Elysia in 2300AD

Introduction

This page details the status of Elysia (the former French colony on the planet Joi in the 61 Ursae Majoris system) in 2300AD both for general game use and for play in GG2.

Contents

1. Maps & Description
2. History
   1. Pre Colonisation
   2. During French Rule
   3. Elysian Revolution
   4. Elysia
3. Economics
   1. GG2 Statistics
4. Military
   1. Military Budget
   2. Ground Military
   3. Wet Navy
   4. Aerospace Force
   5. In System Space Force
   6. Interstellar Space Force
5. In System Holdings
6. Extra Solar Holdings
7. Five Year Plan

System Data

Data relevant to the 61 Ursae Majoris system and the planet Joi as a whole can be found on the Joi Sourcebook home page.

Maps & Description

Under Construction.

Elysia

History

The history of Elysia is closely bound up with the history of Joi as a whole. The common history of the sytem and planet can be found on the Joi Sourcebook home page along with links to the histories of the other four colonies.

Pre Colonisation

Colonial Preparation

With the Pre-Colonisation survey complete the ESA facilities were gradually run down with all the out stations being mothballed. Meanwhile the national survey organisations with colonial claims began their own work to locate the sites for their colonies and examine the local conditions for threats and opportunities.

It was at this point that the French Colonial Administration considered pulling out of their commitment to Joi. The colony on Beta Canum was only one generation old, Kimanjano had been colonised just six years before and plans were already well advanced for settlements on both Alderhorst and Aurore. The colony on Nous Voila had already been relinquished to private (albeit still French) development. The problem was not so much the costs, the supply of shipping or the avalability of hardware but the lack of the relevant experts required to found a colony and sufficeint numbers of colonists. While the available personel could be spread more thinly this ran the risk of a disasterous failure in the event of any unforseen problems. Also distributing an unchanged number of colonists between more worlds would reduce the development rate of all the colonies (and therefore increase the time before they reached profitability) and decrease the efficiency of transportation arrangements.

The French Foreign Office however saw this as a great oppotunity. Already deep in trade negotiations with the Japanese, the Foreign Minister offered his Japanese counterpart the French claim to the Pays d'Esperance. The Japanese, eager for the interstellar prestige that a third colony would bring, quickly accepted and the decision was taken out of the Colonial Administration's hands. As a side note it is interesting that many commentators credit this transaction as one of the reasons that Japan finally intervened on the side of France in the Central Asian War forty five years later such was the Japanese sense of debt and obligation.

There was great consternation in the Colonial Administration at this turn of events but in many ways it gave them a convenient way out of their dilemma (and, a bureaucratic necessity, someone else to blame). The matter did not end there however due to a strange combination of a monk and and an ambitious bureaucrat.

The monk was a member of the Order of Saint Theodora, a Catholic monastic order dedicated to repairing the damages wreaked upon the Earth by Humanity and balancing the needs of man and his environment. Brother Kallel was a member of the ESA survey team (on a sabatical from his post at the Universite de Nouvelle Provence Xeno-Biology Department) who had been assigned to the outpost station on the island continent of Elysia. He had been inspired by the beauty of Joian life and despaired at its likely fate at the hands of the colonists. As his order was one that taught that man should work to further God's will, not meekly accept the Universe as it was, he resolved that he and the Order of Saint Theodora should act.

As Brother Kallel made his way back to Nouvelle Provence, following the run down of the ESA survey, he stopped at the Order's Monasteries and Houses along the way to spread his message of Joian salvation. By the time he reached his home on Tirane he had a growing number of supporters and transcipts and records of his impassioned preaching had passed beyond Tirane to Earth itself. The Brother's Elysian Crusade, as it was jokingly referred to within the Order, quickly gathered momentum. His proposal that the Order should found a colony of its own accord (rather than merely assist, or attempt to mitigate, the efforts of others) was a radical one to many of his Brothers and Sisters. Nevertheless his proposals struck a strong chord and, almost uniquely in the history of the Order since it spread amongst the stars, united the whole Order in a single cause.

The final outcome of Brother Kallel's efforts was that the Order of Saint Theodora agreeed to sponsor any of its followers who wished to emigrate to Elysia and provide support and assistance in setting up a colony. This aid would be provided on the basis that the colonists would follow the Order's principles of stewardship of all life, both Joian and Terran. Although the Order had considerable resources of both finance and expertise (primarily in the biological sciences) it was by no means capable of founding a colony under its own auspices (it owned no starships for a start). What was needed was a friendly nation that could provide the missing ingredients.

Fortunately for the Order the Deputy Secretary for Joian affairs at the French Colonial Administration was one Alain Valcroix who has seen his once promicing position (as the man in charge of a potentially major colonisation effort) reduced to that of a dead end backwater (the man in charge of relations with other nation's major colonisation efforts and transferring survey information to the Japanese). When Valcroix was discretely approached by representatives of the Order he saw the salvation of his career presented to him. France had the vessels and the support infrastructure, what had killed plans for the Pays d'Esperance colony was the lack of suitable experts and willing colonists - and the Order of Saint Theodora was offering to supply both of these.

