Liao (system)

Liao
← 3135 3151
Liao nearby systems (Map Legend)
System Information
X:Y Coordinates	34.29 : -68.578
Spectral class	K5V
Recharge time	196 hours
Recharge station(s)	Nadir
Planet(s)	9

Originally known as the Cynthiana system, the Liao system was home to at least one habitable world, Liao III, and as of 3151 was located in the Tikonov Commonality of the Capellan Confederation.

System Description

Liao is located near the Aldebaran and Genoa systems and consists of a class K5V primary orbited by at nine planets. During the thirty-first century a recharge station was in place at the nadir jump point.

System History

The Liao system was settled in 2189 by Elias Liao and his followers and became the capital of a number of minor states prior to the formation of the Capellan Confederation in the mid-twenty-fourth century.

Political Affiliation

• 2189 - Terran Alliance
• 2202 - Terran Alliance
• 2240 - Independent world (under Victor Liao)
• 2240 - Liao Republic (under Irenna Liao)
• 2315 - Duchy of Liao
• 2366 - Duchy of Liao
• 2367 - Capellan Confederation
• 2571 - Capellan Confederation
• 2596 - Capellan Confederation
• 2750 - Capellan Confederation
• 2765 - Capellan Confederation
• 2786 - Capellan Confederation
• 2822 - Capellan Confederation
• 2864 - Capellan Confederation
• 3025 - Capellan Confederation
• 3030 - Federated Suns
• 3040 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3057 - Capellan Confederation
• 3058 - Capellan Confederation
• 3067 - Capellan Confederation
• 3079 - Capellan Confederation
• 3081 - Capellan Confederation
• 3084 - Republic of the Sphere (late in the year)
• 3085 - Republic of the Sphere
• 3130 - Republic of the Sphere
• 3134 - Capellan Confederation (from August)
• 3135 - Capellan Confederation
• 3145 - Capellan Confederation
• 3151 - Capellan Confederation

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Liao III

Liao III
Astrophysical
System position	Third
Jump Point distance	4.12 days
Moons	1 (Elias' Promise)
Geophysical
Surface gravity	1.05
Atmospheric pressure	Standard (Breathable)
Equatorial temperature	30°C
Surface water	55%
Highest native life	Reptile (10%)
Landmasses	3 (Beilù, Nánlù, Anderia)
History and Culture
Colonized	2189
Population	3,485,000,000 (3025), 3,800,000,000 (3067), 2,395,427,000 (3130)
Government and Infrastructure
Noble Ruler	Duke of Liao, Shonso of Liao
Political Leader	Planetary Governor
Military Commander	Legate Andreas Kamali (3111), Legate Kang Lo Den (3128), Legate Viktor Ruskoff (3130)
Capital	Chang-an (3111)
HPG Class	A (3025)
HPG Representative	Precentor Elizabeth Waite (3025)

Liao III—more commonly known simply as Liao—has one moon named Elias' Promise and has at various points served as a national capital, a Prefecture capital and a Commonality capital.

Planetary History

Early Times

Originally an unsettled, backwater planet in the Aldebaran system, the planet was settled by Elias Liao and his followers in 2189. First named for Elias' wife Cynthiana, the planet was renamed to honor Elias after his death in 2202, although Elias' son David Paul initially opposed the change.

When it was first settled, Liao was an unremarkable planet with wide expanses of grassland and little else. Within the first month, four colonists committed suicide because of the monotony. Elias Liao turned things around and Liao quickly became a major producer of livestock for the local star systems such as Zion, Zurich, and Genoa.

Having established that the biology of Cynthiana could support a number of species from off-planet, Elias aggressively imported a number of plant and animal species; the pride of his efforts was the importing of a number of breeding pairs of Eridani stallions, which he bred up during his lifetime into sought-after sport lines. The inhabitants of Cynthiana had invested the last of their money into Elias' experiment with breeding up livestock species. Although the Cynthiana colonists learned to domesticate the native Liao buffalo quickly, a deadly species known as the Liao cougar proved a major problem, inflicting heavy losses on the colonists' herds; the result was a massive hunting program that had completely eradicated the Liao cougar by the early twenty-fourth century.

