Compendium

Drone Commander is a hybrid Visual Novel / RTS / RPG game that dynamically alternates between gameplay modes to keep the experience varied and cinematic. Players engage in story-driven conversations, tactical real-time strategy battles, and explore RPG-style sections with character interaction and minigames.

The player, an ordinary human, is abducted into a galactic conflict involving several alien factions and an ominous, destructive Type 3 drone fleet. Initially seen as primitive, the player gradually gains influence by showing an uncanny ability to control drones and coordinate defense strategies.

The player's fleet, called the Vanguard, is on the run from the drone fleet while rescuing alien races and occasionally launching counterattacks. Humanity has only recently begun to advance technologically after surviving a near-catastrophic drone attack. Characters have rich backstories and personality-driven arcs, and the choices you make shape alliances, friendships, rivalries, and even romance.

Gameplay Modes

• VN Mode: Storytelling, dialogue trees, choices with consequences
• RTS Mode: Command fleets, deploy drones, manage shields, formations, and superweapons
• RPG Mode: Explore ships and alien planets, interact with crew, complete quests, and engage in pixel-art shooter combat
• Minigames: Crew hiring, job assignment, research progression, morale tracking, fleet economy management

Tone & Themes

A balance of emotional storytelling, sci-fi mystery, and tactical warfare. Explores themes of identity, trust between species, power, and redemption. Blends anime-style drama with strategic gameplay and rich lore.

Space strategy games have a terrain problem. Without hills, chokepoints, or rivers, battles devolve into blobs smashing into blobs in an empty void. Asteroids only get you so far. We wanted something better — mechanics that create real tactical depth without breaking the fiction of open space.

Saturation Fields

Invisible energy-drain zones seeded across the map by generators. Any ship — ally or enemy — that enters a saturation field has its energy slowly sapped. They won't show up on your main view, only on radar, so there are no glowing boundary boxes cluttering your screen. You'll need detector ships to scout safe routes, and smart players will bait enemies into fields they don't know are there.

The result: space has structure.

• Invisible on the main view — no glowing boxes, no immersion-breaking overlays
• Visible on radar only — rewarding players who check their instruments
• Detector ships required — scouting becomes a real tactical role
• Affects all ships equally — your own fleet isn't immune, so placement is a double-edged sword
• Creates corridors and danger zones — flanking matters, recon matters, the map has shape without a single wall

Orbital Hot Zones

The battle takes place in high orbit — far enough from the planet that your fleet can manoeuvre freely, close enough that orbital positions matter for bombardment and landing operations. The planet itself arcs slowly across the bottom of the map on its orbital path, disappearing off one side and re-emerging from the other.

This changes everything. Orbital capture points — the on-ramps for bombardment runs and landing craft drops — shift in value as the planet drifts. A position that's critical right now becomes worthless in a few minutes as the planet moves out of range. Defenders can't just park on a point and hold it. Attackers can't wait forever to push.

Both players see the same orbit. Both can plan around it. The question is who reads the map better.

• Planet arcs across the map in real time — a slow, visible orbit that reshapes the battlefield
• Capture points shift in value — a key position now might be worthless in minutes
• No static defence — defenders have to move with the zones or lose relevance
• Bombardment windows are temporary — time your push or miss your shot
• Predictable, not random — both sides have the same information, rewarding planning over reaction

Hex Fields

The missing piece. Saturation fields give space its terrain. Hot zones give the map a heartbeat. Hex fields give it territory — a living, shifting front line that both sides are fighting to control.

The Grid

At mission start, the entire map is divided into a honeycomb of hexagonal zones. This grid is invisible until a hex scout is deployed into a cell, at which point that hex activates — visually distinct, owned, and projecting modified physics constants within its boundaries. The grid is programmatic: calculated from map width and height at load time with a configurable hex_diameter (default 700). No overlap, no manual placement in the editor. Hex scouts snap to the nearest unoccupied hex centre on deployment.

The whole map is claimable. Every hex is a potential battleground.

What Hex Fields Actually Do

Hex fields aren't walls. They don't block movement. Any ship can fly into any hex, friendly or hostile. What changes is the physics inside.

A friendly hex modifies local constants in your favour — better shield regeneration, faster weapon cycling, improved sensor range. The specifics depend on what's been researched and what tier of energy is powering the field. An enemy hex does the opposite: your ships are debuffed, their ships are boosted. Neutral hexes have no effect.