The Order's environmental and activist credentials, coupled with its strong accademic traditions, meant that many of its religious and lay members were experts in the very fields required to found a colony (indeed the Order's members routinely joined IEX, and other exploratory organisations', expeditions). Many of the Order's Houses on the colony planets specialised in assisting their communities in coming to terms with their new worlds so there was also a great deal of experience in the day to day business of colonial development. The Order had also been at the centre of the Stewardship Movement (which aimed to balance humanity's needs with those of the rest of nature and to repair the damage done my man to his enviroment) in the early twenty first century. Although by the twenty third century the Order was no longer at the centre of things many still looked to it as a guide in following the stewardship ethics that the movement espoused. Thus there were a great number of people who had, for moral reasons, chosen not to partiipate in the colonisation of alien worlds (imposing humanity on yet more vulnerable eco systems). With the Order's backing however a colony founded on the principles of stewardship had the porential to attract large numbers of ideal colonists from the French Union and her close allies.

The agreement struck between Alain Vaicroix and Brother Kallel did not however set up a colony run by the Order under the French flag. The Order had neither the resources nor the desire to be a colonial power. The agreement (the Concordat d'Elysia as it became known) called for the order to provide a range of experts on secondment to IEX and the Colonial Administration to work on Joi and to encourage colonisation among its members and followers. In return the Colonial Administration would administer and support and colony in the normal way and in the event of an over subscription of colonists give priority to those nominated by the Order.

The combination of Alain Valcroix's internal support and the Order's external influence and lobbying soon made the impecable logic of partnership clear even to the French Republic's political elite. Consequently in 2238, less than one year after renouncing her claim to the Pays d'Esperance, France lodged notice of her intent to colonise the island continent of Elysia.

Once the decision to colonise had been made the preparatory work was quickly begun (much of the hardware had for instance already been stockpiled on the assumption that the Pays d'Esperance colony would proceed). The core sections of an orbital terminal were quickly delivered (the Hanoverians having purchased the old ESA terminal to speed their colonial development) and the ESA outstation on Elysia was expanded to include a spaceplane runway and fuel cracking facilities as well as additional accomodation, suppport and scientific facilities.

The construction engineers were quickly followed by a Colinial Administration / IEX team in 2239 (the latter principally staffed by Brothers and Sisters or lay members of the Order of Saint Theodora, including Brother Kallel). The team had three main, interdependant aims. To survey the island continent of Elysia and the surrounding waters both geologically and biologically, to develop crops and animals (either native or terran) suitable for aggriculture and to plan and prepare for colonisation.

The survey was carried out in a similar manner to the global ESA survey, making use of remotely or computer controlled LTAs and rovers backed up by human teams where items of particular interest or difficulty were located. The development group (building on the survey findings) produced and planted experimental crops modifying existing high yielding Terran plants to adapt them to Joian conditions and native Joian flora to improve their yields. They also investigated the adaptability of Terran livestock to Joian feedstuff and the suitability of Joian fauna for domestication. The planning group combined the survey and development results with shipping timetables and the availability of supporting resources to plan the likely development of the colony. They also investigated and located local resources for use in construction and future development.

As the majority of the survey team were either members or followers of Order of Saint Theodora their work and plans unsurprisingly reflected the stewardship ethics of the Order. Thus all the genetic manipulation carried out on plants and animals followed the Beijing Protocol (only genes found within the same species could be transferred) while the development projections and raw materials location assumed the sustainable management of resources. There was no written policy that required these measures it was simply the normal way for those doing the job to work.

As a consequence of this predisposition the French colony rejected the intensive aggricultural techniques later adopted by the Japanese and Azanian colonies. Instead a combination of terran and Joian plants and liivestock was developed which, although less efficient than the intensive methods, was significantly more sustainable and less reliant on off world support.

By 2248 the surveys were completed, the plans drawn up and the colonisation of Elysia began.

During French Rule

The colonisation effort on Elysia was originally concentrated on the area around the main survey base and its spaceplane runway. Central facilities were located in the newly founded city (and colonial capital) of Esperance. Esperance was sited at the mouth of the river

Under Construction.

Elysian Revolution

Under Construction. FPJ Front Populare Joian

Elysia

Under Construction.

Economics

GG2 Statistics

The economic statistics for each of the countires in GG2 have been modeled by Steven Alexander based on the 2300AD rulebooks and standard economic modelling techniques. More details can be found on his Web Pages.

All the data are from Version 5.0 of the Economic Model and are Copyright Steven Alexander 1996, 1997.

Military

Dan Hebditch has produced an Order of Battle for the Elysian military machine (such as it is). This contains a brief history of the forces, their composition as of 2303 and details of their equipment and some leading personalities.

Military Budgets

The economic statistics for each of the countires in GG2 have been modeled by Steven Alexander based on the 2300AD rulebooks and standard economic modelling techniques. More details can be found on his Web Pages.

All the data are from Version 5.0 of the Economic Model and are Copyright Steven Alexander 1996, 1997.

Dan Hebditch has detailed L'Armee d' Elysia as it stands in 2303.

Wet Navy

Dan Hebditch has detailed La Marine d' Elysia as it stands in 2303.

Aerospace Force

Dan Hebditch has detailed La Force de l'Air d' Elysia as it stands in 2303.

Space Force

Dan Hebditch has detailed La Force Spatial d' Elysia as it stands in 2303.

In System Holdings

Under Construction.

Extra Solar Holdings

Under Construction.

The Five Year Plan

Under Construction.

Version 1.3

25/1/2001

Copyright J.M. Pearson, 1998, 1999, 2001