Dryad Union
That national government for the Dryad core worlds, until recently deeply isolationist.
Culture
Dryads see themselves as noble scholars, in touch with the nature around them and their pasts in a way no other peoples can match.
Public Agenda
When dealing with other nations, the Dryad Union seeks to secure alliances and so protect itself from direct attack. As a secondary goal they will attempt to expand their area of control and attempt to found of settle new worlds to add to their empire.
History
NB - The history of the Dryads is one of peaceful, unchanging isolation for a number of Eras - tracking this time would be of little use for this timeline. Thus the timeline begins with the significant efforts to break this isolation.
NB - An Era is a nonspecific unit of time governed by living memory - a given Era ends when no one is left alive who witnessed the previous one. A Decade is used in place of the year for common designations, as the long-lived Dryads consider counting individual years to be impracticably short for most administrative functions. Years are then given when strictly necessary for the sake of differentiation, such as below.
Era 20, D15, Y4 - A number of Exodite Dryads begin an experiment involving untried and possibly stolen technology also earmarked for warship command/control. Their primary interest is in advanced, self-sustaining terraforming operations.
Era 20, D15, Y6 - With their successes in hand, the Exodite researchers made contact with the government on Coeden'y Cyfnodau and brokered a deal between their paymasters in the Tri-Star Commonwealth to jointly support and manage the project. This represents the first peaceful collaboration between the Dryad Union and fauna in living memory.
Era 20, D15, Y7 - The project, now codenamed Martyr's Grace, proceeds rapidly and cooperation is encouraging. After a few months, a working prototype is developed and shipped to an otherwise slow commercial terraforming project in Cer space.
Era 20, D15, Y7 - Premature activation of the prototype led to the loss of the freighter and one of its crew, however unanticipated interactions with a rescue team from the Void Walkers project led to the transformation of one of the affected voidwalkers into a dryad - hull and all.
Era 20, D15, Y6 - With their successes in hand, the Exodite researchers made contact with the government on Coeden'y Cyfnodau and brokered a deal between their paymasters in the Tri-Star Commonwealth to jointly support and manage the project. This represents the first peaceful collaboration between the Dryad Union and fauna in living memory.
Era 20, D15, Y7 - The project, now codenamed Martyr's Grace, proceeds rapidly and cooperation is encouraging. After a few months, a working prototype is developed and shipped to an otherwise slow commercial terraforming project in Cer space.
Era 20, D15, Y7 - Premature activation of the prototype led to the loss of the freighter and one of its crew, however unanticipated interactions with a rescue team from the Void Walkers project led to the transformation of one of the affected voidwalkers into a dryad - hull and all.
Demography and Population
A formally classless society along generally communist lines. Thanks to heavy automation of consumer and industrial goods, and a lifestyle and society that is not particularly resource-intensive, Dryad society has achieved a limited form of post-scarcity in which greed and economic incentives have lost their power. As a result, inequality and so the development of heirarchical class structures in modern Dryad society is effectively neutered.
Despite the economic situation, War Dryads occupy a higher rank in society - having given their lives over to the cause of public defence, and all but guaranteed to meet a violent end that will prevent them from rooting down and providing for their descends in death, their sacrifice is honoured in life.
Those who have fled the Dryad Union for whatever reason, Exodites are a somewhat reviled group within the Union. Generally appearing as naturalised enclaves of refugees or fugitives from justice, Exodites tend to be atheists and occasionally heretics, curious souls filled with wanderlust, and occasionally War Dryad cowards fleeing the military. The editorialised stories of horror these exiles bring with them have served to keep civilised folk away from the Dryad worlds - and so deepen their past isolation. The recent opening of Dryad borders have brought the Exodite communities back into contact with their homeworlds... with all the tension that implies.
Territories
Y'crud Ohonom (Cradle of Us)
The home system of the Dryad Union, containing two major planets: Coeden'y Cyfnodau - Tree of the Eras - the Dryad origin world and capital. Cor'y'meirw - Choir of the Dead - An artificial moon of Coeden'y Cyfnodau, both a garden world and a vast tomb. Cartref'y Tuhwnt'i Gartref (A Home Beyond Home)
A core system of the Dryad Union, containing two major planets:
Bara'r Byd - Breadbasket of Worlds - An agricultural world Cartref Llawen - A Joyous Home - An unspoiled oceanic world Seren Gynnes'yn'y Tywyllwch (Warm Star in Dark)
A core system of the Dryad Union with a hot, active star. Containing two major planets: Coedwig'yn'yr Anialwch - A Forest in Desert - A desert world and terraforming testbed Tir Gwastraff wedi'i losgi - A Burned Wasteland - A long-empty tomb world now mined for raw resources.
