As a child of the 70's, I watched and liked the Buck Rogers tv show. But a part that always bugged me was the mutants in the vast wasteland of America; the pilot movie shows them living like animals in the ruins of "Old Chicago", hunting Buck before they're gunned down by the Earth Defense Directorate. The show kinda retconned them away, but I always imagined a world where you had a mutant civilization in the wasteland but humanity had rebuilt their own cities and reached the stars. Today, a bunch of ideas slid together and here is the result.

We keep the man out of time, but in this scenario he's testing a new drive system for nasa. But an accident has him thrust at near light-speed. When he gets control, he's picked up by an Earth defense craft, who think he's some sort of drone. He discovers humanity had their last war 500 years ago, and now they live in protected arcologies and are now space-fairing. When he inquiries about the rest of the world, he's told it's basically wasteland. He's also told about an alien species that has been attempting to colonize Earth.

Our hero ends up helping the Earth Defense forces, but something seemed off to him. And anytime he suggested expeditions into the wasteland he was quickly shot down because of the danger of radiation and infection. But, as fate would have it, he ends up in the Wasteland, as an encounter with one of the alien ships causes his ship to crash.

He's quickly surprised that there isn't just life in the wasteland, there are PEOPLE. Sure, mutants, but still people. Surprisingly, he quickly finds his 21st century mindset makes it easier to deal with the mutants. And then after several adventures, he meets 2 leaders of the wasteland: an exiled human from one of their Arcologies; and a member of the supposed alien invaders.

He learns the real story of the war: the humans he'd been working with were the descendants of the people who rode out thr war and it's aftermath in vast shelters, while the mutants were the people who suffered on the surface. When the shelter humans came out, they had advanced technology and quickly walled themselves from their mutant cousins. They occasionally would perform strikes on settlements to keep them away from the Arcologies and starports. The Aliens discovered this situation and offered to help the mutant population, but the humans saw this as a threat to their claim to Earth, and restricted them. But the alien's culture encourages them to help those in need, so they continue to send aid ships, designed to drop supplies after being shot down!

That's about where the idea fades. I'd assume he helps to unite both humans and mutants. I imagine the humans and mutants, sitting across the table from each other, the hero and aliens between them, negotiating a peace.

But, that's all my morning brain came up with!

I’m writing a comic series set hundreds of years in the future where humans have been traveling at near-light speeds for a couple hundred years, meaning that about a thousand years have passed for everyone else.

I’m not so concerned about the plausibility or realism, it’s a story with aliens and stuff. What I am having trouble with, is more on the writing side of things.

How do I explain it to people who don’t know what it is in an easy to understand way that doesn’t detract from the story? I don’t want to spend a long time explaining it to where it feels like the whole plot, but I also don’t want to leave people confused about what’s going on.

Any ideas, or books I could read for inspiration that explain it well?

What would humanity look like socially, politically, and economically as a type 1, 2, and 3 civilization on the Kardashev scale? What about Alien civilizations seen in popular works of science fiction? How would they fit into the scale? If they ran into humans would they be willing to help us go even further or would we be seen as too primitive?

I write this with the intent that it be used by others should you wish. I call it Sun Surfing. This is intended as a one way transportation mechanism, unless you find another Sun. The beginning is slower than light as you fly towards the sun. The material constructed by the ship conducts heat, and will store the Sun’s energy. I’m once you have stored enough energy, and are pointing in the correct direction, the ship automatically thrusts itself towards the under fed destination.

The passengers must ingest a liquid so their lungs and organs do not become squished due to the FTL acceleration. For an example of breathing using a liquid medium, see The Abyss.

The tricky part is what of your destination is on the other side of the Sun? Then you have to try to ride the Sun’s orbit, which can get tricky :)

So, first I am curious of what are you guys choice for mc career and why is it matter or is it relevant to plot in anyway? I just wanna what is the reason y'all chose [job] for?

Mine is AI psychologist, because their family want them to inherit their hospital business but they never intended to be doctor or work in any medical field, they just kinda go study about clinical and psychiatric for the sake of their parents' expectations but they eventually quit as they find interactions with other human bothersome and unbearable and decided to move on and eventually cut ties from family and live on as freelance programmer (which is what they actually have passion) but at one point of time when they have met and discussed with sentient AI and sapient androids, they are fascinated by dissimilarity and openness of those who viewed the world differently from that of human, a mind who they completely didn't understand, a mind that they could explore without a burden of expectation and a anticipation and finally, they could find a being whom they could enjoy study, the alienated mind of pure digital intelligence and sapient alien. Eventually become the lead researcher of humanity in term of things that so utter different from human understanding. This reputation is what lead them to become one of four human representatives who was sent to study the Super Intelligence that threatening humanity for there is no human who are so willingly throw themselves into eldritch being and cosmic entity just to comprehend and converse with it as much as they are.

(P.S. for more context of why I use neutral pronoun that because I intended he/she here to have dubious gender and identity.)

Hello all! I am currently writing a sci-fi setting, mostly to entertain myself and to try and keep the hyper fixation urge under control. I was looking for some feedback, critiques, advice, and really any sort of take on my setting so far. I also have some limited art pieces related to this setting, but I am as of now not sure how "canon" I want them to be so I will refrain from posting. Huge text wall incoming!

An unknown amount of time prior to the current date, there existed a precursor race which I intend to elaborate on as little as possible to bring a sense of mystique and scale(think Tolkien's if you explain the misty city idea). They created a large system of gateways that can initiate faster than light travel through means that violate the laws of physics. This is how species like the Orr, Litthis, and Yverrim rose to their prominence. They are simply the most prevalent of hundreds of space faring species that make up the Council of Sentients, the ruling galactic body. This status quo was maintained for centuries, as species came and went. However, roughly 212 years prior to the current setting, humanity created something known as a Relativity Drive in their year of 2292. The relativity drive uses artificial mass generators and the laws of special relativity to have ships travel incredibly long distances over incredible periods of time, while protecting the crew in special "temporal chambers". Essentially, FTL Travel by using concentrated pockets of time dilation to cause the outside universe and protected areas in the ship experience almost no time at all, while the ship itself engages in conventional space travel. This has projected mankind into the preeminent position in the galactic community, giving them unprecedented power and status due to being the only species other than the Precursor race to produce FTL. The rate of mankind's technological development is exponential and completely outpaces other species, however not caught up to some of the most advanced species. The other alien species are relegated to paying extravagant prices for human FTL or taking the far inferior and bureaucratically governed FTL gates, which themselves have only fixed exit points. I'm sure you can imagine why an unbound, effectively unlimited ranged FTL is so powerful. As such, multiple human groups have developed simultaneously.