The result is layered, asymmetric defence without a single physical barrier. Pushing through one enemy hex is manageable. Pushing through three in a row, each stacking debuffs, is a meatgrinder — and that's the point. It replaces the “break the wall, break the turret, break the base” progression of traditional RTS with something that fits open space: each hex you cross tips the odds further against you until you crack the network.

• No movement restriction — any ship can enter any hex
• Buff/debuff zones — friendly hexes boost your ships, enemy hexes punish them
• Stackable depth — multiple hex layers create the layered defence that replaces walls and turrets
• Researchable effects — what each hex actually does depends on your tech progression
• Scalable by energy tier — a hex powered by void matter gives a modest buff; one running on resonant essence is significantly stronger

Chain Logic

Hex fields don't operate in isolation. Every active hex must be able to trace an unbroken chain of friendly hexes back to a command ship. The command ship is the power source. If the chain is broken — because a hex scout was destroyed or shut down — everything beyond the break goes dark. No buff, no debuff, just neutral space.

This is where the strategy lives. A perfectly built hex network can be collapsed by a surgical strike on a single junction hex. A wide, shallow network is resilient but weak. A narrow, deep one is powerful but brittle. Players have to decide how to shape their network based on the tactical situation, and the enemy is always looking for the load-bearing hex to knock out.

• Hexes chain back to command ship — no chain, no power
• Junction hexes are high-value targets — destroying one can cascade a whole section dark
• Network shape is a strategic choice — wide and resilient vs deep and powerful
• Flood-fill adjacency check — each hex knows its neighbours; power propagation is a simple connected-component check from the command ship outward

Void Matter Economy

Hex fields consume void matter to stay active. Not a one-time build cost — an ongoing drain, every tick, for every powered hex. Expand too fast and you'll bleed your reserves dry. Lose your harvesters and your network starts collapsing from the edges inward as you're forced to shut down fields to keep critical ones online.

Each hex scout has a manual on/off toggle. Mid-battle, you're managing a power grid under fire — shutting down rear hexes to keep the front line lit, or going dark on a flank to consolidate resources for a decisive push. The more territory you hold, the more it costs to hold it.

This is the longevity mechanic. Battles aren't just about who has more ships. They're about who can sustain their territorial control while disrupting the enemy's supply chain. Hit their void matter harvesters and watch their hex network flicker and die, hex by hex, as they scramble to decide what to sacrifice.

• Ongoing void matter cost per active hex — expansion has a price
• Manual on/off toggle per scout — triage decisions in real time
• Resource pressure creates natural ebb and flow — overextension is punished, efficiency is rewarded
• Harvesters become strategic targets — choke the supply, collapse the network
• Mirrors the galactic-scale entropy economy at a tactical level

Reading the Board

A well-designed hex battlefield tells a story at a glance. Your hexes glow one colour, the enemy's another, neutral space is dark. You can see where the front line is, where the gaps are, where a chain is thin enough to cut. The enemy's command ship sits behind layers of hostile hexes. Your job is to find the weak point, punch through, and collapse their network from the inside.

Missions can start with pre-established hex networks — the enemy already dug in, your fleet arriving and deploying its initial hexes as crew chatter contextualises what's happening. No tutorial screen. The player sees the board, hears the team react to it, and understands. Push blue into red. Cut the chains. Take the command ship.

The Payoff

Three systems, one dynamic battlefield. Saturation fields give space its terrain. Orbital drift gives the map a heartbeat. Hex fields give it a front line. Every match plays differently not because of randomness, but because the geometry is always shifting under your feet — and the best commanders are the ones who see it coming.

Starting Resources (Per Mission — Tunable)

Resources

Command Ship

The command ship is the backbone. Everything starts here. It generates energy, enables core departments, and builds all non-combat units.

Nanite Forges

Forges are the first thing you activate. They passively generate energy. More forges = faster energy generation. Mission-dependent how many you start with (e.g. 3 for the moon mission, max 6).

Department Unlocks

Departments are enabled by spending energy. Once enabled, they stay on. This is the gating mechanism — you can't do everything at once, you have to wait for energy to accumulate and choose what to enable first.

Note: At 10 energy/sec with 3 forges, the first department takes ~20 seconds to unlock. This paces the early game nicely — you're defending with what you arrived with while the forges tick up.

