Lore

Classic Elite startup screen

Classic Elite's Instruction Manual

Holdstock's Dark Wheel

Frontier (Elite 2) Box

The first of Drew's Oolite Series

Among the seven trillion people who are - at least officially - Cooperative citizens, you are nobody. So far, anyway. You've got a ship, some weapons, and enough spare cash to get started - and one day, you might get the fame, wealth or glory you want. Perhaps one day, everyone might know your name. If, that is, you can survive that long.

The two thousand star systems of the Cooperative once enjoyed a golden age of peace and prosperity, and perhaps the wealthiest of them can still pretend to. The trade ships that once safely travelled between planets now have to be well armed and escorted to fend off pirate attacks, from small-time criminals desperate for their next meal, to powerful robber barons extracting tithes from everyone who passes through their space.

The Cooperative's police force, concentrated near a few influential planets, can no longer maintain order. The mercenaries they hire for a few credits a kill are too few, too unreliable to do so either. And in the darkness between the stars, an old enemy lurks, fearless, perhaps waiting for order to collapse entirely.

Good luck, Commander.
                                                                         from www.Oolite.space

Canon in the Game

There is Strict Oolite - and then there are the over 12655723162254307425418678245150829297671403862274660768187828858528140823147351237817802795619571074765208532598060224803240903782164769430795025578054271906283387643826088448124626488332623608376164081221171179439885840257818732919037889603719186743943363062139593784473922231852782547619771723889252476871186000174697934549112845662596182308280390615184691924446215552586523740084932807259056238962104689731522587564412231618018774350801526839567367444928206231310973619440354723718012867753019556135721376207959558860559933052856914157120622980057169891912595926540427596853441276985006724869558201930657900240943007657817473684008944448183219124163017666607770667585082169598239230274035517738648065600492702095732843492708856036920219883363111527988109277392696562776813446645651238419301586157342867860646666350050113314787911320639668510871569846664873595017518995670958477806411667505346462590471136862647349666243426242677175204732314281064417939041868653741187423064985189556742640111598580035644021835576715752869397465453828584471291269955890393294448315746500268702149708808053100406398480942695623586049403348084970064668900206251516968479727515576425962392136269169089884609794271331061018895634421094082310408889752954265842691732460538911784,960,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 different versions of Oolite with .oxp's - and that is ignoring the tweaked/altered .oxp versions (your tweaks will be different from mine...)!

So to establish a 'canonical version' of Oolite the game is no mean feat! Attempts to do this in the past (Realistic Shipyards & Oolite Extended) failed dismally.

Canon in the Lore

IF we turn from the game to the lore, we find instead a sustained argument.

There have been at least three major schools of thought:

• The first school, the syncretists, seek to link in Classic Elite/Oolite with the Frontier family (which includes Elite Dangerous). It includes those working to incorporate elements of Frontier in Oolite either in the game itself (though writing OXPs) or in literature or writing background material - most notably Selezen and Drew Wagar. See Oolite timeline and GalCop for examples of this approach.

Realistically, if you came into Oolite from having enjoyed Frontier or E:D then this approach may well exert an attraction.

• The second school, the purists, regards the entire exercise as a waste of effort! But they also wish to come up with an argument as to how things in Oolite evolved into what one finds in their Ooniverse. The main purist proponent is Cim, who created an entire history in his Ship's Manual. But Disembodied wrote this back in 2007.

If you stumbled across Oolite before the later members of the Elite family of games but prefer a background with historical explanations, this approach may be your preference.

• The third school, the pragmatists, just want to enjoy the game without getting bogged down in endless detail or a need to force-fit this or that into a rigid history. See Disembodied's 2021 quote here. The Anglo-Saxon world, in particular, has often preferred a more pragmatic approach to understanding their Ooniverse! For a pragmatic argument for a pragmatic approach, read through the old debate on G6 (starting with the naming of Regions, and then devolving into lore) between PhantorGorth and ClymAngus which might begin here.

You will find the relevant histories quoted on the History and GalCop pages.

Some of the keener exponents of the first school have since migrated to Elite Dangerous, whilst those of the second and third schools seem to have been chased away by the Witchspace Lobster.

