Star Citizen: Loremaker's Guide to the Galaxy - Hadrian System

Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment

1. 00:00:36

   Hello and welcome to another installment of Lore Makers Guide to the Galaxy. My name is Dave Hadock. I am the lead writer over here at Cloud Imperium Games. And if this is your first experience with Lore Makers, let me bring you up to speed. We have a lot of star systems in Star Citizen and each of those systems have their own particular history and flavor and whatnot. And so we use this show as an opportunity to delve into some of the particularly interesting aspects of each system and try to provide some insight as to not only like the system itself but sort of why we pick the things that we picked to make it the way it is. So um this this actually this episode was a bit of was a bit of a challenge. Before we do these tape these shows, you know, in the writers room we tend to circle up and figure out who's going to

2. 00:01:23

   do what system and stuff like that. So when talking it over with Will, Cherry and Adam, we started realizing that we are quickly running out of systems cuz we've been doing this for a little while. So uh it raised the question of what we're going to do after we deplete our supply. Should we tackle corporations next? Do we do deeper dives on specific cities or landing zones, planets, etc. You know, do we go back and do time capsules that we did when the in the initial crowdfunding phase? That was a timeline of that leads from modern day to the Star Citizen era. So yeah, it was a interesting thing. So I don't know uh wanted to post to you guys and see what you were interested in. Uh if you have any ideas, feel free to post them in the comments below. So anyway, long story short, uh it was a little tricky to to pick out a system.

3. 00:02:12

   Uh I had it down to a couple, but I ended up going with uh the Hadrian system. Um this is actually another one of our our older systems that was originally a uh part of our system unlock in the initial crowdfunding phase. Uh and um was So yeah, it was it's basically kind of been with us since the beginning and and back then it was uh basically a much more kind of high-level view of it. And yes, obviously it's named Hadrian after the the Roman emperor and wall uh that's that separated Britain. Uh and it was named that because it was basically its original position was it was going to be the sort of border system between human and Xi'an uh during the sort of Cold War-esque tension thing, but we'll get to that in a minute. so let's uh jump right in and get the

4. 00:03:01

   astrographic stuff out of the way. So let's go to our trusty star map here and uh as always we're going to start off on Earth just to give you a sense of kind of where uh the system lines up basically with in the galaxy. So let's zoom out and zoom out and turn on jump points. and I'm going to go to 2D cuz it's easier to navigate. So Sol system over here, so Earth and just to call it out, you have Terra over here. Hadrian system is right here. And so the important thing again, obviously, is the fact that uh it's kind of close to uh all of these systems which are Xi'an controlled systems. Uh it's also got a lot of actually a lot

5. 00:03:48

   of jump points connected to it, which is kind of fun, too. Um, but uh it is directly connected to Castra and Kiel, uh which is kind of important, uh because that basically and actually Baker, too, kind of form the wall that the name of the system is sort of referring to. Uh now, the Eagle-eyed people in our crowd might notice, "Well, the systems that are connected to Hadrian, Gurzil, and Oya up here are technically are blue, the UV ones, which is true." But, they weren't always that way. Um, these systems along with Tohil, Horus, Palace, Hader, Indra, and There we go. Vertis over here were

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   actually part of uh what was known as the Perry line. Um, and so, but we'll get back to that and uh and and go into it. So, um getting into the system itself with Hadrian, we'll kind of start to zoom in on this. Um, Hadrian actually wasn't the original name of the system. Uh it was actually named Nivelan, uh which was named uh the founder of the company who originally discovered the system uh from Pyro. Interestingly enough, that was where the first jump point was was discovered. and they ended up selling it because the company was actually kind of broke and needed the money. Uh so, it was discovered in 2510 uh and uh let's jump in here and we have a big star right in the middle,

7. 00:05:29

   which is interesting because it's actually uh technically a red dwarf star. So, it is somewhat big. So, zooming out, uh you can kind of see it's We have Hadrian 1, Hadrian 2, Hadrian 3. Uh now, the interesting thing actually, uh aside from the sort of red dwarf, is that Hadrian 1 and Hadrian 2 are actually gas giants. so uh that's kind of weirdly enough and also kind of in the what's now I guess the the green zone of the the star. Uh and then you've got a asteroid belt, which I think is represented Yeah, the Hadrian belt. Uh and then on the outskirts you have Hadrian 3, uh which is actually nicknamed which is an ice giant, I believe, uh nicknamed the watcher because it has a large dark spot on the sort of otherwise pale uh