Unit Build Table — Command Ship

Hex Scout Reclaim: Click any deployed hex scout and hit reclaim — the scout is destroyed and a portion of void matter is returned to reserves. Use this to reposition your network or consolidate resources when void matter runs low. Simple, no cooldown, immediate.

Critical Build Chains

Chain 1: Hex Scout (Territory Control)

The primary path — getting hex fields online to claim territory:

1. Deploy Command Ship
2. Enable Nanite Forges → energy starts generating
3. Wait for 200 energy
4. Enable Mining Operations
5. Build Constructor (100 ore from starting reserves)
6. Build Harvester (150 ore) → deploy to harvest zone → ore income starts
7. Wait for 200 energy
8. Enable Engineering & Prospecting
9. Research Hex Scout (30 RP from starting 60)
10. Build Hex Scout (500 ore)
11. Deploy Hex Scout to hex cell → consumes void matter

Void matter fork: Before step 11 works long-term, you need enticers:

• After step 6, also:
• 6b. Build Enticer (200 ore + 15 RP from starting 60)
• 6c. Deploy Enticer to null zone → void matter starts flowing

Players who rush hex scouts without establishing void matter income will watch their fields flicker off. That's the trap, and it's a good one.

Starting RP budget (60): The player can afford the hex scout research (30 RP) AND one enticer (15 RP) from starting reserves with 15 RP left over. This means early decisions matter — do you spend that remaining 15 on a second enticer for safety, or save it for something else? Once starting RP is spent, further RP requires deployed surveyors.

Chain 2: Dampener Ship (Hex Assault)

The path to breaking through enemy hex networks:

1. Research Ship: Research “Dampener Field Theory” (40 RP)
2. Research Ship: Research “Dampener Ship Blueprint” (30 RP)
3. Assault Carrier: Build Dampener Ship (300 ore)
4. Deploy with assault fleet → reduces enemy hex debuffs in local radius

Total cost: 70 RP + 300 ore. This is a mid-game investment — you won't have 70 RP to spare early. The player has to decide when to pivot from expanding their own hex network to building the tools to crack the enemy's. Push too early without dampeners and your fleet melts in enemy hexes. Wait too long and the enemy network becomes impenetrable.

Chain 3: Cyber Strike (Disruption)

The path to disabling enemy systems without a direct assault:

1. Wait for 300 energy
2. Enable Cyber Department on Command Ship
3. Research Ship: Research “Cyber Warfare Suite” (40 RP)
4. Select target → launch cyber attack
5. Enemy gets chance to respond (button-mash defence)

Why it's late-game gated: 300 energy is the most expensive department unlock, and the research prerequisite means you're investing RP that could go to dampeners or upgrades. Cyber is the “I've stabilised my economy and hex network, now I want to start dismantling theirs from a distance” play.

Chain 4: Full Defence Lockdown

For players who want to turtle and weather early aggression:

1. Wait for 200 energy
2. Enable Defence Industry
3. Build Field Generators (100 ore each, tack onto ships)
4. Build Turrets (200 ore each, tack onto ships)
5. Optional: Build Arc-Defence Ships (400 ore)

Tradeoff: You're safe, but you have no ore income beyond starting reserves, no RP generation, and no hex presence. The longer you turtle the further behind you fall on territory. Works as a response to early aggression, not as a long-term strategy.

Cyber Department

The cyber arm operates from the Command Ship once the department is enabled (300 energy) and relevant research is completed on the Research Ship. Cyber attacks are targeted actions with cooldowns — not passive effects.

Offensive Cyber Operations

Defensive Cyber Operations

When the enemy launches a cyber attack on you, an alert fires and a response window opens. The player has a few seconds to engage a button-mash / key-sequence defence minigame. Success reduces or negates the attack. Failure means full effect.

Cyber Research Tree (on Research Ship)

Cyber Warfare Suite (40 RP)
├── Hex Disruption
├── Power Drain
├── Cyber Defence Suite (35 RP)
│   ├── Adaptive Countermeasures
│   ├── Auto-Reject Protocol
│   └── Advanced Cyber Defence (50 RP)
│       └── Mirror Protocol
├── Advanced Cyber Ops (60 RP)
│   ├── Void Siphon
│   └── System Blind
└── Cyber Mastery (80 RP)
    ├── Forge Shutdown
    └── Hardened Core

Total RP to fully unlock cyber tree: 265 RP. That's a massive investment — a player who goes all-in on cyber is sacrificing dampener research, hex efficiency upgrades, and weapon upgrades. But a fully kitted cyber player can dismantle an enemy hex network without firing a shot.

