion of the Cylon fleet in a bushwhack ambush as the enemy forces responded to Twin Rocks. This also resulted in massive casualties to the Air Wing, leaving only sixty wing officers fighting with the fleet. They eventually became known as The Sixty, a legacy name and honorific afforded to them. The Second War ended with the attacks on Caprica stepping up and a sudden reinforcement of Cylons attempting to land massive numbers of Centurions to force a decision point. When the Arpay arrived and began ripping the Cylons apart, the Cylons proposed an immediate cease fire.
  • The OOC Leap (READ): After the end of the Second Cylon War, the game made an OOC leap of 22 years. In the wiki, this is often referred to as "The Leap" and is not to be confused with the a recent IC leap in time caused by an incident near the galactic core (a supermassive black hole). In the time of the OOC leap a lot happened with society and the Colonial rebuilding. The linked page provides a lot of insight into post-war life and what it was like growing up on the Colonies. The game played out for approximately three months on this field. In this time the Orion and an Arpay Carrier Strike Group were supposedly 'on maneuvers' and conducting training according to official fleet press. In reality, they were assisting the Arpay in invading Skath worlds and delivering one important message: The Erfriki are back. How that played out on those worlds remains to be seen.
  • Charlie Foxtrot (READ): The term 'Charlie Fox' is a military euphemism for 'clusterfrak.' This happened on MD #098 (July 15th, 2017). The Orion was just finishing up operations on a planet called Calumet, ripping apart an early Skath occupation, when they were trading out support forces and disaster struck. The Orion Battlegroup was heading back to the Colonies for a three week R&R stint at Piraeus and transiting a wormhole. At the same moment, bombs went off in the Engineering sections of each ship and the wormhole collapsed mid-way, dumping the Battlegroup near the Galactic Core. In and of itself, this is bad. But because of the relationship of time and gravity, approximately one year passed on the Colonies for every hour the Battlegroup spent in the Core. During a heavy engagement with the Skath there, and due to bomb damage, the Orion group lost three ships, a lot of fighters, and 20.5 years. When the Orion finally made it back to the Colonies they found that the Skath had invaded more than 17 years ago and taken the Colonies, badly nuking Caprica in the process. The fledgling, rebuilt Colonial fleet had been decimated and a recon flown to Arpay discovered that The Rally Point was a nuclear wasteland except for their orbital station, which has been building Colony ships, to unknown purpose, and controlled by the Skath. After recons were completed, the Cylons were met-with and discovered the Skath had decimated them as well, whittling them down to just more than a dozen basestars and no logistical ability. The decision was made to evacuate everyone they could off of Piraeus and then depart the Colonies to search for a new home.
  • The Arpay: After an ancient command bunker was found on Piraeus, a device was discovered that detailed greater galactic history. Part of that was that there was a much greater looming AI threat out there, referred to only as 'The Machines' by the device. Further investigation revealed that there was a planet at the edge of the galaxy known as The Rally Point. Rally Point was the location of where humanity could find refuge and evacuation out of the galaxy and to a different part of the local galactic cluster to settle and call home. In a move of desperation for a game-changer in the Second War, the battlegroup modified a science ship called the Erol and attempted the longest FTL jump in Colonial History. A small team discovered this group of highly advanced and evolved humans, called the 'Arpay' and they welcomed the Colonials. After some diplomatic engagement, and a realization that the Colonials could be descendants of a human race called The Erfriki, the Arpay agreed to join the war against the Cylons. After the War, the Arpay became regular figures with the Colonials but were prohibited from becoming Colonial citizens, and were barred from long-term Colonial military service or political discourse due to Arpay Law. Doctor Becks Jimenez is a staff NPC aboard the Orion, serving as a civilian trauma surgeon and is a retired Vice Admiral of the Arpay Combat Medical Command. NOTE: Arpay PC's are restricted concepts and not available for application.
  • The Erfriki: This is a very old branch of humanity that was discovered by the Arpay many millenia ago. They were immediate and highly valued allies of the Arpay in the on-going war against the Skath. They had fairly low technological capabilities but their tenacity and indomitable spirit became a story of legends that spread across the galaxy and even reached the planets deep behind Skath lines, spreading through whispers and tales told around the fire. It has been said that while the Skath/Machines hate the Arpay, the only thing they feared were the Erfriki. The very name inspired ideas of revolt and resistance against the Skath rule. When it became apparent that the Erfriki had moved beyond simply being shock and assault troops of the Arpay, and built their own fleets, the Skath dropped everything to hunt them down and wiped out their home world — which is now a major Skath naval anchorage. According to the legends, only three evacuation ships made it out of Erfrik. One went to Kobol, one went to Piraeus (known then as Ys'ral), and the other got to the Rally Point and was evacuated to another galaxy. …Of course, this is all according to legend. No evidence of this has been able to be proven except for anecdotal and apparent comparisons of ancient DNA to current Colonial. Some believe it is all true. Some believe its a complete fabrication. Many are somewhere in between.