The home system of the Dryad Union, containing two major planets: Coeden'y Cyfnodau - Tree of the Eras - the Dryad origin world and capital. Cor'y'meirw - Choir of the Dead - An artificial moon of Coeden'y Cyfnodau, both a garden world and a vast tomb. Cartref'y Tuhwnt'i Gartref (A Home Beyond Home)
A core system of the Dryad Union, containing two major planets:
Bara'r Byd - Breadbasket of Worlds - An agricultural world Cartref Llawen - A Joyous Home - An unspoiled oceanic world Seren Gynnes'yn'y Tywyllwch (Warm Star in Dark)
A core system of the Dryad Union with a hot, active star. Containing two major planets: Coedwig'yn'yr Anialwch - A Forest in Desert - A desert world and terraforming testbed Tir Gwastraff wedi'i losgi - A Burned Wasteland - A long-empty tomb world now mined for raw resources.
Military
For a description of military doctrine etc, see Dryad Armed Forces
Approximate Naval Numbers:
Approximately 4k FTL-capable bioships grown using the older, flesh- and chitin-based design principles Now mostly technologically obsolete and many simply too old to fight at full effectiveness, these bioships take second-line military roles. Approximately 2k FTL-capable bioships built according to the ‘Everjoy-type’ wooden construction. All smaller and younger than the older type of bioship, but correspondingly more effective in battle for their tonnage. Finally, Everjoy-type tugs and squadrons of escorts taken directly from the VW project have begun to appear in Dryad naval facilities. These bioships are themselves Voidwalkers, raised and trained by Everjoy and her contacts personally, and promise further cooperation between the Dryad Union and its main point of contact with the wider galaxy...
Approximately 4k FTL-capable bioships grown using the older, flesh- and chitin-based design principles Now mostly technologically obsolete and many simply too old to fight at full effectiveness, these bioships take second-line military roles. Approximately 2k FTL-capable bioships built according to the ‘Everjoy-type’ wooden construction. All smaller and younger than the older type of bioship, but correspondingly more effective in battle for their tonnage. Finally, Everjoy-type tugs and squadrons of escorts taken directly from the VW project have begun to appear in Dryad naval facilities. These bioships are themselves Voidwalkers, raised and trained by Everjoy and her contacts personally, and promise further cooperation between the Dryad Union and its main point of contact with the wider galaxy...
Technological Level
See Dryad Technology
Tenets of Faith
When a dryad dies, the body ceases all higher functions and bodily processes as per other races. However due to their vegetative biology, following a peaceful death the body of the deceased continues mitochondrial function and begins to operate along purely vegetable lines. The dryad’s hooves lay down roots permanently and their skin converts fully to bark as all internal organs decompose or are repurposed. Within a few days the body of the deceased dryad is effectively an inanimate tree, and within a generation signs of their original form such as facial features and even the tauriform body shape will fade. Some dryad ethnicities that normally produce fruits will generally do so, and the duration of the dryad’s physical afterlife is effectively unlimited unless struck by disease or physical damage.
Dryad society therefore exists amongst groves made literally from their ancestors, and even as a spacefaring civilisation they are defined by their connection to the past. It is common for a dying dryad to ask to be posed and shaped into a hollow shape to serve as the home of their distant descendants, or to be planted in orchards to one day provide fruits for ritual services.
As surrounded as they are by the peace and unbroken continuity of their forebears, it is common for dryads to offer prayers and requests for wisdom to their more prosperous ancestors. Great leaders of antiquity are often found as towering trees covered in carefully inscribed records of their deeds in life and the aid they offered in death, while countless superstitious or ambitious individuals carry chips of bark from dead heroes as a way to channel their courage and wisdom. As they approach some sense of planetary unity, this worship has become standardised into a loosely defined (and effectively unenforceable) single cult which reveres the state of nature itself as a goddess, or perhaps as the very spark of life in a cold inorganic world.
To a dryad, the practice of carpentry amongst animal civilisations has the horrific implications of exhumation or even necromancy for purposes of structurally sound building materials or, worse, a campfire. The mere idea of wooden coffins amongst the human Empire was so repellant that diplomatic channels were cut to this day after a casual description. This, among many other misunderstandings or incidents, was a major part of building their reputation as violent isolationists.
Founding Date
Era 3, Decade 3, Year 2
Demonym
Dryad (Differentiation between race and nation has not often been needed until recently)
Government System
Democracy, Presidential
Economic System
Post-scarcity economy
Judicial Body
External intelligence is performed by a group known only as The Agency. Known to have assets and ties to Exodite enclaves throughout the sector, they trade tools and knowledge for any information they can find. While the Agency’s official aim is simply to keep watch on the wider interstellar community, they often find themselves feeding smuggling operations to fund the least-worst factions in petty wars or civil disputes.
Internal secret police functions are unnecessary, however a specialist group does exist to find and bring to justice any deserting War Dryads.
Controlled Territories
Neighboring Nations
Notable Members
Comments