Table of Contrasts between Elite/Oolite and FE2/FFE/E:D

Feature	Classic Elite	Oolite Vanilla game	Frontier/Elite 2	First Encounters/FFE	Elite: Dangerous
Number of "Universes"	8	8	1	1	1
Existence of GalCop	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Existence of Federation & Empire	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Thargoids	Enemy	Enemy	Inexistent	Neutral	Neutral...
Non-human races: felines/lobstoids etc	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Planet Earth on map?	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes

For the Syncretists, there is a need to reconcile the gap between the two families of the games: how did the 8 "universes" disappear in the time gap between Elite/Oolite and Frontier? Where did the species go? How do Frontier's nascent Federation and Empire relate to GalCop (The Federation and the Empire are not mentioned in Elite/Oolite, and GalCop is not mentioned in Frontier)?

For the Purists, the need is rather to make sense of how there can be 8 "universes" and how the various species all fit together (were humans always there or did they arrive later?).

Elite's Core Lore

One Purist problem relates to how much material one has to work with. What is the core Lore?

• As regards Classic Elite, we have what we see in the game (see table above). There is also the material in the rest of the boxed game.

Instruction Manual mostly written by Robert Holdstock.

The Dark Wheel the novelette written by Robert Holdstock.

Andy Redman's Imprint (part of the PC Elite Plus Elite game version of 1991) is also a significant source of lore.

The Elite Player's Guide was written by Bell & Braben, but did not make it into the original boxed game.

• But Cody & Smivs, for example, do not see the Dark Wheel as canonical ("there are too many things that Holdstock got wrong" - see The Dark Wheel controversy section).

The purist school is thus split between ultra-minimalist purists who pretty much reject everything apart from the games themselves (ie, the code!) and the moderate purists who accept the Manual and The Dark Wheel etc. See for example, Disembodied's view here (2008).

User2357 on the other hand sees - not only the Dark Wheel & Imprint but - Dylan Smith's The Virtuous Misfortune as an essential part of the core lore (DS is this wikipedia's host).

For an example of ultra-minimalist lore derived from the game code, see Her Imperial Majesty's Space Navy.

In conclusion, our ultra-minimalists will accept Her Imperial Majesty's Space Navy, our moderates will add in Raxxla and our syncretists will be looking to further add in the nascent Federation and Empire from Frontier. Our pragmatists ... !

The relationship between ultra-minimalist purists and pragmatists is probably rather fuzzy!

Oolite's Core Lore

So what is core lore in Oolite?

• There is Disembodied's description from the Oolite.space website:

Among the seven trillion people who are - at least officially - Cooperative citizens, you are nobody. So far, anyway. You've got a ship, some weapons, and enough spare cash to get started - and one day, you might get the fame, wealth or glory you want. Perhaps one day, everyone might know your name. If, that is, you can survive that long.
The two thousand star systems of the Cooperative once enjoyed a golden age of peace and prosperity, and perhaps the wealthiest of them can still pretend to. The trade ships that once safely travelled between planets now have to be well armed and escorted to fend off pirate attacks, from small-time criminals desperate for their next meal, to powerful robber barons extracting tithes from everyone who passes through their space.
The Cooperative's police force, concentrated near a few influential planets, can no longer maintain order. The mercenaries they hire for a few credits a kill are too few, too unreliable to do so either. And in the darkness between the stars, an old enemy lurks, fearless, perhaps waiting for order to collapse entirely.
Good luck, Commander.

• There is also the official "Oolite anthology" with a mix of short stories from adherents of both schools: Alien Items.
  • Then there are Drew Wagar's well known novels and also Clym Angus's Chronicles of Shulth which are both syncretistic - but in very different ways - regarding Frontier. Drew combines early elements of Frontier into his descriptions of the Ooniverse. Clym portrays a Borgesian multiverse ("The Garden of Forking Paths": 1941) where the Ooniverse (similarly depicted to Drew's above) is purposely transmogrified into a lobstoid-free single EDverse by a mad scientist. Needless to say, the efforts of Drew & Selezen to reconcile the Elite family of games (Elite, Oolite, Frontier, FFE & E:D) were cast aside by E:D (despite Drew's official E:D novels & Selezen's official E:D role-playing game)!
  • Cody's novels are very different, as would be expected (no nascent Empires or Federations for example).
  • Thus, while the official anthology may be labelled as such, it is too confusing from a purist perspective to retain any canonicity.

Oolite OXP Lore

A number of the OXPs also add lore into the game. But the very nature of OXPs is that they are optional. You decide what to include, and what to exclude, and what to tweak/experiment with. They cannot be "core lore" by their very nature.

