Galactic Library Profile of Terran Space

Galactic Library Profile of polities of ‘Terra’

Known also as:

• Humanspace
• The Solarian Sector

Background:

The Terrans are a recent entry in the galactic catalog of known alien polities. Explorers from Elian recently found a weak grav-lane out to a previously unexplored, rimward section of the galaxy. These explorers discovered a Human survey vessel, which was surprising because on first examination the red-dwarf system had no out bound gravlanes other than the one the Elian vessel used to get there. After a translator was cobbled together to make sense of the humans languages, the Terrans agreed to take a delegation back to Sol so that they could study the idea of gravlane navigation and propose routes to ’known’ space.
This began in interesting era in Terran and GalCiv history one of limited cultural exchange and discovery. The found novel implementations of technology that they hadn’t considered, given that most Galactics tend to copy one another (resulting in fairly static and similar ways of approaching problems).
Eventually the Humans stumbled into a settled galactic civilization with a rather xenophobic species (who’s negative reaction was compounded by the fact that they didn’t understand how the Humans got there, so assumed they were a stealthy pirate vessel running without a standard transponder - see notes on First Contact War). This episode revealed another unexpected side to the Human way of things, in short they don’t fight conflicts the way the expected. The humans used their unique technology to engage in boarding actions and use of highly mobile capital ships coupled with single seat ‘fighters’ against the standard galactic battle wagons armed with missiles and particle cannons.
How does one engage a cruiser with a missile barrage or kinetic weapons when said cruiser ‘jumps’ to someplace completely different? Luckily plasma and energy weapons work, but then no one was used to having engage at range with energy weapons. They found the entire concept intolerable.
Needless to say, the quickly came to terms agreeing to what amounted to disarmed buffer region and the closure of several gravlanes (a new concept to many. No one had ever really considered such a thing).
As such there is now an undeclared armistice and arms race; how strong can the humans get through alliance building and technological innovation before their surrounding races either figure out on their own, steal, or find a workaround for their ‘jumping’ technologies and swarm them?

How was Humanity missed by GalCiv?

The answer to this frequent query is both simple and complex; the simple answer is that space is really quite large in volume. It is very easy to not see something you aren’t looking for. Humanity can be found in roughly a 100ly sphere (link exploring why human space is spherical instead of gravlane (aka slip knot) or jump gate based in appendix A) around their home system, which is a miniscule volume. It should also be mentioned that First Contact was not with humanities main system, but with a sub-polity vessel exploring a system for some sort of resource mining operation. (Question, how can there be human sub-polities? Please follow the link on human governments for more information).
The complex answer has to do with Astogrophy and the Terran home world itself.
Terran space is far toward the rim, hidden by a dense region of active stellar formation. This actively disrupts gravlane formation between the more settled regions of space and the human regions. Worse, there are no known stargates within that region of the galaxy. Apparently there just hasn’t been a reason to go there until now.
Now on to the Terran home world; most intelligent species come from low emission stellar types, with old, yellow stars being in the upper band and generally rare. Sol is an extremely active yellow class – not quite to middle age. This means that the Sol system is a veritable hellscape of solar storms and radiation, with bursts every century or so which would destroy most pre-space electronics and civilization.
Terrans evolved in this hell space due to their planet being an effective double planet, causing active plate tectonics (!) and a magnetosphere rivaling a small gas giant. Generally, most rocky planets in yellow main line star systems turn out like their second and forth planet, with either the radiation stripping the planet of a useful atmosphere creating a barren rock or a toxic hell furnace.
In short, any explorers to that quadrant would have not bothered to survey Sol for life as it is obviously not qualified. The number of accidents that had to happen to make Terra habitable are… unlikely in the extreme.

Historical overview of Terran Society and interstellar ‘government’.

