Sherwood

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Note: X and Y are coordinates (light years on XY plane) relative to Terra at (0, 0)

Sherwood
← 3135 3151
240px Sherwood nearby systems (Map Legend)
System Information
X:Y Coordinates	563.751 : -118.685
Spectral class	G8V
Recharge time	189 hours
Recharge station(s)	Nadir (after 3089), Zenith (after 3093)
Planet(s)	8

Political Affiliation

• 2317 - No record
• 2415 - Inhabited world
• 2571 - Federated Suns
• 2596 - Federated Suns
• 2750 - Federated Suns
• 2764 - Federated Suns
• 2765 - Federated Suns
• 2822 - Federated Suns
• 2864 - Federated Suns
• 3025 - Federated Suns
• 3030 - Federated Suns
• 3040 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3050 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3052 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3057 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3058 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3063 - Federated Commonwealth
• 3067 - Federated Suns
• 3072 - Filtvelt Coalition (from February)
• 3075 - Filtvelt Coalition
• 3079 - Filtvelt Coalition
• 3081 - Filtvelt Coalition
• 3085 - Filtvelt Coalition
• 3098 - Federated Suns
• 3130 - Federated Suns
• 3135 - Federated Suns
• 3145 - Federated Suns

---

Sherwood II

Planetary History

Early History

Sherwood was one of those worlds that was eminently suitable for human colonisation without the need for terraforming, with a flourishing ecology that prominantly featured towering, tree-like plants that reached heights of more than 100 metres. The original colonists were a mix of settlers from Belladonna, New Avalon and western Europe on Terra, who shared similar ecological beliefs. These colonists named the planet Sherwood after the famous forest in England on Terra when they began setting up their new colony in 2415. The site chosen for the capital city, Marion, was on the River Kent and the shore of the Peaceful Sea, and the colonists established their society as a representative democracy embodied in a Court of Elders elected by the population. The original Court of Elders contained six leaders, which were dubbed barons, but over time the Court would expand to include a representative from the planetary militia, and a representative from each settlement with a population greater than a quarter of a million.

Whatever the original intention regarding the Court of Elders, over future centuries the elected representatives were most typically members of the same five extended families what would come to dominate politics on the planet, to the extent that baron became a noble title with the expectation that each would pass from parent to eldest offspring and that said offspring would be elected to the court.

Among the principles enshrined in the constitution for Sherwood were rules on the construction of large-scale facilities and settlements, which were required to be built among the Sherwood trees in a fashion that prevented or minimised damage to the local ecosystem. This style of construction, which would come to be known as "Sherwood Green", would remain extant throughout the history of Sherwood, blending function with nature together, and gave settlements on Sherwood a distinctive appearance. Most building exteriors used organic shapes that allowed vines and other creeping plants to grow up the side of the buildings, and many had native species of flora planeted on the roofs; many settlements and even factory complexes were difficult to distinguish from the natural rolling hills and thick forests. This brought native wildlife into close proximity to the human population; even inside major cities, native wildlife such as the tree-dwelling Chestnut Astoria could be observed moving in herds along the sides of buildings, while the species known as Digging Glimmershawls built mating mounds in city parks.

The laws created and enforced by the early settlers that would shape Sherwood were viewed by outsiders as ranging from eccentric to bizarre; strict population limits were established for all settlements outside of Marion, laws were put in place to protect native species, immigration of nonskilled workers was heavily restricted via rigid requirements, local agricultural universities were established that provided free public education, and the police and militia forces were established as volunteer organisations, rather than recruited via conscription. These laws attracted concern from members of the political class on New Avalon, who feared that Sherwood's laws would restrict growth and cause the colony to fail, but over the next century and a half the planet thrived. By the dawn of the Star League Sherwood was a self-sufficient world with a population of more than a hundred million highly-educated people with a high quality of life rarely seen on contemporary worlds in the Periphery regions of the Federated Suns.

Star League

During the Star League era Sherwood was considered "rural" in that the world only had small settlements scattered across the globe and vast untouched wilderness. The combination of a prosperous population and wide expanses of uninhabited, pristine wilderness proved to be the source of a significant problem for Sherwood; criminal organisations saw Sherwood as both a safe haven for conducting criminal operations from, and as a source of easy plunder. The planetary militia, known as the Sherwood Jabberwockies - the name coming from an apex predator native to the forests around Marion - were able to protect the population of the major settlements and deal with smaller groups of raiders, but the Council of Elders decided that the militia were unable to protect the smaller, more distant settlements in a satisfactory fashion, while also being overworked themselves. This led to the Council requesting aid from the Armed Forces of the Federated Suns in 2674, but the AFFS was unable to spare troops for what was considered the Crucis March' backwater, leading the Council to turn to the Star League for assistance.

