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Venus

2023-03-08T19:29:25Z

2607:FB91:1196:1318:160:B768:8DD0:F1F8: /* Overview */

[[File:Venus_World.PNG|270px|right|thumb|[[Terra]]'s [[Nocturne|''HOTTER'']] sister.]]
[[File:VenusPic.jpg|300px|left|thumb|Astrographical map of Venus during the Horus Heresy.]]
'''Venus''' is [[Terra]]'s evil twin, the deadly and hellish to the Earth's (relative) peace and tranquility. Unless you're in [[Soft Science Fiction|Sci]]-[[Hard Science Fiction|Fi]], in which case [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|we conquered the planet and terraformed it into Earth 2.0 or better]].

==Overview==
Venus, being the brightest object in the night sky that isn't [[Luna]], has likely been seen in the night sky since the days man was not too far off from animal (i.e. still primitive hunter gatherers). It had a tendency to be confused for being two bodies in ancient times (the "morning star" and "evening star"), though civilizations as far back as Sumeria realized they were just seeing the same celestial body twice in a day. [[Derp|It took until Pythagoras proved Venus, without a doubt, was both the Morning and Evening Stars in 600 BCE to finally lay the two-body belief fully to rest, however]].

In the Middle Ages, Venus as one of the five classical planets would be associated in alchemy with copper and Friday. It would also be associated with femininity, largely due to "Venus" being the Roman name of their interpretation of the Greek Goddess of Love, [[Aphrodite]], leading to its alchemical symbol being repurposed as representing [[Hot Chicks]] forevermore. On the more scientific side of things during the Renaissance, observations of Venus showed it orbited between the Earth and [[Mercury]] and had phases, contributing to the shift to heliocentric models at the time. However, knowledge of Venus hit a roadblock in the 18th century after discovery of its atmosphere - with it being so thick, it was impossible to gleam what Venus was like below it with the methods of the time.

This led to Pulp Fantasy and thus [[Sword & Sorcery]] interpreting Venus as a steaming, primordial world; a planet of turbulent shallow seas, swelting swamps and steamy tropical jungles, often full of [[dinosaur]]s - a young and vibrant world compared to the dessicating husk of [[Mars]].

Modern times picked up the slack as rocketry took off (literally), leading to the advent of probes using radar to map Venus' surface. It was these radar scans that had us discover how shit Venus really is, showing signs of giant mountains of fire and rivers of lava, all ultimately driven by runaway absorption of the Sun's rays. The Soviets famously made the first landing on the surface of the hothouse, though the probe didn't last long before becoming unusable partially-molten scrap. During this time, it was also found that Venus is the only Solar System planet to rotate opposite of the direction it's orbiting in, suggesting it got reversed by [[Exterminatus|a celestial backhand from a protoplanet]] instead of gaining a moon like Earth.

Venus is the 2nd planet from Sol and is notable for being similar to Earth in size, gravity, and overall composition. However, that's where the similarities end - with a ridiculously thick carbon dioxide atmosphere with copious clouds of sulphuric acid crushing you, dissolving you, and causing the planet to be fuck-off hot at the same time, [[FATAL|standing on Venus in the present day is, for all intents and purposes, instantly deadly]]. There's a reason why it needs to be terraformed in sci-fi stories, after all. Visions on how to terraform Venus are diverse. Some think we should try to convert all the CO2 into oxygen and graphite via bacterial photosynthesis. Alternative proposals suggest creating super mountains a dozen times higher than Terran Mount Everest or Martian Olympus Mons with island peaks for humans to live on to avoid the crushing pressures and hellhole temperatures at ground level. Others propose creating floating cloud cities (like Star War’s Bespin) sailing atop Venus’ upper clouds. Both of the latter theories have the settlements’ temperatures and air pressures closer to the Sahara or Death Valley than literal subterranean hell. Such habitats would need to be robustly built to withstand strong winds and acids but is easier than building a pressure vessel thicker than a submarine. It also helps that breathable air is a floating gas lighter than CO2. Either way, the planet has a bit of a PR problem regarding colonization theory compared to Luna, Mars, or the Asteroid Belts due to popular culture.

