Project Prosperous: Children of a Prosperous Earth Campaign

I'm not surprised.

We have no modder, not even anyone to work with the storyline. My study will be over in less than one month, but it'll be busy until then.

I am replying now - I hope we aren't o hibernation!

First post... here's a possible backstory/history for this setting, if accepted. Much of this is admittedly a rough attempt to justify the names of each faction, but here it is:



History:



The First Wave:



From the mid 2020s to the early 2030s, structural problems within both the American and Chinese economies result in a global economic collapse. Global instability plunges the world into chaos. The resultant extremism, factionalism and persecution which arises causes countless minority and sometimes even majority groups to seek an exit. These groups turn to the solar system as their hope. For as it turns out, the only sector of the economy not severely affected by this crisis is the space sector, as while Earthbound economic ties suffer, the newborn space-based industrial economy as a while suffers minimally. Spearheaded by powerful private corporations such as SpaceX and Planetary Resources, and later joined by social entities such as social movements and governments seeking to reduce pressure at home, the first major wave of human colonization of the solar system begins. Many of the modern factions emerge around this time.



- In the United States, wealthy individuals, such as billionaires, fear for their lives as populist sentiment turns sharply against them. First, they offshore most of their assets to more supportive nations. After, they bring with them assorted groups unaligned with this new political wave such as libertarians, Mormons, upper-middle class liberals and normal people just trying to make their fortune. This group would found the first true American colonies in space, as well as forming the nucleus of the Liberty Exchange later in history.



- In China, long suppressed social, political and religious groups such as Chinese democrats, Old Guard communists and Falun Gong practitioners have already been taking to space. They are joined by Chinese fascists, New Guard Communists and traditional Chinese cultural revivalists who find the current social or cultural position to be insufficiently going their way. The government also finds it fit to export large numbers of refugees coming from the collapse of North Korea. Along them joins a large number of normal Chinese citizens seeking to make their fortune in space, and the first space policing force as the PRC government does not sufficiently trust these splinter groups. Combined with the continued endurance of the one state, many govenments model first demonstrated by Hong Kong, China would go on to attain entry from Taiwan, Singapore, United Korea, Cambodia and other assorted states, eventually forming what is colloquially called the East Asian Megastate some time in the future.





The fates of other nations:



- Speaking of Revolving Door Revolutions, this decade sees the final collapse of the European Union, to be replaced with the European National Alliance - an outgrowth of previous alliances between far right political parties in decades past. As they assume power, the old liberal European elites and well off ethnic minorities board the rockets to escape ever increasing persecution. They are matched by the numbers of normal European colonists, as a friendly rivalry between the allied nations results in an internal space race. The ENA, with an shakey distribution of power centres between France, Germany, Poland and Hungary, eventually lean anti-Russian, much to the dismay of Russia (which indirectly caused the ENA's rise in the first place). This situation will hold stable for several decades, until the ENA-Russian Federation war, which will result in the rise of the North Eurasian Socialist Union (the political axis swings hard to the exact other direction in the aftermath of the war).



- Even while Japan was officially a US ally, there were subtle signs that the Japanese leadership were bound not by ties of friendship or honour, but by cold realpolitik. This trend only wavers slightly when Japan is taken over by right wing ultranationalist forces, for even the ultranationists see the cold logic in realigning with China. Nicknamed Nippon Prime, this new Japan sees logic in joining the sphere of influence of her superpower neighbour rather than being a scortched battleground between superpowers, and to gain easy access to space from the EAM's Spaceport Singapore. Being nationalist though, they strongly refuse any offer to join the EAM.



The South Asian War:



The Indian subcontinent as a whole got off fairly lightly from the global economic collapse, allowing them to continue to grow and make politics without external influence. Unfortunately, this also entailed a continuation of the hostilities between India and Pakistan. (India and Pakistan go to a 30-50 nuclear bomb war, causing devastation within both countries, causing even more people around the world to colonize space, and ending in a United Nations military mandate over both countries which resolves with the breakup and reformation of both countries into the South Asian Republic. This republic goes on to assilimate much of the rest of South Asia.)









