Fast Play 2.pdf

I NTRODUCTION T O

S CIENCE F ICTION R OLEPLAYING

I NTRODUCTION TO F ADING S UNS

H OLISTIC D ESIGN

Nobles

Priests

Aliens

Knights

It is the dawn of the sixth millennium and the skies are

darkening, for the suns themselves are fading. Humans

reached the stars long ago, building a Republic of high

technology and universal emancipation — and then

squandered it, fought over it, and finally lost it. A new

Dark Age has descended on humanity, for the greatest of

civilizations has fallen and even the stars die. Now, feu-

dal lords rule the Known Worlds, vying for power with

fanatic priests and scheming guilds.

From the original developers of White Wolf’s Vampire ®

and Werewolf ®, comes a saga of humanity’s fate

among the stars…

Starships

Psychics

Lost Worlds

Ancient Artifacts

FA D I N G S U N S

S CIENCE F ICTION U NIVERSE

Created by Bill Bridges & Andrew Greenberg

www.fadingsuns.com

Holistic Design Inc.

5295 Hwy 78, D-337

Stone Mountain, GA 30097

www.holistic-design.com

I NTRODUCTION TO F ADING S UNS

Introduction to

FA D I N G S U N S

A Futuristic Passion Play

Once the suns shone brightly, beacons in the vast night

of space, calling humanity onward. The stars were symbols

of humanity’s vast potential, a purpose and destiny revealed

in progress, inciting an exodus of unlimited growth to the

distant stars. Once people looked to the heavens with hope

and longing in their eyes.

Then the suns — and the hope — began to fade.

It is the beginning of the sixth millennium after Christ

and history has come to an end. Humanity’s greatest civili-

zation has fallen, leaving ignorance and fear scattered among

the ruins of many worlds. A new Dark Age is upon human-

ity and few believe in renewal and progress anymore. Now

there is only waiting. Waiting for a slow death as the age-

old stars fade to cinders and the souls of the sinful are called

to Final Judgment.

But not all believe in this destiny. A leader has arisen,

an emperor sworn to unite the worlds of Human Space to-

gether again under one banner. To ignite hope once more in

people’s hearts.

It is a monumental task, for most people have already

given up and fallen into the ways of the past, playing serfs

to feudal lords. What is hope to them now but a falsehood

which leads to pain? Better to leave the hard decisions to

their masters and let the Church console their souls.

There are enemies everywhere, those who seek to self-

ishly profit from humanity’s demise: vain nobles ruling far-

flung worlds, power-hungry priests who seek dominion over

the lives of men, the greedy merchant guilds growing rich

from bartering humanity’s needs and wants. They are not

alone. Others are out there among the darkening stars, alien

races angry with humankind for age-old slavery, and enig-

matic alien empires with agendas too paradoxical to fathom.

It is in such a universe that individual men and women

must live. Only a few of them will question. Fewer still will

act on their questions and seek answers, ways to break the

grip of custom and law. To free themselves and once more

seize the stars — and their destiny.

Fading Suns Science

Fiction Roleplaying

Fading Suns is a roleplaying game, a highly imagina-

tive activity which can provide hours of fun and a means of

creative expression. Fading Suns is primarily a game about

heroes and the dramatic conflicts they encounter, from pal-

ace intrigues to cliffhanging combats. It provides a frame-

work for players to create games from any perspective they

desire. If they want to play soldiers who fight evil with guns

and fists, the rules are here. If they want to play merchants

who prefer diplomacy to violence, or priests wrestling with

a metaphysical crisis, rules and helpful dramatic hints are

also provided. Fading Suns is whatever the players want it

to be.

Fading Suns is primarily a science fiction game, which

means that there are starships, blasters, powered armor, alien

races, and weird science. But there are also many elements

of traditional fantasy gaming: heroic characters and

struggles, a feudal sociopolitical structure (noble lords, high

priests and headstrong merchants), powerful artifacts and

great mysteries. And there is horror: monsters and mad-

dening discoveries revealing terrifying metaphysical truths.

In short, Fading Suns is a game which has everything

a roleplaying universe needs in order tell stories of such

varied and exotic themes as can be found anywhere — in

our very own world here and now.

Like all games, Fading Suns should be entertaining and

fun to play. But roleplaying games can be more than mere

pastimes. The players can strive for the same artistic goals

as the author of a novel, a film or a play. Fading Suns is a

passion play of sorts, taking place in an imagined future.

H OLISTIC D ESIGN

Many possible stories can be told here, from galaxy-span-

ning epics to the most personal of tales.

Like medieval passion plays, Fading Suns deals with

grand themes universal to human experience. Its main theme

is the Seeking. This is the mythological role all heroes play:

the knight on quest, seeking power to vanquish his enemies

or the secrets of self-discovery. Success or failure on this

quest is not as important as the insights learned while on it.

The atmosphere of the dramas played out in Fading

Suns is one of tragic ignorance. Civilization is in decline,

and superstition and fear are everywhere. New ideas and

frontiers are spurned by a nervous populace, fearful of

change for the harm it brings. But it is just this sort of will-

ful ignorance that keeps civilization from rising again. It is

such fear that keeps hope buried and great challenges from

being met. The player characters represent the heroes who

can break the bonds of this ignorance and bring something

new and great to their culture, to reawaken and invigorate

life.

story. From the greedy planet-grabbing of early colonists to

the bloody battles of the Emperor Wars, humans have rarely

slept peacefully in the void. They have prospered, suffered

defeat, and dared to hope again. And they have not traveled

down the paths of history alone; aliens walk among them,

with long histories and destinies of their own to complete.

