In previous posts here I've talked about Sci-Fi maps and settings...
Here's a bit more of the sci-fi setting I've been putting together as an example sandbox / playground for my personal RPG rules engine.
The rules engine I currently call eXiSTeNCe. and the campaign is currently called "Salvage Space"
On the frontier of human exploration 48 light years from Earth, explorers find an alien starship graveyard and the gold rush for xenological artifacts is on.
The Alliance government has dispatched the Navy to patrol the system and commissioned universities to catalogue and study the finds - but it's too little too late to keep the freelancers, pirates, and dreamers from flocking to the system looking for their own big score.
If only the derelicts themselves were not so full of alien dangers...
Alliance Salvage Space Star Map (0-15 parcecs from Sol):
https://armageddonmoon.com/existence:star_maps
The real star data my map is based on comes from Terry Kepner's 100 light year extract of the Hipparcos sky survey data.
This is available in a ready-to-use format for AstroSynthesis 3 which is the mapping program I use and what generated this image.
Rather than set the frontier at the edge of my map data, I used a data set twice as wide as the area I wanted so that future "space hexcrawl" adventures that leave the system have plenty of room to expand outward or return inward to the more populated / colonized areas.
Niecti System (HIP 1368) Inner and Outer System maps:
https://armageddonmoon.com/existence:star_system_maps
Next up are two maps of planet and belt orbits within the system - both an inner system view as well as the outer system view.
These views have dark blue orbital lines in them which can be hard to see in the thumbnail view but look pretty great (to me at least) in the full view if you click into them.
These initial survey maps do not have the names colonists and explorers initially assigned to things.
The views are generated from the star system data generated by and kept within Astrosynthesis 3.
Finally, some views of the night sky as seen from these new worlds:
https://armageddonmoon.com/existence:night_sky_maps
These are generated in Celestia by moving the viewpoint to Hipparcos 1368 and then targeting Sol again.
Our star system is smack dab in the middle of the view.
And to give you an idea of how far we've stepped, I've included the view of how much our constellations are distorted when the same patterns are plotted after a 15 parsec shift to the edge of the frontier.
Wrap Up
So, there you go, using 2 tools and realistic data set can help build and maintain a complex and dense sci-fi setting without breaking your brain.
Astrosynthesis 3 from NBOS Software is designed as a sci-fi GM tool to create and manage "stellar empires"
And Celestia is a fantastic desktop astronomy tool that can be used to "cheat" having to do a lot of math yourself.
Terry Kepner's data set is freely available from the NBOS download site and is documented to be used with other tools as well.
Here's a bit more of the sci-fi setting I've been putting together as an example sandbox / playground for my personal RPG rules engine.
The rules engine I currently call eXiSTeNCe. and the campaign is currently called "Salvage Space"
On the frontier of human exploration 48 light years from Earth, explorers find an alien starship graveyard and the gold rush for xenological artifacts is on.
The Alliance government has dispatched the Navy to patrol the system and commissioned universities to catalogue and study the finds - but it's too little too late to keep the freelancers, pirates, and dreamers from flocking to the system looking for their own big score.
If only the derelicts themselves were not so full of alien dangers...
Alliance Salvage Space Star Map (0-15 parcecs from Sol):
https://armageddonmoon.com/existence:star_maps
The real star data my map is based on comes from Terry Kepner's 100 light year extract of the Hipparcos sky survey data.
This is available in a ready-to-use format for AstroSynthesis 3 which is the mapping program I use and what generated this image.
Rather than set the frontier at the edge of my map data, I used a data set twice as wide as the area I wanted so that future "space hexcrawl" adventures that leave the system have plenty of room to expand outward or return inward to the more populated / colonized areas.
Niecti System (HIP 1368) Inner and Outer System maps:
https://armageddonmoon.com/existence:star_system_maps
Next up are two maps of planet and belt orbits within the system - both an inner system view as well as the outer system view.
These views have dark blue orbital lines in them which can be hard to see in the thumbnail view but look pretty great (to me at least) in the full view if you click into them.
These initial survey maps do not have the names colonists and explorers initially assigned to things.
The views are generated from the star system data generated by and kept within Astrosynthesis 3.
Finally, some views of the night sky as seen from these new worlds:
https://armageddonmoon.com/existence:night_sky_maps
These are generated in Celestia by moving the viewpoint to Hipparcos 1368 and then targeting Sol again.
Our star system is smack dab in the middle of the view.
And to give you an idea of how far we've stepped, I've included the view of how much our constellations are distorted when the same patterns are plotted after a 15 parsec shift to the edge of the frontier.
Wrap Up
So, there you go, using 2 tools and realistic data set can help build and maintain a complex and dense sci-fi setting without breaking your brain.
Astrosynthesis 3 from NBOS Software is designed as a sci-fi GM tool to create and manage "stellar empires"
And Celestia is a fantastic desktop astronomy tool that can be used to "cheat" having to do a lot of math yourself.
Terry Kepner's data set is freely available from the NBOS download site and is documented to be used with other tools as well.