Elias Liao founded the Liao Republic when he colonized Liao, and his grandson Victor would become president in 2202 and governor of the world under the Terran Alliance. By 2212, Victor had formal diplomatic relationships with a number of neighboring systems, to the advantage of all involved; while Victor refused to deal in Terran currency, he instead promoted trade by barter or exchange. It was very common for him to trade livestock and meat from Liao for goods from other worlds and for tracts of land on other, less well-developed, colonies. Victor would then sell that land on to newly arriving colonists in exchange for more things to increase the power and prestige of Liao and his nascent kingdom; technology, ships, and most of all, weapons.

Independence

When a number of colonies declared independence in 2236, the Terran Alliance demanded that Alliance worlds raise troops to support a campaign to conquer those worlds that had risen up in rebellion. Victor Liao's response was particularly pointed: he had the Terran Ambassador beheaded, and the head returned to Terra by first-class courier. The inhabitants of Liao waited for a response from Terra, but none ever came; after more than twenty years of preparation and buildup, Liao was suddenly independent when the Alliance issued the Demarcation Declaration and withdrew its borders to include only systems a single jump from Terra.

Independent Republic of Liao

After the death of Victor Liao in 2240, his daughter Irenna became the new President, promptly declaring Liao to be a sovereign nation—the Liao Republic—and starting major reforms of the planetary constitution. Various reforms set in place by Irenna strengthened her own position and allowed for the creation of a feudal dynasty, while at the same time moving Liao from being an independent agricultural backwater into a far more efficient and important polity.

As the colony worlds became increasingly balkanized and nations began to form in reaction to the Demarcation Declaration sporadic local wars began to break out, increasing in frequency as the vagaries of interstellar economies generated runaway inflation and planetary shortages. Liao suffered alongside other worlds during this period, being blockaded in 2249, which disrupted their trade and dramatically reducing the standard of living on the world. These problems intensified under the rule of Martell Liao, who compared unfavorably to his mother, Irenna.

Liao remained the center of a single-world nation until it reemerged onto the interstellar stage during the closing years of the war between the Capellan Hegemony and the Sarna Supremacy. The nearby world of Arboris—a Protectorate of the Capellan Hegemony as well as the most coreward planets in the Hegemony—announced its intention to secede from the Hegemony in 2308, unwilling to continue to contribute to the increasingly heavy burden of the war. Unbeknownst to the Hegemony, Arboris had applied for Protectorate status under the neutrality laws of the Liao Republic, which the ruler of the Republic, Emile Falkner Liao, had granted. Emile had assembled a flotilla of hastily armed merchant vessels to defend the new Protectorate, and the Hegemony fleet sent to subdue Arboris ran straight into the Liao fleet. Emile goaded the Hegemony fleet into an ambush and mauled the fleet badly; while he was forced to retreat to Liao, he did so in good order, and the most the Free Worlds League forces could do in response was to impose a blockade on Liao until April 2309.

The Hegemony's pyrrhic victory cost them the support of the Free Worlds League in the war with the Supremacy, which allowed the nearby Tikonov Grand Union to impose an arbitrated peace. By 2310, Liao was no longer besieged, and had gained Arboris as a Protectorate. This was the beginning of a rapid expansion of influence in the region for Liao and its ruler.

Duchy of Liao

Between 2310 and 2320, the worlds of Zurich, Aldebaran, Gan Singh, and Genoa all applied to Emile Liao for Protectorate status on the same level as that enjoyed by Arboris; Liao's influence grew to the point that in 2315, it became the capital of Emile's new interstellar nation—the Duchy of Liao—a realm that would survive intact until the formation of the Capellan Confederation.

