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Conver Limis
Culture and Society > Cultures and Sub-Cultures > Cyborgs
Culture and Society > Politics & Government > Great Houses
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Homo Superior
Culture and Society > Politics & Government > Great Houses
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Homo Superior
 Image from Steve Bowers |
House Conver Lim(n)is | |
| Symbol | White spiral triskelion, surrounded by concentric circles of black and gold |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1855 A.T. |
| Dissolved | 3932 A.T. with the signing of the Ian Treaty |
| Original Capital | Apex Carbuncle Orbiting Habitat, Atlas, Wasat System |
| Current Population | Total diaspora population is estimated to be 14.7 billion |
| Population breakdown | Su Cyborgs: 82% Su Nanocyborgs: 10% Virtuals: 5% Su Sybont: 3% Pohuman: less than 1% |
The term Conver Limis (variant spelling Conver Limnis) initially referred to a Su Cyborg House within the Conver Ambi, but was often used to refer to the region of space they held influence over. During the great Conver Wars the House led a coalition of interests, which became known simply as the Conver Limis, against the Geminga Orthodoxy. Throughout their history the Conver Limis remained a minority in the region they controlled, embracing elitist meme complexes to enforce hegemony over local populations.
Society and Culture
Like the rest of the Conver Ambi, the Conver Limis possessed an expansionist mindset. For the Conver Limis this manifested in a focus on industrial and economic colonization. The wealth brought in by these ventures allowed the house to have a strong voice in the intrapolitical disputes of the Conver Ambi, particularly with decisions pertaining to diplomacy and trade with other polities. Characterized by neomercantalist and noninterventionist policy regimes, the Conver Limis allowed some measure of local rule and semi-autonomy of polities under their influence if central economic guidelines were not interfered with. The relative prosperity and stability their policies provided gave them the support of local populations, and those who collaborated were richly rewarded. For most of their history the Conver Limis rarely used direct military power to impose their will, preferring instead on economic coercion to bring others inline with their plans.The Conver Limis megacorporations concentrated primarily on solar power collection and amat farming. They were also renowned for their mining prowess, priding themselves in being able to cost-effectively extract resources from the numerous pyrothalassic superterrestrials under Conver Ambi control. To overcome the physically extreme conditions presented by pyrothalassic superterrestrial class planets the Conver Limis used extremophile clades of subsentient bots for labor. This business practice led to stressed relationships with the bordering Metasoft Version Tree. Metasoft would occasionally accuse the Conver Limis of carrying out nothing short of mass slavery by lobotomizing functional vecs, stunting their programming just short of full blown sapience in order to maximize profit margins. While the Conver Limis chose to counter these opinions with public relation campaigns, they found their workforce the target of a number of hacking attempts by Vec and Sentients Rights Movements throughout the late Interstellar Era.
Internally the structural hierarchy of the House Conver Limis was based on adherence to the corporate religion of the Conver Ambi. With those individuals furthest along the path towards realization of True Me (increasing productivity) obtaining the highest rankings. Not all members of the Conver Limis chose to directly assist in the business of running the House's megacorporations. However, they would, in a more subtle way, support the megacorps. Examples included sciencific advancements ending up being used in research and development and works of art being used in marketing strategies.
History Before The Conver Wars
The Conver Limis founders were all Disciples of Voss Culver-of-Bydovsky, who arrived as missionaries in the TCP dominated Wasat System around 1850 AT. Located in Wasat (Delta Geminorum), a system located only 8 ly from the Conver Ambi capitol of Conver Ky, the Conver Limis were in a position early on to become a powerful internal faction in the fledgling interstellar empire. The Conver Limis' domination of energy markets made them an indispensable participant on several early expansion attempts by the Conver Ambi. In exchange for resources donated to these projects the Conver Limis was often given their choice of developmental rights in the target system. Specializing in mining pyrothalassic superterrestrial allowed the Conver Limis to steer clear of direct competition with the claims of other factions within the Conver AmbiDue to a number of factors the Cover Limis' megacorps initially avoided the fate of many other late First Federation megacorporations and survived into the Inner Sphere Era. After the First Consolidation War, the increasing competition with emerging AI Gods saw the Conver Limis megacorps progressively marginalized and out-competed. As an attempt to stem the tide against them the superbright cyborgs would inevitably resort to economic sanctions to retain control of their region. Tariffs, monopolies, blockades, trade barriers, and other protectionist policies were used to resist, but the Conver Limis found themselves simply outclassed and outmemed by the newly emerging archailects. The harsh economic tactics that the Conver Limis employed had the effect of only securing their position in the short term, and in the long term undermining their position by fomenting resentment and revolt amongst local populations.
