Star Drive (stylized as Star*Drive ) is a science fiction campaign setting that was published in 1998 by TSR, Inc. for the Alternity role-playing game . The first published setting for Alternity was provided in the Star Drive Campaign Setting book in 1998.
31-549: It was written by David Eckelberry and Richard Baker. This setting book also requires the Player's Handbook and Gamemaster Guide for the Alternity game system. Much of the material created for this campaign setting was later reused in the d20 Future supplement of the d20 Modern role-playing game. Star Drive is set in the 26th century, starting in the year 2501. Humankind has gained access to faster-than-light technology called
62-593: A German popular astronomical article by Otto Ule . Ule explained the oddity of a distance unit name ending in "year" by comparing it to a walking hour ( Wegstunde ). A contemporary German popular astronomical book also noticed that light-year is an odd name. In 1868 an English journal labelled the light-year as a unit used by the Germans. Eddington called the light-year an inconvenient and irrelevant unit, which had sometimes crept from popular use into technical investigations. Although modern astronomers often prefer to use
93-516: A cyberpunk campaign model called CyberRave , in which the world has become a collection of corporation-owned and run countries. d20 Future Tech is a 96-page supplement for the d20 Modern role-playing game and the d20 Future supplement. This supplement contains rules which expand on various weaponry and gadgets from d20 Future . The book contains additional material expands of the following topics already established in d20 Future : Weapons/Personal Gear, Starships, Mecha, and Robotics. There
124-667: A distant part of the Milky Way galaxy. Ferocious, aggressive, and merciless, they have descended on human-controlled space in a slow and steady wave of invasion. Though the Galactic Concord has slowed their progress, the Klicks are determined and resourceful. Klicks have strange, wedge-shaped bodies covered with smooth, chitinous plates. They possess six multi-jointed legs ending in thick claws, and an additional pair of forelimbs ending in sharp, manipulating claws. A Klick's sensory organs hang in
155-493: A number of new elements to d20 Modern , including: The book presented a number of campaign models, which provided a framework for building a full campaign setting but did not include a full-scale setting. Campaign models introduced include: d20 Cyberscape is an expansion for the d20 Future supplement of d20 Modern . It adds more Cybernetics to accompany those found in d20 Future , as well as alternate forms of cybernetics, such as cybernetics in fantasy. It also includes
186-440: A pendulous glob below the main part of its body, between the forelimbs. The Klicks employ brutal but effective "hit-and-run" combat tactics. They favor ambushes and overwhelming numbers. Military analysts have suggested that Klicks have a hive-mind social structure, like terrestrial insects, but scientists discard the notion as unlikely "Earth-centered" thinking. The name "Klick" was coined by Galactic Concord soldiers and based on
217-549: A rebellion of mutants . This led to a pullback of the humans from their maximum expansion, isolating many colonies. The war continued for over 100 years, leaving worlds devastated and nations and alliances in difficult financial straits. The war ended in 2472 with the signing of the Treaty of Concord. This agreement has held the peace, barely, for the last three decades. In the course of the past five centuries, humans have contacted several alien races . This began with first contact with
248-399: A safe distance. The Star Drive Campaign Setting book is hardbound with 256 pages illustrated in color. It is divided into chapters covering the history of the setting; a description of the conditions, economy, and technology of the 26th century; descriptions of the various stellar nations within a range of over 1,000 light years ; a more detailed look at a mysterious distant region known as
279-417: Is a chapter on how future technology affects life, and one on integrating different types of combat (Mecha vs Vehicle, Starship vs. Mecha, etc.). Light year A light-year , alternatively spelled light year ( ly or lyr ), is a unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equal to exactly 9 460 730 472 580 .8 km , which is approximately 5.88 trillion mi. As defined by
310-402: Is a thirteenth nation called the Galactic Concord, created by the Treaty of Concord. The Galactic Concord is made up of citizens and territories donated by the other Stellar Nations. The "stardrive" is a type of hyperdrive that operates on the principles of gravity induction. By combining two pieces of technology, the induction engine and the mass reactor , it allows travel at FTL speeds through
