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Description
I wanted to play in a different way with the map template I use, and this, heavily inspired by the AquaNox series, emerged.

The Surface War lasted fewer than a couple of months, and was the testing ground of the latest biochemical weapons, after defensive shields rendered nuclear weaponry useless. A lot was made to avoid it, but some stupid thing in Burma started an unstoppable chain reaction. It should be technically correct to state that the Atlantic Compact won and the Eurasian Council suffered heavy losses, but it would miss entirely the point. The aftermath of the War eventually left most of the Earth surface covered by the Cinder, a growing layer of engineered fungi and nanobots that rendered the whole surface useless in a matter of decades. Humanity retreated to the seabed, in hope of reconquering the surface in due time. But after centuries have passed, even that hope is being forgotten. Mankind has adapted to its new medium, and of course, war never changes.

Due to the nature of seabed colonization prior to the Retreat, many emerging states were corporate in nature. The grim, martial and monopolistic Baltcorp; the militaristic Emperor fanatics of the House of Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki-gaisha; the privateering and Libertarian Deep West, the Transhumanism-driven Sonar Research; the efficient-looking but Darwinistic and intrigue-laden Multinational Corporate Board of Olympia; the opulent, aristocratic, at-war-with-itself union of corporate syndicates of the Mediterranean Sea. Even the rogue narco-state that serves as a crossroads and shady trade hub in the geostrategically important enclave of the Guayanan coast, where three trading blocs meet. It would be hard to define the Conventicle: its cabal includes Deep State military, old Royals and sheiks, religious Imams and civilians who backstabbed their way towards it, but it can be called corporate by certain accounts. It's not so hard to define the Arab Solidarity network, the other side of the 50-year long Civil War: a rabidly Secularist form of Neo-Baathism that states that, should there be a God, it claimed the outer world and abandoned humanity, and that it should be seen as a chance. They count with the support of Ormazdistan, an Iranian Zororastrian Revivalist civilization that, in turn, left the Conventicle with help of their main foe: the Shaktist, devout warrior culture of the Aspect of Kali.

Indeed, many nations are theocratic and/or dictatorial in nature. The Indochinese-descended Garuda Kindgom, the Chinese Han Dynasty (unrelated to the former one, started by a charismatic industrialist with a very common surname) and the North Korean-descended Self-Reliant Empire, all count with a God Emperor (though the two former are infinitely more vibrant than the latter). Separated by an impenetrable landmass and actually unable to do more than spy each other and dream of unfeasible superweapons, the two Russias of the Black Tsardom and the Soviet Arctica become more and more repressive in fear of an infiltration of the other side. The Catholic papacy has recovered its majesty from the ashes of the Philippines. And, though more of a multinational layman's underwater monastic force with a submarine flotilla than an actual theocracy, it's hard to say where philosophy ends and religion starts between the followers of the Five Principles, or Pancasila.

Yet, democracy still stands. Its more recognizable form for us would be found in the English-Speaking Atlantic Republic, progressive if worryingly paternalistic to its citizens, or in the dominant-party states of Nigeria (ruled by a non-sectarian hyper-Nationalist party) and Deep Brazil (ruled by a party that combines hardcore Green politics and Pentecostal Millenialism), still making actual efforts to inhabit the surface. The European-descended Confederacy of Hesperia is less a of country and more of a cacophonic Tower of Babel united by a thick layer of bureaucracy. Still, don't say it too loud, because they're also united by determined and superior militay force, involved in most of the conflicts and hotspots of the seabed. The Spanish-Speaking Libertaria, a strong presidential republic with revolutionary, jingoistic and Pan-hispanist rethoric, can also back its Irredentist discourse with weaponry. And the Diversitarian, prosper and Adhocratic Caribbean can also be called a Tower of Babel, except that they seem to be proud of that fact, as they feel pleased to be relatively isolated from the main conflict zones. If it were not for those damn Guayanans and smugglers...

The question is: has humanity learth the lesson from the Surface War? Yes and no. It's very clear for everyone that there are no more chances left, and international limits on biochemical weaponry are under draconian enforcement. In fact, most states share a deep fear of biotech that keeps humanity fairly baseline. The freer societies allow for limited amphibian augmentations, but it's only in the waters of Sonar Research that things get wild: shoals of fully converted humans, soldiers fully fused to their bathyscaphes, dolphin saboteurs, mollusk supercomputers, the like. Only the tendence of their technology to fail and/or turn against them keeps them at bay. Beyond that... well, who knows what you can find in those pirate havens of the Aqua Nullis. And it's more than evident that humanity has brought its distinctions, its drives, its generall folly, to the depths of the oceans. Maybe there's no place in this universe for humanity to escape from them.

