Certificate of Irrefutability

Aliens

Forms

• Sentient alien life exists.
• Aliens can be the product/subject of genetic engineering.
• Spaceborne Fauna exist.
• Hostile Space fauna exist that can/will attack stray spacecraft that stray too close.

Physiology

• There is sophisticated silicon based life.
• Aliens are mostly strange and non-humanoid in physiology.
• The needs and wants of aliens do not linearly match to their human counterparts.
• Humans and aliens are unable to reproduce together.
• Sexual reproduction with humans is an "alien" concept to Aliens, due to differing biologies and psychologies.
• Alien methods of interfacing with space magic vary wildly due to sociological and biological differences.

“Human Aliens”

• Human biology and culture have significantly diverged in response to different environments
• There are species that have a shared human ancestor that have diverged so far they can no longer have viable offspring.

Misc

• Technologically advanced Aliens, those beyond the default technology level of humanity, are rare.
• Sentient species (aliens and humans) are known to live in shared communities.

Exploration

Earth

• Earth is unimaginably far away.
• Earth is known to be the home of humanity.
• Earth’s location and fate are long forgotten
• The setting takes place in another galaxy.
• Humanity once had archives of their past, but the data was lost or corrupted.

Planets

• Planets naturally habitable to human life are rare and precious.
• Planets are complex, and do not consist of a single biome. (Arrakis, Dagobah, Hoth, ect.)

Resources

• Harvesting resources in space is difficult and dangerous work.
• Celestial phenomena are a source of exotic resources.

Ruins

• Ruins around the sector are the remains of a former civilization clearly more advanced than our own.
• The sector lies on the frontier of a former civilization, exploration equal parts rediscovery and exploring truly unknown space.
• It is unclear if the ancient ruins belong to our ancestors or something that predated them.
• A lost civilization has left defunct great feats of stellar engineering in its passing.
• The civilizations that came before sealed away many mighty gifts, and many terrible horrors.
• Sector-wide Archaeology is a relatively new field that often misinterprets/misrepresents new discoveries.
• The sector is in the midst of an archeological gold rush.
• Archaeology is a dangerous profession. Archaeologists often kill each other for the privilege of being the first to say they found and explored a ruin.
• The ruins of multiple civilizations can be found in the sector, not all the ruins come from one previous entity.

Misc

• Star charts are old, inaccurate, and outdated.
• There is still much to be discovered about celestial phenomena (Black Holes, Nebulae, etc.)
• Spaceships often organize into convoys to traverse the dangerous and unknown regions of space.
• Asteroid fields are dangerous, lawless territories.

Space Magic

Origins

• The source of magic does not originate from this dimension.
• Space Magic has no direct bearing or relation to FTL

Cost

• Space Magic requires esoteric rituals, strange incantations, and materials
• Space Magic requires intensive training
• Space Magic is exhaustive to the user
• Repeated minor uses of Space Magic are just as dangerous for the user as a single major use.
• Use of Space Magic is addictive.
• Space Magic is confusing and inherently mysterious even to its users, requiring experimentation to figure out how to produce a consistent result.
• Those who overuse Space Magic run the risk of attracting improbable and sometimes dangerous events.

Misc

• Matter transmutation is a sign of an area where the ambient magic is concentrated enough to be dangerous for organic life.
• Space Magic cannot heal you beyond what a triage center could do.

Technology

Artificial Intelligence

• True AI is allowed but is limited by effective hard blocks on their behaviors
• True AI-controlled shells (or ancillaries) have personalities of their own, as extensions of the AI
• True AI Exists with restrictions in the sector core, but these grow lax towards the frontier.
• Some artificial life are recognized as sentient, not subservient to other species.
• AI are capable of choosing their own physical form.
• Legal AIs are virtual recreations of organic minds.

Cybernetics

• Cybernetics are available and allowed
• The body can only take a limited amount of augmentation before there are serious consequences.
• Cyborgs with completely mechanical bodies, only biological brains, can be created at great cost to the individual.

FTL Communications

• Interstellar communications are slow by default, constrained by lightspeed and the use of the gates to transmit information between systems. High priority information is delivered by FTL capable ships.
• Instant interstellar communications exist but are not cheap.
• If instantaneous communication exists, then high strength data encryption is not compatible with that form of transmission.

FTL Drives

• FTL Fuel is currently scarce in the sector.
• FTL Fuel is unstable until it is refined, a process which requires remote refineries.
• Interstellar travel takes time. Space is big
• Starships are capable of interstellar travel by their own means
• FTL drives are expensive to maintain.
• Personal use spacecraft are small and expensive.
• Space travel is dangerous, ships can be worn down over time and become rickety old things

FTL Gates

• Interstellar gates exist that allow travel between planetary systems (hexes)
• Each FTL Gate is limited to connecting to one other FTL Gate.
• FTL Gate travel is limited by a ship's size.
• Ferry ships exist that carry smaller ships through the FTL Gates.
• FTL Gates require no external power or fuel source to function.
• FTL Gates are overcrowded.
• FTL Gate travel is quick and cheap once you clear the line.
• There are unstable but valuable materials that cannot be transported via the FTL Gates.
• FTL Gates can only operate in space, at a distance from significant gravity wells.
• The materials needed to construct new FTL gates are rare, chiefly scavenged from existing defunct gates.
• FTL Gates are ancient relics and the few we have are connecting the "core".
• Control of the FTL Gates is highly contested due to control of the trade routes and tolls.
• No one entity currently controls all of the FTL Gates.
• Passengers must be safely enclosed within a vessel in order to travel through an FTL Gate.

Genetics

• Human life can be extended but only to a finite limit
• Genetic engineering is available and allowed
• Animals can be genetically uplifted.

Robots & Mecha

• Robots and Automation are not human in form
• Drones and/or Robots are prevalent in military and industrial roles
• Mecha are used in both military and non-military roles.

Teleportation

• Teleportation is possible but is a very advanced technology.
• Teleportation is possible but only on the same planet.

Terraforming

• Terraforming is possible but takes decades to complete
• The cost and benefits of finding new worlds and interstellar travel often come into conflict with the prospect of terraforming, due to costs and shared material requirements.

Warfare

• Missiles are viable weapons in stellar warfare (there is no perfect counter)
• Fighter and Bomber craft are used in space combat
• Ground to Space and Space to Ground weapons exist
• Railguns are limited to large installations (vehicles, spaceships, ect.)
• Mecha exist and are a staple of armed conflict
• Handheld weaponry is more often physical projectiles over energy projectiles however Hyper-Advanced weaponry are rare and bulky at the personal scale.
• There is no single weapons manufacturer, and as a result weapons and ammo requirements are diverse and sometimes confusing.

Misc

• Artificial Gravity Exists but is powered by Exotic Energy
• Energy generation is limited, by resources or by cost
• Society is incapable of celestial manipulation
• Nanites exist but they can not self-replicate endlessly
• Hacking is possible, but there's no one single 'catch all' solution
• The difficulties of interstellar travel mandate that most systems be self-sufficient

General

• "Space Truckers" are an essential part of interstellar trade
• There is no single unified currency
• Space nomads exist that were driven from their homeworld and/or prevented from settling upon a new one.
• Human groups have migrated to the sector at various points throughout history.
• There is no single universal time zone standard for the sector.
• Friction due to culture, faction and nationality is more common than due to looks, species and sexuality.