Battletech Touring the Stars: Jardine
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TOURING THE STARS JARDINE TM Sample file Under License From E-CAT35SN215 ® ©2020 The Topps Company Inc. All rights Reserved. Touring the Stars: Jardine, Classic BattleTech, BattleTech, BattleMech and ’Mech are registered trademarks and/or trademarks of The Topps Company, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. Catalyst Game Labs and the Catalyst Game Labs logo are trademarks of InMediaRes Production, LLC. INTRODUCTION We began on Terra, a lonely, blue-green speck in the vastness of the void. It has been more than a millennium since mankind ventured to the stars beyond home, and while it has been a tumultuous history—at the very least—we have discovered, explored, and conquered worlds that our ancestors could only dream about. Humanity now occupies more than two thousand worlds stretched across a vast range of interstellar space known as the Inner Sphere. For humanity as a whole, Terra, at the heart of it all, will forever be known as “Home.” But for the far greater majority of us, “home” is a very different speck amidst the infinite black. Our homes are many, varied, beautiful, and filled with rich histories—each unique to itself. In the grand scale of interstellar history, it often becomes so easy to forget this, to see planets and solar systems as dots on an abstracted map. But, at the core of the matter, each of those dots is a place where men, women, and children live, work, love, and survive. Join us on a special tour of the Sphere, as we explore the richness of these worlds like never before! —Professor Herbert Redburn, Touring the Stars: One World at a Time, Interstellar Free Press elcome to Touring the Stars, a campaign supplement designed to offer players the opportunity to learn about the worlds of Wthe Inner Sphere, Periphery, and beyond. The background information contained in the Atlas section gives players a world’s geography, history, notable events, and other tools needed to create an unlimited number of BattleTech games for play, while the A Time of War section offers plot seeds and details for the planet’s more notable events. These plot seeds can be used as stand-alone games, woven into an existing game, or as part of a larger on-going campaign. The Rules Annex section explains planetary Atlas information for use in gameplay, as well as optional terrain tables, weather, and flora/fauna rules. Terrain tables can be used as a random chart to determine gameplay maps, or simply as a guide to provide ideas on the types of terrain found on the world. This section also contains a list of other rules that can be used to enhance your game experience. All players should agree whether or not to use any or all of these features before play. Note: The last four pages of this PDF are sized for 11” x 17” paper. Please keep this in mind when printing out the document. CREDITS STAR LEAGUE CLAN INVASION JIHAD Project Development: Joshua C. Perian BattleTech Line Developer: Ray Arrastia Writing: Herbert A. Beas II BattleTech Line Editor: Aaron Cahall Production Staff Cover Design and Layout: David Kerber Maps: Ray Arrastia, David Kerber Special Thanks: To BattleTech. Thanks for all the fun times!SampleSUCCESSION WARS CIVIL WAR fileDARK AGE ILCLAN 3 ATLAS JARDINE (HERAKLEION) Star Type (Recharge Time): G2V (183 hours) Position in System: 3rd (of 5) Time to Jump Point: 9.12 days Number of Satellites: Two (Oahu, Tonga) Surface Gravity: 0.92 Atm. Pressure: Standard (Breathable) Equatorial Temperature: 25°C (Tropical [2765/3067]); 19°C (Cold [3150]) Surface Water: 53 percent Recharging Station: None HPG Class Type: B (2765); None (3150) Highest Native Life: Mammals Population: 443,560,000 (2765); None? (3150) Socio-Industrial Levels: C-D-C-C-B (2765); N/A (3150) Landmasses (Capital City): Taveuni (Luzon Hou [2765]), Mussau, Rapa Nui (Hope [3067]) Editor’s Note: While much speculation and official denials of the so-called “Five Worlds Conspiracy” persist into modern times, numerous historical records confirm the existence of Jardine and its fate, from the early years of the Succession Wars through the opening days of the Jihad. As late as 3130, the world remained unlisted on navigation charts, though it was declared a secured protectorate of both the Marik- Stewart Commonwealth and the Duchy of Tamarind-Abbey, who only permitted limited access to it for civil and scientific expeditions. As of 3150, Jardine’s protected status is unclear, but official maps still omit its location. The following documentation derives from numerous sources, the most prominent of which are the accounts of Dr. Brooklyn Stevens, an independent explorer who reportedly rediscovered the planet in late 3067. Extensive efforts were made to verify the details enclosed here, but errors may remain. Mystique still surrounds Jardine, the Hidden Worlds of which it was one, and the enigmatic powers who shaped ComStar and the