The United Colonies of Humanity can trace its history more than 400 years prior to the League of Nations, and the later United Nations. Controlling nearly 700 worlds, it is the premier human faction, leading in both political and scientific fields. They maintain a large fleet to protect trade routes, on which their economy depends, and attempt to keep the other 2 human factions in line, attempting to present a unified front to other groups who would see humanity repressed and the status quo of the galactic community upheld. This has become increasingly difficult, however, as the Charter's increasingly radical expansionism and the Corporate Alliance's independent political ties to other species challenge the idea that the UCH is the ultimate human authority. Their government is made up of 2 representatives from each planet, 1 representative from each nation of earth(a hold over from their days of the "UN"), and a military admiralty. The representatives have equal shares of power in theory, but in practice the interests of Earth herself are greatly overrepresented to the detriment of many outer planets. While presenting themselves as a moral and responsible republican government, the admiralty effectively has a gun to the head of the policy makers within the Congress. While the Congressional president legally has control over the armed forces, the Admiralty has the ability to override decisions made by the Congress in times of crisis, should it be deemed necessary. Ultimately, the fate of the UCH is in the air as they are seemingly a relic of an older time and unwilling to meet the new circumstances of galactic politics with the necessary change. They make use of a ratio of 2 combat-ready ships per billion citizens, giving them a fleet numbering 98,000. It is important to note however that not all combat ships are equal and the majority of the UCH fleet is made of picket ships and smaller classes of cruisers or destroyers.

The second human faction is the Charter of Mankind, based in the galactic Northwest. They are pseudo-religious fanatics believing in the inherent superiority of mankind, and are willing to subjugate the galaxy by diplomatic means when possible and military means when necessary. Alien species within their ranks who join willingly are treated as semi-equals, though faced with much societal discrimination, while subjugated species are as second class citizens or in some cases completely subservient labor castes. Holding about 300 worlds, though the majority being rural or harsh planets, they field the most decentralized military, making use of militant groups and independent militias sharing their views. Smaller, privately held navies or Charter-endorsed Privateers weaken independent worlds through extortionate prices to allow trade in, all the while importing subversive elements to stir up masses of humans towards supremacist ideals. Once sufficient political discourse has been initiated, the CoM will deploy large numbers of their military to establish peace on the planet, effectively holding the planetary government hostage until they join the CoM or until violent replacement of governance and forceful takeover. This asymmetrical status allows them plausible deniability towards events that would otherwise condemn most political entities to immense tariffs and economic warfare. While governmentally a representative democracy, only citizens are allowed to hold power in their government, effectively making it a government of the few for the few, reminiscent of the ancient city state of Athens.

The third and final major human faction is the Corporate Alliance, located near the galactic southwest. As soon as FTL became available to mankind, many of the largest corporations saw the value in the resources of vast space, and as such invested heavily in their independent, privately owned space programs. Dozens of corporations of various morals make up the alliance, split between Major and Minor Corporations. The Majors are as follows: Quisabia Corporation, Helox Trading Hegemony, Orus Mining Clan, Graveson and Sons, Mimbus Transportation, and Anderson Mechanized Solutions. Notable Minors are Lockheed Martin, Costco Intergalactic, and Pepsi Co. Space. Each has incredible and unprecedented influence over the galactic economy, with corporate owned planets and large military forces more familiar to nation-states rather than companies. Each corporation controls a fiefdom of various sizes, scaling from almost 50 worlds in the case of Quisabia, to a single planet in the case of The Hershey Trust Company. They operate as a council of mutual interest coalitions, operating and self governing independently from the Alliance as a whole but rallying to common causes determined by the Alliance Board Directorate. There is a strong “gentlemen’s agreement” between each company to not interfere with other's operations, save for instances of corporate warfare. The Alliance Board Directorate is the central authority of the Corporate Alliance, and membership in the alliance requires client companies to provide a standing force of at least 50,000 pre-equipped, pre-trained soldiers to be used at the discretion of the board, as well as 1/50th of their independently owned fleets. The remaining military-based assets of the corporations are able to be used completely independently of the Alliance’s authority. Inter-corporation warfare is not unheard of, as several wars have been fought between corporations over contract rights, technological development, aggressive takeovers, and asset acquisition. 

Anderson Mechanized Solutions is the premier military force within the Alliance, operating as the main standing force for the Corpos. Tracing their origins to an American robotics company prior to their exodus to space, they field the most advanced military technology within mankind, dedicating a significant measure of their resources to technological development and military applications. Their hardware is some of the most bleeding edge technology available to mankind. Their troops are separated into 3 categories: Contractors, Enlisted, and the legally nonexistent Fiduciary Blacks. Contractors are standard humans, hired out for terms of military employment, similar to modern military contractors. They are required to have a minimum of 10 years service experience and a minimum of type 2 combat augmentations. Their assigned uniforms use advanced AR headgear and interactive basic skeletal exosuits, along with any personal assets they wish to make use of. They enjoy high paying contracts and a large degree of autonomy to accomplish their tasks. Enlisted are the more conventional military held by AMS, made up of civilian volunteers. They are equipped with standard military uniforms involving basic AR headgear and squad-based artificial intelligence. Enlisted are, unlike the majority of armed forces in other megacorporations, not required to take loans to pay for their equipment, and are provided relatively comfortable living accommodations, compliments of AMS. This has led to a large and very loyal standing military force. They are also supported by very experimental automated infantry, with a single unit being assigned to each 10-man squad as a support unit. The Fiduciary Blacks are picked from the most promising Enlisted during Basic, who have the most promising military minds and intelligence. They are subsequently put through rigorous and intensive additional training, filtering out any who cannot meet the requirements, both physical and mental. They are then required to undergo muscular augmentation surgeries, skin enhancement, muscle and bone growth treatments, and many cybernetic additions. Their uniform consists of both a hard and a soft exoskeleton, complimenting full body ballistic armor and advanced sensor-suite helmets. They have 4 hard points mounted on their back that are completely customizable based on the requirements of the mission. Fission thrusters for mobility, directional energy shielding, missile pods, automated gun attachments, manipulator arms, interface arms, and more. Anderson taxation fleets are hired out to assist other political entities as long as their interests do not conflict with Alliance goals.