The Star League Defense Force responded by assigning elements of the Third Army to Sherwood from 2676 to help root out bandits and criminals from the wilderness, focussing on the region known as the Loxley Forest Preserve around Marion. The Third Army began deploying elements of its BattleMech divisions, which met with some success, but even with the SLDF assisting the Jabberwockies a particularly ruthless group of pirates named the Titanium Blade were able to establish themselves and remain an active threat for almost a century.

The Titanium Blade were backed by elements from the Taurian Concordat, and during their tenure on Sherwood would grow from a single company of BattleMechs to a demi-brigade of conventional and 'Mech forces. The Third Army troops and the Jabberwockies attempted to fight a guerilla campaign against the Blade, but the standard SLDF tactic of applying overwhelming force to solve a problem proved impossible to apply on Sherwood, due to the lack of infrastructure in the remote regions favored by the Blade, the lack of accurate intelligence from orbital satellites due to the density of the forests, and the frequency with which 'Mech units would get bogged down in those same forests. This prompted a passing SLDF WarShip squadron in 2731 to suggest dealing with the Blade through orbital bombardment - a suggestion that led to anti-Star League protests across Sherwood following the Court of Elders denouncing the Admiral responsible for the suggestion because of the ecological damage it would inflict on their world.

The Third Army continued to apply the same ineffective tactics against the Titanium Blade until a major raid against the SLDF forward operating base at Montfriar, which saw the Blade destroy the garrison there - a company of SLDF 'Mechs - and escape with an SLDF Leopard-class DropShip loaded with Wasp LAMs, and millions of League dollars' worth of repair equipment, munitions and supplies. The infamous 2759 raid led to a year-long investigation by the SLDF, during which the Third Army forces were pulled back to their primary facilities near Marion, leaving the Blade to operate largely unimpeded other than the overstretched forces of the Jabberwockies. The investigation highlighted several failures on the part of regimental and divisional commanders caused by limited thinking and an overreliance on BattleMechs as the means for solving problems in a battle they were unsuited for.

The SLDF responded to the findings by redeploying the 132nd Royal Jump Infantry Division to Sherwood in late 2761. At the time of deployment the 132nd had come under the command of Major General Jonas Tyler, who had been recently promoted at the age of just thirty-one, making him the youngest Major General in the Third Army. Tyler was keen to prove himself, and took personal command of the 1321st and 1322nd Royal Jump Infantry Regiments during the deployment. For the next two years, Tyler would spend the majority of his tenure leading the infantry forces from the front lines as he used ambushes and aggressive tactics to dictate the strategic initiative of the campaign, deploying VTOLs at treetop level to support the infantry as they battled the Blade. One of the last major engagements between the 132nd and the Blade saw LAMs from the 132nd fighting light aerospace fighters from the Blade and the stolen Wasp LAMs directly over Marion, and by mid-2763 Tyler's tactics had seen the Blade defeated after nearly a century of banditry.

The exploits of the 132nd during their campaign against the Blade had led to the media dubbing them as "Sherwood's Sheriffs", and their victory further endeared the division to the population. When Tyler married Yulia Flyntham, daughter of one of the barons, in 2765 the Court of Elders named him an "earl" of the Court, although Tyler's initial tenure on Sherwood would be cut short by the redeployment of the 132nd into the Taurian Concordat as part of the SLDF response to the Periphery Uprising. Tyler's campaign against the Blade made the 132nd a priority target for the Taurian forces they fought during the Uprising, and the Taurians used exceptionally brutal tactics against the Sheriffs. The division was destroyed as an operational formation, and Tyler was crippled during the fighting. Tyler opted to retire back to Sherwood, along with a small number of other survivors from the 132nd and their surviving equipment. The SLDF equipment was integrated into the Jabberwockies, and the surviving members of the 132nd formed a new ad hoc planetary militia that they named "Tyler's Terrors".

