It is the year 120007917 CE. It is the beginning of a new era for the race of transformers. Following the defeat of the Heralds of Unicron and the reunification of Cybertron’s colony worlds five thousand years before, cybertronian-kind has prospered. New technologies are being developed, new planets are being discovered, and old alliances are being renewed. It is the dawn of a new and prosperous age.
But this new era will soon be threatened by powerful forces beyond reckoning. A timeless evil lurks at the fringes of the galaxy, gathering conquerors and thieves to its cause. In the past, when villains emerged, it fell to bands of brave and extraordinary heroes to rise up to defeat them. Once more, the time is coming for heroes new and old to stand against the darkness. You, dear player, are one of these great heroes, and the ultimate fate of all you know rests upon your shoulders.
Transformers: Dawn of a New Age is a freeform, text-based, science-fantasy RPG continuing the stories of my previous game, Transformers: Twilight of the Golden Age, and that game’s prequel, Transformers: Salvation. Extensive knowledge of the Transformers franchise and participation in my last RPs is not required- all are welcome!
To read more about the lore of the fanon universe in which this game is set, click here. I’d say that the original post and the timeline linked in the table of contents are the only “required” readings, though if you want to read more then I certainly won’t discourage you.
Rules:
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First things first: have fun! I’m here to have fun, and you’re probably here to have fun, I’ll assume. If anything gets in the way of that prime directive, talk to me, and your fellow players. We’ll work something out.
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For returning players from TOTGA and/or Salvation: you are of course allowed to reprise most of your characters from both RPs over the course of the game, but for now, I ask that you only reprise the characters you used in TOTGA. That’s only if you want to reprise any old characters, of course.
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There will be no real player or character limit in this RP. However, I do recommend discretion when deciding how many characters you want to play. Having a small army of PCs at your command, while perhaps alluring, is very taxing for everybody.
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No evil/villainous characters, please. Your characters will be the heroes of this story. Try to not engage in PvP as well, as your characters will also be allies.
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Your characters will be working with one another as a group. Have them talk to each other, and fight together when in battle. Build friendships (or friendly rivalries) between your characters. This is more of a suggestion than a rule, but following it will make the experience more enjoyable for everyone.
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Players can only control their own characters and possessions of their characters (like weapons, spaceships, or personal dwellings), unless otherwise given permission by another player or the GM. For example: if your characters were to find themselves in command of a team of NPCs, those NPCs would be controlled by the GM unless otherwise stated.
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If your characters are going to fight, odds are they’re going to get hurt. Sure, they can dodge or parry or block some incoming attacks, but be ready and willing to have your characters suffer injury. Character death is also a possibility, so be ready for that, too.
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As always, no autohitting during combat. I’ll give your characters the opportunity to react to attacks on their own terms, and I ask that you return the favor to me and your fellow players (though again, try not to fight each other, if possible).
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Don’t be a jerk. Respect your fellow players and be kind when speaking to them. If you’ve got a problem with how somebody’s doing things- myself included- bring it up here in a constructive manner. We’ll see if we can work things out. Be excellent to each other.
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Refrain from metagaming. There will be a distinction between what you, the player, knows and what your characters know in-universe. Recognize that distinction and respect it, please.
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Follow the Boards’ guidelines for content in the RPG and Literature categories. I will endeavor to do the same. If ever there is something that comes up within the game that makes you uncomfortable, please tell me so. You can do this either here or via a private message. I will remove or tone down the offending elements, if possible, to ensure that we can all have a good time.
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Please refrain from making OOC-only posts in the RP. This topic is for OOC discussion as well as character submission. I encourage the players to talk among themselves frequently in this topic.
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Other Boards rules apply where applicable.
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Failure to abide by these rules can result in your removal from Transformers: Dawn of a New Age and the involvement of the moderators/site staff if necessary.
Character Sheet Templates
Players have the option to create both cybertronian and human characters. I might be persuaded to accept other kinds of characters, though- if you have an out-there idea, feel free to run it by me here!
Player characters can also own spaceships to travel around the galaxy. These vessels are usually relatively small and lightly-armed, and more on them can be found below.
Your characters can come from almost all walks of life. They can be celebrities, soldiers, bounty hunters, scientists and explorers, great leaders, or people who are (at least at the start) completely unremarkable. There is little that is off the table, though if you are unsure about a particular backstory, feel free to run it by me.
Cybertronian
Name:
Homeworld:
Subtype (Optional): (minicon, headmaster, combiner, etc.)
