Earth that used to be

[trappedslider]

Hundreds of planets in a single system? I don't know all that much about stellar mechanics but that sounds a bit implausible.
Also, why do the robots need to build a receiving jumpgate? After all they arrived in the system via jumpgate just fine.

And finally, why exactly has the terraforming of Mars, etc. failed? When you can evacuate several billion people lack of resources seems implausible.

http://firefly.wikia.com/wiki/The_Verse

You've never seen firefly have you? lol and they don't fail Terraforming efforts will be abandoned within two years due to a lack of native resources.


EDIT: As for the receiving jump gate rule of cool IMO lol

 

[Random Axe]

You've got your Whedon in my Straczynski!

Sounds like you're colliding Babylon 5 with Serenity, more than anything else. But in an incomplete manner, unfortunately:

"2072: First Wave: Dozens of robotic terraforming ships are launched via the jump gate that has been placed on the edge of Earth's Solar System."

Launched how? There is no exit gate at the destination White Sun system because:

"2101-2120: Some of the Robotic Ships start the building of the receiving jumpgate,while others do terraforming work."

So, how did they get there in the first place, if there was no receiving jumpgate?

 

[Janx]

Depends what, for these purposes, is a "planet".

In Firefly, they don't really give details. The best description I've seen has it as a multiple-star system, in which each star has planets, and many of the planets have multiple moons - many of the moons and planets were of a size for terraforming. That way, getting into the tens or dozens of worlds isn't too implausible.

Without hunting down facts, this sounds about right with the representation of the setting, having just finished re-re-watching the series last night.

In at least on episode, they referenced that they were on a moon. So likely some of the gas giants had viable candidates.

Near as I can tell, The Firefly premise is:

earth got over-populated/resources got scarce
a distant star system was identified and terraformers were sent and then a mass exodus occurred from Earth.
Earth blows up (referred to as the "Earth that was" in the intro to Serenity if I recall). Quite possibly what they really mean by "used up"

space travel appears to be sub-light, but faster than NASA current tech, and other than being in a multi-star system, is limited to that solar system

For Firefly:
given the assumed lack of FTL, my guess is they identified a star system with lots of planets
They send robot terraformers, at new tech sub-light speeds, that took a few hundred years
they sent sleep/generational ships behind the terraformers, schedule to arrive shortly after terraforming completed.
Not all terraforming is equal, so some planets suck. if your colony ship drew Planet#12, you were stuck with a frozen iceball until interplanetary travel picked up
New inter-planetary ships get built (military, freighters, passenger, etc) to bring people/stuff from the inner/outer planets)
Ships like the firefly class get built, used, retired
Earth finally dies.

Barring specific years defined in the show, it's feasible that the setting for Firefly is about the new society that forms when man gets out of the Sol System because Earth or the Sol itself are due to expire finally. So be it 2500AD or 3 million years in the future, the effect is the same. You can't go to Earth because it's gone.

Now a sly trick is like what happened in Asimov'sFoundation series, Earth is there, it's just been forgotten about and lost.

Now for the OP's setting, if you're going to say there was a big multi-star network for space travel and then say it's wrecked, then the players are pretty much stuck to playing in a single solar system anyway.

Something to realize, as it's a pet peeve of mine when the GM sets something out and then negates it, then why bother anyway...

 

[Derren]

http://firefly.wikia.com/wiki/The_Verse

You've never seen firefly have you? lol and they don't fail Terraforming efforts will be abandoned within two years due to a lack of native resources.


EDIT: As for the receiving jump gate rule of cool IMO lol

Not to sound rude, but when you intent to simply copy firefly and dismiss any logical concern with "rule of cool" or "thats Firefly" then why did you made this thread?
That the terraforming ships were able to get into the system without jump gate exit, yet the colony ships require one is a serious flaw in your history. And personally I can't believe that the asteroid belts in our solar system don't hold enough resources to make staying in the solar system on terraformed planets not viable.

 

[trappedslider]

Sounds like you're colliding Babylon 5 with Serenity, more than anything else. But in an incomplete manner, unfortunately:

"2072: First Wave: Dozens of robotic terraforming ships are launched via the jump gate that has been placed on the edge of Earth's Solar System."

Launched how? There is no exit gate at the destination White Sun system because:

"2101-2120: Some of the Robotic Ships start the building of the receiving jumpgate,while others do terraforming work."

So, how did they get there in the first place, if there was no receiving jumpgate?

That was iindeed my plan lol using the Jump gate network from B5 and the western space setting of Firefly,

As for the contradictions in the timeline..I think I can reasonable handwave with unreliable narrator and how did they get with no receiving jump gate...total luck blind jump to the system (talk about putting all your eggs in one basket huh?)

