The Lupidira collective
A fledgeling starfaring race originating from the large arctic planet "Nix aeternam".
After some time, they finally have organized enough to communicate with other galactic groups.
Lore:
After a relatively short history, the Lupidira peoples saw a great brightly burning object in the sky.
The object flew above their burrows in the light of day, stunning the primitive species as they looked on in awe.
The Tiark co ship landed on a nearby patch of ice, and Tau soon came into contact with Lupidira.
Seeing in Lupidira a potential for greatness, as Eho-Lord I'by once saw in Tau themselves, Tau interviened in the form of technology. And for the first time, a fire was lit on the planet.
The icy world of Nix aeternam, a wasteland of ice, snow, and vast glaciers reaching as far as the eye can see.
Local flora, of what little there is on the icy hell that is their home, is soft and well adapted to store water.
Although not openly hostile, their twisted branches and grey leaves are almost impossible to set aflame.
Was it not for Tau intervention, the primitive species would have stood no chance at progressing much further fowards.
Remarkably the species, without tools or fire, had spread across their homeworld millennia before Tau even first saw them, creating a language and basic society along with it.
Just as remarkable, is their respect for eachother. Not a single war was ever fought on the planet between themselves, a feat thought impossible by many.
Calm, and often quiet in nature, Lupidira live to ages that command the utmost respect.
A likeley reason behind their lack of any true internal conflict, and their willingless to cooperate and learn.
from the outside their society seems similar to a Direct democracy, however this is a clear misinterpretation of their culture.
They often act almost like a hivemind, often agreeing on matters and communicating with few, if any spoken words.
Often, a simple nod is all it takes to solve an important diplomatic issue.
As for their speech, you would be forgiven for believing they couldn't speak at all at first glance.
Even in large groups, they often stay silent, communicating via body language and hand signals alone.
Appearance:
Lupidira are somewhat similar to Tau, although this is of little suprise considering Tau as a term includes thousands of different species.
Lupidira themselves are bipedal, and stand on two digitigrade legs.
Although somewhat tall, they are suprisingly light, barely making any trace of their movement as they move across even the deepest patches of snow.
Each has ice white fur, with grey markings that break up its outline for potential attackers when hiding in snow.
Due to their lack of the ability to cook food, their immune system is like a fine tuned machine, able to prevent even the worst of illnesses.
Although perfect for living in cold enviroments, Lupidira are extremely non-adaptive, and find it almost impossible to live anywhere even slightly warm.
Society:
As of yet unstudied, or at least in full detail.
Not much is known about the secretive Lupidira or their history as of yet.
Absorbuit crystal:
Beneath the icy world of Nix aeternam, there lies a hidden gem.
In fact, the only reason Tau ever landed was to look for it.
Deep beneath the surface lie a type of crystal unique to the planet itself.
It contains large reflective qualities, meaning it can almost entirely deflect or absorb low level laser and other energy weapons entirely.
By crushing it, and then applying it in paint, any ship can become much more protective against thermal weaponary.
The only problem, would be getting to it.
The planet would either have to be cracked open, or a thick layer of hardened surface rock would need to be navigated around.
Of course, Lupidira have known how to burrow around this layer of rock for quite some time.
And so, anyone intrested in this crystal would need to get past them...
Ships:
After Tau kindly gave Lupidira access to a old shipyard, Lupidira have designed numerous ships with help from Tiark co.
Supposedly, the shape of the hull is like that of an Absorbuit crystal, hinting at its possible cultral significance.
Lupidira Technology, Note that this is OORP and factions would not know these exist
Note: odd MK numbers (such as I and III) are reserved for prototypes, and as such are not used.
Perfect stealth drive, "occulta gemmam drive MkII"
NOTE: Not yet in mass production, awaiting sufficient ship designs to fit device.
Overview:
Using the Eho-drive as a basis, Lupidirans have created perfect stealth.
In fact, you could define their ships using the device as "space submarines".
Description:
The stealth drive works by placing the ship into a "semi-eho cruise state", and via using up FTL fuel, along with using various methods to stabilise itself.
The ship then sits silently in the semi Eho-cruise bubble, and due to modifications made to the drive, has nearly 0 emmisions in realspace, instead its emmisions are vented to Eho-space. This makes the ship entirely undetectable by anything in realspace, however it can still retain the ability to look out at things in realspace. It also has the side effect of making the ship "phaze" though projectiles, however projectiles trajectories are affected as it does so.
Via guzzling more fuel than normal, the device can even drop further towards Realspace, and move around physical objects.
An example is that it could in theory pick something up from realspace.
drawbacks:
Unfortulately, the nature of the drive means that the ship must have very sensitive and powerful sensor equipment to stay functional within the stealth bubble.
Alongside this, if someone was to fire weapons, they would possibly notice some being seemingly deflected by an invisible object.
Even worse, is this technology means that shielding is impossible to equip simultaneously whilst the drive is being used, due to the way the bubble works and its insane power draw.
Its probable, that the only ships that could equip this and stay in the bubble for an extended period would have to be either very large, or somewhat under-armed to allow for spare power.
These present large issues for designers to fix for the MKIV version.
Ejector cryo-pods MKII
Overview:
Fighter seats that once ejected, immidiately form an airtight cryopod seal around the pilot, meaning that it is almost impossible to lose Fighter pilots unless the pods are actively shot at.
Description:
The cryo-pods can be manually or automatically activated, they quickly clamp shut around the pilot, as the flight controls are automatically moved out of the way.
The seat itself has multiple rounded panels that quickly shoot out fowards from beside the pilot and clamp shut, and two other panels, one below, and one above, seal the pilot into a oddly shaped pod. The seat then ejects, and the pod then freezes the Lupidiran so they will survive until collected at a later date.
In case of emergencies, a manual switch is located on the seat, and a Lupidiran can choose to stop the process before the freezing kicks in.
Alongside this a second variant, with multiple thrusters and a manual control stick on the arm rest, is able to be fitted to fighters, however the cryogenic fuel is replaced with thruster fuel and as such cannot freeze the occupant.
The pod itself is very heavy, made of the same armour as capital ship hulls to prevent lasers and stray shots damaging them. Manual respirators are available in case of the airtight seal being breached.
Drawbacks:
Fighters using the device must be quite abnormally large, with flight decks made specifically to fit the seat.
It is also very expensive, however preventing loss of life is more important than the cost.
Territories:
As of now, very small.
Tiark co, upon helping them reach the stars, oversaw their expansion across their home system.
poised for expansion, their small fleet quickly has begun scouting surrounding systems to the current galactic south, for in the north lie the ten systems that Tiark stations inhabit. And as much as Tau and Lupidira are happy with their coexsistance as allies, they wish not to jeopardize this relationship by trying to expand into the same systems as Tau.
Opinions:
Tau: Heavily liked. -unofficial allies