User:SpacialSnowflake/Golden Age

The Golden Age refers to the prosperous bygone era in the history of the human race during which human civilization spread far beyond the confines of Earth and expanded throughout the Solar System.

Origins
Shortly after present day, humans observed strange events occurring on Jupiter, Mercury and Venus such as drastic climate change and environmental changes, they also saw what looked like a sphere traveling between these locations. Curious humanity tracked the object to Mars and began to make preparations for an expedition to inspect the object. Sometime later a mission was prepared to go to Mars using the spacecraft Ares One. They selected the Pilots Mihaylova, Qiao and Jacob Hardy for this mission due to not just their training as astronauts but also as soldiers. After a 14 month journey to Mars armed and ready for what was to come they landed in not a cold desert devoid of life but a planet breathing the first breath of life, when they landed the event was broadcasted back to earth. When they finally saw the Sphere it was not hostile but instead it was breathing new life into Mars and the astronauts own bodies. In the brief time after this exchange the power of the Sphere also transformed humans curing aging and improving the human mind. With this new power the Golden Age began. Humanity called the being responsible for this The Traveler.

Changes Of The Golden Age
The Traveler's arrival had brought enlightenment to humanity, and with the miracles it had created the views humanity once had about the world quickly shifted changing them forever. With the new found knowledge the Traveler had granted humanity, an age of relative peace and prosperity ripe with technological innovation on a grand scale began.A colony was formed on the Moon with research stations beginning to be set up on Luna. Warp drives were invented, allowing humanity to easily reach out to the planets the Traveler had terraformed and claim them as their own building great cities on Mars and Venus, Mercury blessed by the Traveler became a garden world. Soon an age of philosophical debates and scientific advancement followed, as humanity had few problems of the mundane type that still needed solving. Eventually Humanity claimed Jupiter and its moons, whether or not they lived on the actual planet is unknown however it is likely they had colonies on Europa and possibly other moons. As industry sought to expand they saw the Asteroid belt as an untapped treasure trove of wealth begging to be taken and soon an Asteroid mining boom began.

The Traveler's arrival had changed more than the Humans, stirring something on Venus and causing strange ruins to appear in the Ishtar Sink that appeared to be highly technologically advanced but still predate humanity by a few billion years in response to this humans established the Ishtar Collective, a research group dedicated to discovering the secrets of the region. The Collective spent many years studying the region and eventually encountered the Vex. After capturing a live Vex they experimented on it and found that the Vex are hyper-intelligent robots capable of predicting an almost infinite amount of futures. The Vex were not the only ones to mysteriously appear on Venus: a strange race of Dragons or Worms known as the Ahamkara who could grant wishes at a terrible cost.

Advancements and Technology of The Golden Age
The Golden Age saw many technological advancements created for humanity. The most notable of these where advancements in AI resulting in the Warmind and the Exo who both seem to be created for the purpose of War. Advancements in the field of space travel where also common with Humanity having vast fleets of both warp enabled Jet's known as Jumpships and larger cruiser like ships primarily used for colonization. Additionally many other fields of technology would need to have advanced in order to support such a large human population as with a biologically immortal population overpopulation becomes a problem and therefore humanity must evolve technology to support the ever growing population.