341-454: Is exactly 299 792 458 metres or 1 / 31 557 600 of a light-year. Units such as the light-minute, light-hour and light-day are sometimes used in popular science publications. The light-month, roughly one-twelfth of a light-year, is also used occasionally for approximate measures. The Hayden Planetarium specifies the light month more precisely as 30 days of light travel time. Light travels approximately one foot in
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#1732890658882372-628: Is the parsec (symbol: pc, about 3.26 light-years). As defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the light-year is the product of the Julian year (365.25 days, as opposed to the 365.2425-day Gregorian year or the 365.24219-day Tropical year that both approximate) and the speed of light ( 299 792 458 m/s ). Both of these values are included in the IAU (1976) System of Astronomical Constants , used since 1984. From this,
403-473: Is the product of a mean Gregorian year (365.2425 days or 31 556 952 s ) and the defined speed of light ( 299 792 458 m/s ). Another value, 9.460 528 405 × 10 m , is the product of the J1900.0 mean tropical year and the defined speed of light. Abbreviations used for light-years and multiples of light-years are: The light-year unit appeared a few years after the first successful measurement of
434-461: The d20 Modern role-playing game written by Christopher Perkins , Rodney Thompson , and JD Wiker . It facilitates the playing of campaigns in the far future , using elements such as cybernetics , mecha , mutations , robotics , space travel , starships , and xenobiology . d20 Future is one of the most extensive of science-fiction d20 games and has its own SRD , which is a source for many other sci-fi d20 games. d20 Future introduced
465-492: The International Astronomical Union (IAU), a light-year is the distance that light travels in vacuum in one Julian year (365.25 days). Despite its inclusion of the word "year", the term should not be misinterpreted as a unit of time . The light-year is most often used when expressing distances to stars and other distances on a galactic scale, especially in non-specialist contexts and popular science publications. The unit most commonly used in professional astronomy
496-484: The Sloan Great Wall run up into the billions of light-years. Distances between objects within a star system tend to be small fractions of a light-year, and are usually expressed in astronomical units . However, smaller units of length can similarly be formed usefully by multiplying units of time by the speed of light. For example, the light-second , useful in astronomy, telecommunications and relativistic physics,
527-511: The parsec , light-years are also popularly used to gauge the expanses of interstellar and intergalactic space. Distances expressed in light-years include those between stars in the same general area, such as those belonging to the same spiral arm or globular cluster . Galaxies themselves span from a few thousand to a few hundred thousand light-years in diameter, and are separated from neighbouring galaxies and galaxy clusters by millions of light-years. Distances to objects such as quasars and
558-851: The Fraal in the Sol System , followed by the brutish Weren, cybernetically enhanced Mechalus, reptilian T'sa, and gliding Sesheyan. A total of 50 sentient species in all have been contacted, with each being rated at various levels of development. (Some are considered borderline sentient.) At the beginning of the 26th century, Humanity's political and social structure is divided into Stellar Nations (once countries), rich corporations or federations, most trying to collect their former colonies. These are : Austrin-Ontis Unlimited, Borealis Republic, Hatire Community, Insight, Nariac Domain, Orion League, Orlamu Theocracy, Rigunmor Star Consortium, StarMech Collective, Thuldan Empire, Union of Sol, and Voidcorp. In addition there
589-495: The Julian year) and a measured (not defined) speed of light were included in the IAU (1964) System of Astronomical Constants, used from 1968 to 1983. The product of Simon Newcomb 's J1900.0 mean tropical year of 31 556 925 .9747 ephemeris seconds and a speed of light of 299 792 .5 km/s produced a light-year of 9.460 530 × 10 m (rounded to the seven significant digits in
620-539: The Verge, and finally game-specific details covering the player species, careers, employment, skills, equipment, and special game options available for players. The game world includes a variety of standard fare science fiction features. These include psionics , cybernetics , robots , spacecraft , mutants , and advanced medicine. The level of technology is at "Progress Level" 7 (Progress Levels are used in Alternity to describe