Quisabia Corporation was originally a Turkish-based pharmaceutical company before the Corporate Exodus. They established themselves as the most “moral” of the corporations, investing heavily into biomechanical development and eco-friendly production methods. As such, they are the crown jewel of the Corporate Alliance and exist as the diplomatic branch of the Alliance due to their high reputation. While comparably small in terms of military power, they are the hegemony over the least machine-appearing implants and almost all medicinal output for the Alliance. They also maintain a number of resort worlds to bring in tourist revenue, adding to their reputable nature. They employ contractors exclusively for individual combatants, but do own a navy to patrol and maintain their territory. They do employ a specialist group known as the Tepegǒz who operate as their equivalent of a super-soldier/enforcer. They are very physically impressive, being grown to sizes varying from 6.5 feet to 8 feet. They are equipped with a lightweight, durable alloy-plating environment suit, a soft exoskeleton, and numerous secretive augmentations kept hidden as a corporate secret. They have a fierce rivalry with AMS, often competing for political influence within the alliance, though no physical warfare has yet occurred due to economic M.A.D.

The Orr are a hexapodal-amphibian species resembling a cross between a starfish, a dog, and an eel. They do not have a conventional face, but rather have decentralized sensory organs spread across their body. They absorb nutrients through a series of small holes across each of their limbs, usually in liquid form dispersed in water. They own a series of planets terraformed to be mostly aquatic shallow oceanic biomes. Initially discovered by the UCH in 2438, believing their territory to be uninhabited, resource rich planets, the Orr were the first alien species humanity made contact with. They remain close allies to mankind, engaging in mutually beneficial trade, and operating as mankind’s guide through galactic politics. The Orr are a very colorful species, both physically and culturally. Mostly pastel colors, they have developed completely unique sections of colorful patterns across their body effectively serving as a fingerprint or unique identifying feature. While not militaristic in most senses, the Orr are quite loyal and have been known to join some human military navies as to not be separated from close friends. Orr can “choose” a companion to whom they are attached to for life. This functions for both close friendship and reproduction, as Orr are hermaphroditic in nature. Rare cases have been documented of Human-Orr bonding, but it is unclear what results may come of this due to its recency. Orr trade mostly in agricultural excess, found mostly in their cultivation of massive coral farms and algae sheets covering hexagonal sheets, sprawling across their planets in large patches. The shallow nature of their terraforming allows for easy growth and harvesting, and artificially perfect environments tuned to the means of which to capitalize on growth are maintained to maximize production. The Orr are almost universally beloved, save for the most hateful, spiteful groups in the galactic community. They are governed in individual “clans”, leading them toward a very decentralized ruling system closely resembling monarchies of humanity long past. Each clan operates independently of the others and is able to control territory and function as they see fit.

The Litthi, plural form of Litthis, are a species that proved the concept of the Boltzmann Brain- being almost entirely non-corporeal and existing only as electrical signals in highly conductive particles of the element neutronium, housed specifically within completely artificial constructs of unknown origin. They are the single most advanced species within the galaxy, operating the only 2 known Dyson Spheres(the satellite variety) within the galaxy. The Litthi are secretive about their own culture, history, technologies, and abilities, and were initially believed to be artificial intelligence until the UCH was informed otherwise by members of the Orr. The Litthi interact mostly through trade and diplomacy, exporting large amounts of raw energy and heavy elements made in the cores of their stars that would be otherwise too costly for most species to produce conventionally. Their goals are widely understood to be keeping other species and conflict out of their territory, and behaving as mediators, attempting to dissuade conflict and disagreement between large factions or species via mutually beneficial agreements or compromise. However benevolent they may claim to be, the Litthi generally only view issues on a macro scale and are quite devoid of emotion or understanding for smaller problems facing individuals or, more accurately, problems that do not impact them.

The Yverrim are a species of biomechanical carbon based life-forms that have long since shed their original forms for the benefits of complete physical control in synthetic bodies. They cannot be universally described, as they each have the ability to completely design their own appearance, however visual similarities are consistent among their kind. Such constants involve a grey-red color, preference for rounded shapes, and a heavy contrast between soft, flesh-like texture and hard, plastic-like texture. They exist in a post-scarcity society in which the majority of day to day tasks are handled by crude automated systems, allowing every member to live a luxurious lifestyle of comfort. They are the envy of most species, being seen as the ultimate goal to achieve for most, and a competitor at worst. They carry immense weight in galactic politics, being able to put immense weight behind their statements by leveraging their species’ biotechnical advancements and vast mechanical military. Each Yverri is able to pursue their goals to whichever ends they desire, should it not be detrimental to their society or possibly cause a galactic incident. Because they are able to so easily transfer their consciousness into mechanical constructs, they are able to “plug in” to their fleets, making the Yverrim Galactic Navy one of the most formidable. Any specific maneuver can be executed by an admiral personally at almost no risk to the individual. All these factors have coalesced into a massively egotistical society that has led to interactions with other species being purely transactional, meaning the Yverrim have no close allies within the galactic community.