Word of Blake over the centuries after the fall of the First Star League. JARDINE (HERAKLEION) Bathed in the light of a yellow sun not much different than Terra’s fauna proved far less diverse than its early discoverers expected. Entire Sol, but orbiting from a mean distance of just over 0.8 AUs, Jardine was orders of animals found on planets of similar development, such as a world of warmth and beauty. Geologically young and tectonically analogs of Terra’s marsupials, simians, ungulates, and many reptilian active, the planet was lush with jungles and forests, especially on the and amphibian species, were completely absent on Jardine. In their northeastern continent of Rapa Nui, and throughout the southern half place were a disproportionate number of other species, most of which of the large Rapa Nui landmass. Despite its active volcanism, Jardine’s took on decidedly felid and avian morphology. For this reason, many weather patterns were relatively milder and more stable than those biologists studying Jardine during its early settlement years came to of Terra. Combined with the abundance of mineral-enriched soil, nickname it “the Planet of the Cats” or “the Feline Aviary.” freshwater lakes, hot springs, and river complexes that radiated across With so much of its land covered by temperate and tropical forests whole continents, this climate created an environment almost entirely against a backdrop of volcanic mountain chains and hot springs, shrouded in vegetation. Indeed, what few deserts and arid badlands Jardine felt like a second homeland to its founding colonials, most of existed amid this global garden were found only in the deepest whom hailed from the various island states of Terra’s Pacific Islands and reaches of the continents of Mussau and Taveuni. coastal regions affiliated with the so-called “Ring of Fire.” Over time, While Samplethese features produced a world well-suited to a broad these settlers developed a local culturefile that was an eclectic mix of range of wildlife—including the humans and other animal species Hawaiian, Filipino, Polynesian, and Maori ethnicities. To maintain the eventually transplanted there during its colonization—Jardine’s native native beauty of their world, many early colonies imposed a multitude 4 ATLAS of laws and traditions aimed at limiting heavy industry along the major In early 2811, raiders presumably operating out of the Lyran riverways and coastlines, while declaring huge swaths of woodlands Commonwealth struck Jardine without warning or mercy. The and jungle off-limits to large-scale human habitation. These ecological attack lasted barely more than a week, but in that time most of the restrictions—at least partly aimed at making Jardine a garden paradise planet’s major cities were razed and cobalt-salted nuclear weapons for wealthy tourists—hobbled the planet’s commercial development transformed Taveuni into an infernal hellscape. Unable to call for help so significantly and for so long that major corporations came to see while their planetary government and infrastructure lay in ruins, the Jardine as a poor candidate for expanding their businesses. Thus, by surviving populace succumbed to despair and panic as skies across the the time Jardine formally entered the emergent Free Worlds League, globe darkened with the smoke and ash from Taveuni’s firestorms. the planet’s economy had become almost entirely agrarian in nature. It was amid this chaos that the first aid ships arrived, hailing from the Its biggest exports took the form of exotic foods, decorative flowers, last place anyone expected: Terra. and an assortment of domesticated beasts—the most well-known and According to the sketchy evidence that remains, what followed was coveted of these being the tabiranth, a felinoid animal as large and part of the greatest secret project ever conceived by Jerome Blake and tamable as the terrestrial horse. Conrad Toyama, masters of the nascent ComStar. The details of this Although the Star League era did see a rise in Jardine’s industrial operation remain sparse even today, but they confirm that Jardine was development—particularly across Taveuni, where most of the selected as one of five potential base worlds that Blake and Toyama planetary spaceports, light aerospace support industries, and the planned to use as emergency fallbacks for ComStar’s control over the capital city of Luzon Hou stood—Jardine never shook its image as a HPG network in the event that one or more of the Successor States commercial and strategic backwater, with abundant but ultimately chose to ignore Terra’s neutrality. Though each of the five were chosen unremarkable resources. This suited the locals just fine, as they had for different reasons, all were said to be “remote and unremarkable” grown accustomed to an existence absent of the interstellar hustle within their respective realms—the kind of planets that nobody would and bustle seen elsewhere in the Inner Sphere.