Tersta (world)

Tersta/Khouth (Corridor 0102)
Milieu 0	C574000-0 Starport C Routine: No Construction, Major Repair, Unrefined fuel Size 5 Medium (8,000 km, 0.40g - 0.57g) Atmosphere 7 Standard (tainted) Hydrographics 4 Wet World 40% Population 0 Barren (0) Government 0 No Government structure Law 0 No Law Tech Level 0 Pre-Industrial (primitive)
Classic Era (1116)	C574522-7 Starport C Routine: No Construction, Major Repair, Unrefined fuel Size 5 Medium (8,000 km, 0.40g - 0.57g) Atmosphere 7 Standard (tainted) Hydrographics 4 Wet World 40% Population 5 Moderate (300 thousand) Government 2 Participating Democracy Law 2 Low Law (no energy weapons) Tech Level 7 Pre-Stellar (electronics)
New Era (1200)	E574543-6 Starport E Frontier - no facilities Size 5 Medium (8,000 km, 0.40g - 0.57g) Atmosphere 7 Standard (tainted) Hydrographics 4 Wet World 40% Population 5 Moderate (100 thousand) Government 4 Representative Democracy Law 3 Low Law (no automatic weapons) Tech Level 6 Pre-Stellar (nuclear)
See also	UWP
System Details
Primary	F3 V
Planetoid Belts	2
Gas Giants	0

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Jump map from Travellermap.com

Tersta is an agricultural, nonindustrial world still lacking adequate means to expand its economy.

• As an agricultural world, this world is a near-ideal environment for producing quality foodstuffs of plant, animal, and other forms. Quality foodstuffs are a major export commodity for this world.
• It requires extensive imports of outside technology to maintain a modern, star-faring society. Having to import most manufactured and high tech goods drives the price up for these items at this world.
• This world contains an archaeological site with suspected high-tech remnants of the now-vanished Ancients precursor race.
• It is a member of the Third Imperium in the Khouth Subsector of Corridor Sector in the Domain of Vland.
• This world is a member of the Dzarrgh Run.
• During the initial surveys this world was named Ishash.

Description (Astrography & Planetology)

Stellar Data

Tersta has a solitary primary star.

• It is a white main sequence.

Tersta has a solitary primary star.

Tersta
	Type	Category		Mass (Sol)	Temperature (K)	Luminosity
	F3 V	Main Sequence (Dwarf)		1.44	6670 - 6750	3.58318
	Unit	Diameter	Safe Distance	Habitable Zone	Jump Shadow	M-Drive Limit
	AU	0.0147	0.157	1.7 - 2.94	1.47	14.7
	Orbit #	*	0	5	4	7
	Remarks		None

System Data

The worlds of the system have been surveyed. They consist of:

• The mainworld.
• x8 secondary rocky worlds.
• x2 planetoid belts.

Mainworld Data

Mainworld Size (S)

Tersta is a Meso World between 7,200km and 8,800km in diameter. The world has a standard gravity between 0.4G and 0.57G. The horizon will appear about 4km away.

Mainworld Atmosphere (A)

Tersta has a pressure of 0.71 to 1.49 atmospheres. While a Standard Atmosphere does not require survival gear this atmosphere also contains an unusual taint such as disease, a hazardous gas mix, pollutants, or sulfur compounds which requires the use of a Filter Mask. Some taints may require more protective equipment. TL–3 or more advanced survival gear is required to settle this world.

Mainworld Hydrosphere (H)

Tersta has 35-45% of its surface covered by liquid water. There will be a number of small seas or one larger body of water. Wilderness refueling is possible.

Mainworld Geography and Topography

No centrally held map of the world exists within AAB Library Data records.

(Blank map, predominantly dry world.)

History & Background (Dossier)

Tersta is a member of the Dzarrgh Run, a small but important Main crossing between Tuglikki, Provence, Deneb, and Corridor Sectors.

• High cargo capacity, low jump rating vessels move among its systems, carrying vast amounts of goods and commodities between its member worlds.