Appearance: (Please give credit when using artwork that is are not of your creation)
Alt-mode(s): (See above. Characters from Muto can have up to five alt-modes)
Weapons: (Be reasonably specific here, please. If your character’s alt-mode has weapons, list whatever weapons it has here, too.)
Equipment: (Be specific here, too)
Abilities/powers: (Be specific here, too.)
Bio:
Narrative note: most cybertronians in this universe only live about 80,000 years- which is a long time, sure, but significantly less than what cybertronain lifespans usually are in most official continuities. Age has little effect on a cybertronian’s physical or mental abilities, though, but this does mean that most PCs likely were not alive to personally witness historical events like the end of the First Golden Age or the Great War.
Human
For lore on humanity’s standing in this universe, click here.
Name:
Homeworld:
Age: (the average human lifespan in this universe is around 300 years, thanks to many advancements in health and medicine, and most humans remain in good health for most of that time. Unrealistic, perhaps, but realism left the building a long time ago.)
Appearance: (describe how your character looks- height, build, clothes, etc. Be as specific as you want.)
Weapons:
Equipment: (if your character has any gadgets that aren’t necessarily weapons, describe them here)
Abilities: (if your character has any biological or cybernetic enhancements, or other extraordinary abilities, describe them here.)
Bio:
Ships
PCs can own small, lightly-armed spaceships for interstellar travel. These ships can hold a handful of occupants and small cargo. It can be assumed that all spaceships are equipped with basic necessities like life support, artificial gravity, inertial dampeners, a basic array of communication systems and sensors, and a transwarp drive for faster-than-light travel. Transwarp-based superluminal travel is conveniently free of the time-dilating effects of other methods, thanks to the exotic properties of energon and the general screwiness of transwarp space. Physics is scary and I don’t dabble in it any more than I need to.
Name:
Description: (Describe your ship’s appearance, size, and so on. Give credit when using artwork, of course.)
Occupancy: (describe how many humans and/or cybertronians your ship can accommodate- comfortably or otherwise. It would be best to keep this number in the single-digits.)
Weapons:
Equipment: (if your ship has any gadgets in addition to those mentioned above, detail them here.)
Planetarium
Below are detailed the main locales of Dawn of a New Age: various worlds claimed by cybertronian-kind and humanity. These are the worlds from which you can choose to be your character’s homeworld (with the exception of trecedim); they can be traversed freely and each have their own NPC inhabitants, sidequests, and secrets to discover.
All major cities on the cybertronian worlds have spaceports and space bridge nexuses in and around them- with the exception of Trecedim- for quick travel between planets. Earth and Avalon Prime don’t have space bridges, but Amity- as a human and cybertronian territory- does. superluminal travel via spaceship is the only way to reach a world without a space bridge- under most circumstances at least. Every spaceport and nexus also has a superluminal communications facility or two that you can use to contact characters on other planets.
Cybertron
Gigantion
Velocitron
Sero
Orbiting a young star in an unusually empty sector of the Milky Way, Sero is an ocean planet dotted by lengthy island chains with a small continent in its southern hemisphere. In the First Golden Age, the Knights of Cybertron established research outposts on Sero to study new applications of cybermatter, the substance used to cyberform planets for their colonization programs. From these experiments, Solus Prime became inspired to create the Omega Lock.
During the War of the Primes, Optimus Prime destroyed the Omega Lock to keep it from being used as a weapon, breaking it into five pieces. This event triggered an explosion of cosmic energies from the Lock, which sent waves of cybermatter rippling across Sero’s surface, drastically altering its landscape and ecology. The planet was effectively cyberformed, complete with massive Wells of Sparks beneath its oceans that produce gargantuan techno-organic creatures with entire islands on their backs, each boasting their own sustained ecosystem. There is no sign that Sero’s Wells can produce sapient cybertronian life, however.
There are no plans to colonize Sero. The cybertronian population throughout the New Imperium is stable, and the current technologies that drive their civilization are sustainable; there is no impetus to further expand at this time. Of course, the ability to support a civilization is not the only measure of a world’s value. Sero’s unique ecosystems attract scientists of all doctrines from across the galaxy, and historians and archeologists are drawn to the remains of ancient cybertronian outposts that dot its landmasses. It also boasts a unique beauty, though opportunities for tourism are limited. Under normal circumstances, only scientists and VIPs can freely visit the planet.