Succession Wars

As a relatively remote world, Sherwood was left relatively untouched by the Succession Wars, and little merchant traffic passed through the system. The First Prince gave official approval to the title the Council of Eldars had given to Jonas, and Jonas' and Yulia's children went to military academies on New Avalon and New Syrtis for their educations. When the children returned to Sherwood, they were given command over the Terrors, and it was considered inevitable by many that they would be elected to the Council of Elders. This was pre-empted by a change to the planetary constitution, which amended the structure of the government from a representative democracy to a crowned republic; the Tyler family were appointed as representatives of Sherwood with ceremonial duties, but under the new constitution would have only a single vote on the Council of Elders, in line with the other members of the Council. A small Court Guard was formed, serving to continue the tradition of the 132nd Royal Jump Infantry Division.

While other worlds in the Outback suffered and declined steadily during the Succession Wars, with the region coming to be a source of mockery due to the widespread lack of education and faltering economies, Sherwood managed to maintain a consistant standard of living. It wasn't until the FedCom Civil War that Sherwood began to suffer the effects of economic uncertainty sufficient to cause the sense of stability given to the insular population to falter. As a member of the Davion Light Guards, Earl Jonathan Tyler had fought against Katherine Steiner-Davion's forces on New Avalon, returning to Sherwood and resuming command of the Terrors shortly before the Jihad began.

The Jihad

When the Word of Blake attacked New Avalon in one of the opening strikes of the Jihad, Jonathan Tyler began deploying Tyler's Terrors as if they were an AFFS unit, moving them to worlds as far afield as the border with the Capellan Confederation; Jonathan was a charismatic figure, and explained his actions as the Terrors meeting their obligation as Federated Suns citizens with military training to do their part to destroy those who would harm their fellow citizens. Jonathan also had a more personal motivation; his first wife, Victoria, had been killed in the initial Blakist orbital bombardment of Avalon City. The Terrors eased some of the local pressure on the AFFS, but left Sherwood vulnerable to piracy, as the only armed forces left on the world were the inexperienced jump infantry troops of the small Court Guard and the public police forces. bandit attacks began hitting Sherwood in 3070, the largest of which struck at the Lake Lionheart aquaculture facilities. The damage inflicted in this raid put a severe strain on planetary food stocks.

The Court of Elders felt that Sherwood was unable to protect itself, as highlighted by the Lake Lionheart raid, and went against the wishes of Jonathan Tyler by voting to join the Filtvelt Coalition in February 3072. The vote was split 55-45 in favor of the Coalition, and while Tyler may have wished to return to Sherwood to oppose the move, he and the Terrors had made promises to Jackson Davion they were unwilling to break. Tyler did send the conventional forces within the Terrors back to Sherwood, however, and they arrived in time to hold off a vote by the Council of Elders that would've resulted in the Filtvelt Citizen's Militia deploying a company from the Thumpers to garrison Sherwood.

Despite the presence of the Terrors' conventional forces on Sherwood, the FCM deployed the Third Filtvelt Citizen's Militia to the planet in 3078. Most of the MechWarriors from the Terrors died during the Jihad, but those who returned - including Jonathan Tyler - were veterans of some of the Jihad's heaviest fighting. Jonathan was badly mentally scarred by the events of the Jihad; in addition to the lost of his first wife, many of his friends and family had died in the fighting, and he retreated from public life for several years, feeling sullen and betrayed by those who had chosen to take Sherwood out of the Federated Suns.

The Dark Age

In 3084 rumors circulated that the Court of Elders was considering appointing a regent for Jonathan due to his absence; Jonathan responded by making an unexpected appearance at the court, during which he delivered a passionate hour-long lecture to those present on how the barons had reaped the benefits of peace and freedom from the Federated Suns only to then betray the nation that fostered them and flee during a time of crisis. Transcripts of his lecture circulated through every major news outlet in the Filtvelt Coalition, leading to a movement that would later become known as the "Peaceful Revolt".

Jonathan was determined to return Sherwood to the Federated Suns; he called in favors earned by the Terrors during the Jihad, opening up investment funds from New Avalon, and he combined this with his own personal funds to launch a number of major infrastructure projects on - and above - Sherwood. The first was the introduction of a network of maglev trains between Marion and the regional capitals across Sherwood. The maglev trains were forest-friendly, and made it significantly easier for people to move across the wide, uninhabited areas of Sherwood. Jonathan also initiated the construction of recharge stations at both system jump points, the first of which opened for business in 3089 at the system nadir jump point, followed by a station at the zenith jump point that opened in 3093, bringing a steady increase in merchant shipping moving through the system. The success of these projects were described by Jonathan as grand successes only possible due to the Federated Suns.