==Warhammer 40,000==
Since we are in [[Grimdark]], there's no 'Second Earth' hippie bullshit here. At least, not in the Age of the Imperium - the [[Dark Age of Technology]] may have seen an ''actual'' verdant Venus instead of one we just know is habitable. Kinda familiar sounding to [[/v/|Destiny]] (having its own Venus being a terraformed paradise that gets turned unsafe by some cataclysm), though both are ripping off much older sci-fi stories.

Before the age of the Imperium, the only history we know of Venus is that it was once ruled by War Witches who fielded armies of Litho-Gholem. The early [[Iron Warriors]] Space Marine Legion led the conquest of Venus during the Mehr Yasht campaign.

In the grim darkness of the 41st milennium, Venus lives a double life - an Industrial World on the surface, the planet itself is not much of note besides its identity. However, it is also host to the finest luxury orbitals in the entire Galaxy, and is essentially ''the'' summer getaway for the top dogs of the Imperial hierarchy living in the deep cloud-hives of the planet. Emperor knows how much [[Slaanesh]]i corruption has weasled its way into these hubs of hedonism. In that sense, it can also be considered an arechetypal [[Imperial Worlds#Pleasure Worlds|Pleasure World]], though unlike most the pleasure is most certainly not to be found on the surface of the world.

{{40k-Planets}}
[[Category:Imperial]]

Mars

2023-03-08T19:26:53Z

2607:FB91:1196:1318:160:B768:8DD0:F1F8:

[[image:Mars and Syrtis Major - GPN-2000-000923.jpg|thumb|right|400px|The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million to one he said...]]

{{Topquote|I would like to die on Mars. Just not on impact.|Elon Musk, ancient <s>avatar of the Omnissiah</s> [[Heretek|tech-heretic]]}}

[[Mars]] is the fourth planet in our solar system. It has a long history of fictitious inhabitants, and its proximity to [[Earth]] makes it a popular target for colonization. It has a tendency for probes sent to it to meet [[Rage|bad]] ends. It also used to be believed to be a dying world, a desert with a primitive Egypt-like civilization making canals and a huge face-shaped landmark, but these later turned out to just be dried up rivers and a mountain, respectively. IRL, Mars has become the most targeted candidate for human colonization efforts. While issues abound like the high amount of solar radiation (which is theorized to have stripped away all of Mars’ early atmosphere), toxic perchlorate salts in the soil, and low gravity, it’s not as severe as airless Luna or hell-hole Venus.

== Warhammer 40,000 ==
In the backstory of [[Warhammer 40,000]], the [[God-Emperor of Mankind]] imprisoned a very large shard of the [[Void Dragon]] on Mars during the Middle Ages, knowing that He would [[Just as Planned|need it later]]. Though when He took the Void Dragon to Mars is unclear, so maybe Big-E stored him in the Marianas Trench or underneath the city of Centralia, Pennsylvania [look it up!] and with the advent of space travel centuries later, decided to relocate offworld to Mars, ultimately ending up in the Noctis Labyrinthus. Presumably it [[Troll|amused itself]] by blowing up space probes during M3.

Mars turned out to be one of the first worlds colonized by [[humanity]] because no shit Sherlock it's right fucking there. The colonization and terraforming were backed by industrial cartels and megacorporations, and carried out by their employees. Obsessed with technology and knowledge, its inhabitants upgraded themselves and their planet in every conceivable way. Mars became encrusted with buildings, factories, and laboratories, a sort of hybrid [[Hive World| Hive]] and [[Forge World]] (the first of many to come). It was independent of [[Earth]] (granted right away to prevent/delay the inevitable secession wars that would come from not granting it) which gave the megacorps free reign on how to treat their employees, leading to usage of slave labor. One particular cartel was infiltrated by a [[C'tan]] and flat out became a [[Chaos Cults|Chaos cult]], this lead to [[Doom|a daemonic incursion on Mars, and later Terra, which was dealt with]] by an individual theorized to be related to [[God-Emperor of Mankind|the Emperor]].

During the Age of Strife, Mars could no longer import what it needed to maintain its artificially-maintained terraforming (Mars being too small and lacking a magnetic field for it to stick). As a result the cartels collapsed leaving the planet's inhabitants to die. The only groups that survived were those that hoarded enough know-how to build environmentally sealed facilities that could keep air in and mutants out. This led to their tech-obsession becoming fanatical, and their disregard for anything but machinery made sure that the environment would never recover.