List of known advancements during the Golden Age:
 * Fusion Powered Directed Energy technology. This technology was later used in the City Age to power Fusion Rifles.
 * Warp Drive technology used to allow ships to attain Faster Than Light travel, a key component for having an inter-planetary community.
 * Colony Ships used to colonize terrestrial planets. The Cosmodrome in Old Russia is home to a large amount of these ships . All the ships seen in the Cosmodrome appear to be almost identical however it is not known whether or not this is the same model shared by every Colony Ship or just a specific class of colony ship although it seems unlikely that the Russian model is the only one as The Reef seems to be littered with many different kinds of ships.
 * The Exo, a mysterious humanoid robot shaped in humanities image. Large amounts of speculation and mystery lie around the Exo with every Exo in the City Age still unsure about what they are the leading theory is that the Exo was a War Machine.
 * The Warmind, an advanced super-computer that houses an AI construct connected and able to connect to the defense network, why Warminds where needed in the Golden Age is unknown however they played a key role in keeping humanity alive during the collapse with some still operational in the City Age. The most notable Warmind is Rasputin who's data center resides in an old Salt-Mine in the Cosmodrome. The Warminds during the Golden Age seemed to mainly play the role of a COS (Central Operating System) managing the highly complicated human society and even managing other AI, metaphorically keeping the house of cards firmly stuck together with Super-Glue. When Rasputin detected the Darkness it appears that he secretly prepared to combat it in order to avoid creating panic.
 * Jumpships, fighter jet like spacecraft capable of initiating a warp displacement field. Although the jumpships use in the Golden Age is unknown it is likely they where military in nature as commercial interplanetary transport was likely preformed by larger spacecraft capable of acting as public transport. The rare use of Jumpships can also be indicated by the large number of cars still used by people hinting to the fact that personal transport never really moved beyond the car.
 * Stealth Technology. Like the purpose of this technology, the technology itself lies in mystery. What is known is that the technology requires a frequency to operate. What it most likely does however is give off electromagnetic waves that mirror the surrounding area's light or ripple space-time around the field to reflect sound and light in a distorted way using vibrations at a certain frequency. In fact it would make more sense that both this methods work. Bladedancer's manipulating electromagnetic signals around using Arc energy allowing them to mirror their environment with assistance from their ghost doing calculations, however because of the high amount of arc energy required it can't be sustained long-term and the high amount of computing power required means they can't move to much. The second option would be near infinite in duration and require a special frequency to work, however an overload would permanently destroy it due to the space-time around it literally crushing the device, there is even evidence of this in the mission "Last Rites" because as your stealth field breaks down, due to excessive movement or vibrations from shooting you begin to turn red indicating that space-time is collapsing inwards causing the light around it to move away from what your 3rd person view point is. Once that stealth drive breaks down it also cannot be used again as it has just been crushed. Technology that bends space-time in order to cloak is nigh perfect, the only reason why a Guardian has an outline is because the light changes space-time and cannot be changed by space-time, you are essentially seeing your own light.
 * Engrams, are encrypted matter held in a crystal structure, once encrypted the engram then takes the form of whatever it was coded to be, for example you could essentially code a pizza into an engram, encrypt it and then send it to someone who could then decrypt the engram back into the pizza. This technology would have revolutionized physical security and shipping as almost anything could be coded into an engram, encrypted and transported and then decypted by the intended recipient. Clovis Bray is responsible for creating the engram.
 * Glimmer. The greatest currency ever to be made is Glimmer. Glimmer is simply programmable matter which with the right energy and inputs applied to it can be transmuted into almost anything. Glimmer would have revolutionized commerce in The Golden Age allowing for practical currency that naturally avoided inflation because the use of Glimmer removes it from the market keeping it's value stable. Glimmer is an essential component in engrams and is still used in the City Age as the dominant currency.
 * Annihilation-Pumped Caedometric Weapons: An Annihilation-Pumped Caedometric Weapon appears to be an anti-matter powered surgical laser weapon. Caedometric means to cut/hew/fell a meter and as this weapon is powered by anti-matter it is logical to think that it is a precision weapon used to cut away matter in small precise amount and under these criteria it seems like a laser weapon would do the best job. Because this weapon was launched by Rasputin it is likely that he(it) used it as a surgical weapon to cut out the Travelers propulsion system before it could flee (Assuming the theory he prevented the Traveler from leaving is correct).
 * Magnetically Accelerated Cargo Transport. The accelerator in Archers Line on the moon is operated by magnets. It operates on the same mechanics that run the CERN super collier, accelerating objects using a long tube at speeds far greater than the Moons escape velocity towards other Terrestrial colonies in the system. This system is a more effective way of moving cargo than ordinary space travel. Theoretically because the object would never decelerate unless colliding with something it would need to be aimed at a separate station that would then decelerate the object. (Citation needed). It is highly likely that The Jade Rabbit uses the same design to shoot it's projectiles as the accelerator on the moon.
 * Exotic State Polymer. This polymer when Ionized and Heated gains exotic properties such as over-penetration and Ricocheting when hitting certain surfaces. This is the technology used to power Hard Light after a Warlock known as a Thanatonaut kills himself in order to have a vision which reveals to him how the Golden Age technology works, after the vision the Warlock is then revived by their ghost.
 * Helium-3 Fusion Reactors. Why are the lights still on? Good question, they probably shouldn't be but in the Golden Age they perfected Helium-3 fusion and with enough surplus material and some AI, power could be kept on going for hundreds of years without humans. The Helium Filaments found on the moon are what remains in the city age to continue to charge the Cities own Thermonuclear reactors (unfinished).

List of likely advancements during the Golden Age:

Culture of The Golden Age
(Article in progress)