ALT: Assisted Learning Technology
Assisted Learning Technology is one of the many features of the Information Cloud. It is a dedicated neural net built into the sensor cap that is provided with the Sphynx-II Controller Rack. What it does is to monitor the brain's normal learning mechanisms and accelerate them. An example is where the user of the sensor cap first tries to learn how to control Augmented Peripheral Awareness with their mind. It is a difficult task and under normal circumstances may take weeks or months to perfect. Assisted Learning Technology already knows what the user needs to learn from studying the brain patterns of thousands of previous users, and it monitors the user's activities to see what systems they are using at any one time. It uses this information to predict what memories and neural patterns the brain will try to construct and to assist it to do so with less repetition. It also vastly accelerates the rate at which short term memory is consolidated into long-term storage. The sensor cap provides both direct chemical neurotransmitter injection and also other energy based technologies that artificially stimulate specific brain regions while an activity is taking place. By doing this they enable the user of the sensor cap, to learn in ten minutes what would normally take a month.
APA: Augmented Peripheral Awareness
Augmented Peripheral Awareness is one of the many optional features of the Information Cloud that can be configured via a Sphynx-II controller rack. The feature is essentially a means of interfacing the Information Cloud's massively parallel information streams into a human's partially parallel brain. Since the human brain cannot handle so many parallel streams without extensive long-term training that can cause mental illness, the APA option injects a high level summary of each stream directly into the user's visual cortex so that it appears to the user in the form of a symbol in their peripheral vision. In this manner it makes the user indirectly aware of all possible streams and lets them mentally select which single stream to view at one time.
Auto-bar
A virtual personality that is projected into a hologram to act as a personal waiter and bartender. Auto-bars can synthesise most types of food and drink, based upon old records of the flesh composition of various types of animals. Auto-bar can also synthesise vegetables and herbs.
Bull Ranger
One of the larger mechanised combat droids. Bull Rangers stand one and half times the height of an average man. The bulk of their strength is in the powerful legs that not only provide them with impressive running speeds but also allow them to jump and rapidly switch direction to avoid enemy fire. Bull Ranger's arms are short and loaded with multiple weapons systems including liquid propellent flame throwers, chaff blasters, high energy discharge units and plasma bombs. They specialise in short range combat. A Bull Ranger's armour is soft and absorbs impacts from a range of munitions. Their limited control systems gives them a bad reputation as fire and forget assassins. They are largely self governing once launched and their abilities to differentiate friend from foe has been drawn into question on a number of occasions.
Bull Rangers also utilise a highly effective 'Mask Ant' force field system that it can calibrate on the fly to link with enemy force fields. This can fool an enemy's defence systems into believing that the Bull Range is one of the many subsystems within itself. A Bull Ranger can then run straight through an enemy force field, trusted and untouched.
Cafe Lyon
A cafe in the Old Quarter that has Auto-bar and net feed consoles. It's customers are mostly loners, geeks and businessmen.
Central Command
The centre of governing power that controls the Security Forces.
Cinnamon City
A metropolis policed too long by the overstretched Security Forces, and constantly influenced by an underground organisation known as the Kamari. Cinnamon City has a central Old Quarter that dates back several hundred years, but the outskirts have been extended and modernised with commercial and business districts. A high crime rate still plagues the city even after several crack downs and there is a general feeling that the Security Forces are not in full control.
Cloud Awareness
Cloud Awareness is one of the many features of the Information Cloud. It enables a person who normally only experiences awareness of their current single location, to experience being in many different locations simultaneously. It does this in order to allow the user of the Information Cloud to assimilate all the perceptual input from up to 250 net-feed droids at the same time. Each droid has its own physical location and provides inputs from that context. Net-feed droids can form a single swarm covering one large area, or can split into several smaller swarms covering multiple smaller areas, or can even spread out so that every single droid is covering a separate and isolated area. Cloud Awareness allows the human user of the sensor cap to assimilate these different droid configurations in multiple ways, including Augmented Peripheral Awareness (each swarm is represented by a symbol in the user's peripheral vision but they do not receive stimulus from that swarm until they focus on it), time splice awareness, (where the user's awareness only sees stimulus from one swarm at a time but the currently selected swarm cycles on a regular short time period), or Full Cloud Awareness (not recommended). Full Cloud Awareness streams all inputs directly into the user's mind as multiple parallel threads. Under testing, this has general caused madness or death.