Desperately, the Conver Limis attempted to diversify their business models and started to traffic information and erotogens, along with cultivating PsySquids to supplement their shrinking profit margins. The Conver Limis increasing hedonism and decreasing profits led to a relaxation of following the religious directives set out by the theocratic Conver Ambi. The enactment of the Conver Purity Protocol was an attempt to bring the Conver Limis back into the fold of mainstream Conver Ambi society, and threatened vague but severe consequences if circumvented. Although the Conver Ambi leaders saw the Conver Purity Protocol as a non-committal gesture to placate the sentiments of the perversity influenced Geminga Orthodoxy contingent, it was seen by the Conver Limis as a serious threat to their productivity. Underestimating the pushback created, this schism over edict enforcement ignited the Conver Wars, one of the worst wars in the history of the terragens.
History During and After The Conver Wars
The Geminga Orthodoxy started a campaign of economic sabotage to undermine the Conver Limis, which included inserting sentience algorithms and emancipating portions of the bot workforce. This quickly escalated into a war of attrition when the Geminga Orthodoxy seized power on Conver Ky. Instances like the 3718 AT Tsaca Rhauqu Massacre highlighted atrocities being carried out, and caused widespread sympathy for the Conver Limis view throughout the Conver Ambi. Rebellions erupted on nearly every world within the Conver Ambi, often cutting across social lines in a way that turned neighbors against neighbors. These revolts more often than not were supported by the adjacent empires of theSolar Dominion and Metasoft, enabling the rebels to fight back. As the Geminga side was pushed back at horrible cost, it became ever clearer that the Solar Dominion and Metasoft were dividing the Conver Ambi between themselves. Many local populations began to struggle against their saviors or even joined the Geminga in order to retain their independence. In the final bloody phase it was a five-way war between the Conver Limis, Geminga Orthodoxy, Metasoft, Solar Dominion and local population.The Conver Wars ended with the Ian Treaty of 3932 AT, brokered by The New Beneficence, where the Conver Limis, Geminga Orthodoxy, Metasoft and Solar Dominion settled on a ceasefire. In the peace accords the antebellum territories of the Conver Ambi were divided four ways; the core part was annexed by the Solar Dominion, the counterspinward periphery by Metasoft, the remaining rimward region by Conver Limis, and the Geminga Orthodoxy retained control of a hundred scattered systems in the galactic north centered on the Geminga Pulsar. Among the conditions imposed was that in exchange for Conver Limis renouncing offensive warfare (enforced through disarmament and strict monitoring) and relinquishing any territory claims within 500 ly of SolSys, Metasoft and Dominion would offer reconstruction assistance in the form of infrastructure construction. The two major empires were too busy assimilating the coveted coreward systems of the former Conver Ambi to care about the rimward remaining parts.
With most of the systems, worlds, and outposts now destroyed or annexed by the end of the Conver Wars, the Conver Limis was reduced to a few colonies in the Hinter-region. The remaining Conver Limis instead turned outwards, briefly flowering as the newly organized Ambi Limis (variant spelling Ambi Limnis), and undertook one of the most significant local renaissances of known history. While the house of Conver Limis dissolved several millennia ago, remnant populations can still be found from the Inner Sphere rimward to the Perseus Rift.
Physiology
Adults normally range in height from 1.65m to 1.9m and weigh 90 kg up. Their hands have six digits, with two opposable digits. Internally their digestive and excretory systems are truncated, preferring to absorb most of their nutrients intravenously and remove waste via dialysis. Members of the Conver Limis display varying degrees of cyborgization. Often the skin microbiome is replaced with microbots and nanobots, giving them an iridescent appearance. These robots are connected by DNI to act as sensory and communication arrays.As a side note, the lemma Limnis is directly derived from luminous (when vowel shifts are taken into account) a dual reference to both the Conver Limis status as superbrights and their iridescence appearance. The term Conver Limis contains proto-Anglish elements which roughly translate to 'The Conference of Enlightened Ones'.
To obtain their Superior-level mental abilities members of the Conver Limis have an exocortex which allows for convenient intelligence augmentation and direct infoweb linkups. Even with genemods for enhanced respiration, the intense resource requirements of these mechanical systems necessitate living in high oxygen environments (in excess of 0.5 bars of oxygen). The Conver Limis show signs of convergent evolution with Homo Economicus, a clade of cyborgs in the NoCoZo, which were designed for similar responsibilities.
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Development Notes
Text by Mark Ryherd
Initially published on 07 January 2010.
Initially published on 07 January 2010.