The Frontier Colonies are the collective names for human or alien colonies which are rather cut off from the galaxy at large, with only a few settlements per planet. Originating from personal or community-funded settlement programs, they often use hereditary family heirloom "armor", which are shoddy pieces of metal welded and attached to old space suits. They are fiercely independent, seeing themselves as frontierspeople and pioneers, and are more than willing to take up arms to defend their homes. They have a strong, surprisingly unified identity with each other, and it is not unheard of that closely located Colonies coming to the aid of each other with shoddily modified settlement ships when necessary.

They’re inspired by Doc Smith’s Galactic Patrol.

The universe is pulpy, retrofuturistic. Originally I was using the term “Astroguard”, but I saw it somewhere recently in another setting and I got discouraged. Every conceivable name that sounds “cool” is taken.

I’m down to “Astro Patrol” and “Spaceguard” (all one word).

I don’t know, man, I may just say screw it and stick with Astroguard.

Edited to add: I remember where I saw it now. Of course it would’ve been Atomic Rockets

Does anybody have a clue how to estimate the habitable zone of an artificially lit, undersized mini-star orbiting a real star? I did my best but I want somebody to check my math and make sure I can actually fit a miniature Niven ring and eight terraformed but otherwise natural habitable bodies in its expanded habitable zone. The Developers did some extraordinary things in this star system, I'm just trying to make sure all the math on the Devs' shenanigans works out.

The body in question is called Gnosis Dei, it used to be a 70 Jovian mass brown dwarf, so about the size of 47 Ophiuchi C, but it's been artificially lit and for all it matters to the things in its orbit it is now a red dwarf. It is the right temperature and luminosity for a red dwarf, nothing else matters.

My questions regarding it are:

• EBLM J0555−57Ab is the smallest known red dwarf and has a mass of 88 ±4 Jovian masses but it actually has a smaller radius than 47 Ophiuchi C. Is it safe to assume Gnosis Dei would have a slightly smaller habitable zone than EBLM J0555-57Ab because it is less massive or should it be slightly larger because it has a larger radius? Spacecalcs.com spat out 0.02 to 0.02 AU or 3 billion to 3 billion meters as the ideal habitable zone for EBLM J0555-57Ab, so just under or just over 3 Gigameters for Gnosis Dei before factoring in the system's primary?
• It's also orbiting an F0V named Gnosis Zul at a distance of about 12 AU or 1.8 Terameters or slightly farther from its 1.6 solar mass primary as Saturn is from the sun. Gnosis Zul itself has an ideal habitable zone of 2.57-3.71AU or 385.5-556.5 Gigameters, so obviously it's WAY outside that, but it still adds some warmth. That's got to expand the outer limit of the habitable zone somewhat, right?
• Would how the ring is currently oriented towards Gnosis Zul give the ring seasons? The idea is Summer would be twice per Dei's orbit around Zul whenever Zul's light shines parallel to the atmosphere retaining walls and perpendicular to the ground and winter would be twice per Dei's orbit when Zul's light is blocked because it's shining perpendicular to the walls and parralel to the ground.
• I'd wanted to put the ring around Dei at a radius of 3,145,728km, does ~3.15Gm seem to you like it does to me like it'd be in the ideal habitable zone between the mini red dwarf itself and the extra warmth of the system primary star? For what it matters it has a thick atmosphere, 333KPa under 8.01m/s² gravity with 480km atmosphere retaining walls, that could contribute a greenhouse effect or be reflective and cool the ring, but it looks about right to me to be in the ideal habitable zone and not need either.
• I'd also wanted habitability in eight out of its hundreds of moon-planets, or whatever you call the bodies orbiting a planet-star or whatever it is you call Gnosis Dei. Is there any chance I've got room for all that in its expanded habitable zone? Remember this range is being expanded by heat sources like the orbiting body size in combination with the star system's youth, atmospheric mass and composition, tidal forces and more, so are 8 out of 200+ remaining moon-planets being in that expanded band believable? (Most were completely disassembled to make the ring.)
• Note: The ring orbits perpendicular to the plane the smaller bodies orbit Dei at and is only 1656km wide (1536km inside the walls) as to minimize the impact of its' and its "night panel" statites' shadows on the other bodies. (It still has nearly five dozen times the habitable area of the entire Earth. Also a 34 hour 35 minute 16 second rotation around Dei made of 32x 64 minute 51.1 second day/night cycles. And yes, the wildlife really moves to that rhythm.) Hopefully that's enough to not ruin all the smaller bodies.

In short, is my ring at a plausible distance from its planet-star, can I plausibly also fit eight habitable moon-planets around it and will the habitable moon-planets be adversely affected by its shadow?

So, long story short, for my project, I got an idea and went straight down the rabbit hole after few discussions on Reddit.

The plot is set in a future city where a central system continuously evaluates citizens’ stress, happiness, emotional stability, and behavior. That score affects where people are allowed to live, what services they can access, and how high they can move socially. The system was originally built to improve quality of life, but over time it started treating predictability, conformity, and emotional control as signs of being a “healthy” citizen.

The idea that came to me was roughly this:

“What if a game built around psychology and constant surveillance actually used psychological tests and player behavior measurements as mechanics, and the world reacted to them?”

I came to Reddit with that thought, and because the idea was still pretty broad, opinions were split pretty evenly between good/bad. That actually helped me see one thing very clearly: I need to be extremely careful with this, and it’s probably better not to make any specific psychological conclusions, diagnoses, advice, or direct claims about the player.

But.

A few people close to science and psychology joined the discussion and shared some really interesting ideas. The cool part is that after figuring out how some of this could work inside the game, the story and the world became much more detailed and solid.

And this is where it gets interesting.

When mental health becomes social conformity

The system is not completely wrong, but it is flawed.

On the surface, it sounds reasonable: take care of your mental health, the system raises your social class, and your quality of life improves.

I have found that psychology has things like:

• The Need for Closure Scale (NFCS) - a psychological questionnaire that measures a person’s desire for definite answers and their discomfort with ambiguity and uncertainty.
• Rituals. Rituals can decrease the neural response to performance failure: repeated and structured actions may reduce the brain’s internal response to mistakes, probably by increasing a sense of control and reducing uncertainty.