Classic Elite lore-based OXPs

Lave: the old Lave OXP and the newer Lave Academy OXP.

Tionisla: The Tionisla Orbital Graveyard collection.

New Cargoes looks at the planet descriptions from Elite & the associated literature and generates trade items from them (Zero-G cricket bats, Shanaskilk fur, thumpberry juice & noseoid leather).

There is also the Deep Space Dredger and the Generation Ships OXP.

Syncretist (Adding in elements of Frontier/FFE)

A number of the older OXPs add in bits of Frontier: mostly ships, but also other elements.

Frontier/FFE/E:D lore-based OXPs: various Empire elements have been added as OXPs - Selezen created Imperial Courier & Eagle Mk II ships for Oolite, and the mix has been further added to with HUDs, for example.

Oolite lore-based OXPs

From Drew's novellae: Tianve OXP, Status Quo Q-bomb OXP, Technical Reference Library, Tionisla Chronicle Array, BoyRacer, Torus station, Famous Planets, System Redux (Oolite), Behemoth, Imperial Courier, SuperCobra and Snoopers/GNN.

From ClymAngus/Wyvern's novellae: Kirin, Kirin Sport, Caduceus, Dragon, MilSpec HUD OXP, Automatic Chaff System (now in Missiles and Bombs), Missile Spoof & Military Missile.

From Cody's novellae: Coyote's Run & Green Gecko

Personalities OXP bump into Cody, Selezen, Wyvern, Disembodied, Captain Hesperus, PA Groove etc in-flight.

Galaxy-wide OXPs

The Assassins Guild OXP refashions G7, adding in GalCop bases, inter-system rivalries, mafia-style gangs and their bases, a research laboratory et cetera. Iron Raven has a similar effect on G8. Ionics impacts the NE corner of G2.

Systems OXPs

There is basic vanilla game lore in the descriptions in Cim's Ship's Manual (Planetary Governments).

Commies

There is a lot of lore for the Communist States:
Captain Hesperus added lore for Commies which posits the existence of Comoonin in G4. See Powers and Organisations: Governments: Communist Worlds, Powers and Organisations: Notable Organisations of Galaxy Four (Angiana): The Comoonin & Hesperus's description for the Worker's Commuter.

Ramirez's Iron Raven which flavours G8 adds in the KSR (Kosmicheskikh Slyushba Razvedki)

Feudal States

Ramirez added in a .pdf for this OXP which contains the following lore: A History
The Feudal States were formed in the decades following the first wave of the galaxy’s human colonisation. While the Corporations and Democracies had great success in securing new territory and resources, many individuals found themselves disenfranchised from power, lacking either the political skill or the business acumen to have a real say in the governing of their own affairs. In many systems, breakaway movements soon sprung up, with miners, engineers and farmers agreeing to pool their resources and seek a better life elsewhere.
The risks were great. Much of the galaxy’s unclaimed territory had by this time become a lawless hunting ground for pirates, cruising from system to system preying on unfortunate merchants and passenger liners. With no defence fleet of their own, and little money to pay for mercenary protection, the colonists turned their back on the complex systems of government that had oppressed them, and instead sought to build their strength through the ancient principles of feudalism. The idea was simple: anyone willing to provide military service to the movement would be rewarded with substantial territories in the new systems, with all the wealth and privilege associated with it.
Despite its rather old-fashioned nature, this offer of service was readily accepted by thousands of highly-rated combat pilots, many of whom had also lost out in the galactic land-grab and were having to scrape a living as itinerant freelancers. For them, serving as a knight in one of the Feudal States was an opportunity to further their careers in a more stable environment and finally earn the respect they felt was their due.
Many Feudal States were established in this way, each system forming its own set of houses, ranks, titles and styles based loosely upon those of Old Earth. For several years, the different states supported each other, eager to present a united front to other governments. But as the ranks of knights swelled, the Feudal States became ever more aggressive in character and friendly rivalry often led to war. Unable to challenge the military authority of the more established governments, the Feudal States turned upon each other in a bid to achieve supremacy.
The Feudal Wars, as the conflicts became known, were small, localised affairs and had little impact on the galaxy as a whole, although many dealers in other systems made their fortune by supplying arms and equipment to the belligerent states. Only when fighting spilled over into a nearby Democratic system, resulting in the accidental destruction of a passing freighter convoy, did the Galactic Cooperation act to put an end to the conflict. A ceasefire was enforced, the terms of which included a general embargo on the supply of offensive weapons by members of the Cooperation to any of the Feudal States.
The ceasefire remains in force today, however it is an uneasy truce and hostilities have recently resumed, with the feudal houses mounting frequent raids against each other’s trade convoys and even capturing high-ranking nobles for ransom. So long as any violence is contained within Feudal borders and does not endanger the lives of visitors, GalCop has tended to turn a blind eye to most inter-house conflict and police patrols do not venture far from the main space stations.