Jonathan then expanded his work, traveling to other former Federated Suns systems nearby to fund similar infrastructure projects, all paid for using funding from the Federated Suns and his own resources. Jonathan refused to take credit for any of the works, instead insisting that they were only possible because of the Federated Suns. The end result of his efforts was a unanimous vote by the Sherwood Council of Elders in 3098 to rejoin the Federated Suns. In later years, Jonathan's efforts would result in Ebro, Memphis and other systems taking a similar path and leaving the Coalition to rejoin the Federated Suns.

Although Sherwood was wooed back into the Federated Suns the planetary rulers went on to implement the same kind of educational system on their world in the thirty-second century that Prime Minister Berko Okeke was driving throughout the Filtvelt Coalition, markedly improving the level of education on the planet through a combination of tax and spending increases. Sherwood continued to remain a local leader in areas such as eco-friendly forest training and agricultural education, whilst being a staunch defender of the Federated Suns within the Periphery March.

Military Deployment

2676 - 2760

• Elements of the Third Army

2761

• 132nd Royal Jump Infantry Division
  • 1321st Royal Jump Infantry Regiment
  • 1322nd Royal Jump Infantry Regiment
• Sherwood Jabberwokkies Militia

2766

• Tyler's Terrors

3078

• Third Filtvelt Citizen's Militia

3079

• Third Filtvelt Citizen's Militia

-(shared with Lackland)

3085

• Second Filtvelt Citizen's Militia

-(shared with Morven)

Native Fauna

The native wildlife on Sherwood is of considerable interest to xenobiologists for its unusual nature. The majority of the fauna found on Sherwood resembles some form of Terran starfish in appearance, with five or seven limb-head appendages that are often tipped with sensory organs and eating orifices. Most have very large eyes due to the low-light environment that exists under the tree canopy, with those eyes either being located on the sides of each limb-head - although some prey species have just one eye per limb-head, located on the upper surface. The Sherwood fauna analogues to lizards can use their eating organs to expel waste, while the mammal analogues have reproductive and waste elimination organs on their main bodies, allowing them to give live birth. The young of these species attach to gland bulbs found on both genders of parent, giving the parents the appearance of dozens of small, twitching limbs on their central bodies. While avians never evolved on Sherwood, but some lizard and mammal analogues have evolved into a similar niche, using specialised elongated limbs with membrances stretched between them to glide, while retaining those arboreal characteristics common to other Sherwood life forms. The mammal analogues generally have spare hair, but a number of species have specalised melanocyte cells that serve purposes such as shifting colors to send signal warnings to others of their species, or to blend in with flora and foliage.

• Jabberwocky
• Striped House Grunter
• Tuck's Tongue

Image Gallery

• Sherwood Planetary Map.JPG

  Planetary map of Sherwood

• Sherwood Flag.JPG

  Planetary flag of Sherwood

Nearby Systems

Systems within 60 light-years (distance in light years) Closest systems first:
Ebro	10.95	Rentz	21.95	Hahira	22.90	Memphis	23.26
Brockton	32.07	Morven	34.72	McRae	36.05	Metter	37.18
Anjin Muerto	46.95	Steinhatchee	47.35	Cogdell	48.07	Shawnee	54.83
Lackland	57.78	Crofton	58.09	Wetumpka	59.02	Zolfo	59.84

Bibliography

• Era Report: 2750
• Era Report: 3052
• Era Report: 3062
• Era Report: 3145
• Field Manual: 3085
• Field Manual: 3145
• Field Manual: SLDF
• Field Report 2765: Federated Suns
• Field Report: AFFS
• Field Report: Periphery
• Handbook: House Davion
• Historical: Liberation of Terra Volume 1
• Historical: Liberation of Terra Volume 2
• Historical: Reunification War
• Historical: War of 3039
• House Davion (The Federated Suns)
• Jihad: Final Reckoning
• Jihad Hot Spots: 3072
• Jihad Secrets: The Blake Documents
• Map of the Inner Sphere 3130
• Touring the Stars: Sherwood