SELUNE - DINOSAUR MOON

This is the moon that revolves around the planet Kopeta. From Kopeta, this moon appears as a silvery, featurless moon. This is due to the constant cloud cover which masks the surface features of the moon.

The atmosphere lies low and is denser than normal. It is always very damp and the stars only rarely visible from the surface of the moon. The atmosphere is also thinner than normal. There are mountain peaks which actually stick up above the atmosphere into the almost airless reagons. The ecology of the areas above the clouds is very different than that below.

The gravity is lower on Selune than on the other inhabited planets (roughly .5 standard) and the inhabitants have changed their forms to adapt to this. Their bones are lighter, they carry less body weight and they are much taller. The heavier atmosphere has also decreased the size of their lungs and the efficiency of their blood oxygenation.

Selune rotates in the opposite direction from Kopeta. The planet’s rotation is slowing down, but is still rather rapid. A day lasts just under 8 hours. Thus the natives devide their time into 3 equil length divisions called Thirdays, and this measure is devided into 2 parts called li and di which are about 4 hours each. The watches are usually a li or di long (for LIght and Dark periods). A work shift is commonly 2 Thirdays long with a break in the middle ½ a di long where the main meal is eaten and a short siesta is taken.

Seasons follow those found on the surface of Kopeta, but the hollidays are very different. In the winter months, the rain lasts almost all day.

Water - Water is abundant on Selune; in fact it rains about 8 out of 24

This planet was chosen for Terraforming and as a genetic experiment by the Greldians. They were curious about geneticc evolution and concieved a way to monitor the evolution of this planet. So where the other terraformed planets were populated with the flora and fauna which were aready evolved, Seleune was populated with only very simple lifeforms from which a accelerated evolution occured. The idea being to observe the lifeforms as the changed to give information about how current genetic structures might be modified based on this other system.

The first step to creating a livable enviornment was the creation of Gates which could be used to instantly transport people and materials to the planet. There were 3 gates built. 2 were known by all, but a third was built in secrecy, and its existance is now completely unknown today. The others were used up until the time of the Great Conflict and were used on a ongoing basis until that time.

Before the simplest lifeform could be placed on the planet, it was necessary to set up the meterological and gravatitional enviornment. To the end, a deep cavern was created 100 miles under the surface of Selune. A Fusion engine was then made and used to power great gravitational fields which almost doubled the gravity of the planet from its norm. This is still only ½ the normal gravity of Kopeta (and the other inhabited planets), but was the best they could do. A byproduct of the fusion process (which used the rocks found underground as its fuel) was water. They used a Hydrogen cracker to seperate the from the oxygen.

Next, they used clerics to create more water and air to achieve a stable atmosphere. The atmosphere developed slowly over a period of a thousand years before the first lifeforms were placed on the planet. Only the most simple of life forms was introduced. At first they were nothing more than single cell life forms and rudimentary colonial multicell creatures. Controled releases of radioactive waste from the fusion reactor was used to "speed up" the evolutionary process by increasing the number of mutations of existing species.

Things went along smoothly with evolution advancing millions of years in 10’s of centuries. This continued until the Great Conflict where the Technologists and the Mages began their battle for control of SOS.

With the disruption of life and society on the major worlds where the battle was being fought, millions of refugees were seeking a safer place to live and raise their families. At that time Selune was not considered a good place to live and the only humans living there were located in the caverns 100 miles under the surface. The only creatures existing on the surface at that time were based on reptilian life forms (dinasaurs and a variety of LizardMan). But it looked better when the superweapons of the Techs and Mages began wasting the surface of the other planets.

Toward the middle of the Great Conflict a large group of people from the oriential regions of Kopeta banded together to travel to Selune and make it their own, despite the opposition to this action by the Technologists who controled Selune at that time. They armed themselves and took over the facility on Kopeta which was in charge of the Selune Project (as the evolution experiment was called). They killed the Tech’s and managed to transport their entire group, their livestock and goods to Selune before the badly decimated Tech army could allocate troops to take the station over again. Once all the people had arrived on Selune both of the known gates were distroyed so none could easily follow them. The ruins of the gates are still visible today near the 2 main cities of Selune.

This colonization occured 2500 years before the date when the party will arrive on Selune. During the intervining years the Oriental culture which the refugees brought with them has developed along lines tangential to the current society on Kopeta. The differences found can be attributed to a few major factors:

One of the most important features of the Selune culture is it’s reliance on human power for work. Although many species of animal was brought with the settlers when the began their colony, none of the beasts of burder (horses, oxen, burrows etc.) survived being transplanted. Attempts were made to break and domesticate the lizard based species native to this world, such animals are both limited in their intellegence (tough and time consuming to train) and are resource inefficient (they consume more water and food than they repay in labor). Thus, the only existing beasts of burden is a small variety of dinasaur similar in form to a small Brontosaurous which is used in ways similar to that which a elephant would be used. An average size village might support one of these beasts, with a large fort owning 3.

Because so much must be done by hand, the phesant class is very large and the middle class is relativly small. The ruling class is very small, usually limited to 1 or 2 families in villages and 5 or 6 in a large settlement. There is a large warrior class which is responsable for the saftey of the people around them. They assume complete control of all issues concerning security which includes land use (if new fields are opened to use, can they protect the homesteaders), trade with neighboring people (as all caravans must be escorted to protect the merchants from the dinosaurs, can this be done economically) and political associations in general. Although they do not "rule" they do control the parameters which bind the rulings of the nobles. Woe to the noble who alienates the warrior class as they may find themselves without protection from the roming pack of ravenous raptors!