Sandraker

The Planet known as Sandraker is occupied by the NMX as of YE 44, and is currently being contested by both the Sfrarabla Mishhuvurthyar Xhrafuklurp (SMX) and Iron Company It is located in grid 2502 of the Kikyo Sector.

Sandraker
Desert Planet
Faction	NMX, Iron Company, Sfrarabla Mishhuvurthyar Xhrafuklurp (SMX)
Population	Unknown-Estimated at least 500,000
Local Government	NMX Supreme Command
Planet Size	12,256.9 km (7616.08457 mi)

Sandraker was discovered at some point the by the Mishhuvurthyar at some point either during or shortly after the Second Mishhuvurthyar War. When it was actually settled is up in the air as well, but what is known is that, based on reconnaissance data gather by the Company is that most facilities are generally geared towards mining or military purposes, with a handful of specialized facilities possibly meant for production and agriculture. This is not surprising given that Sandraker is a barren, windswept rock covered in near constant twilight due to it orbiting a white dwarf and frequent dust storms, often inhibiting visibility and sensors, but has high concentrations of rare earth elements and heavy metals such as lithum and cobalt-materials vital to the manufacture of electronic components.

Sometime in either YE 43 or YE 44¹⁾²⁾. the Valhallans landed on planet; much to both parties chagrin and established the settlement of Bifrost.³⁾ The planet shortly earned the nickname 'Hel's Arsehole' due to not only the highly toxic and outright lethal environment but also the rather….unwelcoming natives.

Sandraker is a rocky, desert world orbiting a white dwarf covered in steep valleys and dunes cut by its ferocious winds over the millennia of its existence, and is the only planet its system. The atmosphere is mainly composed of carbon monoxide and is normally saturated with fine particles. Dust storms are extremely common, with wind speeds reaching well over 100mph-this poses a severe threat to even military units, as the wind can easily flip armored vehicles and dust kicked up has been known to act like a sandblaster-inflicting heavy damage to even hardened armor and wearing down shields quickly-limiting any outdoor operations to a few hours at best. Aerial units suffer even more than ground units-often grounding even the most capable aerospace assets. Even at its calmest visibility is save for extremely rare circumstances extremely poor, lending an almost eerie, ethereal look to the the planet.

This, combined with its high toxic mineral content and background radiation given off by the nearby white dwarf lends itself to a hostile environment. In addition to the low visibility, communications, and sensors suffer heavily degraded performance outside of the most basic both on and off world-rendering even powerful ship-mounted scanners nigh-on useless. Communicating to and from Sandraker-between the interference from the dwarf and the storms renders even the most advanced forms, such as quantum entanglement and telepathy, extremely limited in range. It's unknown why the latter suffers such difficulties, though it has often been chalked to the environment. Ion fields are another major hazard, as the lack of moisture in the air prevents any sort of grounding-and should one be unfortunate enough to stumble into one; it strikes with the force of a vengeful god; leaving little more than shattered, melted armor fused to glass and bone.

Planetary gravity is Yamatian standard in spite of being smaller than earth due to its dense iron core, and its rotation is 18 standard hours, with the 'daytime', if one could call it that last only 6 hours, and its nighttime 12. It has a single moon, nearly always visible in the dim twilight of the world, and it is little more than a large asteroid that happened to get caught in its gravity well. Temperatures range from -27 degrees Celsius to 101 degrees Celsius.

The only way to reach this world is by space travel. The best place to land, and arguably the safest is the Valhallan settlement of Bifrost, as they are the least likely to shoot on sight. Once on the ground, individuals must take the necessary precautions to avoid either getting caught in a dust storm or worse; by the Mishu.

Aside from the very hostile Mishu, Valhallans can also be found here; while they are not overly welcoming of the native Kikyoan population, a few extra guns never hurt.

• Mingle with the Valhallans⁴⁾
• Fight the Mishu
• Mine Toxic Minerals
• Vist the Iron Company
• Treasure hunting and salvage⁵⁾

These may or may not be true:

• It's been going around that the Grandmaster knew what they were walking into when they landed-though given that the intelligence they had was primarily related to the Kuvexians and their attempt to conquer the sector, this rumor's been largely debunked. But it has been used by some of the ruling elite that arrived with the Iron Company to undermine their efforts to establish something resembling order.
• Rumors are going around that NMX are not the only Mishu planetside, though this has yet to be properly confirmed.
• There are local reports of numerous facilities sighted by patrols due west, but no one's really been able to confirm given the conditions on the ground. They do not seem to be Mishu in origin.
  • There's a massive canyon running hundreds of miles along the planet's western hemisphere extending several miles below the surface. What caused this is unknown but it is speculated that it was possibly caused by a meteorite millennia ago. Save for the Mishu and perhaps a few stray visitors no expeditions have been mounted. None have ever returned and it is now considered an 'off-limits' zone by Supreme Command.

There's a lot of hardware; Mishu, Iron Company, Star Army, and Nepleslian in origin to be found on-world thanks to a combination of salvage, conquest, black market purchases and perhaps even the occasional bit of theft. This speaks more to the desperation for hardware on all sides in the conflict than it does to the major players' involvement.

Commissar Farzi created this article on 2023/08/26 18:30 using the namespace template and later updated it with the places template. Art by Midjourney AI.