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balkanized worlds

parmasson

SOC-14 1K
I just realized something. IMTU balkanized worlds and those just recovering from civil wars and distress are quite common. Looking at my two subsectors that I have detailed it looks like close to 1 in 4 planets are either in the middle of a civil war, balkanized as a result of one or just recovering. How common is civil strife in the OTU Imperium or IYTU?
 
I don't think every balkanized world needs to be engaged in, or the result of, a civil war.
 
I agree, balkanised worlds are more likely due to:

more than one colonising group in the first place

cultural differences between colonists eventually leading to separate settlements

daughter colonies establishing themselves and declaring independence.

There needn't be civil strife in any of the above, but human nature being what it is...
 
Put two or more different independent political units on the surface of a planet with the ability to raise an army and you will have conflict. I guess I take my clue that there are few places on this planet that have not been the site of a war or political upheaval within the last 30 or so years.

You could also have two habitable worlds in one system that are enemies as well.

I guess that I am suggesting that balkanized world might be common.
 
Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
Put two or more different independent political units on the surface of a planet with the ability to raise an army and you will have conflict. I guess I take my clue that there are few places on this planet that have not been the site of a war or political upheaval within the last 30 or so years.
Well, it's been about two hundred years since the U.S. invaded Canada, but I guess that just means Canada's number is comin' up soon.

;)

I agree that different governments on a balkanized world may be competitive with one another, but I don't think that is a straight line to armed conflict.
Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
You could also have two habitable worlds in one system that are enemies as well.
Been there, done that, got the MCUF.
Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
I guess that I am suggesting that balkanized world might be common.
Okay - I guess my view of human nature isn't quite as bleak as yours, though there are plenty of dystopias in my Charted Space.
 
Aso remember that some cultures (Vargr?) prefer a very decentralized form of planetary government, leading to more than one planetary government.
 
KG,

I must agree with the other posters. A balkanized world need not the result of war, civil strife, or any of the others things Earth's Balkans are noted for.

Sigg's suggestion of different initial colonies is a favorite of mine. A planet is a big place even with hypersonic grav craft and sat-net 'cell phones'. Using Earth as a guide, you could plunk a million people down in eastern Australia, another million down in the Cote d'Azur, and they could ignore easily ignore each other for centuries.

Beliive me, I don't think anyone here has a lower opinion of humanity than I do, but I can say with a straightc face that civil strife, constant espionage, cold and hot wars, and DMZs are not automatic features of a balkanized planet.

You could also have the original colony break up into self governing units after it matures. Each new unit is still part of the Imperium and each new unit participates in whatever global political umbrella the world has; a planetary League of Nations with the Imperial Consul as the Secretary General for example, but each unit is still viewed as a separate polity.

On current day Earth, we're unitary states devolve all the time, sometimes peacefully and sometimes not. That could be the 'source' of many balknaized worlds in the OTU.


Have fun,
Bill
 
Balkanization can also be by desire rather than Federate or Confederate some people just want to be left alone. Usually it requires a sizable population but sometimes when the respect of the minority is not heeded they only answer is separation. This can be quite civil, afterall a new world with many resources might not object to the creation a new authority only later to contemplate unification at a later date.
 
"Okay - I guess my view of human nature isn't quite as bleak as yours, though there are plenty of dystopias in my Charted Space."

You are all right. it is bleak.

BTW
Didn’t Canada have any Indian wars or “forced removals” in the 1800s?
 
Sure Canada, had its Indian Wars in the 1800s, they were just done more stealthfully than in the US. We had two major Rebellions and countless small ones, in which the police was dispatched. Then we got them to sign false treaties and then tried the worst forms of cultural genocide upon the First Nations.
 
Well in my setting, and planet with a tech level of 8 or less is assumed to be balkanized, these are aboriginal planets. Having a unified planetary government is something of an accomplishment they haven't achieved yet. Also the populations on these worlds are randomly rolled, instead they are directly related to tech level and what tech level does to the population carrying capacity of each planet, which the aboriginal population tends to fill. The relationship between tech level and population code that I use are as follows:
Tech Level -- Population Code
0 -- 6
1 -- 7
2 -- 8
3 -- 8
4 -- 9
5 -- 9
6 -- 9
7 -- 9
8 -- 9

The government type I use is always 7, which means the planet is broken up in a number of nations, the law level is something of a controversy as it varies from nation to nation, but over all it should be low or zero, and perhaps the law level should apply to nations rather than people. A person who notices the low law level, might land within a totalitatian police state and be unpleasantly surprised. Kind of like an alien space ship that lands in North Korea for instance expecting lax law enforcement.
 