Early Succession Wars

Liao suffered a number of spoiling raids, which reduced the planet to a backwater world with no significant infrastructure worth attacking. The planet remained important to House Liao, due to its historical importance to House Liao's ruling party. The world aside from harboring a palace on world for Chancellors, served as a training ground for Liao forces.

Fourth Succession War

In August 3028, House Davion forces led by the Thirty-third Avalon Hussars launched the invasion of Liao in a surprise attack in First Wave of the Fourth Succession War. The Hussars’ lead task force consisted of all three regiments of the Blue Star Irregulars and successfully made planetfall without meeting resistance from the Liao defenders. The first regiment of the Irregulars, the 1894th Light Horse, landed in southern continent where it easily overwhelmed and destroyed the understrength BattleMech regiment, Vincent's Commandos.

The rest of the Davion forces made landfall in Liao's northern continent and made a push towards the Forbidden City. In a mountain region, the First Confederation Reserve Cavalry and the Warrior House LuSann made push an attempt to stop Davion mercenaries from making a push to the capital. In the following week after invasion force’s landing, the Cavalry would make its move against the Irregulars' third regiment, the Twenty-first Rim Worlds. The Irregular regiment engaged the Cavalry in hope to prevent the Capellan forces from linking up with its Warrior House compatriots. The Irregulars nearly completely destroyed the Cavalry until Prefectorate Guards sprung their ambush. The Irregulars undertook a fighting withdraw from the ambush at the cost of their commanding general dying fighting a lance of Griffins. In another part of the battle, the LuSann would be devastated by the Avatars of Painful Death's infantry, armor and aerospace assets, losing a battalion's worth of 'Mechs in the fighting.

House Davion forces progress towards the capital would end up being stalled by the Liao's defenders’ efforts. It would not be until the arrival of Redfield's Renegades that the stalemate would turn into AFFS victory. The Renegades dropped behind LuSann's battlefield lines and entered the Forbidden City with no resistance. With the fall of the Forbidden City to Davion mercenaries, the remains of the Capellan forces withdrew from the planet.

Return to House Liao

During Operation GUERRERO in 3057, Chancellor Sun-Tzu Liao assigned the liberation of Liao to all of the Confederation's Warrior Houses. The planet's defending militia, the Liao Sarna March Militia surrendered to these forces without a shot fired. The Chancellor made Liao the capital of the newly formed Liao Commonality, with his cousin Shonso Hurtong Liao as its governor by 3061. Earlier, as part of reestablishing control of the world, the Liao Conservatory of Military Arts would be established in 3059. Liao experienced an economic and cultural renaissance as a result of its designation as the prefecture capital. Hurtong Liao worked hard to reestablish the Confederation's rule over the world, trying to bring its citizens who experienced a higher standard of living during FedCom rule.

Jihad

Liao was attacked by the Word of Blake on 2 November 3069 but local Capellan Confederation Armed Forces troops were able to repel the attack. The Capellan forces on Liao were mysteriously well-prepared for the invasion, and when the Blakists invaded the CCAF struck first, hitting the invaders with massed artillery fire and chemical weapons. The Word of Blake forces were unable to capture Liao, but the planet paid a heavy price for the aggressive tactics of the defending forces; the island continent of Anderia was rendered uninhabitable, and the population of the planet suffered horrible casualties.

Republic Era

Incorporated into the Republic of the Sphere following the end of the Jihad, Liao remained a coveted target for the Confederation. Liao was one of the former Capellan worlds within the Republic that was embroiled in a grass-roots war that began in 3101 and which was intended to return the planet to Capellan control. In 3111, Capellan forces were able to land on Liao after a junior lieutenant stationed on the world was bribed to allow an unauthorized DropShip landing on the planet, only for the infiltrating forces to launch an attack that slaughtered Republican civilians, including the family of the officer who had assisted them in landing in the first place. The war ended soon after and Liao remained a member of the Republic.