There are issues requiring resolution. DGill's update of the Feudal States adds in non-human dominated Feudals in G8 (the other galaxies include for example G1 Edzaon: Yellow Bony Lobsters ruled by an English aristocracy!). And the OXP currently contradicts Cim's description of G7 Atlaeser.

Anarchies

There is much less lore here. Disembodied's introduction above implies that these systems fell into anarchy, being taken over by pirates or whatever. There is also the single anomaly of a utopian anarchy in G1 Ascension (added in by the Famous Planets OXP).

And then there is the League of Anarchists added into G8 by Ramirez's Iron Raven OXP. It is not stated whether this extends beyond G8, but it seems unlikely.

Dictatorships

Ramirez wished to avoid fascist governments in his OXP, and so split these systems between agricultural Juntas and industrial Imperial systems. His .pdf gives descriptions of one of each: see the Lore section on the Dictators OXP page. Note that there is no indication whether the Imperial systems for example are part of one galaxy-spanning Empire or if they are all independent of each other.

The others (Corporates, Democracies, Confederacies, Multi-governments)

There are no Systems OXPs for these and no overall analysis beyond disparate posts on the BB, musings on the oddity of G4 & Cim's comments on the vanilla game governments in his Ship's Manual.

Diplomancy OXP: Inter-system rivalries

Diplomancy generates inter-system alliances and rivalries. This is done algorithmically and so the nuances introduced from the Resistance Commander OXP might not be reflected in it.

Species: Humanoids, Avians, Lobsters, et cetera

There seems to be little alliance between for example the various lobstoid worlds, and the government political divisions seem more relevant. This may reflect Disembodied's view that the various species are actually quite distinct - Reorte's "Black fat felines" have nothing to do with Tianve's "Blue bony felines" - and are probably even unrelated to Ensoreus's "Black fat felines"!

Some thoughts about Frontier/FE2

• Dylan Smith wrote in his page on the Frontier game that "Many rumours abounded following the release of the game that Frontier was never intended to be a sequel to Elite, and was simply written as a new space simulation. The rumour states that someone suggested tacking the Elite ships onto the game, and the decision was eventually made to include the popular elements from Elite into the game, including Lave and the surrounding systems and the ships from the older game. This, although never confirmed to this author's knowledge, does explain why there are very few other elements of Elite present in the game other than the most well known systems and the ships".

• It should be mentioned that both Drew & Selezen now (in 2021) also see a lore-based disjunct between Elite Dangerous and its predecessors. Whilst in the early days they were trying to harmonise the lore in ED with the earlier variants (and inter-alia were campaigning for the Orbital Graveyard to be installed in ED's Tionisla), with ED game changes driving ED further away from its earlier versions, they have since thrown in the towel. See The calamitous consequences of corporate states for more on this.

So What?

At time of writing (end 2021), Oolite probably offers something like 1,200 oxz's/oxp's!

Many of these happily co-exist with each other from a lore-based perspective. But not all.

Example: Space Navies

Take the Navies. The game code for Elite features no navy at all, just a couple of references to it in the missions. There are under a dozen references in the The Space Traders Flight Training Manual:

• The "Navy Training Manual" recommends the following approach and dock sequence;
• Though most of the Thargoid Space Fleet is currently engaged by the "Galactic Navy" in InterGalactic Space, a few of the smaller battle ships make occasional destructor-raids into human space. ...

Additionally, most Thargoid battle ships carry several small, remote-controlled "thargons", killer-craft each equipped with a single, but highly advanced, pulse-laser. "The Galactic Navy" are developing their own deep-space RemCraft, and pay a large bounty for any thargon craft that are brought to them.