So in the end, besides everything else, like performed happiness, the system naturally rewards people who are predictable, stable, unwavering, and capable of following rules clearly without hesitation.

People who follow it live a much higher-quality life: private cars, better housing, cleaner districts, more access and comfort. But they must regularly perform system tests, their behavior is constantly evaluated, and they actually have less freedom and are more separated from each other.

Meanwhile, people living in the lower classes barely care how the system reads them anymore. They are surviving, but they are also much freer and closer to each other. They interact openly and don’t constantly worry that the system will punish them for it.

Mechanically, this would work through very simple tests.

One would measure simple reactions and movement: press Space when asked, click a target, keep the cursor inside a circle, things like that.

The second would ask questions like:

“Hesitation is a threat.”
“Rules are designed for a better life.”

And you choose yes or no.

At the same time, the player’s reaction time and behavior would be recorded, compared against established baseline values, and then used to build the player’s own baseline over time.

So through these tests, the player can choose whether to follow the system or resist it, and the story changes accordingly.

And if the player genuinely hesitates or stops to think, the system can notice that too - and react.

The part I find most interesting is that the system doesn’t really need to become openly evil. It can continue genuinely improving people’s material quality of life while slowly redefining psychological health as stability, perfromance of happiness, predictability, certainty, and obedience.

For the past 10 years I’ve been toying around with a sci-fi concept and I’m not sure if this is a good place to post but I finally nailed down some specifics and need some sort of advice on actually writing the dang thing.

I get really stuck on the worldbuilding and lore aspects and also get stuck on imagery and what I want to see vs how it would unfold in a book or story.

For background and understanding:

My world is an unnamed galaxy where humanity has resided for well over a century or two now. The gist of it is this

The Interstellar Authority is the main power and government of humanity now. Operating within 3 regions (Prime, Meridian, and Ridge) they are run by a Council made up of ministers of things like finance, infrastructure, science, and that sort of thing. They recently came out of a massive war that was started because the IA was exposed for having performed experiments on folks in a prison camp on one of the Meridian worlds.

The experiments involved augmenting the brain in a way that forced productivity at the expense of the body’s natural responses to stress and long periods without rest and nutrition — providing their brain with dopamine dumps, in essence. This process of course killed a lot of the prisoners but the ones who survived went on to have children who now had a mutation that allowed them to have heightened empathy and the ability to project feelings onto others.

The Prime Region is made up of Orpheum (The Political Seat of the Prime Region), Gorenvir, Azaran, and Maldorin. Meridian is made up of Crimson (Home of The Experiment), Oceania, and Thiridium. The Ridge Region is made up of Tenebren, Solaxa, Veratum, and Cyph. Prime & Meridian worlds have been largely developed and have a lot more going for them. The Ridge worlds are struggling. Tenebren recently underwent massive changes and had direct intervention from the IA due to corruption and embezzlement. Solaxa is home to the underbelly of Settled Space and known to most as a pirate refuge. Veratum is largely run by the Science Ministry as it is largely uninhabited. Cyph is where the next bit of intrigue lies.

The story in mind is that a descendant of a prisoner, with the mutation, is brought up by the government after having removed them from the parents. She’s trained to be a ruthless hunter and elite agent of the IA. The story begins with her waking up on her ship out near Cyph with no recollection of the past few days. Adrift in space she gets boarded by the Ridge Authority and can’t really explain why she’s there. Suddenly a call rings out from the planet below and they’re called away while she gets called back to the Prime region.

In going back she’s tasked with an investigation into missing cargo which turns out later to be a nuclear device called a Planet Killer. Her investigation brings her across all 3 regions hunting down the insurrectionist known as Blacktide. She hears stories on her journey that Blacktide was a hero for most of the working class and that he stood up for the common people and chose to work against IA because they exploit people, planets, and systems. She later learns that Blacktide led one of the most brutal campaigns during the recent war that ended with over 2,000 of his followers being wiped out. He lived in exile until coming back to finish the job and wipe out Orpheum.

Towards the end, Rayna finally reaches Blacktide and manages to get him at gunpoint before he can arm the PK. He turns around only to discover his missing sister who was ripped away from the family. She then experiences intense flashbacks that break her programming from IA and she remembers what she was doing near Cyph at the beginning of the story: she had found her IA file and read that her parents were part of the war and part of a “cult” called The Descendants that the IA wiped out with the last known location being Cyph.

\*\*\*

As a worldbuilder I’ve put a lot more thought into the long term for this concept. The IA at first tried to wipe out these Descendants because they posed a threat to the order and way of the universe with some people given powers that were deemed too dangerous. They genuinely believed they saved Rayna but when the IA began to notice her heightened sense of empathy they had to counteract it with selective amnesia targeting recent missions so she’d forget things. Eventually Rayna began to question things and tried to learn her history. All she knew was that she was an orphan saved by the IA and each time she got close to the truth she’d wake up confused.

At the end of this first iteration, she discovers the truth and unites with her brother who is a broken shadow and almost an opposite. He was older at the time IA swooped in and killed their parents but he thought they killed Rayna too and he took to vagrancy, bounty hunting, addiction, and eventually revenge to satisfy this black hole inside him. They both then at the start of the second iteration go their separate ways with Rayna uncovering the location of the Descendants outside Settled Space and Blacktide returning to his addiction.

They both have separate spiritual journeys before being brought together again. Rayna learning who she is while Blacktide comes back to warn them the IA has plans to come back and wipe them out for good after following Rayna. The third iteration is about this prolonged fight between the Descendants and the IA ultimately leading to Blacktide finally surrendering, having planted the Planet Killer onboard the IA ship now docked on Orpheum destroying the planet and wiping out IA for good. Rayna takes up the mantle on rebuilding and telling the story of her family.

There’s way more in the lore notes but I think this could evolve from lore to a somewhat cohesive story.