(Chart sourced from Traveller Map)

• Worlds lying on the Run are highlighted in tan.

Point of Interest: Ancients Site

The unnatural atmospheric pollution eventually attracted academic interest from several prominent universities. These sent a number of expeditions to discover the cause, eventually finding the fragmentary remains of an extensive Ancient site in 774. In much poorer shape than the better known site on Antiquity (Corridor 0816), it nevertheless transformed the sleepy world as tourists came to gaze at its wonders. The Ministry of Colonization publicly boosted the site, hoping to encourage goodwill between the Imperium and its less well understood neighbors. Extensive visits from nearby chapters of the racial supremacist Church of the Chosen Ones made some Imperials wonder just which kind goodwill the Ministry was trying to elicit. But the project did make the world a minor trade portal between the two sides, albeit not a very prosperous one.

The site itself is mostly static, consisting of the ruined remains of massive kilometer high towers that existed about 300,000 years ago. Hundreds of these buildings covered the world at random intervals, and the Final War attack that destroyed them must have lasted days. Most of these buildings lacked physical exits of any kind, and their interior construction was both wondrous and bizarre, consisting of shifting walls of electrodynamic copper and mercury. Meta-conductor antennas built atop the towers were used to transmit large electrical currents into the atmosphere for unknown reasons. Huge spheres of melted glass or quartz have been found embedded in otherwise solid rock, sometimes hundreds of meters below the ground, and many of them were hollowed out to contain a variety of inorganic and organic materials. Even the atmospheric taint is strange, with lightning or solar flares creating huge phosphorescent rain clouds that will glow for days on end, hum with mechanical noise when they come close to mountains, and expel rain colored in purple or green hues.

Imperial Landed Nobility (N)

Tersta, as a member world of the Third Imperium, holds the estate of an Imperial Landed Knight who acts as an Imperial representative to the world, and the fiefdom of a member of the Imperial Landed Nobility, who oversees affairs regarding the world at an Interstellar and Imperial level.

• It holds the estate of an Imperial knight, the Imperial representative to the world.
• It holds the fiefdom of an Imperial baron.

World Starport (Sp)

Tersta has a Class C Starport, an average quality installation which features amenities including unrefined fuel for starships, some brokerage services for passengers and cargo, and a variety of ship provisions. There is a shipyard capable of doing maintenance and other kinds of repair. Ports of this classification generally have only a downport, unless this is a trade port or system with an hostile environment mainworld.

World Population (P)

Tersta has a population of 100,000 sophonts (hundreds of thousands).

• This is a Nonindustrial World, too small to support the complete chain of production of most goods from start to finish.

World Demographics

Humaniti, population 95%

• Other, population 5%

World Languages

• Anglic
• Vilani

World Government (G)

Tersta is governed by a Participatory Democracy where eligible voters determine laws and policy. What determines an eligible voter varies. There may be smaller councils or regional bodies to draft the policies voted upon. Leadership of the government and all members of the bureaucracy are determined by the voting population.

World Military

No information yet available.

World Law Level (L)

Tersta has a low law level. There are few laws, covering only important areas. There may be few or no law enforcement officers, the expectation is citizens will bring law breakers to the attention of the Judicial system. Legal proceedings will be fast, with few people involved. For interactions outside of the framework of the laws, cultural norms dominate. Portable energy weapons, body pistols, explosives, and poison gas are typically regulated or prohibited.

World Technology Level (TL)

Tersta possesses a Technology Level of TL–7.

• Common Communication technologies for this TL include: Early video and early satellite communication networks.
• Common Power Generation technologies for this TL include: Early fuel cells, solar energy, and geothermal power sources.
• Common Transportation technologies for this TL include:
  • Land: Improved automobiles, hovercraft, and bullet trains.
  • Water: Hydrofoils and early triphibians.
  • Air: Hang gliders and supersonic jets.
  • Space: Deep space probes and interplanetary spacecraft (System Craft).