• ASP MK II

"Galactic Navy" vessel designed and manufactured in government workshops, incorporating secret self-destruct devices which are primed to activate when the astrogation controls are used by unfamiliar hands. Integument has chameleon properties enabling the ship to assume effective camouflage in any type of environment. Intended for reconnaissance and the transport of high-ranking military personnel from combat it is very fast and maneuverable.

etc

The original novels have a little more.

So, at various stages, people have started writing Navy oxp's for Oolite. None of these are currently on the in-game Expansions Manager (Galactic Navy lacks a license, HIMSN was banjaxed by E:D's emergence in 2014 and still cries out for a more complete version).

Matt634 & Nemoricus wanted to create a strong powerful Navy. They did. The Galactic Navy OXP has a strong powerful presence in the eight galaxies with lots of SecCom Navy bases, patrols, battleships, etc etc. If you add it to your Ooniverse, it totally changes the feel of the place!

Others reacted against this. Switeck has just published a more modest version of the Galactic Navy OXP. Reese249er wrote 249th Naval Reserve Wing OXP which uses civilian patrols to supplement an invisible navy off fighting Thargoids elsewhere. Others who wanted an actual navy, replacing GN, created Her Imperial Majesty's Space Navy (HIMSN) instead. Much more self effacing (off fighting the Thargoids in InterGalactic Space, not much encountered otherwise), and a more modern oxz, using newer graphics techniques, etc.

These probably all work together with some minor tweaking. But the lores and underlying philosophies are quite different - and the original Galactic Navy clashes with HIMSN & 249th Naval Reserve Wing in this respect.

Conclusion

We are all different. Some of us want Lore and explanation - we find it gives colour to our game. Others of us just want to get on with playing and not get bogged down in insignificant details. In Oolite, you decide what goes into your Ooniverse - and you decide how you wish to make sense of it. Enjoy!

Definitions

The Lore (accumulated knowledge or beliefs held by a group about a subject) can be defined by the Canon. Thus arguments about Lore often end up as arguments about the Canon.

Links

• For significant differences between the schools see History, GalCop & Species.

BB threads

• Cim on the lack of reverence for the lore amongst OXP developers (2022)
• Metafiction: Dialogues on the Lore of Xlite: 2020 discussion.
• "Not in the manual" - setting and canon in the eight charts: 2015 Discussion led by the 3rd Lead Developer, Cim
• 2014 Discussion of "is there a canon"?
• Combined index - OOfiction and canon, text searchable (2013) - pranged by difficulties in definition
• What is regarded as canonical in Oolite history?: 2012 Discussion
• The Whole Frontier Canon Mess: 2010 Discussion: some pithy points
• Background story of the Elite universe - musings of a Frontier devotee back in 2006
• The Problem of the missing Earth for Selezen's syncretist solution (2010)

• Brainstorming: Adding flavour to the game through Lore (2021+ - see discussion)

On a lighter note ...

• For something less heavy than the above, try Legends of Elite & List of Oolite stories.
• The "Oo" puns... (2007)

Tionisla Chronicle Array

Lore-laden OXPs

OXPs bringing lore from the literature into the game. They include

• Lore Collection (Classic Elite) cherry picks the relevant oxp's from the Expansion Manager's collection thus missing Lave OXP just below.

• Lave: Lave OXP (old) has learner drivers, the Lave moon etc. Lave Academy has the academy station with classes.
• Tionisla: Tionisla Orbital Graveyard & Tionisla Chronicle Array
• Tianve: Tianve OXP (old - but you can pick up a nice bumper sticker!)
• Deep Space Dredger & Generation Ships from the original Elite manual discussed above
• New Cargoes links the newer cargoes to planet descriptions (zero-gravity hockey sticks etc)
• Kirin, Caduceus & Dragon - über-ships with their own fiction (Rise of the Kirin, etc.)
• Coyote's Run - a mission OXP based on the novel
• Galaxy Names OXP: places galaxy name at top of the F6 screen
• Technical Reference Library: from the novella Mutabilis
• Status Quo Q-bomb OXP: emulates the bomb behaviour described in Status Quo

OXPs introducing new lore into the game. These include

• Famous Planets expands on the F7 screen descriptions
• The systems OXPs: Anarchies, Commies, Dictators OXP & Feudal States
• Galaxy changing OXPs: Diplomancy, Weapon Laws & Smugglers
• Monument - a monument to deceased commanders at Lave
• Missionaries OXP - ever been harangued by a Happy Eye preacher or a Witchspace Lobster missionary? Boy, do you have a treat in store!