On other plot points:



- On Ground Battles: Rather than having each faction swear not to wage war on Earth, what if we flipped it - Each faction does brutally and viciously wage war on Earth. Only, there's one problem - Stalemate. It first began as an outgrowth of ground based anti-ICBM technology, which also allowed for such vicious ground war in the first place as mutually assured destruction is no longer a thing. The problem expanded with the growth of tactically incredibly lethal weapons, such as precision guided munitions, which tends to result in a strategic defensive being strongly favored. Something of a mix between www.unz.com/akarlin/future-war/ and Rocketpunk Manifesto's www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2010/09/space-warfare-xii-surface-warfare.html . This will go on to provide a reason for each faction's focus on space warfare - because it is seen as the key to break this stalemate.



- Why space? Primary reason for the average individuals I have simply pulled from historical colonization examples. Namely, escaping persecution, forming one's own utopian society, making it rich on the frontier and fear of violence at home. This is most strongly developed for the American and Chinese factions above, but will need work for the other factions.

I recall SpaceX intends to bring down the cost to about $100 000 to $500 000 per person to Mars should they get their rockets fully reusable. Still extremely pricey and out of the reach of most people, but I can imagine the upper middle class managing to do this. Now, consider adding some real space launch infrastructure - a Space Elevator ($200/kg) for example, or a Lofstrom Loop ($3 or $0.3/kg), or a Startram ($40/kg). High capital investment, but if it gets launching, costs drop to the tens of thousands or even thousands of dollars - well within the reach of normal people now. Or given the sheer laser firepower we have in game, laser thermal rocket launchers (rocket just carries inert water, ground based lasers heat it up as it drops out of the rocket), which are probably more scalable than the previous suggestions and result in prices about the same. Also consider nuclear launchers - the Liberty Shuttle, or even better, the Orion ground launched, and suddenly launch costs to orbits are on the matter of cents per kilogram or less.

Space and Space colonization is obscenely expensive because we don't have the infrastructure and/or tech in place for now. Once we do, the skies are open on the launch end, which dramatically drops the prices of most things. The main reason space is so expensive today is because it costs over $5000 per kilogram to orbit - and this is a heavily reduced price from the old $11 000 thanks to SpaceX driving the prices down already.

As for the cost of the rest of the infrastructure, admittedly that might be rather significant. I don't have numbers for that.

On libertarians, upper-middle, leftists and mormons working together - actually the idea wasn't so much them working together, as much as them being the main groups leaving for space given the chance. Particularly given wealthy sponsors they have. They do not necessarily work closely together, but they do go off to space, and found their own colonies, and work loosely together. Same for China.

How do nationalist parties take control and ally with each other? Opportunistically, and in opposition to modern globalist liberalism. There's more than just that particular one, interestingly enough. Is this stable? Very arguable, but unlike last time imperialism and expansionism are not things they support, on average.

Not all Americans left. Only a small minority, forming the core of the American colonies in space, who come back to influence America. The USA is largely still on Earth. Canada probably gets annexed by the USA rather than the other way around.

Depends on how the Korean peninsula unites. A managed, controlled unification would bring about a stupidly powerful great power in the region, alongside an incredible economic boom. This said, I did say North Korea collapsed, so that's not good. I'll find my source on this in a bit.

I think one of you may not understand what libertarianism is in American politics, by the way. Liberals and libertarians actually have a lot in common. The basic difference between them is that liberals trust the government to fix social problems, while libertarians agree that said problems need to be confronted, but don't trust the government's ability to solve them.

Project Rho has some essays on 'space libertarians' and points out that the individualism of libertarianism on the American frontier in space is doomed to failure simply because you need a certain minimum number of people in order to make a habitat work. It's why CoaDE warships have (in practice rather large) crews, instead of being mostly automated with just one or two people at the helm. This community-level organization is more liberal-like than libertarian in sound, although it does offer freedom from more impersonal governments on Earth, since a government for a society of a few hundred people will be in better touch with its individual citizens than a government of a society of millions. As such, libertarians may want full independence from society the way that settlers did on the frontier, but they can't have it. They can have smaller government, though, so even this concession is better than nothing.

So yeah, I can easily see liberals and libertarians setting aside their differences to live together in space.