Crab Scanners
A Crab scanner is an old technology for scanning large areas with an autonomous collection of ground based scanning droids. A primitive precursor to the X16, the Crab is ground based only, and has a bad reputation for becoming stuck in uneven terrain due to its short legs and low ground clearance. The Crab scanner actually walks forwards rather than sideways but does have a similar appearance to a smaller version of a Fiddler Crab. Their scanning abilities are limited to visible light, infrared and ultraviolet radiation detection. Crab scanners have zero armour and no defence systems. They have a limited range of around one kilometre.
Croc
Croc is the long-time nickname Of the RS6 Attack vehicle. The RS6 is an all terrain vehicle consisting of an armoured low-slung body made up of three separate modules. Each module is interchangeable but the default configuration consists of a weapons module, a communications and navigation module, and a personnel module. The RS6 cockpit is made of a heavily reinforced Perspex heat shield. Crocs are designed with flocking behaviour, enabling them to work together making joint decisions on formations, attack and defence strategies. When multiple Crocs have their communications and navigation module's linked there is usually one master and the others act as slaves. If the master becomes inoperable, one of the slaves will automatically take over as master. Crocs have six legs that project sideways from the core body and move in a similar sideways motion to crocodiles, hence the nickname Crocs. They come with intermediate armour rating and proton cannons as standard. A standard Croc can carry up to fifteen crew in addition to the pilot. The number may vary according to the pod configuration.
Cronin Pit
A cronin pit is an excavation pit for the rare mineral Cronin. Usually the pits are small and very dark because Cronin is extremely reactive and combusts when it comes into contact with visible light.
Digital Volume
A digital volume is a hand sized folder that is designed to be portable and to provide a semblance of an old antique book. It contains large amounts of digital information that can be accessed without any local communications networks. Digital volumes are old technology and are not commonly used.
Dome Shield
The Dome Shield is a vast shield that covers the entire Orange Zone. It was constructed by the order of The Techno-Prophet Colloran Hades.
Drop Ranger
A Drop Ranger is a large cargo vessel with a built-in long-range communications unit. It's purpose is to carry a large number of autonomous droids and to release them over a target area. Once all the units have been released, the Drop Range will perform a controlled descent and crash land nearby to act as a relay station to manage all routing of communications between the droids and any remote Sphynx-II controller racks. The Drop Ranger is capable of delivering up to 250 droids to any target within 200km. The Drop Ranger is also fitted with state of the art compression technologies in order to compress the enormous amounts of data generated by its droids.
DS
A calendar system. 715DS means 715 years since the construction of the Dome Shield.
Durban District
An affluent area of Cinnamon City inhabited by a lot of engineers, scientists and professional types.
EMP
Electromagnetic pulse (EMP) is a sudden and powerful wave of electromagnetic radiation. Its aim is to generate powerful electric currents in circuits and cables by means of induction. If the induced current surge is large enough it will cause severe damage to the cables and circuits that it passes through. This can render whole systems inoperable.
Flesh mould
A fungi that travels through the air as spores and then grows on a human a carrier. It lives on the flesh, typically in dark damp areas and grows tiny roots into the surface of the skin to feed on the host's blood supply. The fungi is very small and often not noticed until itching and blood diseases ensue. Flesh mould can be treated with anti-fungal medicines.
Hand-Box Generator
A small generator that can be held in one hand. Although small, the Hand-Box Generator contains dense power coils and fuel cells that are capable of delivering a high power output for several months. Their high price makes them a specialist piece of equipment and therefore quite uncommon.
Havers Compound
Havers Compound is an old building that was originally built to house a large mining community that worked in the nearby Gollard mine. It provided long-term accommodation, canteens and recreation areas to over three thousand miners during the Iridium wars. The Iridium mines were exhausted over fifty years ago and they have been unused since then. Likewise Havers Compound had been thought unused over that period until Commander Nick Chambers received orders to investigate the area for any possible Kamari activity.
Impact Pistol
A small side arm that uses a short powerful electrical discharge to super-heat a small volume of air. The sudden massive expansion of the air propels a small physical object at high velocity over short distances. The weapon is considered primitive but is still quite effective. The fact that it is cheap to mass produce and light to carry makes it ideal for day to day use by the Security Forces.
Information Cloud
A dynamic and coherent world model that is constantly updated by a swarm of autonomous information gathering agents. An Information Cloud provides the operator with a fully immersive experience, omnipresent viewpoint and augmented senses. The volume of information and the extended field of reality can cause headaches, vomiting and madness. One of the greatest Techno-Prophets of our time, Colloran Hades, described the Information Cloud as 'Gods own eyes' and expressed his regret that the human mind might never be capable of fully using the power that it provides. He also described it as a milestone in man's own extinction.