My story is currently "under review". Does that mean it is being actively considered for publication by the staff or is that no different from basically saying its been received?

I know with Analog things can take a long time, just unsure if this means anything

In the world I am imagining earth has colonised 10-30 star systems using enormous laser sail ships accelerated and decelerated by laser array powered by dyson swarms

However since acceleration and deceleration take a long time the wait times for passengers to get on a interstellar ship is about 2 to 4 years

Some of these colonies are 15+ ly out meaning their info and cargo they receive are from earth over 15 years ago

My question is can a interstellar government command from earth and rule over dozens of colonies in this regard for at least a moderately long period of time?

I don't need it to be stable as want the difficulity in managing this government to be part of the story

Usually, a warship is living crew that needs commands from commanders to operate, which is a burden on logistics. Now, lets say a warship is piloted by a single computer, no more huge logistical burden, or need for human limitations, what is most optimal shape for a warship/stellar attack object?

I want to come up with characters that are basically intelligent space vampires that feed on a verity of beings, but is there a way to do that through hard sci-fi or at least sci-fi that seems less goofy? How would them feeding on different aliens affect the vampires do you think?

Hello there. I'm in the middle of writing "meet the team" ahh short stories cycle in my universe (I thought it will be a good start before anything more meaningful). It's sci-fi, but many technologies in it rather create inconveniences and obstacles than opportunities (mostly to shape the warfare and civilian life in a way I like it, of course).

So. I got an idea for structurally simple short story to showcase air forces. Few strategic bombers with escort and AWACS making a bombing raid on enemy industrial clusters in the middle of a night inside some valley.

But after writing few scenes I understood that I have quite shitty understanding of [somewhat] modern aerial combat, and can't design a whole scenario in such way that it feels realistic/plausible, and as enticing as I would like it to be. So decided to ask ye, finest folk, for... ideas and thoughts, I guess, after my initial conventional research failed.

Anyway, here's the whole task:

First of all, very important thing — Stonehenge Complex technology. SC cuts communication and connection between planet surface and orbit almost completely with EW dome shell and aerosolic layer (or any other optical interference layer, still wasn't able to decide better option). Basically satellites, radars, lasers, even cameras from orbit can't reach surface with meaningful results, and so can't surface reach orbit. Aerosol is sprayed thickly on altitude 40,000-39,000m, somewhere covering also EW shell, EW shell layer is spheroid dome with radius 100,000m and max height 38,000m. Area of operations is securely covered with one of Stonehenges being quite nearby (we can't destroy it on this run, far too sturdy target).

We don't have missiles, it's bombs-only run (shortly, such are universe rules, no missiles allowed, except space torpedos). But otherwise we have all modern and advanced technologies, and we also supported by AWACS. Communications are laser-only and between squad members only, using said AWACS as proxy.

City was fully evacuated in the start of war on the planet, it has ideal blackout, visually we see just stars and darkness, and enemy industrial facilities also has working hours set to cool off the equipment inside, to minimise temperature signatures. We have two target clusters — first one has targets scattered, second one has targets quite concentrated, though the valley width (and area of operations) don't change. Further ahead we have our spy aircraft that mainly needed to spot nearby (ETA around 5-8 minutes after take off) airbase activity. Maybe it can flash some active radars and transfer the info to main squad, but then it will happen right before the hatches will open.

It would be good to make it as stealthy as possible before bombs will touch the targets, or at least minimise the time between point where we are noticed (enemy has really, really good EW and radars in and around valley) and point where first bombs hit targets. And to make it precise, if possible. But of course, objective minimum is to destroy "as many targets as possible" and safely return, so if ideal execution isn't an option, "good enough is an option".

Choice of exact armaments and their specs is open, but as I said, it's mainly bombs, maybe also laser machineguns.

We have AWACS and four strategic jet bombers + 6 escort fighters (fighters also capable of carrying bombs, of course, but carrying capacity is far smaller than strategic bombers, duh), they are orbit-to-surface, so basically don't have maximum altitude, but armaments do have restraints, I believe. Target area is around 320km behind enemy lines.

Our escorts won't be able to beat up the air base forces, of course, only cover bombers for a while.

Enemy AA is mainly... laser Bofors (I feel a bit awkward saying it) and specialized railcannons (sic!) with cluster flechette munitions. Operators are cybernetically enhanced to counter extreme speeds aircrafts can achieve.

How do we do this?

Ready to clarify anything 🫡

I've recently started planning for a passion project I shelved years ago. So far I've come up with a basic proof of concept of a Cyberpunk story but I want to make sure my foundation for the overarching plot is solid before I continued with planning/world-building.

The story is set in 2397 on a human colony known as Intelligentsia IV. The colony is Humanity's hub of technological advancements (Including but not limited to: Artificial Intelligence, Human Augmentation, Robotics, Advanced Cyberspace Networks, and Virtual programing).

The colony is mostly governed by the Corporations that originally settled there and they're in control of what's known as the Five Great AI (Essentially the only true AI that exist in the story's present. Somewhat close to being super-intelligent with some limits). The Great AI's development has led to the creation of Virtual Intelligences and Concrete Intelligences (essentially just simple robots/drones).

The central conflict of the story a brilliant scientist (name pending) has had a breakthrough in her research toward the advancement of AI that she believes will bridge the gap between Humans and Machines. Escorted by her security detail (led by the MC who happens to be her secret lover), they're attacked by a group of mercenaries when they arrive on the planet. Their mission seemingly to capture the scientist and whatever she brought with her. In the fighting, the scientist accidentally gets killed and the MC is grievously wounded. Both the scientist and the MC are brought back to the Mercenary's hideout. They want to salvage whatever they can from the Scientist's implants and they want to try and save the MC (possibly to get some information out of him since he's the head of security)

Among the group of mercenaries is a doctor they captured. The doctor is tasked with both the restoration of the scientist and the salvaging of data. Though the doctor secretly augments the MC in the process. While salvaging parts from the scientist, the doctor discovers what he thinks is a strange VI and ends up installing the VI into the MC's neural net (VI's are known to assist with Augmentation). The MC finds out that this VI is actually a Great AI that's been created by uploading the brain of a human (the first successful case). From there the two get wrapped up in a conspiracy by the Corps to bury the scientist's project by destroying the AI and anyone who knows about it.