In some ways, the Terrans are lucky to have escaped their planet. Due to ecological collapse, poor planning, and the usual unplanned technological expansion (See link to known galactic tomb worlds where a sponsor was not found prior to this, sadly, all to common fate). So while their homeworld can be at best described as a mess, they've been able to thrive because of two factors; their discovery of non-gravlane bound interstellar travel, and an unusual affinity for biotechnology (Most non-native ecospheres are horrifyingly toxic to non native species. Humanity has been able to rapidly terraform primordial planets into useful biomes, resulting in a far denser spread of humanity and their 'uplifts' than really any other known sphere of the galaxy). These places have been settled independently of any central authority. Thus places like ‘New France’ (also known as Europa), partially frozen water world in orbit around Jupiter in the Terran System with extensive underwater settlements and an adapted biome for many native and Terran aquatic species. This has resulted in many unaligned polities within the rough 100ly sphere of humanity (see treatise on novel human drive systems which are not tied to grav-lanes in appendix B). So while the Dominion of New Terra is considered the main representative of Humanity, it is very possible to run into humans who not only claim non-allegiance, but will actively work to subvert their so-called government.

Galactic policy (See appendix C for a list of all known Human Polities)

Current Galactic relations with GalCiv

Naturally this far too large and complex a question to be answered in any general detail. For further information on a specific polities or regions relationship with human space, one should consult the Galactic embassy of that power. However, some general statements can be made about human / galactic relations.
Humanity exists in a strange position because of their lack of Higher sponsor, therefore some cultures are reluctant to deal with them. On the other hand, humanity has turned out to be exceptionally gifted in terms of xenotechnology, having now uplifted multiple species.

• Uplifted and allied species include Porpoise, Orca, Giant Pacific Octopus, Canine, Chimpanzee, Gorilla, Elephant, Xitixhui and the Chilran
• The Xitixhui are a remnant species, rescued from an extra planetary colony of the native species which had very recently annihilated its own home planet with fission weapons.
• The Chilran were a pre-industrial society uplifted to the space age by humans.
• Humans are frequently used as mercenaries outside of human space. Their lack of political unity has resulted in a far more conflict oriented society when compared to the galactic norms.

Major Known Polities within Human Space

• Sol System
• Chung Quo
• New Nippon
• Hinduraj
• The Mughal Imperii
• Libertaria
• New Moresby
• Zion
• Various unaffiliated independents.

Human Physiology

Bilaterally symmetric. Bipedal. Land based, but comfortable in water environments with technology or genetic adaptation. Sexually dimorphic across a spectrum. Live birth. Adaptable in most climates with a reasonable O2, NO2, CO2 atmosphere. Zero G adaptable. Biologically adaptable to non-standard gravity environment. Wears clothing due to lack of fur, plumage or exoskeleton. Remarkably physiologically robust (significantly higher standard ability to withstand hydrostatic shock and temperature variance). Observed broader than standard personality profile when compared to GalCiv norms. Omnivore species derived from 'endurance hunting' savannah dwelling primates. Higher that mean bone density and muscular development. Only class four omnivore species known (most class four or class five species are predatory or lithovores. As such, humans make for very popular mercenaries. They get along well with most species without constantly evoking a flight or fight response).

Human space drive technology

Humanity has discovered a way to directly produce and manipulate what they call an Einstein-Rosen Bridge (null space wormholes) within their spacecraft. This has an advantage and a disadvantage, they can be created between any two relative proximate points in space. Their disadvantage is that gravlanes are much more stable and cover a significantly longer distance. StarGates naturally dwarf the null space distance that their vessels can create. Conversely, any ship, even some fighters can create their own wormholes, making for horrifying tactical implications. Such as flanking and enveloping maneuvers which leverage time dilation factors that can make targeting at distance extremely difficult.
Marine drop pods in which a boarding action can be initiated by their marines at an instant!
There are even reports of living ‘voidships’ which can hop between normal and null space at will, left over from their so-called Singularity / Voidship AI wars.
In addition to all of this there is the research they have put into wormhole and null space travel. It turns out many species go mad when exposed to raw null space (symptoms include psychosis, sociopathy, and what some even call ‘possession syndrome’ in which the victim becomes uncontrollably homicidal), while humans seem either more able to withstand the effects, or completely immune.

Conclusion

It cannot be stressed enough that the Human region of the galaxy is very unlike the rest of Ascendancy space. Expect the unexpected and chaos. Considered an ‘at your own risk’ region.