Now for the OP's setting, if you're going to say there was a big multi-star network for space travel and then say it's wrecked, then the players are pretty much stuck to playing in a single solar system anyway.

Something to realize, as it's a pet peeve of mine when the GM sets something out and then negates it, then why bother anyway...

Here's a map of the 'verse


and I'm thinking that there's one gate for each star, that would have before the accident n Miranda negated the need to fly thru the black.

Not to sound rude, but when you intent to simply copy firefly and dismiss any logical concern with "rule of cool" or "thats Firefly" then why did you made this thread?
That the terraforming ships were able to get into the system without jump gate exit, yet the colony ships require one is a serious flaw in your history. And personally I can't believe that the asteroid belts in our solar system don't hold enough resources to make staying in the solar system on terraformed planets not viable.

I'm not one into the actual nuts and blots of the whys and hows, for example, I once had an earth like planet that was 99.9% earth like, but the .1% was the oceans being the color Orange..why? IDK, cuz it sounded cool and my players know how that's how I roll ( haha)


EDIT: With my three year game about to wrap up, I'm planning on presenting this idea to that group,since they know that i've been working on this for a while or at least they know i've been working on something.

 

[trappedslider]

so instead of

2506: Terraforming fails on Miranda (last known location of the gate's access codes). Some settlers die. Miranda is removed from maps of habitable worlds. The war for Unification begins.


2511: Unification War ends with the defeat of the Independents.


2518: Now

how about 2506: In a lab on Miranda a fungus (or even advanced computer virus) is accidentally set loose from a government lab destroying the jump gate network, leading to the Unification war. The outer planets resented the feeling of being second class to those who were in the core and thus declared independence, the Core worlds disagreed and so war happened. Due to the ongoing war, the fixing of the jump gates was put on the back burner (yes i know this makes little to no sense...but all efforts were put on winning the war and keeping the populace feed and happy in the core. )

2511: The war ends with the defeat of the Independents

2518: now

 

[Umbran]

That the terraforming ships were able to get into the system without jump gate exit, yet the colony ships require one is a serious flaw in your history.

But that one is very, very simple to work - terraforming ships have relatively small (or non-existent, if robotic) crew. Sending small numbers of people ahead in cryogenic sleep or the like may be reasonable. But maybe the radiation doses taken during the long trip ensured death by cancer young, and/or rendered them sterile.

Colony ships need to carry huge numbers of people, and they have to be healthy and ready to breed. So, colonization without gates is impractical.

And personally I can't believe that the asteroid belts in our solar system don't hold enough resources to make staying in the solar system on terraformed planets not viable.

That depends on exactly what resources are required for the terraforming to work. The asteroids, for all their mineral wealth, are deficient in some elements. Also, what resources there are in teh asteroids are spread over a *HUGE* volume of space, so that gathering all of what you need in once place could be prohibitive.

 

[Umbran]

earth got over-populated/resources got scarce
a distant star system was identified and terraformers were sent and then a mass exodus occurred from Earth.
Earth blows up (referred to as the "Earth that was" in the intro to Serenity if I recall). Quite possibly what they really mean by "used up"

I always took "used up" to be more of a resource and ecological issue. We poison ourselves out of house and home, or humans introduce ecological change that damages the biosphere such that it cannot sustain a civilization. It takes a *lot* to blow up an entire planet, you know.

Barring specific years defined in the show, it's feasible that the setting for Firefly is about the new society that forms when man gets out of the Sol System because Earth or the Sol itself are due to expire finally. So be it 2500AD or 3 million years in the future, the effect is the same. You can't go to Earth because it's gone.

The basic description in Firefly was that the move to colonize was basically the last drive of human culture on the world - a truly massive undertaking, requiring the dying gasp fo the two superpowers to produce. You can't go to Earth because you just don't have the will to muster the resources for that kind of effort again. Especially when, for what you know (which among most in the 'Verse is mythical) the Earth isn't worth going to anyway.

 

[Janx]

I always took "used up" to be more of a resource and ecological issue. We poison ourselves out of house and home, or humans introduce ecological change that damages the biosphere such that it cannot sustain a civilization. It takes a *lot* to blow up an entire planet, you know.

The earth blowing up in reference to being "used up" was symbolic, not literal cause and effect.

The earth birthed mankind, we grew and dug deep into her until we were able to take off on our own before she finally expired.

It ain't that mankind specifically blew her up. She was destined to blow, and we got off that rock.

 

[Grumpy RPG Reviews]

Maybe something shut the gates down.