  • The Lines, aka Skinjobs: Early on it was believed that the Lines were merely creations of the Cylons. This is not the case. The Lines were initially created on Piraeus long before the Colonies were even settled. The Twelve Lines were created as composites of hundreds of thousands of human volunteers and made to represent the best qualities of humanity. Their purpose was to travel into the stars and explore for the Ys'rali people and also serve as their scouts against the nigh-forgotten Skath threat, living out one full life — resurrection was never intended. However something happened along the way. When the Skath finally landed on Piraeus, the Lines fought to the bitter end of the fall of Ys'ral. The Lines disappeared for thousands of years and then, according to the Cylons, Model One showed up on their galactic doorstep one day with an idea: Help him take down the Colonies or he would make sure the Cylons had no choice but to go back to war and win. With the Cylons' hands forced, they relented. Brainwashed of their history, the rest of the Lines (save for Model Three) were awoken and set to task with infiltration and destruction of the Colonies. Understandably, not everyone believes all of this ICly and are understandably wary of the Cylons. Today, due to their rebellion against their own enslavement by One, the Lines are afforded all rights to serve with the fleet but total numbers allowed to exist, across all Lines, was stopped at 75,000. The Lines, in whole, gave up resurrection three years after the end of the war and suddenly began having children, something that current science cannot explain. Their children, while potentially dealing with the racism of being a mix of human and synthetic, are otherwise normal people. The Fleet currently has two resurrection ships in accompaniment but neither are strictly operational. Yet.
  • The Skath/Machines: The term 'Skath' is an old Erfriki word for destructive insects and pests, and how the Colonials call The Machines. According to Arpay history, the Skath originated on either the same world as humanity, or one connected to it, somewhere near the Galactic Core tens of thousands of years ago. History is so vast and so much it lost, that not even the Arpay could pinpoint any one Skath world that they could identify as a homeworld. Similar to Cylons, these are sentient machines that appear to operate as individuals but without real, defining individual qualities. They share a similar design and construction to Cylons, but with a few marked differences. These differences inclusion of flamethrowers on most models, as well as being more heavily armored and standing a full head taller than the Cylons (Skath are about 9.5 feet tall). They are also painted jet black and rather than having a single red scanning light like Cylons, they have a triple ocular setup of three green vision devices that visibly glow even at night. The estimated size of the Skath fleet is approximately 200,000 capital ships of varying size and according to the Arpay they have explored and lay claim to around one third of the galaxy. One important note is that their designs for both air defense systems and Raiders (standard and heavy) were introduced to the Cylons by Model One when he came to them about going to war with the Colonials. These Skath designs are older than Arpay knowledge of the Erfriki.
  • Skath-Occupied Worlds: When the Skath find a human populated world, they make a simple calculation based on resource cost. If it will cost them more resources to capture a world and then see a net 'profit' to what they can regain, versus just nuking it, then they will wipe the planet. This simple economics to them. However, they choose to nuke only about one quarter of the time. When the Skath land and take over a planet, their occupations are rolling and imposed as they take over an area. They depose all political classes and install loyal subjects into positions of provincial leadership much like kings and vassals. Most of the people are forced to mine natural resources or work agrarian jobs to support the mining operations, which feed the Skath war machine. Technology is destroyed and outlawed and the population is reduced to roughly fourteenth century European Earth. The Church is installed whereby the population is forced to recognize and worship the Skath as saviors of humanity, preventing itself from self-destruction via technology. Sitting in on these services, run by loyal subjects with particular and learned skills, speak hypnotically and eventually brainwash those who spend more than a few services forced to listen. In these places, the Skath have divided the population insidiously via The Church. It not only imposes the belief that the loyal should rule and given power by the Skath, but also that women never should have been granted rights, effectively forcing the population back into a patriarchal set of societies where women suffer immeasurably as property and without rights, unable to even travel far without a male in accompaniment (known as a 'pater'). In many of these locations women whisper about what life used to be like while men have it all now. Understandably, the Colonial Fleet does not look kindly on the Skath designs for human society.
  • The Clerics: Possibly the only thing more feared than the Skath are their Clerics. The Clerics are Lines (read: Skinjobs) that seem to have no compassion for humanity. Even the biggest, baddest hombre in a province is terrified of getting on the wrong side of a Cleric. They are readily identifiable as wearing crimson red robes typically. However, their power is derived from one important point: Their projection. The Clerics have weaponized projection with the ability to overwrite minds and memories, installing whatever they want or even implanting subtle cues for the victim to perform a certain action without the victim ever knowing until it was too late. They can wipe and install a new mind in as little as thirty seconds. Current orders from the Colonial Fleet are to avoid contact with them at all cost and to never let a Cleric within twenty feet of a crew member. And because they are identical to the Lines serving on the Orion, extra security precautions have to be taken.

Minor Points

  • Air Wing: The Air Wing uses two non-canonical but Colonial-produced aircraft. The Predator and the Rhino, both using ECO's and both can be flown by Viper or Raptor pilots. The Predator is a low-altitude strike aircraft designed for high speed and maximum ordnance delivery. They are best suited towards taking our air defenses or conducting close air support of Marines. The Rhino is a very heavy ground assault aircraft designed to not just put Marines on the ground, but also offer fire support via a large number of manned guns and rockets. NOTE: There are Arpay fighters and ships as well, but are not pertinent or need-to-know for coming onto the game. Their primary fighters are known as 'Hornets.'
  • FTL & Wormhole: The fleet uses the standard FTL system for shorter jumps. The Arpay shared their technology to provide the Orion and its largest ships with a wormhole drive that allows them to travel much more vast distances. The drives can be used to cross the entire width of the galaxy in two hours and, like FTLs, cannot be tracked. However, an FTL is required for wormholes. The wormhole functions as creating an entrance and then an FTL is used to precision jump into the center of the entrance. This allows the ship to travel down the center of the wormhole without bouncing off the sides and exploding. This is a term known as being 'In the lane.'
  • The Orion: The Orion has been extensively upgraded from its original roots as a Mercury-Class Battlestar. The Orion has become something of a mixture of a battleship and carrier after the upgrades were completed, to include a wormhole drive, additional storage, and a host of other capabilities.
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