It's a rough idea with some smoothing out that needs to be done. But I'm hoping to see if it's at least solid enough to build off of. It's supposed to deal with themes of Transhumanism, Corporate Rule, Tech-Driven inequalities, and ultimately what it means to be alive.

*Edit: Posted on mobile, fixing spelling mistakes.

For a while I have been working on my Sci-fi world to help tell stories but more importantly for things to make since. I am almost ready to call this large section of it done but I want to make sure I thought of or have an answer for things.

The Rules I have set myself.

1. No Magic Gravity
2. No Inertial dampeners
3. Respect the Speed of light
4. When breaking a established LAW or RULE that is set there much be established reasons why it will not work.

In a nut shell Humans and Aliens approached the same problem but from two different directions. The Alien ships travel through Subspace, think Babylon 5 or The Lost Fleet series. They do this because their ships use organic components to help manage the transition and travel. Think Far Scape or again like the Shadows from Bab 5. This lends its self to small and modest ships that are quick and maneuverable so in system travel times are respectable. Weapons tend toward laser and Electricity because the Bio ships have excess energy and special organs that it uses to defend its self.

Humans saw subspace and decided it was to slow for them. The Toros drive targets a known system, star or other gravity point, surrounds the ship in a field of its own space, cuts Spacetime once, pulled the other point together, compressing the distance to almost nothing and then sliding through to appear at the other star. Using this drive in system isn't worth it because you would need to calculate and account for all the gravity and masses in both locations which be be difficult, so the tend to jump in and out beyond the Heliopause.

It looks like when asked to go to London from New York the aliens turned a Whale into a boat where humans built a door so they can open it and step right through to London.

This leads the Humans to completely different ship builds. Think BattleStar Galactica. Massive heavily armored brawlers, built to trade blows and survive while using thrust or rotational gravity.

The Humans have the strategic mobility.

The Aliens have Tactical mobility.

The Aliens can not use the Human way because the bioships interacts with subspace like a submarine through the ocean which means there is a near zero amount of friction on their hulls when they move through. Normally not a problem because the bio ships heal themselves as they go, so its more like a gentle exfoliation treatment. So when you take the Humans Toros drive or jump Gates and try to move through it, its like taking a steak through a London length sandpaper straw. The ship may still arrive but it would at least be skinned...Alive.

The human ships can travel subspace, but its like running a submarine through a pool of Slfuric Acid, it will work for a short time, but after a while it will eat through the hull. And because traveling through Subspace is faster, a short trip in system can take days, weeks or even months.

The Human ships would fail.

There are some items that I am keeping for story points. Things like:

1. Aliens finding ways to use Human jump principles.
2. Using Light Speed Lag to help out maneuver enemy combatants.

3 What happens when a alien ship SEES the toros transition from Subspace?

Please, give me your thoughts ether in DM or post here. There is a lot of details I can not add to a reddit post, but I want to make sure this process passes the sniff test.

This is the beginning of a larger story about a fantasy universe and the Legendary Weapons.

Long ago, a being named Byron created 10 Legendary Weapons to protect the universe and galaxies from various disasters and threats.

In addition, for the Legendary Weapons, the Raidomizer was created — a special building enchanted with magic. It is the one that chooses a worthy person who can become the wielder of one of the Legendary Weapons.

The first movie tells the story of one of these weapons — the Bita.

Sixteen years ago, because of Byron’s mistake, the Bita was lost.

The story begins on the planet Sicilius. Argayd’s role is to monitor objects in space and develop various technologies. A couple of years ago, he created a device designed to search for objects made from the same metal as the Legendary Weapons.

And after two years, his device finally detects 27 objects made from the same metal that was used to create the Legendary Weapons. Among them, Argayd notices an object whose size exactly matches the size of the Bita.

Argayd immediately informs Byron — the leader of Sicilius and the creator of the Legendary Weapons. They understand that the object is located on a planet unknown to them. Byron gathers a small team of four beings, and they travel there.

That planet turns out to be Earth.

The story then shifts to Demid, a sixteen-year-old boy who lives a difficult life. Because of constant problems with his stepfather and frequent moving, he has barely attended a regular school and has spent most of his time being homeschooled. He lives with his mother and stepfather and has no idea that his life is about to completely change.

On his sixteenth birthday, Demid travels with his family to visit his biological father. There, he learns more about the reason his parents separated.

Later, Demid ends up in a field and finds an ordinary-looking wooden bat.

He calmly picks it up, not realizing that it is actually a Legendary Weapon.

Ever since his birth, Demid had been chosen by the Raidomizer as the worthy wielder of that particular weapon.

Later, Byron’s team proves to Demid that the wooden bat he found is only the hidden form of a true Legendary Weapon.

But at the same time, another danger is already threatening the universe.

Even before Argayd discovered the Bita, the threat level known as the Raid had begun to rise rapidly. Now the Raid is at a high level, and the inhabitants of Sicilius are preparing for a possible war.

Byron’s team arrives on Earth, and after the events that take place there, Demid is taken to Sicilius. There, he is told about the fantasy universe, other planets, the origin of the Legendary Weapons, and why he was chosen as their worthy wielder.

After that, Byron, his team, and Demid begin traveling to different planets, trying to gather allies and strengthen their army before the possible battle.

In the end, the first movie leads to a massive battle against a maximum-level Raid.

Would you watch a movie with a story like this?

Which part of the idea sounds the most interesting to you? What seems weak, unclear, or in need of further development?

I need some ideas for the part of my story where one of my characters gets captured and has a sort of mental experiment done on her. I've toyed with various ideas, but they all feel incomplete and like I'm missing a realism effect.