Ionic field
A field of charged particles that can be used to disrupt or join with energy force fields.
Kamari
The Kamari is the collective name given to several political, commercial and religious groups that gradually coalesced into an organisation that opposes the Security Forces. In it's early incarnations the Kamari was made up of businessmen that were unhappy with the way that Cinnamon City was run, and unhappy with how wealth was distributed and controlled. When politicians became involved, a splinter group began to represent these businessmen and push for radical changes to laws and infrastructure. Some of the businesses involved were arms companies and when political disagreements escalated the Kamari became an armed underground organisation. Until recently it had not taken part in open warfare with the Security Forces, but this has now begun to change.
Mech-Tractor
A mechanised tractor (mech-tractor) is an agricultural vehicle powered by raw fuel cells. It is capable of carrying out repeated manual tasks. It can operate without a driver if given a predefined series of operations to perform.
Mekinet News
One of the largest news agencies of Cinnamon City. Founded only twenty years ago by the media and business tycoon Ario Neech, the company has grown from strength to strength. After an unusual series of technology licensing deals with the government and the Security Forces, Mekinet News gained a reputation for underhand dealing and dubious practices.
Multilayer Hybrid Deflector Dish
A large concave mirror made from multiple layers of highly heat resistant reflective materials. The different layers are each designed to deflect a different type of energy weapon. The hybrid deflector dish therefore acts as an all-in-one shield capable of deflecting several different types of energy weapon.
Nano-grade Weapons
Nano-grade weapons are weapons which are built on the dimensions of nanometres (one thousand-millionth of a metre). These weapons are small enough to attack biological cells or molecule scale mechanised systems. They attack an enemy from within rather than from outside as is the case with conventional weapons.
Net-feed Droid
A net-feed droid is a swarm-capable information gathering autonomous droid that began as military hardware but was licensed by Mekinet News for an undisclosed sum during a time of great upheaval in the Security Forces. Some said it should never have been sold to a commercial news agency; others said that the Security Forces' huge deficit was reason enough to find additional revenue streams from licensing of non-lethal technologies. A net-feed droid has the appearance of a silver spherical raindrop with trailing thin metallic arms on each side. Consisting largely of sensors, communications and navigation equipment, the droids are relatively simple units. There true power comes from their swarm capabilities. up to 250 net-feed droids can act as a single swarm using a Drop Ranger as a relay station. Net-feed droids have sophisticated damage avoidance systems left over from their military origins but they have no armour or weapons capability since this was removed as part of the licensing agreement between the Security Forces and Mekinet News. The net-feed droid's small thin arms are limited in use but can carry up to 100kg of cargo. Multiple droids can work together to carry heavier loads but this is not their primary purpose and they can be cumbersome to coordinate when using their short arms.
Nimbus Jump-pad
A short range flight capable personnel carrier. The Nimbus jump-pad is well liked by those who use it regularly but it is rather basic in its abilities. It has limited armour, limited flight range, and has a low power consumption. It's maximum personnel capacity is seven people. The Nimbus jump-pad has no weapons systems though its makers do point out that you are welcome to fire your own weapons out of the open slots on the sides of the vehicle chassis.
Orange Zone
The Orange Zone is an area of several hundred square kilometres which is loosely defined as all land under the protection of the Dome Shield. It comprises of Cinnamon City, the southern territories, and all land in between.
Personal force field
An undergarment that is strapped to the torso of a person to provide a short range defensive force field. The units come with a range of power and armour class ratings. A personal force field surrounds the wearer with a sensor field that detects high velocity projectiles and slows them down using a repulsive M-force.
Plasma Grenade
A small hand-held grenade that can be detonated with a configurable timer control. When detonated the grenade generates a short intense plasma field and wraps it in a powerful magnetic field until it is super-heated. This all happens within a few thousandths of a second. The magnetic field is designed to fail almost instantly, releasing the plasma field and allowing it to expand rapidly. This causes a sudden burst of intense heat and rapid expansion of the surrounding air, leading to a high powered compression wave that is highly destructive to all surrounding objects. Plasma grenades are graded according to the power of their detonation. Grade E will blow concrete walls apart up to a range of three metres. Higher grades have a rising scale of destructive power. Grade A can take down buildings over a five hundred metre radius.