Research Ship

The research ship is primarily a buff/upgrade platform. It doesn't build combat units — it makes everything else better. It has the same defence tack-on options as the command ship (turrets, field generators, etc.).

General Upgrades

Assault Carrier

The assault carrier builds all combat units. No gating departments — if you have the ore, you build the ship. The constraint is ore income and queue time.

Note: Unit roster is illustrative — existing units from the current build slot in here. Costs are placeholders for balancing.

Fleet-Wide Weapon & Ability Unlocks

Ships produced by the assault carrier are expendable — built in bulk, lost in battle, replaced from the queue. But their effectiveness scales with fleet-wide upgrades purchased via RP (and in some cases void matter) on the Research Ship. These are permanent for the duration of the mission.

Design note: Each ship class starts with one weapon and can unlock additional systems through RP spending. This means RP is an ongoing operational resource — not just a tech tree currency. A player generating high RP income has a fundamentally more capable fleet than one who isn't, even with identical ship counts. Void matter also plays a role in some upgrades, creating further tension with hex field maintenance costs.

Capital Ships (Reserve Ships)

Capital ships are distinct from assault carrier production. They are persistent — they survive between missions, carry upgrades forward, and grow in power over the campaign. Think pets, not cattle.

• Persist across missions — damage, upgrades, and loadout carry over
• Individually upgradeable — RP and void matter spent on a specific capital ship, not fleet-wide
• Limited in number — you won't have many, each one matters
• Boss-tier combat presence — significantly stronger than standard fleet units
• Named and characterful — tied to the narrative, crew dialogue, and story progression

Capital ship upgrade details will be fleshed out as the system develops. The key constraint: RP and void matter spent on capital ships is RP and void matter NOT spent on fleet-wide unlocks, hex fields, or cyber operations. Every resource in this game should hurt to spend.

Build Priority Decision Tree

At game start (1,000 ore, 60 RP, 0 energy), the player faces genuine strategic choices:

All are viable depending on the mission and enemy aggression level. The 60 starting RP is enough to do one thing well, not everything — that's the tension.

Energy Hierarchy (Future)

The current resource model uses void matter as the hex field fuel. Long-term, the plan is a tiered energy hierarchy that maps to the game's lore:

This hierarchy doesn't need to be implemented now, but the resource system should be built with it in mind — void matter is tier 4, and the plumbing should allow higher tiers to slot in later.

Details to be revealed…

Details to be revealed…

Originally known as the Dark Worlders by the ancient Skrill race. The Sekarri refer to them as the Drone Fleet to reduce panic, as the name "Dark Worlder" carries a legacy of hopelessness.

Origins

Proto-Human in origin — the original humans, grey in colour, from another galaxy. They once had nations, many races and colours, but eventually formed a single totalitarian government and a single skin colour: grey. As they expanded outward, they were intensely xenophobic.

They originated on a planet over 1 billion years ago. Originally a civilization with culture and wars similar to others, they became obsessed with technological supremacy, eventually utilizing eugenics and total domination. They were eventually trapped on a planet surrounded by a Null Field — a barrier that prevented matter from existing.

Visual Evolution

• Early Expansion: Their army and politicians looked mechanised — giant armoured suits, faces concealed, breathing mask fittings. Like Vorlons from Babylon 5.
• Mid-Expansion: Their form shifted from metallic to wizard-like: robes, cloaks, facial masks became capes. Front line troops looked like mages.
• Late Expansion: Ethereal, light-bending material. Face obscured to prevent aliens looking upon the face of their "gods."

The Skrill War & The White Hole Event

An ancient race called the Skrill (Keepers of the Universe) broke the barrier, believing they could "fix" the Dark Worlders' programming. This acted as Pandora's Box. Upon release, the Dark Worlders destroyed the Skrill's 10th Fleet and ignited a 10,000-year war.

The Skrill attempted a diplomatic meeting near an entropy sink (black hole) to contain the threat. The Dark Worlders betrayed them, corrupted the entropy sink, turning a black hole into a White Hole. This rift allowed reinforcements from another galaxy, leading to the extinction of 95% of all life in the galaxy.