Description
I wanted to play in a different way with the map template I use, and this, heavily inspired by the AquaNox series, emerged.

The Surface War lasted fewer than a couple of months, and was the testing ground of the latest biochemical weapons, after defensive shields rendered nuclear weaponry useless. A lot was made to avoid it, but some stupid thing in Burma started an unstoppable chain reaction. It should be technically correct to state that the Atlantic Compact won and the Eurasian Council suffered heavy losses, but it would miss entirely the point. The aftermath of the War eventually left most of the Earth surface covered by the Cinder, a growing layer of engineered fungi and nanobots that rendered the whole surface useless in a matter of decades. Humanity retreated to the seabed, in hope of reconquering the surface in due time. But after centuries have passed, even that hope is being forgotten. Mankind has adapted to its new medium, and of course, war never changes.

Due to the nature of seabed colonization prior to the Retreat, many emerging states were corporate in nature. The grim, martial and monopolistic Baltcorp; the militaristic Emperor fanatics of the House of Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki-gaisha; the privateering and Libertarian Deep West, the Transhumanism-driven Sonar Research; the efficient-looking but Darwinistic and intrigue-laden Multinational Corporate Board of Olympia; the opulent, aristocratic, at-war-with-itself union of corporate syndicates of the Mediterranean Sea. Even the rogue narco-state that serves as a crossroads and shady trade hub in the geostrategically important enclave of the Guayanan coast, where three trading blocs meet. It would be hard to define the Conventicle: its cabal includes Deep State military, old Royals and sheiks, religious Imams and civilians who backstabbed their way towards it, but it can be called corporate by certain accounts. It's not so hard to define the Arab Solidarity network, the other side of the 50-year long Civil War: a rabidly Secularist form of Neo-Baathism that states that, should there be a God, it claimed the outer world and abandoned humanity, and that it should be seen as a chance. They count with the support of Ormazdistan, an Iranian Zororastrian Revivalist civilization that, in turn, left the Conventicle with help of their main foe: the Shaktist, devout warrior culture of the Aspect of Kali.

Indeed, many nations are theocratic and/or dictatorial in nature. The Indochinese-descended Garuda Kindgom, the Chinese Han Dynasty (unrelated to the former one, started by a charismatic industrialist with a very common surname) and the North Korean-descended Self-Reliant Empire, all count with a God Emperor (though the two former are infinitely more vibrant than the latter). Separated by an impenetrable landmass and actually unable to do more than spy each other and dream of unfeasible superweapons, the two Russias of the Black Tsardom and the Soviet Arctica become more and more repressive in fear of an infiltration of the other side. The Catholic papacy has recovered its majesty from the ashes of the Philippines. And, though more of a multinational layman's underwater monastic force with a submarine flotilla than an actual theocracy, it's hard to say where philosophy ends and religion starts between the followers of the Five Principles, or Pancasila.

Yet, democracy still stands. Its more recognizable form for us would be found in the English-Speaking Atlantic Republic, progressive if worryingly paternalistic to its citizens, or in the dominant-party states of Nigeria (ruled by a non-sectarian hyper-Nationalist party) and Deep Brazil (ruled by a party that combines hardcore Green politics and Pentecostal Millenialism), still making actual efforts to inhabit the surface. The European-descended Confederacy of Hesperia is less a of country and more of a cacophonic Tower of Babel united by a thick layer of bureaucracy. Still, don't say it too loud, because they're also united by determined and superior militay force, involved in most of the conflicts and hotspots of the seabed. The Spanish-Speaking Libertaria, a strong presidential republic with revolutionary, jingoistic and Pan-hispanist rethoric, can also back its Irredentist discourse with weaponry. And the Diversitarian, prosper and Adhocratic Caribbean can also be called a Tower of Babel, except that they seem to be proud of that fact, as they feel pleased to be relatively isolated from the main conflict zones. If it were not for those damn Guayanans and smugglers...

The question is: has humanity learth the lesson from the Surface War? Yes and no. It's very clear for everyone that there are no more chances left, and international limits on biochemical weaponry are under draconian enforcement. In fact, most states share a deep fear of biotech that keeps humanity fairly baseline. The freer societies allow for limited amphibian augmentations, but it's only in the waters of Sonar Research that things get wild: shoals of fully converted humans, soldiers fully fused to their bathyscaphes, dolphin saboteurs, mollusk supercomputers, the like. Only the tendence of their technology to fail and/or turn against them keeps them at bay. Beyond that... well, who knows what you can find in those pirate havens of the Aqua Nullis. And it's more than evident that humanity has brought its distinctions, its drives, its generall folly, to the depths of the oceans. Maybe there's no place in this universe for humanity to escape from them.