651-426: The accuracy of his parallax data due to multiplying with the uncertain parameter of the speed of light. The speed of light was not yet precisely known in 1838; the estimate of its value changed in 1849 ( Fizeau ) and 1862 ( Foucault ). It was not yet considered to be a fundamental constant of nature, and the propagation of light through the aether or space was still enigmatic. The light-year unit appeared in 1851 in
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#1732890658882682-581: The distance to a star other than the Sun, by Friedrich Bessel in 1838. The star was 61 Cygni , and he used a 160-millimetre (6.2 in) heliometre designed by Joseph von Fraunhofer . The largest unit for expressing distances across space at that time was the astronomical unit , equal to the radius of the Earth's orbit at 150 million kilometres (93 million miles). In those terms, trigonometric calculations based on 61 Cygni's parallax of 0.314 arcseconds, showed
713-409: The distance to the star to be 660 000 astronomical units (9.9 × 10 km; 6.1 × 10 mi). Bessel added that light takes 10.3 years to traverse this distance. He recognized that his readers would enjoy the mental picture of the approximate transit time for light, but he refrained from using the light-year as a unit. He may have resisted expressing distances in light-years because it would reduce
744-467: The extra-dimensional medium of "Drivespace". Depending on the engine power of a stardrive, it could travel anywhere from 5 to 50 lightyears in a single trip, but due to the spatial physics of Drivespace, any and all travel between two points takes exactly 121 hours (approx. 5 days), no matter how far apart or how close the two points are. The Klicks are a fictional race of aliens within Star Drive . At
775-559: The far end of the Verge, alien species unheard of before the Second Galactic War have begun to stir. Slowly but inexorably expanding into civilized space, the alien klicks and their allies began by devastating the entire Silver Bell colony on Spes, followed by fierce ground fighting on Rakke. The Galactic Concord has responded as quickly as possible, but faster-than-light technology being what it is, even distress messages take many days to get through. Klicks are arachnid-like aliens from
806-513: The following conversions can be derived: The abbreviation used by the IAU for light-year is "ly", International standards like ISO 80000:2006 (now superseded) have used "l.y." and localized abbreviations are frequent, such as "al" in French, Spanish, and Italian (from année-lumière , año luz and anno luce , respectively), "Lj" in German (from Lichtjahr ), etc. Before 1984, the tropical year (not
837-416: The known space. The Verge is described, in many cases, planet by planet. The more prominent planet descriptions give a broad overview of the world, the government, and sites of interest. Maps of the main worlds are also show at a high scale. The cover was among artist R. K. Post 's first work for TSR. The following careers are available to players: D20 Future d20 Future is an accessory for
868-432: The odd clicking sounds that the aliens make when they communicate. To further stymie efforts to understand this enigmatic species, Klicks captured in combat never survive longer than a few hours—generally because of terrible wounds sustained during their apprehension. A Klick naturally produces a field of energy that causes non-Klicks to feel weak and tired. Galactic Concord soldiers, accordingly, prefer to battle Klicks from
899-423: The speed of light) found in several modern sources was probably derived from an old source such as C. W. Allen 's 1973 Astrophysical Quantities reference work, which was updated in 2000, including the IAU (1976) value cited above (truncated to 10 significant digits). Other high-precision values are not derived from a coherent IAU system. A value of 9.460 536 207 × 10 m found in some modern sources
930-466: The stardrive, a merger of technology between humans and the alien Fraal. A period of stellar colonization of habitable worlds ensues, led by six wealthy power blocs. New powers emerged, forming the Terran Empire in 2250. Tensions between the colonies led to the first galactic war in 2299, finally ending in 2312 with the emergence of 26 stellar nations. A second, even nastier war began in 2346, sparked by
961-481: The technology of a civilization, with present-day Earth described as Progress Level 5, and the Industrial Age described as Progress Level 4). Characters are typically employed and have an allegiance to a company or government. They may also follow one of the future religions described in this book. In addition to humans, players can run a character from one of the handful of alien space-faring races that lie within