Hierarchy

• Arkons: Regional/Galactic political masters. Visible as orbs of energy with no physical body. They oversee harvesting quotas, entropy conversion, and construction of exotic artefacts.
• Sovereigns: Supreme military commanders charged with conquering entire galaxies. Appear as mages in cloaks wielding "magical" staves (high-technology weapons). Cannot be killed and can spawn like instances of an app.
• Arch-Pestel: Brigade/corps leaders who micromanage at the solar system/planetary level. Charged with ensuring the expungement of 95% of populations. Now exist as part of the Sovereign's mind.

Military Capabilities

According to Kira, no race has ever won a single skirmish against them. Their technology appears as "magic" to the Sekarri (who are 300 years ahead of humans). They have wiped out 95% of tier 2 and 3 sentient life in the galaxy.

The "Hornet" Strategy: They utilize scouts. If a scout is alerted, the fleet swarms in overwhelming force. The only counter-measure is to destroy or distract the scout instantly. The Sekarri once sacrificed an entire fleet just to stop a scout from reporting their location.

• Classification: Tier 0 species (year 2029+), on the edge of Dispersion networks
• Deep culture shock after first Drone Fleet invasion
• Transformed after the war — several massive leaps in technology, unexplained to the outside observer
• Desperation forced humanity to strip naval ships for material to build starships
• Relies mostly on young ship captains under the age of 35

A race of humanoid feline-like species. Very advanced but now a nomadic travelling race. They came from a world called Alara that was destroyed. Alara had continents: Langara, Caelin, Lyran, Gerestone and Mythan.

• Classification: Tier 1 species, 300+ years more advanced than humanity
• Extermination survivors; post Alara and Deridana
• Females outnumber males 7:1
• Height: approximately 7'6"
• Their society revolves around prides, and the supply of men often lies at the center of politics and culture

Modern-day Sekarri, though 300 years ahead of Earth technically, are culturally very similar to humans. Technological developments allow them to be more progressive and inclusive, but some stereotypes linger.

Sekarri females have adapted to "maidenhood" — true poly-type relationships including love for the male, love for other females in the group (pride love), and love for the crown (first female). Their relationship dynamic is both complex and simple.

A corporate-driven planet, with smaller moons and planets where anti-capitalists have fled. They still believe in nobility, monarchs, and love buzzwords.

They evolved from spiders. Their star shouldn't be what it is — a mystery that hints at deeper secrets in the galaxy.

• Decentralised, spread out through the galaxy
• No home world (destroyed by the Drone Fleet)
• Can blend in and infiltrate other races, better than Sekarri Demi technology
• Mercantile in nature with spiritual underpinnings

A faction-driven species split into two main sides: A) A totalitarian, mafia-like state with connections and hubs on planets all over the galaxy. B) A rebellious resistance faction, still substantial but built of many decentralised splinter cells.

Their species lost their home world to the drone fleet, but never had the interest nor resolve to fight back. Rather, they expanded their influence with as many races as they could. By definition, they mix with all sorts of aliens and do business with anyone.

Planet: Shal

Deritonians are bipedal and reptilian in appearance, possessing mammalian features like hair. They come in varied colours from green to pink, with heights from 5ft to 8ft.

A hardy, externally pacifistic species organized into a traditional, feudal society of houses and clans — blending rituals and nature-spirit beliefs (akin to feudal Japan's Shinto) with medieval European culture (Wales, England, Scotland, Ireland). They have templar knights.

Drakhans are a Tier 3 dragon-like ancient species who are extremely pacifist, hiding from the galaxy after devastating wars. They share the planet with the Deritonians, but enforce a strict policy of isolation causing Deritonian civilization to stagnate.

The Deritonian government is formally seeking asylum with humanity, offering 500,000 battle-hardened warriors and rare minerals in exchange. Deritonians and humans have already begun forming personal bonds, including romantic relationships.

Mouse and squirrel-like in form, with large diversity in both appearance and culture depending on distance from the Core Worlds. Vionites are the most advanced Tier 1 civilization.

• Population: ~100 billion citizens across multiple star systems
• Height: 4.8 ft (1.45 meters) on average
• Highly intelligent, passionate and aggressive
• The only T1 race that can travel in space without dispersion fields
• Core Worlds: Militaristic mouse-like generals
• Home Worlds: Retail sector, politicians and luxury
• Fringe Worlds: Hippie squirrel-like populations

Unlike others, the Vionites' energy footprint is too high to hide. So they prepare for war — culturally, politically and scientifically. They are currently undergoing a massive Total War military campaign, the only race insane enough to go toe-to-toe with the Drone Fleet.