8. 00:06:18

   planet. And and yeah, so you got two gas giants and an ice giant. So, at the time, uh you know the UNE couldn't really do much with this. There's not a lot to terraform here. So, uh there wasn't a lot going on for Nivelan system as far as inhab- in like setting inhabitants and stuff like that. But, there was a asteroid field and planets and stuff, so there's opportunities for resources. So, they kind of opened it up um for resource harvesting and particularly in the the asteroid belt. So, again, it was discovered in 2510. Uh so, flash forward a bit and uh we're actually going to zoom out here because in 2530, uh humanity discovered the Xi'an.

9. 00:07:06

   And discovered is an interesting way of putting it. Uh to give you some context, basically at that time humanity was sort of in the in the thrall of a massive expansion thing. So, there was uh the idea is like jump drives were becoming more accessible, so more people were kind of in space and able to sort of start scanning for jump points, and uh terraforming tech was starting to be refined. So, basically there was this huge push to and just influx of people just getting out there and trying to kind of um discover new systems and new resources and stuff like that. So, you know, kind of unsurprisingly this led to a lot of um greed and kind of questionable behavior. And so anyway, so when Oya system was discovered, a small terraforming outfit basically like blazed into the system sort of

10. 00:07:56

    desperately trying to stake a claim and started to set up their terraforming machines on a planet and didn't really check to see if the planet was actually uninhabited. And it turned out it wasn't. Uh High Xian, that's how we met. So in 2539 they discovered this jump point into Gurzil basically uh that wasn't that that big a deal in and of itself, but when a Xian scout ship popped into the system from an unknown jump point suddenly Hadrian system or Nivelan system was now sort of at the forefront of a lot of basically the the Xian Empire. So the UPE sealed it off from civilian use and the military moved in. Now again,

11. 00:08:45

    bear in mind that right now that the tensions of the with them were high, but it was not war yet. But at the same time they were just trying to play it safe and and stuff like that and you know, they had still a couple years before the the first war with the Tevarin which was real bad. Anyway, so once Ivar Messer rose to power he basically he used this sort of prove this undercurrent of paranoia about the Xian and and kind of fed it. He sort of just he he would feed it with this sort of sense of like an inevitable invasion that would one day come and all this stuff and and fear of the Xian and stuff like that as a way to sort of cement his power uh and and whatnot and he even very famously implicated um what he assumed what he said were Xian

12. 00:09:35

    assassins were responsible for a series of bombings against civilian population centers and that was one of the things that catapulted him into sort of this new what was called the prime citizen which he later revamped to become the Imperator and basically seized control entirely of the government which led to several centuries of despots which is you know So anyway So during the Messer reign basically they they constantly had the Xi'an as a bad guy a sort of the boogeyman that they could always kind of loom over the people as something like you know you know you need us to help keep them at bay type thing So basically there was that thing with war was kind of in the air and Hadrian as it was

13. 00:10:24

    renamed now to reflect the sort of the wall mentality was the center point so you have Hadrian Castra and Kiel are now connected to these systems up here which formed the Perry line so this this was basically kind of the no man's land so right on the other side of the no one inhabited these systems and right on the other side of these systems were connected to Xi'an ones so they basically just sort of demilitarized all of these and then set up watch points in all of these systems to keep an eye on making sure that no one was coming in through these through these jump points So the military would like lace the area with mines military bases battle groups you know basically all prepping for a war that I mean they didn't know this at the time but would never come and that's kind of how it stayed for a really long

14. 00:11:13

    time this very kind of tense stalemate paranoia and fear and you know just sort of chomping at the bit fingers on triggers type thing waiting for the Xi'an to make a move and vice versa them waiting for us to get aggressive and make a move so it was definitely you know took two to tango on that one. So, that was that was basically the status quo on Hadrian. So, it was primarily a military system. Uh civilians weren't allowed there. Tons of weapons and ordinance and stuff like that were sort of laced around and and anti-invasion countermeasures and stuff like that. Uh and and that was basically it. So, uh once the Messer's were finally ostracized and the new government kind of stepped in, uh a big aspect of it was ratcheting down and sort of de-escalation, like taking away