Dark Age

In 3126 and 3127, Capellan agitators increased tensions at the Liao Conservatory of Military Arts. These tensions burst in 3128, when the campus was seized by disgruntled cadets. Legate Kang Lo Den responded violently, and two students died. Paladin Ezekiel Crow prevented a full assault against the protesters and pressured Legate Kang to resign. Things calmed down again, but a new insurgent group called Ijori Dè Guāng was formed. On 25 July 3132, the HPG station on Liao underwent a mysterious shutdown that lasted four days, and may have been a herald of Gray Monday.

After the Blackout the Capellan Confederation sent troops into the Republic. The Second McCarron's Armored Cavalry regiment landed on Liao and faced the garrisoning troops. After six years of terrorist assaults by the Ijori Dè Guāng the garrison forces were on edge, and peaceful protests quickly exploded into violence. The Liao Standing Guard, the Fifth Triarii Protectors and V Principes Guards faced multiple hit and run attacks from the Armored Cavalry across two continents while the protesters and Ijori Dè Guāng joined forces with dissident elements of the Liao Conservatory of Military Arts to cause more problems. Despite this, five weeks of fighting had slowed the Capellan forces. Then the Dynasty Guard arrived. They joined with the dissident forces and opened a new front against the Republic troops. The Republic forces might still have won, but one of their aerospace fighters shot down a medical transport DropShip filled with refugees thinking it was transporting CCAF reinforcements. Overnight all loyalty to the Republic disappeared and the citizens of Liao rioted against the Republic troops. A last minute attack against the Dynasty Guard failed, and the Republic forces surrendered. They were allowed to leave Liao, returning the system to the Confederation.

Military Deployment

2765

• First Liao Guards
• Fourteenth "Zurich" Lancers

2786

• First Liao Guards

2821

• Fourth Liao Guards

3025

• First Confederation Reserve Cavalry
• Vincent's Commandos

3028

• Prefectorate Guard
• Warrior House LuSann
• First Confederation Reserve Cavalry
• Vincent's Commandos

3038

• Liao Sarna March Militia

3050

• Liao Sarna March Militia

3054

• Liao Sarna March Militia

3067

• Dynasty Guard

3079

• Dynasty Guard

- The unit was at 65% strength, with 100% of their equipment featuring upgraded technology.

• First St. Ives Lancers

- The First was at 35% strength, with 95% of their equipment featuring upgraded technology.

3085

• V Hastati Sentinels

- The unit was at 70% strength, with 87% of their equipment featuring upgraded technology.

3145

• Holdfast Guard

- The unit was at 95% strength with an "A" equipment rating.

• Liao Conservatory Cadre (Battalion)

- The unit was at 90% strength with a "D" equipment rating.

Geography

The planet Liao has three continents which settlers named Beilù (Northern), Nánlù (Southern), and Anderia. Anderia is an island continent, and all three continents are dominated by wide stretches of open grassland; some of the grasslands stretch across the entire of a continent. The continent of Anderia was rendered uninhabitable during the Jihad as a consequence of the use of chemical weapons. Various prominent mountain chains exist on Liao; Anderia is home to the Langtang Mountains, while Beilù is home to the Highwall Mountains, Northern Ranges and Du-jín Mountains. The vast grasslands of the Southern Plains and the Great Northern Plains dominate the two major landmasses, although the Chengdu Plateau is a major geographical feature, separated from the rest of Beilù by the Highwall Mountains. Major seas and oceans on Liao include the Northern Sea, the Cyntheryen Sea, and the Eastern Ocean.

