A notoriously addictive free real-time strategy game played in a browser.

- Aging Empires -

Aging Empires is the currently active casual game round.
Nothing is known about this universe as of yet.
Which faction will reign supreme over the others?

Active Players:428 Aquila:40% Players Today:108 Discordian:26% Colonies Founded:5,085 Scion:20% Battles Fought:20,384 The Lost:10% Ships Destroyed:7,560,850 Technocrats:4%

Date: 13:18 10-18-2662

[H3] Class Dismissed

Article by DrPwnguin

One of the fabled Sol wormholes. Very sparkly, very awesome. [The Following is an Excerpt from a History Lesson at the Aquilan Naval Institute; chronicling the events of Historic Round 3 in brief]

“They say history is set in stone, that the annals of the ages are steadfast and unyielding to the dance of time; they just roll on by.
Well there’s more than one way to cut the stone. Through the winds and the rushing whitewater the stone is rewritten, and the tide of the ages held-back and reshaped more often than inscribed down. It is with this knowledge that we seek to understand the rushing white-water. And by that of course, I refer to the Aquilan Imperium.”

Thwack! The Pilum smashed the desk and awoke a sleeping student. Typical. What nonsense that was, all that flowery speech gone to waste on an uncaring youth. How did they expect to survive in this universe if they don’t learn from the past?

“Son,” began the Professor of History and War. “Do you know why I carry this?” He held up the Pilum; a large throwing spear. The tip was made of iron and bore the Eagle standard, symbol of the Aquilan Imperium.

“N-No sir,” replied the student, terrified. “I wasn’t paying attention, I’ve been cramming for a Physics final.”

“Damn right you weren’t listening.” The Professor smacked him upside the head with the butt of the Pilum. “We went over this first day. Now sit down, shut up, and listen lest I run you through.” As he returned to his podium in the amphitheatre-shaped classroom the Professor meditated on how much pay he’d be docked for actually killing the student. The benefits began to outweigh the costs for a moment, but then he settled into his old routine.

“We carry the Pilum so that we are on guard at all times, able to respond to a crisis effectively.” He glanced at the now completely-awake student with an intense focus. “But you would know that if you spent even a minute learning about the History of the Imperium… our history.” He looked around the room. “How many of you had family in the armed forces?”

Everyone raised their hands. It would be stupid not to. At one point in their history all citizens had been drafted into military service; a response to increased SLF incursions into the then-only Aquilan galactic arm.

“Good, you’re all awake.” He brought down the vid-screen and smacked it with his Pilum. Instantly a large display of the galaxy came into a 3-D view. It was all projected in the Student’s minds, as actually projecting a continuous beam of energy for a 3-D image was more expensive than stimulating the brain directly. “We will now continue.”

“It was once said that History is written by the victors. For the better part of Earth’s history this was true, not only because the Victors dominated everyone else but more often because the Victors had invented writing. The civilizations who ruled had more people, which translated into large economies and technological innovation; which led to the winning of wars and subsequent domination of nations. Can anyone tell me what the state of the Galaxy was like after the exodus from Earth?”

A few hands went up into the air. Surprisingly, one of them was of the student who had been asleep; a male named John, the Professor now remembered. “Yes, John?”

“Humanity was largely confined to 4 principle worlds, with scattered colonies on worlds in the galactic core. The reason for the 4 principle worlds was the access to unstable wormholes in the Sol system; and the subsequent irradiation Earth suffered following the large-scale atomic warfare between Martian Colonists and the United-Earth Federation.”

“We all know about Earth’s history John, would you continue regarding the more modern trends?”

“Certainly Professor,” said John. “I’ll try not to put you to sleep.” The Professor chuckled at this, and John began.

“The Universe was divided amongst four factions and some non-aligned groups which would later form the ‘Lost Empires’. Prior to the war between Mars and the UEF some colonization vessels had been dispatched to the galactic core. Upon arrival to their destinations Earth had already been vacated, while the other ships remained in contact. Eventually they formed an alliance called the SLF; Smurf-Liberation Front, a name created due to the blue tinge colonists suffered after having been in Hyperspace. This, apparently, was a genetic change that occurred.

The four factions were those of the different Earth Political Groups that journeyed from Earth to the new worlds. Sociologists had determined a more stable Humanity would exist if each person journeyed with those who closely aligned with their interests and hobbies. The distance between each world would prevent war-fare between the emerging powers.”

"Wait!" said a female student wearing camouflage. "What were the 4 main political groups?"

"To answer your question there were a few more than 4. The Capitalists and Wealthy went over to Scion, taking the color Purple as their national color: Purple was traditionally the color of royalty.

The Patriots and Historians went off to Aquila to establish the New Aquilan Imperium, a tribute to the Roman Empire of Earth, the eagle standard was used as the flag for that purpose.

The Hippies and Hedonists went off to Discordia to establish an eco-friendly utopia with very little government influence when compared to Scion and Aquila. This put them off with the heavily autocratic governments of Scion and Aquila.

Everyone else jumped ship to the Technocrats who made an all-pervasive government the likes of which had never been seen before. They collapsed very quickly in the wake of attack."

The Professor clapped. “Bravo, it appears you have been paying attention. Or, you’ve listened to my lectures while you sleep?”

“A little of both, sir.”

“Well, whatever works.” The Professor made a grandiose sweep and returned to his lecture.

“It is important to remember that History moves to the whim of the individual, not the massed populations. The invention of inter-system Capital Ship drives broke the once lauded distances between the worlds. By the time of its invention all the different worlds had developed wildly different cultures. Lines were drawn for borders and it was only a matter of time before wars would start.

In the beginning the factions had agreed to conquer the Lost Empires in the Galactic Core, citing each Factional World as the true heirs to Earth’s government. The Lost, of course, resisted these endeavors with war-ships and increased technological innovation. Their technology surpassed even Aquila’s own, which led to their conquering of Thessalien; and important economic center close to the Aquilan Imperium’s Homeworld and Capital; Aquilae. It was soon apparent, however, that the Discordians had been supplying the Lost Empires with money and technology; an alliance had formed between them. When Aquila saw this they joined together with the Scions to create a strong alliance against Discordian influence.”

A student then asked, “Professor, what about the Technocrats?”. The others were silent, it hadn’t occurred to them that the Technocrats had been relatively absent in their history lessons.

A wry smile lit up the Professor’s face. “They were conquered very early on, a rather insane General of the Scion faction, who called himself the ‘Memory of Light’ took a large force to their arm and practically eliminated them. A few of their holdings exist today in Beta-Tau, but they are largely peaceful and unable to cause trouble. Rather ironically their technology is very primitive.”

“In any case the battle-lines were drawn between the Aquila/Scion alliance and the Discord/Lost alliances. In the end the Aquilans had taken over 50% of the universe’s population with the Scions controlling 23%. At this point the Aquilan-Scion alliance was technologically superior and more motivated than their enemies, and the Discordians surrendered. That is the current state of affairs. It was not easy, our side came very close to losing when the Scion Homeworld was glassed by Discordian Battle-Fleets. A few weeks later some major breakthroughs in Scion-Aquilan military technology completely changed the war-game.”

He looked at his watch, it was about noon. The final was a few days from now, but he was sure they’d be ready. “Class Dismissed.”

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