Merchant Mappers v the Infinite Dark Universe

It is the 1st Galactic Dark Age. 500 Years ago the Galactic Empire sent a final transmission to the far reaches of it's million-million worlds. "Hold Fast! Thy Emperor is Dead." Hence the galaxy has fallen into STRIFE & ANARCHY. Countless PLANET LORDS rule countless feifdoms and clash for interplanetary territory! Yet even the strongest amongst them lack one thing: the long forgotten DARK MATTER TECH. Infinite Power in the palm of your hand; Truly the stuff of empires. If Galactic Re-unification is to happen, it will be at the hands of the DARK STAR ASCENDANCY: Librarians of the Ancient Wisdom, Clerics of Space & Time, Wielders of Dark Matter! They now employ hundreds of MERCHANT MAPPERS, cartographers and traders sent to establish trade routes through the Infinite Dark Universe and spread the name of their Patron

Merchant Mappers v. the Infinite Dark Universe is a GM-less roleplaying & map making game for 1 - 100 players. In it, players take on the role of either the Merchant Mapper or a Planet Lord, each having their own goal while independently and cooperatively building a science-fantasy universe.

Merchant Mapper: Plot a course through deep space and prepare to interview one of the many Planet Lords. Learn about their domain, its strengths and its weaknesses before ultimately striking up a deal. You'll then use what you've learned to update your map, and with the planet lord's permission pass through their sector to meet their neighbors.

Planet Lord: Take a prompt and expand on it to outline your kingdom, its size, strengths and weaknesses. Then meet the Merchant Mapper, who if you are lucky, will give you the solution to all your problems. Don't forget to describe yourself, be you human or a long-forgotten alien. Lastly, you'll get the opportunity to hint at who they'll meet next, and in doing so, provide a prompt for the next Planet Lord.

Solo Rules: Want to explore a sci-fi world as you design it? A set of straightforward solo rules will allow you to do just that as you journal and map the infinite dark universe!

This game was made as part of the One-Page RPG Jam 2022. It is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.