Planetary Locations

Liao World Map

• Anderia (continent)

• Franco City: a ruined city
• Jaffa: a ruined city

• Beilù (continent)

• Chang-an: the planetary capital city, located on the Cavalry River on Beilù close to Lianyungang and Thei

• Liao Conservatory of Military Arts: a military academy

• Hunnan: a major city located on the western coast of Beilù
• Hussan: a major city on the eastern edge of Beilù, on the shore of the Eastern Ocean; located on a major river, on the opposite shore of which is a spaceport
• Kurnath Liao Memorial Naval Base: a military facility located south of the Highwall Mountains on the northern coast of the Cyntheryen Sea
• Lianyungang: a minor city and spaceport located close to Chang-an, but on the opposite side of the Cavalry River
• Overland: a minor city in the northern regions of the Great Northern Grasslands
• Thei: a major city near Chang-an
• Xiapu: a minor city in the Great Northern Plains

• Nánlù (continent)

• Desu: a major city on the northern shore of Nánlù
• Duan: a major city located south and east of the Du-jín Mountains on the shore of the Eastern Ocean
• HungLi Military Base: a major military base in the eastern regions of Nánlù
• Jíla: a major city on the western coast of Nánlù
• Mau-ti: a minor city located in the Southern Plains on Nánlù close to Shanto and Yulan
• Opskillon: a minor city located on the Murat River on the southern coast of Nánlù
• Shanto: a minor city on the northern coast of Nánlù close to Yulan and Mau-ti
• Sovetskaya: a minor city located on the southern shore of Nánlù
• Yulan: a minor city in the Southern Plains close to Shanto and Mau-ti

Image gallery

• 

  Planetary map of Liao

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  Planetary flag of Liao

Nearby Systems

Closest 76 systems (74 within 60 light-years) Distance in light years, closest systems first:
Genoa	10.0	Aldebaran	10.4	Gan Singh	13.3	Bhaktapur	14.0
Zurich	15.2	Arboris	19.3	Ningpo	20.1	Nanking	20.4
Pleione	20.4	Manennaia	22.0	Bex	22.6	Zion	24.1
Azha	25.9	New Canton	26.4	Slocum	28.9	Saiph	29.7
Styk	30.0	Acamar	30.5	Algol	30.6	Shensi	30.9
Poznan	31.0	Hsien	32.0	Woodstock	33.3	Tall Trees	33.6
Menkalinan	34.4	Kansu	34.6	Snailzar	35.4	Buchlau	35.8
Belluevue	36.1	Bharat	36.5	Terra Firma	36.9	Chisholm	37.2
Capolla	37.8	Halloran	39.5	Hamal	39.6	Sichuan	39.8
Kyrkbacken	40.2	New Aragon	40.3	Nopah	41.7	Conwy	43.5
Kawich	43.6	Tsitsang	43.7	Asuncion	44.1	St. Andre	44.9
Mandal	44.9	Hunan	46.0	Kristiandsund	46.0	Fletcher	46.7
Second Try	47.2	Sheratan	47.5	Brownsville	47.7	Yangtze	48.0
Berenson	48.1	Suzano	49.1	Epsilon Eridani	49.9	Outreach	50.5
Basalt	50.8	New Hessen	51.0	Ruchbah	51.3	Ingress	52.2
Epsilon Indi	53.3	Algot	53.4	Alrescha	53.8	Hall	54.0
Ilmachna	54.8	Myrvoll	55.7	Wasat	56.0	Tigress	56.2
Alpha Eridani	56.2	Demeter	57.2	Palos	58.5	Wei	58.6
Yunnah	58.9	Bryant	59.2	Elnath	60.7	Menkar	61.1

Bibliography

• Dark Age: Republic of the Sphere
• Dark Age: Republic Worlds (3130)
• Dark Age Turning Points: Liao
• Era Digest: Dark Age
• Era Report: 2750
• Era Report: 3145
• Field Manual: 3085
• Field Manual: 3145
• Field Manual: Updates
• Field Report: CCAF
• Field Report 2765: CCAF
• First Succession War
• Handbook: House Liao
• Historical: Liberation of Terra Volume 1
• Historical: Liberation of Terra Volume 2
• Historical: Reunification War
• Historical: War of 3039
• House Liao (The Capellan Confederation)
• Jihad: Final Reckoning
• Objective Raids
• Shattered Fortress
• Shattered Sphere