Amity
Amity was first discovered by the Order of the Knights of Cybertron during the First Golden Age in the nineteenth century. The planet’s landmasses play host to beautiful forests, scenic grasslands, and impressive mountain ranges covered in greenery. The Knights planned to cyberform this planet for colonization, but the War of the Primes put a halt to this endeavor as the order was called to battle. After the war, the Knights returned to the planet to hide a piece of the Omega Lock there, building a great fortress in which to keep this fragment and embedding great and mysterious machines deep into the world’s crust and mantle.
Amity was then forgotten by history until the year 10002990, when the CFC Salvation and her crew were led to the planet by a map to the Omega Lock. After acquiring the Omega Lock fragment hidden on the planet, Salvation left to continue her voyage elsewhere. The new government established after the Great War, the Cybertronian Commonwealth, planned to return to the planet and explore, but it was prevented from doing so once the cybertronian people were exiled and confined to their pre-existing territories. Once more, Amity faded into obscurity.
In 12002937, after the Transformers’ exile had come to an end, cybertronian colonists once more returned to Amity with the intent to cyberform the planet and settle it, only to discover that a multinational coalition from the United Human Polities had much the same idea. The humans had only recently discovered the planet, and were unaware of its significance in cybertronian history. Whatever tensions might have initially brewed between the cybertronian and human colonists were quickly resolved, however, as they soon agreed to settle Amity together. The transformers used their machines to cyberform the planet, creating the Wells of Sparks and energon reservoirs necessary for them to live, while preserving Amity’s natural environment for the humans. Since then, the humans and transformers of Amity have lived together in peace.
Amity’s planetary government is a republic in which each city-state on the planet elects a representative to serve in a senate. A chancellor, chosen by popular vote, is also elected to oversee senate proceedings. The chancellor is an arbitrator in mediations between the senators, and is also tasked with maintaining order should deliberations within the senate become spirited. If necessary, the chancellor can also veto legislation made by the senate, though the chancellor is required to immediately resign their position after exercising this power. Amity is considered a territory of both the New Imperium of Cybertron and the United Human Polities, and is a symbol of the renewed bonds of fellowship between the two species. The planet also is home to the terrestrial headquarters of the Non-biological Extraterrestrial Species Taskforce (NEST), a joint human-cybertronian military group which combats terrorist groups and criminal organizations in human and cybertronain space.
Since Amity was cyberformed, something seems to have activated within the machinery beneath its crust. Seismographs record strange movements beneath the surface, and other sensors regularly detect anomalous energy patterns. Ancient machines on the surface regularly engage in odd behavior, their purpose unknown. None of it seems to pose a threat to Amity’s inhabitants, fortunately; it is a fascinating mystery that the people are excited to unravel.
NEST
The Non-biological Extra-Terrestrial Species Taskforce (NEST) is a joint human-cybertronian military unit operating within the borders of the New Imperium of Cybertron and the United Human Polities. Human and cybertronian technologies and combat doctrines are merged to create a peerless fighting force, accomplishing more together than what either could on their own. NEST was first founded during the Great War, when Autobot commandos and human special forces teams were deployed together on high-priority missions against the Decepticon threat. Roughly a thousand years after the war, however, the taskforce was disbanded when the cybertronian race was exiled from the Allied Species and confined within their borders. With humans and transformers once again as allies, NEST has been rebuilt.
NEST’s terrestrial headquarters are located on the planet Amity. Named Firebase Armorhide, after an Autobot from the original taskforce, the base is the logistical heart of the organization. It is here that NEST’s soldiers are trained and housed, and where the taskforce’s modest fleet of starships is sequestered in orbit over the facility. The NEST fleet is built less for direct warfare, and more for transporting strike teams to their missions- most ships are lightly armed and equipped with stealth drives and sensor bafflers to evade enemies. The exception is the Wilhelmina Lennox, a six mile long vessel which serves as NEST’s mobile command center. Named after the human soldier who successfully captured the Decepticon Air Commander Starscream at the end of the Great War, Wilhelmina Lennox is deployed on missions which require long-term NEST presence and activity, where her purpose is to support deployed personnel.
NEST uniforms, ships, and gear are primarily colored black and green, with the occasional red trimming. The taskforce’s cybertronian members are encouraged to adopt this color scheme, but this is not required. NEST’s emblem is a bull’s skull. The taskforce’s current commander is one General Henry Rothschild, an Earthborn human. In this era of relative peace, NEST’s activities have mostly been limited to counter-terrorism and combating organized crime; but should another war come to the Milky Way, the taskforce is ready to deploy alongside the rest of the human and cybertronian armed forces against any enemy.