Puggles
Lisa's favourite doll. It's a cloth doll with long ears, and it looks like a cross between a boy and a donkey. Lisa says it's a donkey but her mother isn't sure what it is meant to be.
Roach
A Roach is a small land based vehicle built for speed and manoeuvrability. It lacks armour and has no weapons systems. It is generally used as a short range vehicle for transporting soldiers over short distances that are difficult to navigate or too dangerous for larger vehicles. It runs on six short legs so is ideal for muddy or uneven terrain and its small size allows it to enter small spaces or travel through narrow access routes.
RS6 Attack vehicle
See Croc.
RS12 Personnel carrier
The RS12 Personnel carrier has a similar appearance to a hotel on wheels. It is one of the larger classes of personnel carriers and can hold up to five hundred personnel with all their equipment. Due to its weight, the vehicle has thirty-two sets of large wheels equally spread beneath it's box-like black structure. It is slow and lacks manoeuvrability so is seldom sent into combat areas until the area has already been mostly cleared by allied forces. The RS12 is not completely defenceless however. It's thick heavy armour can withstand ongoing attack from a range of medium class weapons systems and its segregated bulkheads mean that any armour that fails will only expose one segment of the vehicle, while adjacent sections automatically realign armour to defend their exposed areas. The RS12 also has up to six medium range proton cannons making it a formidable opponent that most enemies will avoid.
Security Forces
The Security Forces are the combined military forces that support Cinnamon City, the Orange Zone and most of the southern continent. The are financed by multiple governments and businesses and are governed by the Council of Lords through Central Command. They are responsible for the protection of the Orange Zone as well as maintaining public order and law enforcement. Many believe that the Security Forces large remit and limited budget leaves them overstretched and open to corruption.
Shinara
An industrialised area in the south. Mekinet News has a high security facility in Shinara where it maintains its net-feed droid hangars.
Slow paralysis
Slow paralysis in the context of Bull Rangers refers to a known weakness in their design. It is possible, if you know the exact location of their self diagnostic service routines, to damage those routines in such a way that the Bull Ranger wrongly diagnoses its own condition. The Bull Ranger can mistake its own systems as hostile attacking agents. It will then shut down its own systems one by one believing them to be hostile or compromised when in truth they are neither. This series of events is externally visible in the Bull Ranger's behaviour as though it were suffering from a slow paralysis.
SP armour
Soft protection (SP) armour is an armour that is intentionally designed to be soft rather than hard. It does not deflect any projectiles but it does absorb them, reducing their kinetic energy in the process.
Sphynx-II Controller rack
The Sphynx-II controller rack is a highly complex control unit that allows the operator to control a swarm of droids by using either manual screen interfaces or the all immersive sensor cap technology.
Spinner Rockets
Spinner rockets are heat seeking, highly explosive weapons that are generally fired from above ground onto ground based targets. Each rocket weighs around 140kg.
Techno-Prophet
A modern day prophet who has a wide understanding of technology, society and the symbiosis of the two. He has some very firm opinions on the role of technology in the destruction of mankind, not through the development and application of weapons but through the modification and bastardisation of mankind itself through technological development.
Voice-Amp
A lollipop shaped voice amplifier that can be used to project the voice over long distances, or through noisy environments. Voice-amps are used by the Security Forces for crowd control.
Walker
A Walker is an upright heavily armoured weapons platform that walks on two legs. During combat it will mostly be stationary to aid with balance during explosive attacks or heavy impacts but it can walk and fight if necessary. Walkers are rare, highly expensive and generally considered to be too vulnerable to air attack to be used widely, but in ground based warfare they are a powerful and deadly opponent.
Walstone Report
The Walstone Report is the result of a government investigation into alleged inconsistencies within the Security Forces records of technology procurement and business partners. At its heart it suggests that the Security Forces has purchased weapons systems from underground organisations including the Kamari. The report was immediately seized by Admiral Gail Thompson and all copies had been thought to have been destroyed. When Mekinet News tried to make a deal with the Security Forces it became clear that Ario Neech had somehow obtained a copy also. This resulted in a long stand off in which Mekinet News did very well financially. The stand-off was uneasy however and Gail kept a close eye on Ario Neech, waiting for her opportunity.
White Spear
The White Spear is the centre-most tower of Central Command. Surrounded by six black towers, the White Spear rises high above them, forming a distinctive silhouette on the horizon of Cinnamon City.
Wyser River
A river close to Havers Compound.
X16
See net-feed droid.