First Republic

Humanity first reached the stars under the auspices of

the First Republic, a one-world government run by the

“zaibatsu”: greedy mercantile barons whose corporate states

replaced the nations of the earth. The zaibatsu colonized

the solar system in search of new sources of wealth and

mineral resources. At the edge of the solar system they found

the jumpgate.

This ancient artifact of alien manufacture baffled and

awed humanity. It took many years of research to unlock

even the most basic secrets of its technology, but its main

function was clear: it opened portals to distant star systems.

Diligent scientists constructed the first jump drive, an en-

gine installed on a spaceship which could propel the ship

through the gate, transporting it instantly into foreign space

light years away.

The exodus began.

At first, the zaibatsu carefully controlled the manufac-

ture and ownership of jump ships and reaped the resources

of the new worlds and solar systems. But once anarchists

leaked the secret of the technology to all, nobody could keep

back the vast wave of people seeking to escape corporate

tyranny and claim worlds of their own. The First Republic

collapsed in a civil war over ever-expanding territory and

diminishing loyalties.

Diaspora

The new universe of Human Space was made up of frac-

tured, planetary nations, some democratic, some totalitar-

ian. Many of the original rulers of these worlds created dy-

nasties which would last for millennia: the first noble houses

to rule the stars. But years of political and social experi-

ments yielded only chaos and strife between worlds. Into

this dangerous universe came the Prophet, a man with a

vision of Creation he claimed was gifted to him by God, whom

he called the Pancreator. The Prophet gathered disciples and

followers about him and performed many miracles. A hu-

manity desperate for unity and hope looked to the Prophet

for their answers.

During this time, humanity met its first sentient race,

the ungulate Shantor. At first, they were thought to be merely

clever horselike beings. But it was soon realized how intel-

ligent they were — and how dangerous. Another sentient

race, the Ukar, were gifted with psychic powers — powers

which they used to goad the Shantor into a bloody revolt.

Without further ado, we give you a glimpse into the

tumultuous fate of humankind four millennia from now….

History

The chronicle of humanity’s history among the stars is

a long one, stretching over two millennia. It is not a quiet

Experiencing the Sathra Effect

I NTRODUCTION TO F ADING S UNS

Zebulon the Prophet

matic “gifts” and lore from the Vau over the centuries have

been curiously effective at starting conflicts among humans.

Second Republic

Eventually, with the unity provided by the Church and

economic interests heralded by mercantile leaders, the Sec-

ond Republic was born, a democratic government which

eventually spanned all the worlds of Human Space. Under

its auspices, an unprecedented era of prosperity and high

technology was initiated. It seemed that there were no lim-

its to human development, no secrets which could not be

unlocked by the power of the human mind, along with a

little ingenuity and grit.

But power eventually seems to coalesce into the hands

of a few, especially when the people are no longer vigilant.

The noble houses of the Diaspora, still rich but now rel-

egated to meaningless roles, hungered for the vast power

they once had and plotted against the Republic. They were

aided by a new milleniallism and apocalyptic fever, for sci-

entists had discovered a new, dread phenomenon: the suns

were fading. The stars grew dim and no one knew why.

The government could not calm the fears of all the

worlds, and the untimely crash of the welfare computer sys-

tem caused riots in every major city on every planet. Rebels

rose up and with lightning speed, claimed the central gov-

ernment on Byzantium Secundus. The nobles joined together

with the Church to free the capital. Victorious, they refused

to return power to the senators and instead seized power for

themselves. This ushered in a new age for humanity: a Dark

Age of feudal lords, fanatic priests and scheming guilds.

New Dark Ages

The new lords of the Known Worlds quickly began to

war upon one another, with only the largest, most cunning

or richest houses rising to prominence, while many others

were destroyed. In this chaos, the common people were left

defenseless. In desperation, many signed generational con-

tracts with the noble houses, swearing fealty to their local

lords for themselves and their children to come. At first, the

Church fought such indenture, but it eventually adopted such

contracts itself when they proved the only reliable means to

raise armies against rivals — and the Church was just as

combative and martial as the nobles.

The corporations of the Second Republic were left with

little of the spoils. With their holdings seized or signed over

forcefully, they had little overt power. But a conglomeration

of these corporations banded together to form the Merchant

League, and rewrote their charters to form guilds rather than

corporations. Guilds could more easily control membership

and advancement within their ranks. In addition, the League

maintained their secret technological patents, often paying

for this privilege with the death of many agents charged

By the time the truth behind the Shantor’s rage was discov-

ered, it was too late to reform the beasts in humanity’s eyes:

the “dangerous and uncontrollable” Shantor were enslaved

and moved to reservations across the Known Worlds, break-

ing up their families and culture.

The following Ukar War united humanity against an-

other star-faring race, one inimicable to human interests.

With the aid of the Ukar’s cousin race, the Obun, humanity

gained ground in their galactic war. Finally, Palamedes Alecto,

follower of the Prophet, led the newly formed Universal

Church of the Celestial Sun against the Ukar on their

homeworld. Humanity was victorious, and the place of the

Church in future politics and martial power was cemented.

Humanity marched across new worlds and subjugated

the sentients living upon them, most of whom were inca-

pable of star travel and thus considered inferior.

Until the Vau.

Humanity met more than its match when it subjugated

a peaceful race of gardeners known as the G’nesh. When

their overlords arrived from unknown worlds in vastly su-

perior starships with devastating energy weapons, humans

had no choice but to fall back and go no further. Luckily, the

Vau were non-expansionistic, and pursued no vendetta

against humanity. As long as they were left alone, they would

cause no trouble — or so most humans believed. But enig-

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