I have had an idea for a Freespace 2 campaign this past year and as a new year's resolution have decided to see about actively developing it in 2025. I have done beta testing work for Wing Commander Saga and some personnel tweaking of FS2 over the years but I could use all the advice and help I can get as this is my first time writing and developing a FS2 project of my own.
Quoted below are the initial thoughts I posted in the writing thread on the HLP Discord that describe the idea I would like to develop.
So I had an idea for an interesting FreeSpace 2 campaign. Inspiration comes from Blue Planet, Between the Ashes, Series Resurrecta, What If: Another Great War, and the Eishtmo's Terran-Vasudan War timeline.
First off it starts with an AU Blue Planet setting in which the there has been no Vishnan nagari influence on the Elders. The UEF exist but without such a one party system. Peaceful contact and mutual recognition of both the GTVA and UEF as successor states to the GTA occurred instead. No Age of Aquarius type cross universe jump or problem with the Sol-Delta Serpentis node occurred.
A major economic boom has followed the reunion and the Terrans have matched the Vasudan’s post Capella recovery. The UEF, having taken stock of the events of the second Shivan Incursion, has invested in more infrastructure and force size as well as building their own Knossos that has reopen the Sol-Beta Aquilae node.
Now that the subspace nodes to Sol are stable alternate uses for the subspace gates have been proposed. While interest exist in linking Epsilon Pegasi with Vega to restore the subspace trade link lost with Capella it is set aside for later do to the experimental subspace physics involved. Instead the decision is made for a joint GTVA-UEF project to reopen the Talania system’s jump nodes starting with the Vega-Talania node using the GTVA subspace gate and recolonize the system.
Having opened the Vega-Talania subspace node the system is secured by a joint Fed-Terran-Vasudan task force to ensure the Shivans have not entered the system after which a large engineering and colonization fleet moved in to start restoring the abandoned system infrastructure.
With the Vega-Talania subspace node stable and eighteen months of colonization work done the UEF subspace gate has been moved into the system to reopen its second subspace node. During the gate activation something goes wrong and a massive subspace pulse flashes across the system. When sensors recover it is found that the system’s second and third nodes are open but moderately unstable while the Vega-Talania subspace node has destabilized to the point where only transmissions can traverse it.
It is discovered that while the other Talania nodes appear open in the system the GTVA reports that the other end show them to still be closed. While the system has a been heavily colonized and those trapped there have a decent stockpile of resources and a whole untapped system available for raw materials they had not yet reached full self sufficiency. All the GTVA and UEF can offer for help is information assistance until the node stabilizes which could be years away.
With no other option the GTVA-UEF forces explore beyond the unstable nodes only for stealth fighters and science ships to discover another universe, one where the Shivans never showed up. No shields, no subspace tracking, no beam weapons, a world that when on a different path.
The Talania Colony has advanced tech but would be at a massive strategic disadvantage if a conflict with the native GTA and PVE forces were to result. Now it is time for the joint GTVA-UEF colony to move carefully in secret to collect the resources needed to survive.
Responding to a comment about the defunct Alternate Paths mod.
I will have to give that a look. I like the BP ships and was trying to think of a way to use them including a B5 crossover. Then all of the background work including system maps and civilian infrastructure, local government, law enforcement and criminal stuff that I have seen in the start of Between the Ashes made me think a story could be told in a different way from a classic hot war scenario.
I think some of the resources from The Unification War and Another Great War could work well as part of the setting. Modified for the campaign of course.
I have been thinking some more about the idea above and based upon the remarks is about the economic stress of the war made in FS1 I would have the T-V war result in an armistice within another year or two. After that there is a sort of Cold War which due to the lack of 20th Century like strategic deterrence results is periodic flashes of hot war every few years on and off.
Filling out some more thoughts I have had since writing the above. I intend to keep the Orion and Typhon as the largest combat vessels the GTA and PVE have in the parallel reality. In that universe the two powers have instead developed a mix of lighter combatants in the gunship to light destroyer/carrier range due to the Cold War economic pinch. For this I am planning on using a number of models from Frontlines, What If: Another Great War, The Unification War Project, etc.
I am also looking at just about every civilian infrastructure model I can find until I narrow down just what I need for the missions to be develop.
In addition I either need models for the Vasudan iKhemu-Sek-class destroyer, Aaru-class heavy corvette, and Akhenaten-class cruiser from the Blue Planet background material or suitable stand-ins. Looking at some of the new Inferno models to fill in. I plan on using the GVCv Pnepheros as a Vasudan counterpart for the Diomedes strike corvette.