An aquatic, noble and benevolent race. They were the first — the elders, the founders, the forerunners. They built all the infrastructure found in the galaxy today. But they were wiped out by the Dark Worlders after releasing them from their prison, in an event known as the White Hole incident.

Reclusive and ancient. Legend has it they were around when the Dark Worlders were first released — millions and millions of years ago. As a Tier 3 race, they are godlike in technology compared to all other living species.

The Honnehari knew they couldn't stay or they'd be wiped by competition (the Drone Fleet), or eventually atrophy as all intelligent races do. So they left the galaxy — no one is sure how.

Previously known as the Adamant. A species still being fleshed out in the lore — details to come.

In short: Sovereigns harvest life in the galaxy to extract entropy (crystallised/locked information). The entropy can be used to create Fake Universes, in which they build things they need. They then import those things using Virtual Entropy.

Entropy is a base layer of reality. The real-world definition is the measure of the unavailability of energy to do work, or a measure of disorder. Drone Commander expands this interpretation as the percentage of locked-in information, unmodifiable — essentially, the soul.

Entropy is superior to available information, in that entropy can be used to generate new information. This is what makes it so valuable. The Dark Worlders have limits on what they can create (stars, black holes, etc.) as physics limits what information can do. Entropy allows them to work around this — a minable resource giving access to exotic matter like Shard Strange Matter.

Casting Alternate Fake Universes

The Dark Worlders treat entropy like an oil rush. They don't care that harvesting extracts souls or destabilises local space — it powers their economy, allowing them to make Fake Universes, Shards, and cosmic-constant altering matter.

Alternate realities don't exist in Drone Commander. However, the top-tier species can manipulate and cast alternate probabilities into micro-universe bubbles within our existing universe. With Fake Universes they can build whatever they want; with Virtual Entropy, they import what they built.

The Dark Worlders believe they are doing good, because they think they can prevent the universe from ending by leaching Fake Universes.

• The leftovers of when entropy is harvested or corrupted. Must be processed to form into Spawn.
• When a forge is created and people (alive or dead) are brought for processing, wastage is left over that festers into malicious energy.
• The Dark Worlders realised that if left untouched the energy would dissipate, so they channel it into Entropic Spawn — a second layer of defence for the forges.

It's not faster than light, nor transportation, nor quantum nonsense.

Billions of years ago, species noticed that not all CMBR (Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation) was equally distributed — it appeared to clump together in 12 places. On closer inspection, CMBR seemed to almost instantly appear in another location. There were 12 regions in the galaxy where physics behaved differently.

The top races of that era began a gold rush, racing to each location and bottling up the super-resource into Shards. Shards are like batteries for special matter that can change the physical constants of the universe.

• If you have a shard, you don't need to play by the rules of the universe
• You could double your weight or make the speed limit 5x faster
• You could make distances shorter
• But like oil, you have to refine it for what you want — there are hundreds, maybe thousands of shards

The shards are bottled super-physics from regions of early CMBR where physical constants were different and variable. These clumps of space have long dissipated, but the ancients raced to mine, refine and purpose them. Different shards have different functions related to the part of space they came from.

History of the Sekarri (Sekar venatrix)

Venatrix meaning gender imbalance. Sekarri come from a wider family of Sekar, meaning smart hunters.

Pre-History: During their last major evolutionary phase ~200,000 years ago, environmental factors caused females to die at much higher rates in childbirth. Through selective breeding and survival of the fittest, women who bore more females were selected for — creating the 7:1 forcing function.

Early History: Social bonding dominated their civilisation. The instability of breeding meant many Sekarri still carry epigenetics from previous Sekar favouring monogamous relationships. It took the rule of law, religion and even caste systems to engrain their polygamous society. A Pride System was formed.

< 800 Years Ago: Sekarri maintained strict traditions — any male not pairing with more than 6 women would be severely punished, as would women who attempted to keep a man to herself.

After 400 Years Ago: Living standards improved. Autonomy and individual rights became more of a thing. Cultural revolutions followed. People were free to form relationships how they pleased — with the final caveat being that high-level government officials must still be seen to follow traditions.

