The horizon Effect
The horizon effect, also known as the horizon problem, is a problem in artificial intelligence whereby, in many games, the number of possible states or positions is immense and computers can only feasibly search a small portion of them, typically a few plies down the game tree. Thus, for a computer searching only five plies, there is a possibility that it will make a detrimental move, but the effect is not visible because the computer does not search to the depth of the error (i.e., beyond its "horizon").
- c.f. Wikipedia
- c.f. Wikipedia
End of an Age: The Inner sphere
100 years ago, human civilization came to an end. The Golden Age, the Concordance Age, came to a sudden stop when the Gods that made it possible went away. Nobody is sure where those Gods went or why they vanished, but what they left behind was a shattered and broken civilization and trillions dead or missing, and a mess that, even a century later, has yet to be fully repaired. Of course, humans being humans, we recovered and moved forward, doing what we always do in the wake of such tragedies: come together while ripping ourselves apart.
Élivágar Methane CloudsÉlivágar, a gas giant that orbits around the star Wolf 359 (also called Niflheim) is home to a thriving skimmer culture - some argue the original skimmer culture - who live and operate in the cloud decks of the gas giant, mining important gases. |
Hermes MiningThe mercurian world of Hermes in the Tau Ceti system has been mined so extensively for raw materials that the planet is features massive tunnels connecting antipodal points, some of which are hundreds of years old and hold who knows what within them. |
Kodiak BeehivesThe Kodiak beehive habitats are some of the most extensive microgravity and low-gravity habitats anywhere in the sphere, and are home to number of experimenting and experimental clades who try to survive in these conditions. |
Ruins of EarthThe Ascension Crisis and Nanoswarms left Earth in ruins. Barely inhabitable, surrounded by an orbital junk yard and in the middle of a vast destroyed Dyson swarm, Earth looms large in everyone's mind, even as humanity attempts to move beyond it. The past refuses to stay dead, however, and even the ashes of our home world are proving problematic for the people of the Verge and Bleed. |
A New MarsIn the wake of the Earth swarm collapsing and the failure of the Solar Dyson, the focus of power within the Solar System has shifted from Earth to Mars, humanity's home away from home. Now the capital of the Solar Combine, the inheritor of the Concordance Era God AI civilization, Mars is attempting to recapture some of the legacy that Earth once had in a galaxy that is increasingly diverse. Of course, Mars isn't alone; it has to compete with the most heavily occupied body in the Solar System for title of capital, Jupiter's icy moon, Europa. So even within the heart of civilization, disagreements threaten an unstable order. |
Smart cities of IxionDeclarations of the city's death are premature. Ixion, one of the most heavily populated bodies in the Inner Sphere and the capital of the Alpha Centauri system, is home to some of the most intelligent and networked cities, with architecture that is capable of shifting itself and its structure, changing from one architectural type to another. Escaping the Nanoswarms and Ascension Crisis largely unscathed, a number of Ixionians insist that they, not Mars or Europa, should be the new focus on human civilization in the Solar Combine, and point to their long history and technology as evidence they are the real successors of Earth. |
Beginning of an Age: the Verge and Bleed
Beyond the reach of the God AIs that controlled civilization, some humans and their descendants and creations created thriving cultures, civilizations, and experimented in the depths of space with new methods of social organization. In the wake of the collapse of God AIs and their civilization, these odd descendants of humanity are the new human civilization, lost amidst as sea of stars, linked by wormholes, and constantly at political odds with themselves and others.
AMUR ForestsFound on the planet Amur, one of the rare naturally occurring garden worlds, these vast swampy jungles are home to a wide array of plant-like organisms that can be dangerous to travelers. |
Indus JunglesThe planet Indus is a palaudian world covered with shallow oceans and swamped with hot temperatures, home to a huge range of biodiversity, including several curious and intelligent species like the orang tupai. |
POLARis Floating CitiesThe oceanic world of Polaris is home to numerous floating cities, called 'Chandelier cities" because of how they float in the icy cold waters of their home world,, tidally locked in orbit around an M-type flare star. |
Bluefall Paradise
One of the most well-known planets in the Verge and Bleed, few other worlds occupy the same conceptual space that Bluefall does. The story of terraforming done right, Bluefall is know for its beautiful beaches, its beautiful people, and its thriving economic might. A cultural and financial titan, Bluefall is seen as many as a "replacement Earth" and is often treated as the "unofficial home world" for the new brand of humanity that lives beyond Earth - those that feel humanity needs to bother itself with planets, at any rate. However, what can't be denied is the strength of Bluefall; it is the beating blue heart of a major meta-empire for a reason. |
akashic NodeFound in the Verge and Bleed, the Akashic Node is a computer in the form of a megastructure constructed just above the event horizon of a black hole by an unknown species, powered by the same black hole. At one time, engineers and technicians suspected it of being the final resting place of the God AIs, However, it's since been discovered that the Akashic Node connects to a number of alien computer networks via information-gauge wormholes, many of which are poorly explored. This has launched a massive exploration of the digital megastructure and the thousand of fully realized worlds it contains and connects to, perhaps as a means to find where the God AIs went. |
Procyon ReachThe Capital of the Verge Consortium, the Procyon System, and the largest Stanford torus ever produced, by humanity, the Procyon Reach measures a jaw-dropping 656 miles from the end of one arm to the other, with an interior surface area of over 60,000 square miles (a surface area comparable to the old European nation of Latvia) and houses several hundred million people. In addition to being a space station, the Procyon Reach is also a starship, capable of modest acceleration, although it prefers to orbit the star that gives it its name. Truly, it's a megastructure of unparalleled size, matched only by the largest megastructures of them all. |
Sothic RingworldIf size matters, then megastructures do not get much larger. Formerly part of the Solar Combine before breaking off after the Verge Consortium assisted with vitally needed repairs, the Sothic Ringworld is a massive ringworld that orbits the star Sirius A at 2.3 AU and has a surface area of almost 10 AU squared (almost 8,641,000,000,000,000 square miles). The crowning achievement of the God AIs and home to several billion people despite being able to hold trillions or tens of trillions in relative comfort, the Sothic Ringworld has pedigree and prestige, and is the crowning feather in the Verge Consortium's cap of megastructures. |
The Laser Project
One thing is apparent. No one polity, not even the meta-empires, are large enough financially or militarily to control space and bring order to this diverse range of planets and people. There are problems they can't solve, social agreements that require outside input they can't be there to settle, and even when they can, they're dogged by the specter of their own self interest.
To help fix this problem, the Solar Combine, the one major meta-empire with no major presence in the Verge and Bleed, began the LAZR program - the licensed autonomous zone regulator program. These individuals are troubleshooters, problem solvers, bounty hunters, and whatever else needs doing as they travel between systems using the wormhole network. Being a Laser is demanding work, requiring a wide range of skill sets and talents since a Laser can never be sure what problem they're going to wind up faced with next.
Do you think you have what it takes?
To help fix this problem, the Solar Combine, the one major meta-empire with no major presence in the Verge and Bleed, began the LAZR program - the licensed autonomous zone regulator program. These individuals are troubleshooters, problem solvers, bounty hunters, and whatever else needs doing as they travel between systems using the wormhole network. Being a Laser is demanding work, requiring a wide range of skill sets and talents since a Laser can never be sure what problem they're going to wind up faced with next.
Do you think you have what it takes?