World Economy (Ex)

No information yet available.

Trade Data

Trade Classifications for this world:

• No information yet available.

Trade Lines with other worlds:

• No information yet available.

Urbanization

No information yet available.

World Infrastructure

This world possesses TBD infrastructure.

World Culture (Cx)

No information yet available.

Historical Data

World Timeline

Major events that have affected this world and the wider region that it lies within:

• ca -250,000: The Ancients are active within the region, transplanting the Vargr onto Lair.
• -9235: The Vilani discover jump technology. A few explorers and settlers begin to pioneer the region.
• -4045 to -2204: The Ziru Sirka claims a few rimward worlds and establishes a firm border. The Windhorn Rift and the absence of any significant Mains discourages large-scale Vilani expansion into the region.
• -3810: The Vargr discover jump technology and begin an era of expansion.
• -2400s: Vargr raiding into human-dominated areas significantly increases. This becomes known as the Vargr Pillaging.
• ca -1700: Vargr rimward expansion gradually ceases: the border between human and Vargr space stabilizes.
• -1776 to 0: The Long Night. There is widespread regression within the area and some worlds become barren.
• The Year 0: To rimward-trailing, the Third Imperium is founded.
• circa 26: The Empire of Varroerth is founded.
• early 100s: The Contract of Taarskoerzn is founded.
• 347: Tersta is one of the last worlds to be captured by the Imperium at the end of the Vargr Campaigns.
• 300-420: The Imperial First Survey charts the system.
• early 400s: The Irrgh Manifest is founded: it absorbs the Contract of Taarskoerzn.
• mid 500s: The Knokseng Confederation is founded.
• 869: The Glory of Taarskoerzn is founded. It splits the Irrgh Manifest.
• 995-1065: The Imperial Second Survey charts the system.
• 1065: The Second Survey is published. Information about the system becomes widely available.
• 1080s: The Knokseng Confederation is dissolved.
• 1090: The Dzarrgh Federate is formed.

Pre-Imperial

Tersta was a world of marginal importance to the greater interstellar community. The Vargr hardly looked twice at it, as it lacked many of the resources that would justify colonization, and used it as a jumping-off point for raids into the Khouth Cluster. Khouth (Corridor 0104) only saw the world as a potential jumping-off point for raids into its system and thus patrolled it but didn't settle.

The Imperium nonchalantly wrested it from the Vargr in 347 during the final battles of the Vargr Campaigns, as part of the final campaign to push the Vargr beyond Reference, but otherwise found no value in it either. It was annexed to the Duchy of Khouth the following year (348).

Early Imperial

Thereafter the world elicited little interest other than an occasional foray by corsairs that built bases here to raid Imperial shipping, and these remained a thorn in the side of the Imperial administration until their final expulsion in the 500s.

Later Imperial

Lingering hostilities prevented much trade between the Imperium and the Provence Vargr at any rate, and the world seemed doomed to mediocrity.

Post Imperial: Dzarrgh Federate

Tersta fell without a fight to Dzarrgh Federate forces in early 1117. For the most part the local inhabitants were ignored. While the Ancient site attracted a sudden surge of interest from the Chosen Ones, hostilities between them and the Federate government compelled a temporary closure of the world to outside contact until 1122. After the blockade was lifted, the part-starving, poverty stricken population began to abandon the world for the Domain of Deneb.

Post Imperial: New Era

Virus came in 1138 as part of the wave that also destroyed Serk (Corridor 0304), and destroyed the original starport and the local Federate garrison in one blow. Food shortages have compelled the remaining population to allow excavations of the ruins by Vargr corsairs and Vampire Fleets in return for food from nearby worlds.

References & Contributors (Sources)

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This list of sources was used by the Traveller Wiki Editorial Team and individual contributors to compose this article. Copyrighted material is used under license from Mongoose Publishing or by permission of the author. The page history lists all of the contributions.

• EXTERNAL LINK: Peter Gray - TNE RCES
• Marc Miller's Traveller T4 First Survey