User:The Minmus Derp/sandbox/Metamaranth

The Amaranth Succession project is a long-running science fiction/fantasy multimedia series and worldbuilding project taking place in the chain of three universes connected by the grand universal force of Amaranth. Founded in collaboration between Su'uni Ash Nikal and Va'aksa Errat during shore leave in 119 AC, it spent its first few years as a small affair restricted to the two founders' friends and the rare person who wandered into the subwave network server and stuck around. The original project lead and co-founder was lost alongside FSS Kareland|his ship and presumed dead in 121, passing the leadership role to Shasin. Shasin undertook a project to increase publicity of the writing community, and the way social networking works caused the number of active writers to balloon in size. However, his leadership strategy greatly antagonized many writers, causing a great decline in the site's activity until he was ousted by Errat and fellow early writer Irsirranna.

By the time of Ash Nikal's surprise return with 28 years' worth of unpublished content, over four thousand writers had worked on their small corners of the three universes. The return of the original leader to the position alongside Irsirranna brought a renaissance to the ailing community, bringing back many departed writers. However, the deaths of Irsirranna on Mev'Dar and Ash Nikal during the Battle of the Colony in the same year left the community rudderless until Captain Airilli took the position on the will of the writers at large.

History

119-127: Founding and Early History

The Amaranth Succession Project was initially founded in 119 AC under a collaboration between Su'uni Ash Nikal (ManOfArnena) and Va'aksa Errat (CosmicBeerBottle), both of which remained anonymous until very recently. The vast majority of writers, especially in this early era of the community, were known only by usernames.

The project spent much of its first year under the sole ownership of Nikal and Errat, but a few new writers began to join in these first years. Among the first was later project leader and noted Q'Mau scientist Irsirranna (Gloves10), who created the Ambrosia Galaxy and the planet Haven. Irsirranna retained tight control over this setting for the first years of its existence, only allowing grammatical checks to be made on her articles. Haven, however, was introduced as much more collaborative, with most writers having a hand in its environment.

In 121, the FSS Kareland was lost within Keuremaske's Labyrinth, with its captain Su'uni Ash Nikal along with it. Errat, having no interest in leadership at the time, allowed the mantle to fall to Shasin (Shasin2148). He undertook a grand project to increase the publicity of the community and setting, bringing in his "Amalgam" friend group and attempting to center the setting around a specific science fantasy genre. Creative disputes between the Amalgam group and Irsirranna led to Ambrosia and Haven being sectioned off as their own chronologically earlier setting, Imagindarium's creation. The setting of Florathel within the main universe, created by user Airilli (who had notably forgone any form of subwave alias or anonymization), was drastically changed under the "advice" of Amalgam member "Lumi". Lumi encouraged him to strip away many of the more grounded elements of the writing and introduce more fantastical concepts which had been added to the rest of the settings by Amalgam's influence.

Airilli would gradually withdraw from the community over the years, as the expectations placed upon them by the community leaders became too much to deal with. Many other less prolific writers did likewise, reducing the circle of active community members almost exclusively to Amalgam and those who agreed with everything they did. By early 127, the surviving admin team successfully forced Shasin out of the leadership position, at which point he simply left, never to return. He was never heard from again by any member of the community, save an obviously insincere apology letter sent to random members of the admin team over a year after the fact.

127-138: Writer Influx

In the post-Shasin era of the community, diversity of writing increased greatly. The main setting fissioned into three different ones, allowing for writing at a greater number of scales. The first to come into being was the Borealis universe, splitting off from the now-named Cosmoria to provide a galactic-scale setting for people to write in. Amalgam's idea of shrinking the setting was considered to have merit though, and Cosmoria continued to shrink down to barely interstellar scales. Users TheStarryExplorer, ReturnerN, and ShahsoSuckedAtArt banded together to create Universe 6E, a setting specifically for the wildest of large scales.

Errat's leadership brought great prosperity to the community, ensuring its vitality for years to come. During this time, Shasin's original outreach program was picked up, streamlined, and brought to new heights by the new administration team. It was highly effective, bringing the number of writers to 500 in 136 AC in time for the fifteenth anniversary. This time was considered by those in the succeeding years as the golden age of Amaranth. Even then-president of the Vernarcan Federation Sirelai Isvoy took time out of their schedule to write a set of articles about the nation of Tairane and its locations and characters within the Borealis setting.

138-149: Decline

149-present: Renaissance

Content

The Amaranth Succession project contains a vast amount of material about the fictional worlds of the titular Succession. The chronologically earliest world in-universe, originally created by founding member Gloves10 (in reality noted Q'Mau scientist Irsirranna) a year into the project's existence, is that of the Imagindarium's Creation. This setting is primarily divided into the twin regions of Ambrosia and Haven, with guest writers creating smaller-scale events in both under Gloves10's advisement. After Irsirranna's death when Mev'Dar was destroyed by the Void in 150, writing in the realm largely went dormant aside from already agreed upon and planned projects.

The setting created first by Ash Nikal and Errat's collaboration initially had no name, but later became known as Cosmoria. In the early years, this setting underwent massive changes, going from a vast galactic cluster based upon the real Silky Way neighborhood to a universe of unimaginably powerful civilizations to a fully fictional galactic cluster to a small grouping of stars in an infinite void, all the while moving away from the more grounded science fiction it originated as. As the number of active writers increased, the main setting fissioned into a group of concurrent ones at three different scales: the original Cosmoria, Universe 6E and the Borealis Universe.

Cosmoria experienced the greatest expansion of content, with the majority of the community's active writers participating in its construction. 6E was primarily held aloft during its heyday by users TheStarryExplorer, ReturnerN, and ShahsoSuckedAtArt with relatively few contributions outside that group before largely going dormant following these people's quiet departure from the community. Meanwhile, Borealis was enjoyed by those wishing to write at a galactic scale, providing a middle ground between the barely-interstellar scales of Cosmoria and the unfathomable vastness of 6E.

Around 135, the project began to branch out beyond it's little subwave network server and site, with the production and publication of books and even animated movies and shows. The acclaimed Last Alliance trilogy notably "breached containment" as it were and brought much publicity to the project from beyond it's usual sphere of readers. Grey Federation Days was written by Su'uni Ash Nikal during his voyage aboard the FSS Kareland|FSS Kareland and published upon his return, boosting traffic further in the form of people looking for what else this mysterious man has worked on. Animation group Ssaa Rai Siri took on the project of a set of animated series' set in the universe, with several project members providing their voices. One of these was an adaptation of the Last Alliance trilogy, followed by a series chronicling the events of the War of Saiheran Succession. Ssaa Rai Siri also announced other projects following characters elsewhere within the project in 149 in honor of the founder’s surprise return.

Culture

In general, the culture of the Amaranth community is broadly welcoming to newcomers, and always has been with few exceptions. The lawless or overly authoritarian environment common to many such communities was long since purged from this one, and disputes are generally easily mediated by the staff. A cornerstone of Amaranth culture is the concept of author autonomy, which requires that an author's work is respected and not changed without their consent. A variety of resident visual and audio artists can be found within the community, who help illustrate the various worlds of the project.