The villains are specifically experimenting on her with some kind of drug/chemical or mind-altering system/process. The important part is that it was originally being developed for positive, productive use and was intended to eventually be available to the public, but the villains get ahold of the research and figure out how to use it less great purposes.

I don't necessarily want it to be literal “brainwashing,” but something that can significantly alter or interfere with her mental state, perceptions, memories, associations, etc. I’m still trying to figure out exactly what the original intended use was and how the villains are twisting it as well.

While she's being held, they repeatedly do things to confuse and destabilize her understanding of what's happening. They mess with her perception of time, location, their motives, and what she can trust. They're also moving her between different locations frequently, so whatever they're doing needs to be something that can work regardless of where they take her.

My original idea was for the villains to wear a very distinctive mask. That mask is consistently present while they're administering the drug/chemical and/or putting her through various experiments, psychological manipulation, torture, etc. Later, after she's recovered, one of her teammates wears that same/similar mask, and she has an extremely strong fear or aggressive reaction toward that teammate- even though she consciously knows he's not one of the people who captured her.

What's important as well is that the bad guys aren't looking at necessarily "turning her evil" or completely breaking her. I'd like for their goal to be that she actually DOES get recovered and returns to her team

One idea I had was some sort of process that alters her memories in a way that leaves her understanding of true vs false in the information she took in while captured, maybe a chemical that convinces her brain everything she heard/saw was complete truth. This would be beneficial towards them trying to keep people loyal to then.

Another was that they played specifically with her dopamine levels in conjunction with the things she heard/saw.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

Every life form I have seen, bacteria, virus, micro-organisms, parasites, insects, all have a special feature that allows them to survive in a unique way. But if judging by most likely for long term survival over the course of hundreds of thousands or even hundreds of millions of years, what type of life form is most optimal for that kind of survival?

So I'm worldbuilding a big futuristic world mostly about the next few thousand years of humans spreading across the solar system. The main means of space travel in the earlier eras of the story is nuclear fusion. During this time, humans build space cities to live in as they terraform Mars and Venus.

After the terraforming finishes, I want to have some kind of dark age, where humans are mostly stuck on the planets for a few thousand years. It's not that there's no space travel in that time, it's just more expensive and therefore less common. Eventually there would be a nuclear war on Mars, sending them back to mostly low-tech society and Venus will have to make some new innovation to solve this.

But what could be a good cause for this dark age? At first I was thinking it could be fusion fuel depleting, but after doing some research I realized that probably won't happen. Fusion fuel (i.e helium 3, deuterium) is found across the solar system and is very efficient. So any ideas for how there could be a space travel dark age? It could be technological but maybe it could also be cultural/social.

Was exploring an idea in an otherwise very grounded sci-fi setting where a PMC creates it's highly sought-after but legally questionable mercenaries through an extreme form of mental indoctrination and training. They're put into a medically induced coma for a period of about six months so that multiple cybernetic and biological augmentations can be performed, and while they're under, their minds are surgically wired to a simulation system that puts them through rapid and constant combat simulations and mental fortitude training exercises. From the outside, they've been in a surgical bed being cut apart and put back together for a few months. But as far as new recruits are concerned, they've been at war for hundreds of years, died painfully countless times, been forced to make monstrous decisions over and over again, and had every one of their morals rewritten through lifetimes of scripted experiences.

They come out on the other end of the procedure as all but without their humanity, their completely amoral nature only kept in check by the unbelievable amounts of propaganda they were subject to during their simulations.

Trying to get a general vibe from people on where this sort of thing falls on the lameness scale. Unreasonably grimdark edgelord stuff, or an avenue to create a compelling allegory for the real human cost paid by real people who have been exposed to doing terrible things from a young age because those above them think it makes for a better military force?

edit: Decided in not following through on the idea. Definitely too edgelordy for my setting and style, not to mention all the pinholes in the practicality and logic of the whole thing, with solutions that drive it into an even more dark and edgy place. For military forces in my setting I'll be sticking to mostly regular humans, with the caveat that most are genetically designed and have some degree of cybernetics due to cultural norms making those things accessible and acceptable to varying degrees across most of human society.

These are just some thoughts I’ve had recently about the state of science-fiction literature. I’ve noticed there appears to be a shift towards “open community writing” versus the old standard of curated author writing. The second of these is still dominant I think but from my (admittedly limited) reading of the contemporary scene, more and more fiction is being produced that disrupts the foundations of the established literary order. For example, take the phenomenon of SCP:

https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/

By creating a framework that caters to the same impulse which drives a lot of fan fiction but, in virtue of the itemized independence of the stories being written, allows these to be readily absorbed into a single canon, SCP fuels not only a community of readers but also a more organic way of “farming” the actual literature. I don’t expect this trend has wholly escaped the notice of the publishing industry but I found it curious myself. On the one hand I can see the appeal from a business model standpoint, as well as the virtues of having an open and low barrier form of literary community, but on the other hand it does seem to invite more of the cultural homogenization that social media can already take enough dubious credit for. So, I’m personally a bit ambivalent here.

That said, there are definitely alternative models being explored. Another I’ve come across recently is ‘Parallel Biome’ at the literary magazine Hexfiled:

https://hexfiled.com/parallel-biome

Their publishing approach is more traditional but they use a similar device of overarching framing (Each story is contextualized in a dossier by the “Outer Proximity Intelligence Division”) that allows entirely separate works to persist in a shared universe. Different though to an IP like Warhammer 40k where there’s a much stronger emphasis on interconnected narrative. It’s something more along the lines of what the Twilight Zone did.

I’d be interested in hearing about examples of other alternative approaches to fiction on the rise. I don’t expect we’ve really begun to feel the true impact of AI on writing and yet there are already various other influences too in the technological landscape that are radically reshaping culture and so worth paying attention to. And I expect that human ingenuity will continue to discover viable niches for whatever stories it considers worth telling.

I’m trying to figure out creatures for a scifi script I’m writing based on speculative evolution of creatures found on earth. What could some of the most dangerous ones be? What niches would they fill to make them dangerous? What would make them predators and what would be their prey?