Until you stumble across the planet that was settled by different SCA groups, and CHOOSES to maintain a Tech-3 society...

Or a planet founded by Civil war Re-enactors, who WANT a Steam Age civilization.

While MOST planets in the OTU are inhabited by HUMANS, not ALL of them are "natives". And there are a bazillion reasons for some group to just go out and settle a planet.

Consider, also, a planet settled by the Amish (just ignore the use of Starships ^_^). The planet would be "balkanized" into self-sufficient, self-administering Granges, but no matter where you set down on the planet, the "culture" would be the same. Amish.

And while the Amish don't want none of your stinkin techno-toys, PRIMITIVE they ain't.
 
These are exceptions. the basic rule is, if your going to colonize the planets you need at least Tech Level 9 to get there, or you need help from someone with tech level 9 to transport you. Most people who live in primitive societies are primitive by choice, usually they are primitive because thats all that is available.

If you have a planet with 1,000 TL1 humans on it, this is not a natural situation, they would have had to have arrived recently by some means at a tech level higher than 8 in order to be there.

The presumed explaination for primitive humans on a planet is that they are shipwreck survivors or descended from such survivors, or they were deliberately abducted from their home planet and placed on a new planet by advanced aliens. Whatever the reason, the marooned humans either lost their technology deveral generations after their ship crashed, or they never had such technology and were transplated by aliens for some mysterious purpose.

Now either one of two things will happen, either the human population will thrive and expand or they will die off. If it thrives, then humans will expand their territory until they populate the entire habitable surface of the planet. If they are hunter/gatherers at TL0 then they'll have a population in the millions, because that is all the population a natural unaltered environment can support, any more than that and the humans will overhunt, suffer food shortages and famine and their number will decline until their is sufficient food to feed them.

At TL1 you have agriculture, and the population can then be in the tens of millions or low hundreds of millions, as cultivated land can feed more than uncultivated land, but agriculture is back breaking work at this tech level. At higher tech levels more efficient agriculture devlops with higher crop yields and requiring fewer farmers, so the population can go from hundreds of millions to billions as the TL increases, but up to TL8 they are all stuck on one planet. At TL9+ humans can travel to other planets with the development of the jump drive, so now it becomes common to see planets inhabited by thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of humans, since they just got here their population is low, and since their are plenty of planets they can travel to, their is no reason to fill any single one up to capacity.
 
Originally posted by Laryssa:
If you have a planet with 1,000 TL1 humans on it, this is not a natural situation, they would have had to have arrived recently by some means at a tech level higher than 8 in order to be there.
Psionic mass-teleportation.
 
I use transplanted Earth racial and cultural divisions in my game for those worlds settled early by generation ships and such for Solomani settled worlds, and a few non-earth based cultures for 'Ancients' settled systems, and a variant French-Spanish culture for the Vilani, hence my backgrounds are rife with politics and economic competitions between worlds and countries in balkanized states. I get some use out of those rules from COAAC this way, and startegic level wargames for merc and noble characters.

The DGW Knightfall adventure book refers to the 'Primordials', a Tech 21+ race that predates the Ancients and 'Grandfather' by several hundred thousand years, which is going to play a big part in my next background creation related to the Imperium canon, as the characters begin researching this and trying to trace it's history and ends. I'm using them as the real destroyers of the 'Ancients' culture, as well as the culture the Ancients themselves 'borrowed from to spring out of 'nowhere' so fast way back when,

I see some interesting notions about First Nations here. Suffice it to say most First Nations tribes were 'genociding' each other before Europeans came along. They were neither more or less innocent than humaniti anywhere else, but maybe that's for another thread? They were a pretty mercenary lot.
 
I guess if the threat of the Imperium brought two or more sides together for a treaty then things could at least in theory develop peacefully. Do we have two starports then?
 
Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
Do we have two starports then?
KG,

According to GT:Starports and the old JTAS 'Skyport Authority' article the answer is yes. However, that 'yes' needs to be explained.

We'll have one Imperial-operated, wholly neutral, xtrality enjoying starport and any number of member state-operated, wholly partisan, non-xtrality starports that the various balkanized powers can afford to operate.


Have fun,
Bill
 
Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
I guess if the threat of the Imperium brought two or more sides together for a treaty then things could at least in theory develop peacefully.
One of the balkanized worlds IMTU is Converse (E722479-9) - it is divided between Havelock Mining and Milling (HM&M) SA and the Converse Consortium (ConCo) LIC.

Converse is a backwater of the Horizon Main in Ley Sector, originally settled by independent prospectors - during the early period a succession of small mining companies formed and dissolved, none with the requisite resources to make a viable claim to the whole of the planet. One such company was purchased by HM&M, a sector-wide mineral development corporation - after the initial investment proved profitable, HM&M began to increase its holdings by buying out additional claims.

Several of these small mining operations, in response to HM&M's burgeoning interest in the planet, decided to band together to protect their mutual claims, forming ConCo. With a few exceptions that remain independent to the present day, mining operations on the planet were subsumed under either HM&M or ConCo.

HM&M is interested solely in mining operations on the planet, and as profitability diminishes, the corporation has begun scaling back its operations on Converse, keeping only the most productive mines in operation and shutting down the rest. ConCo has a long-term development plan including an atmosphere project and other terraforming to attract colonists to the planet. Representatives for HM&M have approached ConCo with an offer to sell its interests on the planet to the smaller consortium, but so far ConCo has held out, waiting for HM&M's price to come down.

Now if I'm Kurega Gikur, I probably see a planet with private security forces battling industrial spies commiting acts of espionage against its rival. However, what I see is a large planet that is sparesely populated over which the competition for resources is limited - at the moment each company is getting what it wants out of its operations on Converse, with the prospect of a negotiated settlement that will leave ConCo as the main proprietor in the next few centuries on the table. The main conflict on the planet is not between the two corporations, but between the corporations and the handful of independents, and with rogue prospectors who encroach on either HM&M or ConCo claims - these activities occupy the small security teams for each corporation present on the planet (HM&M has in-house security personnel, ConCo employs a platoon of mercenaries), and also provide a number of potential patrons with whom adventurers may come into contact during planetfall.

No need to invoke Imperial intervention here.
Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
Do we have two starports then?
Both HM&M and ConCo maintain separate class E facilities. HM&M's 'port at New Durban, its headquarters on Converse, is situated adjacent to the Green Eye, the shallow sea that forms the planet's only significant surface water body - dipping is permitted with a permit from HM&M. A second class E facility is present at Converse City, the center of ConCo's operations - ConCo plans to upgrade its starport to class D over the next decade, including the installation of an orbital dock.
 
Originally posted by Bill Cameron:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Kurega Gikur:
Do we have two starports then?
KG,

According to GT:Starports and the old JTAS 'Skyport Authority' article the answer is yes. However, that 'yes' needs to be explained.

We'll have one Imperial-operated, wholly neutral, xtrality enjoying starport and any number of member state-operated, wholly partisan, non-xtrality starports that the various balkanized powers can afford to operate.
</font>[/QUOTE]+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

In support of Mr Cameron...

Agreed, or if you use any form of subtables for balkanization (pick yer flavor of Trav here)--maybe only the superpowers have such Imperial starports.

I cite the example of Hasaggan/Massilia in Knightfall (MT Module adventure)--a balkanzied world with 2 separate democracies; one differentiated by the cultural factor of political office holders had to have two wives. If any on th two left or divorced said politician, he/she was immediately cast from office (the intent of the culture being, if you couldn't manage two spouses, why are you leading a planet? ).

Each of these two nations had both orbital & downports.

Speaking of cultural issues of ethnicity balkanizing a world, there is also religion, another great historical divider of mankind..

Good thoughts here! Loved it gents.
 
Ok, I agree. balkanization does not have to equate war. Hmmmm private ownership.
Interesting ideas if you can accept that two groups of people can live next to each other peacefully.

Could even have a nine or ten way division based on mining claims.
 
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