• Swat Sisters: Sub-specialist unit, high volume, called upon in most urgent war theatres. High fatality rates, well paid.
• Battle Bros: The male contingent of Swat Sisters. Normally separated by gender until the fall of Alara.
• Red Sisters: Super-specialist hit women. Contracted by governments or lucrative companies with government approval. Have an ethical checklist and can refuse jobs.
• Tier 1 Operators: The elite. Fel was a fleet Tier 1 operator — one of the very few with space combat experience. Irivin was all-terrain, specialised full-core army.

To adapt to the gender imbalance, Sekarri females developed fine needle-like hairs below the belly button that stand on end during arousal. These inject a form of organic hormones into males on contact — a genetic historical adaptation.

As centuries progressed, they lost utility as cultural mechanisms took precedence. However, some females still have active filaments: 1/5 Sekarri women have them, but 1/3 Langarans do.

• Velara (Primary Nurturers): "Heartkeeper" — deeply involved in the child's upbringing, providing love, guidance, and daily care. The emotional anchors of a child's life.
• Lorena (On-and-Off Caregivers): "Lifebringer" — participate more sporadically, offering support when present but with other duties or interests. Still contribute to the child's upbringing when they can.
• Astraea (Rarely Present): "Star-touched" — more remote, often due to duties or personal choices. Serve as a figure of admiration or distant influence. Astraea have been known to float between prides.

What Children Call Their Mothers

Sekarri children have multiple mothers, and each parenting role carries its own terms of address:

• Velara: Most Sekarri call their Velara Mum, Mom, or Mother — the same intimate terms used across many cultures.
• Lorena: Typically addressed as Maw, Mala, or simply Ma.
• Astraea: Can also be called Ma or Maw, though this is rare and not used by all children. The common approach is to call them Mimi followed by their name — e.g. "Mimi Fera's coming over for dinner tonight."

The Sekarri's polyamorous lifestyle isn't simply a consequence of the 7:1 ratio — it's a deeply woven emotional tradition rooted in something far more profound than physical need.

At the center of their prides is Bondlove — a sacred, near-sexual connection shared between women. It transcends friendship, built on mutual comfort, emotional syncing, and intimate touch: nuzzling, holding, shared warmth. Though not explicitly sexual, bondlove carries a closeness that often feels just as fulfilling as time with the male partner — sometimes more so.

There is no envy, no rivalry. When the male is unavailable, one woman may take on the Veyla role — altering her voice and posture in a respectful ritual. She doesn't just comfort the others; she is rewarded with favour and affection. Bondlove is more than custom — it is the very fabric of Sekarri identity, sisterhood, and healing.

Alara has multiple continents, much like Earth. The Sekarri World Wars revolved around the supply and rights of men.

First three wars — The Supply of Men  |  Fourth and fifth wars — The Rights of Men

Tactical & Military Command

Intelligence, Science & Control

Civil & Political Caste

Just as humans once knew of light speed but believed in the Ether before Einstein showed the true 4-dimensional nature of the universe, the Vionites have glimpsed the basic principles of entropy in action. They understand this as Resonant Essence.

This discovery took 200 fleet ships working for 300 years in one of the most extreme environments known — a pulsar system. The combination of time-dilation, intense radiation, and the gravity gradient allowed them to view how information works at the fundamental level.

700 years ago, the Vionites came across several dead Honnehari corpses in a Void Stasis Krypt. General Ozerath's staff, working with a Honnehari Eridix (Ethereal AI/droid), were able to reverse-engineer ancient, godlike Tier 3 technologies. This hinted at Resonant Essence.

After centuries of work, they finally built instruments to measure Resonant Essence. They expected to see a new field, particle, or dimension.

They did not expect to see the fundamental soul data of living beings.

Vionites, Sekarri, humans — all complex, branching data snippets that grow, split and merge. Not DNA code created from parents, but immortal data streams that resonate through different dimensions and time domains. Even after death, their Essence directly influences the evolution of the galaxy.

This shocked the Vionites to the core. The pragmatic conclusion: they were at least 100,000 years behind from being able to make Tier 3 status. The system is now off-limits, but like Area 51, the technology benefits are being slowly siphoned to the populace — including Stellar Architecture via resonant stream fields.

Carapax

A semi-sentient species that used to live on Alara. Before the evacuation, Neph was free to abduct as many as she could and convert them into her armies.

Tiny

Details to be revealed…