Their culture had changed as well; with so much knowledge lost during the dark times (and with some influence of the Dragon), the people of Mars had dedicated themselves to preserving what information they could, and they did this with a religious fervor, coming to be known as the Mechanicum (and even later, reformed as the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]]).

The [[God-Emperor of Mankind]] won them over to his side for the [[Great Crusade]] by pwning their expeditionary fleet they sent to raid Terra for STC printouts (the only remaining knowledge from the Dark Age of Technology), and then promptly promising them first dibs on any terran [[STC]] printouts, and the new ones that would be discovered by his [[Space Marine]] Legions, and they provided [[power armor]] and [[bolters]] for his growing armies. [[Just As Planned]].

While most of the Mechanicus was on board with this, unfortunately there was tension within the ranks of a few butthurt [[tech-priests]] at the uppermost strata of the leadership fixated on personal gains, and [[Horus]] was able to play on this (with more than a little help from [[Chaos]]) and sow a civil war as part of the [[Horus Heresy]]. And this is where that help from chaos came in, as the aforementioned butthurt senior tech-priests managed to gather followers not with convincing arguments, [[Grimdark|but just by infecting them with cyber-AIDS, known as scrap code, and robbing them of free will]]. Terrible weapons were unleashed, from the mighty [[Titan]] legions to bizarre techno-organic creatures (which may have been [[Daemons]]), and Mars was left even more damaged than before.

The present-day Mars is more or less recovered, though it would never attain the greatness it had before the Horus Heresy. Much of the planet is barely-inhabitable wasteland dotted with forges and hives, where stored knowledge is fragmented at best, and at risk of being subverted by Chaos or, even worse, by the [[Necrons]]. Though the new Adeptus Mechanicus is essentially a superstitious priesthood, they retain most of the Imperium's technical knowledge and best technologies; and Mars is still the seat of one of the most powerful Imperial institutions and is among the top percentile of the most productive forge worlds, if not ''the'' top forge world.
{{40k-Planets}}
[[Category:Imperial]]
[[Category:Adeptus Mechanicus]]
== Pathfinder ==
[[image:Akiton.png|thumb|right|Welcome to <strike>Mars</strike> <strike>Barsoom</strike> Akiton.]][[image:Shobhad.png|thumb|left|A Shobhad, looking uncomfortably similar to a [[Avatar|Na'vi]].]]
From the [[Pathfinder Roleplaying Game]]'s [[Campaign setting|Campaign Setting]], [[Golarion]], we have Akiton. A typical Mars expy, made of vast red plains of iron-rich sand and stone with two polar icecaps, it's largely inspired by Science Fantasy tales from the early 20th Century; Most notably the Barsoom series by Edgar Rice Burroughs. It has low gravity, a thin but breathable atmosphere and is inhabited by human-like red skinned natives; 12-foot tall, four-armed grey skinned Shobhads whose tribes are constantly a war with each other; ratmen, red-skinned lizardmen and finally, the bizarre Contemplatives of Ashok, who are giant floating brains with crude, thin bodies hanging almost uselessly underneath. Behirs, like on Golarion, can be found along with Death Worms, Elder Things (Usually hibernating in either of the Poles), Denizens of Leng (Who can be found pretty much everywhere else too), Girallons (Giant four-armed apes, also from the Barsoom series), Shoggoths (Usually in the South Pole) and Witch-Wyrds.

The Campaign Setting book "Distant Worlds" deals with Golarion's solar system and its planets.

== Space: 1889 ==
[[Image:Space_1889_mars-map-s.jpg|thumb|right|The natives can have the polar icecaps]]
In [[Space: 1889]], a Victorian sci-fi (not steampunk) setting, Mars was the go-to place for exploiting the natives and natural resources. Why deal with human-rights issues in India when you can exploit the non-humans of Mars instead? Mars is also the source of liftwood, used for crafting the hulls of gravity-resistant skygalleons, and useful for aetheric vessels between planets.
[[Category:Pathfinder]]