Tahora Whai: Difference between revisions

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==Professions==

While regarded as either fearsome raiders or prolific and protective whalers in much of Beacon Space, the Tahora Whai are more than a pair of professions. Even within the groups that tend to predominantly hunt whales or pirate space, few individuals are defined by any one field. Ships and their crews are usually equipped to engage in both industries with many modifications and tools serving dual purposes. Beyond these ships a diverse network of professions consisting of shipwrights, mechanics, salvagers, gunsmiths, armorers, butchers, merchants, traders, cybernetics manufacturers, tattooists, researchers, etc. support what is commonly seen as the ‘average’ Tahora Whai. The popular image of scruffy void-borne menaces of trade falls flat when observing Whai society as a whole, but this image is cultivated to maintain a fearsome reputation.

===Raiding===

===[[Tahora Whai Piracy and Raiding|Raiding]]===

Since before the development of the [[Vak and the Tahora Whai’s neural link]], the planet [[Dynae]] was the source of a piratical tradition .The Tahora Whai are, in many ways, inheritors of this Dynaean culture, much like how they are descendants of Dynae’s practice of whaling.

TBD

Whai ships often disguise themselves as humble traders or whalers to catch their victims unaware and with their guard down. But the ruse was much more effective if they were in fact utilizing their ships as a whaler when no dupes could be found. Dual- or multi-use ships became commonplace for the Whai. Tools like [[Technologies_of_the_Whai#Ship_Weapons_and_Equipment|harpoons and trackers]] could likewise be utilized in both situations.

In the Rangi, and in other bases of Whai influence, escort services are a thinly veiled extortion racket to legitimize Whai piracy. For a fee, the Whai will keep your ship safe from the many dangers of the sector. On refusal to pay, a ship will be effectively marked as a target for various schemes. The Whai have negotiated rates with the [[Space Truckers]]–large shipping and logistics services of the Sector–to travel in these regions with minimal interruptions. Special relationships, such as the [[Commonwealth-Whai_Treaty_of_Free_Navigation_and_Commerce|Reach-Rangi Agreement]], also exist with entities like the [[Assembled Commonwealth]] for agreed ‘safe-travel’ for licensed merchants. The decentralized nature of the Whai causes a handful of diplomatic incidents but plausible deniability is the name of the game for the denizens of Sector-West.

===[[Whaling in the Rangi|Whaling]]===

The great [[Spaceborne Fauna|megafauna]], or Tahora, of the [[Rangi]] and Sector-West are part of the lifeblood of the Tahora Whai. Creatures like the [[Teuthemi Leviathans]] (aka Great Tahora) provided the people of [[Dynae]] with the resources to endure hardships and the devastation of their world; not to mention the inspiration for the [[Vāk and Erinaa|Vāk cybernetics]]. Whaling has long been practiced in this region of space, even before the genesis of the Tahora Whai.