Primogenitum
Vergrandis
Elementum
Concordia
Spirabilis
Bellator
Trecedim
Avalon Prime
For the last 15,000 years, the planet Avalon Prime has served as humanity’s cultural and political heartland following the devastation wrought upon the Sol system in the Final War. The complete destruction of infrastructure throughout the system and the spread of the Red Plague across Earth forced a mass exodus never before seen in human history. Once just another promising candidate for colonization, Avalon Prime became the refuge for the surviving elements of the UHP intergovernment. After the Final War’s end, Avalon Prime was officially designated the new home of the intergovernment and the center of human civilization.
Avalon Prime’s landmass is divided among two great supercontinents: one in the northern hemisphere, and one in the south, separated by vast ocean which narrows in the western hemisphere. The northern continent is mostly taken up by an enormous megacity, which is also named Avalon Prime (this can be a little confusing to offworlders). The city is built vertically around a forest of monolithic trees the size of skyscrapers, with rugged park and wide pink leaves, with bridges and boulevards stacked atop each other between great towers and encircling the trunks of the massive trees. As the center of human civilization, Avalon Prime’s architecture borrows from a variety of cultures, but all with a sleek and futuristic edge to them. Most of Avalon Prime’s municipal functions are automated, and overseen by an AI named MORGAN. MORGAN can be accessed by city residents through public terminals, and her physical architecture is housed in an underground chamber beneath the city center. At the heart of this great city is the UHP Council Building, in which representatives from all nations within the United Human polities meet to rule on matters of international law and civility. Closer to the north pole, the city gives way to frigid and inhospitable mountains. Avalon Prime’s planetary militia often conducts training exercises within these peaks
Avalon Prime’s southern continent is primarily used for agriculture, with much of its terrain flattened to allow for cropland and livestock farms to be built. A great many plant and animal products are grown in these fields- called the Eden Fields- which are mostly tended to by robots. Humans live above the Eden Fields in enormous arcology towers, though there are some private estates elsewhere on the southern continent owned by certain wealthy persons.
Avalon Prime is a fairly utopian world. It is a symbol of what humanity can be at their finest, embodying all their better qualities, hopes, and values. The planet has two moons: Merlin and Nimue. The Avalon Prime Defense Corps is headquartered on the latter satellite.
Earth
The fabled Cradle of Humanity, Earth, is now but a shadow of what she once was. In the last decades of the Final War, a nanotech weapon system called the Red Plague ran rampant across the planet’s surface. Initially designed to only wipe out the enemies of its creators, it targeted all humans and could not be stopped. Earth was quarantined and the plague spread freely, devouring every human left behind after the evacuations and reducing entire continents to rubble-strewn boneyards. The Red Plague grew too massive, too ravenous to sustain itself across the entirety of Earth, and over the course of five millennia it gradually shut down.
While most of human civilization quickly began to reorganize itself around Avalon Prime, many still longed to return to Sol and its planets- Earth in particular. Shortly after the Red Plague went dormant and Earth was declared habitable again, billions of humans flocked back in fleets comprised of any ship they could get their hands on, and rallied themselves under a new government called the Sol Conservative. For over 10,000 years, the Conservative’s mission has been to repopulate and rebuild infrastructure across Earth and Mars, and the moons of Saturn and Jupiter, to return humanity’s ancestral home to her former glory.
The largest city on Earth now is Nadiya, situated in a wide valley in the Carpathian Mountains in Europe. It’s home to the Sol Conservative’s House of Representatives, and presents itself as a diverse hodgepodge of urban architecture expanding outward from the House in a rough circle shape. Monolithic communication towers rise up between the skyscrapers, and the skyline is constantly buzzing with suborbital aircraft.
A mag-lev train system runs between Nadiya and a spaceport built along the Danube River: Cosmodrome Gagarin. It is Earth’s largest spaceport, practically a city in its own right with vast habitation blocks for the workers and their families, along with visitors from other worlds. Hundreds of miles of black earth plains surround Cosmodrome Gagarin, littered with the remains of buildings destroyed in the Final War and all manner vehicles and starships half-buried in the soil.
The repopulation of Earth has been slow going, but largely successful. Cities thrive on all seven continents, with a robust infrastructure of commerce and migration between them. Some regions on Earth are still marred with the Red Plague, however, which manifests as scabby, red and black structures formed over the landscape and encrusting ruins of old cities. These structures are not
entirely inactive, and those who dare to venture into a Plague zone are advised to bring protective gear and weapons with them.