15. 00:12:00

    a lot of the tension that had existed between us and the Xi'an. And so, in 2793, uh they basically dissolved the Perry Line. So, all of these systems basically were divided between um the UEE and the Xi'an. And uh in in sort of an attempt to kind of let people back in and and and breed more trust uh between the two. Um but interestingly enough, now Hadrian has sort of lost its sense of purpose. Uh cuz again, this is it sort of had its like identity defined by the fact that it was the sort of the uh center point, kind of tip of the spear type thing against the Xi'an invasion. And now it didn't have that. So, and again, it was not like there were uh landing zones or planets and stuff

16. 00:12:47

    like that where people could live and develop their own kind of culture. The culture was military and war. Um so, in the wake of this, you know, while there were discussions about reopening the system for mining opportunities and stuff like that. Unfortunately, you know, center centuries of uh ordinance, you know, and anti-invasion tech and all the stuff that was scattered throughout the system made it really tough to to fly around, basically, or really dangerous. Uh so, you know, the military tried to clean out what they could, but the idea was that there was still a very high potential that there were old munitions kind of just lurking out there in space. Uh so, it was very dangerous and and stuff. So, they're trying to kind of you know, clean it up. Um but interestingly enough now, you know, Hadrian sort of poised to be at an start a new chapter in its existence

17. 00:13:36

    basically. Uh as we've been talking about in a lot of the news updates, you know, recently there was the passage of the Human Xian Trade Initiative or Husha. Uh and Hadrian basically is sort of poised to be sort of a main travel point now. You know, it's I mean it's obviously you can see connected to Terra and could be a a kind of a major way into, you know, um into Xian space. So, it it basically has kind of the potential to open up a lot of trade from both sides uh coming through and and help maybe give it that identity that's been sort of lacking. so, that's basically Hadrian historically. Now, uh as far as the sort of character and flavor for the the system itself, you know, I mean for me one of the things that was sort of appealing about them as a system was was having this was this idea of

18. 00:14:25

    sort of being haunted by the um the spectrum of war. Um I mean we we sort of allude to that in a couple other ones, you know, Hades for example is sort of the relics of this sort of ancient battlefield it's that sort of ancient battlefield thing where it's just like, you know, we don't know exactly what happened, but you know, whatever lived there is dead and we can see the effects of of that devastating devastating war. But, Hadrian was different cuz Hadrian is basically sort of war unfulfilled. Uh and there was something just kind of fun about that concept, you know, like it was there, it was poised to fight and it but it never actually did and then it had to kind of ratchet itself down. Uh so, you know, you have the system that was cultivated for war

19. 00:15:12

    and now forced to kind of figure out who it is. Uh and which is actually something that it kind of shares with Castra. That was also going through a similar my of identity crisis. But, at the same time, Castra you know, has um planet side locations and stuff like that. And they've started to build their own culture, but Hadrian doesn't have that to fall back on. So, it'll be kind of interesting to see sort of how they you know, how they how they handle it. so, that was just sort of the what was sort of the fun challenge with it. So. Um so, yeah. That is basically Hadrian in a nutshell. Uh and that'll do it for this episode of Lore Makers Guide to the Galaxy. Uh as always, I urge everybody to check out the star map uh on our site cuz it can give you fun additional tidbits about all the planets and systems and stars and and kind of points of interest that you can find uh in the

20. 00:16:01

    universe. Uh if you're interested in reading more about Hadrian itself, uh subscribers can go back and read a galactic guide we did about it in the April 2017 issue of Jump Point. Uh so, you can read that there. I think Will wrote it. It's very, very cool. Uh and speaking of subscribers, uh just like to thank all of you for your additional support that help us make content like this and ATV and Bugsmashers and Happy Hour and all that good stuff. And of course, a big huge thank you to all of our backers who have helped uh us build this um incredible thing that we're building. Um so, yeah. I'm Dave Haddock and I'll see you next time. Thank you for watching. So, if you want to keep up with the latest and greatest in the Star Citizen and Squadron 42's development, please follow us on our social media channels. See you soon.