Post by Darth Xaos on Apr 23, 2015 0:02:09 GMT
(Written in collaboration by Darth Ares and Darth Xaos; edited by Darth Xaos)
General Information:
Dol Gorath is located near Chiss space inside a dense asteroid field, requiring the use of drift charts to navigate. The remote location of the planet, as well as the presence of the asteroid field, mean that the Galactic Alliance is completely unaware of the planet’s existence, and without the drift charts completely unable to penetrate the natural defense of the asteroid field. Because of this, Dol Gorath is always referred to as ‘Garrison Base’ in Union communiqués.
The secure location of the planet, as well as the scope of the resources it contains, has resulted in the planet being restored to full-scale operation under Union control, acting as a permanently garrisoned planet in the vein of Yaxon VI, the home of the Federal Military. It is currently being used as a central armoury for the Terrestrial Forces, housing an extremely large portion of the division’s vehicles, weapons and armour, as well as a sizeable defense force both on land and in space.
The planet’s terrain is mostly forested wilds, with a standard Type-I atmosphere and no sentient life, despite the presence of multiple species on the planet. The central point on the world is the Citadel, the fortress housing the planet’s cache of equipment and headquartering the military presence on the planet. More than two kilometers in diameter, the fortress is arranged in the shape of a cross, four wings connecting to a central tower. Each wing houses a kilometer-long hangar located on the upper level, numerous armouries, barracks, and expansive vehicle bays on in the basements. The central tower houses the command center, officer’s quarters, more armouries and a throne room at the tip of the tower. The tower had been designed to slay any non-Force Sensitives who entered it but this feature was deactivated when the Union took possession.
Dol Gorath is defended by a permanent garrison of approximately 32,000 members of the Terrestrial Forces, headquartered in and around the Citadel, as well as several other strategic locations on the planet, with access to heavy armour, infantry transports and fighting vehicles, numerous aerospace superiority craft and the armouries of the Citadel. To defend the planet’s orbit, a fleet charged solely with the defense of Dol Gorath has been established under the command of Rear Admiral Kjo Sjroon of Gladius Squadron.
Historical Data:
Pre-History:
Little is known of Dol Gorath prior to its settlement by the Galactic Empire. Few archaeological, geological or paleontological studies have ever been conducted on the planet but it is generally assumed that there has never been any native sentient life on the planet. Some records of the Chiss Ascendancy suggest that Dol Gorath may have been used as a base of operations for pirate groups at various points but no permanent settlements were established until 2 BBY.
Imperial Colonization:
During the year 2 BBY, the Empire initiated a program of building military bases in remote areas as a counter-measure against the growing Rebel Alliance. Dol Gorth was purchased by the Empire from the Chiss Ascendancy to fulfill this role in the Unknown Regions (which Imperial Commanders were convinced played home to several Rebel bases). The Imperials soon developed a reliable means to calculate routes through Dol Gorath’s shifting asteroid fields and began construction on an outpost. The first building created was the Citadel, which still dominates the landscape and is the only structure never to have been leveled in the planet’s brief but violent history. Soon other structures followed, creating military settlements not only around the Citadel but elsewhere on the planet.
Time of Two Empires:
After Emperor Palpatine’s first death in 4 ABY, Dol Gorath was quickly impressed into the service of the newly-minted Imperial warlord Thrawn’s Empire of the Hand. It served primarily as a manufacturing and supply center with its vast fields providing food, its factories providing arms and ground vehicles and its modest shipyard producing fighters and frigates. Dol Gorath’s soldiers and ships would see the front lines of battle in Thrawn’s campaign against the New Republic. After Thrawn’s death in 9 ABY, Dol Gorath remained a member of the weakened Empire of the Hand.
Within a year, however, Emperor Palpatine had returned to life and in one fell swoop reunited the disparate Imperial holdouts. Dol Gorath again became a highly efficient source of military supplies in the effort to restore the Galactic Empire. However, history did not stop repeating itself there and within a year Palpatine met his final death. Again Dol Gorath turned inward after a bitter defeat and looked to their position in the Empire of the Hand to assure their future.
The Rise of Darth Matas:
The years between 11 and 19 ABY were relatively quiet ones for Dol Gorath. Elsewhere in the Galaxy, however, events were occurring that would in time deeply impact the planet’s history. A movement called the Empire Reborn had been founded not long after the Battle of Endor and was gaining new strength in the aftermath of Palpatine’s death. This movement was lead by former Procrutor of Imperial Justice and Dark Jedi Hethrir. One of Hethrir’s key allies was High Inquisitor Antinnis Tremayne. Each of these men had a disciple whom they considered an Apprentice. Hethrir’s Apprentice was named Sarqon Matas and Tremayne’s was Tarna Savvo.
Sarqon and Tarna would play key roles in the Empire Reborn. As Dark Jedi they were invaluable operatives and the pair was often assigned missions together. The Dark Jedi formed a strong comradeship while accomplishing such key goals as acquiring new Force-sensitive recruits and covertly destroying Republic bases. Both were present for the Empire Reborn’s brutal but ultimately failed attack on the Jedi Praxeum. Both Tarna and Sarqon were elsewhere when Hethrir perished on Crseih Station, however, which marked the end of the Empire Reborn movement.
A few years later the pair conspired with four Crimson Guards to fake a yet another instance of Palpatine returning from the dead. This scam managed to unite those Imperial Warlords who sought to resist the Imperial Remnant’s truce with the New Republic. Styling themselves the Second Imperium, this alliance of warlords managed to grow into a legitimate threat to the Republic and Remnant. The Imperium even possessed its own order of Dark Jedi Knights. The Second Imperium ultimately fell on the same battlefield that the Empire Reborn had lost: the Jedi Praxeum. Though their four Guardsmen co-conspirators were eventually tracked down and killed, Sarqon and Tarna’s involvement in this peculiar historical episode was never uncovered by the New Republic.
Taking what soldiers, ships and supplies they could, the two Dark Jedi fled to the Unknown Regions to avoid the retribution that would never come for them. After a few stops in old Imperial deep-space stations, they acquired the coordinates and asteroid drift charts they would need to reach a former Imperial supply world: Dol Gorath.
Around the same time the Second Imperium was being founded, the Empire of the Hand was falling apart. The death of Thrawn’s clone, the sole source of the Hand’s remaining legitimacy, led to a crisis that would consume the state. Dol Gorath had always been on the fringes of the Empire and was soon isolated after the Hand lost control of its neighbors. A vicious attack by pirates left Dol Gorath’s defensive fleet annihilated and their shipyard in ruins. Over the next four years, the colonists on Dol Gorath would be completely cut off from the Galaxy.
That isolation ended when Sarqon’s fleet arrived above Dol Gorath. Still in deep anxiety after the Empire of the Hand fell and culturally programmed from birth to equate Imperialism with authority, Dol Gorath’s citizens readily submitted to Sarqon and Tarna’s authority. Setting about mapping their new planet, the Dark Jedi uncovered a stash created by Palpatine long ago. In this storehouse was held a single object: a holocron created by the Emperor to train future Sith in the contingency that both he and his current Apprentice were to die.
Drinking in the holocron’s knowledge, the Dark Jedi became Sith. After a vicious duel to determine primacy, Sarqon became Darth Matas, Dark Lord of the Sith, and Tarna was named his Shadow Hand and Grand Inquisitor.
Birth of the Matasian Empire:
Darth Matas saw his training by Palpatine’s holocron as not only justification for claming the title of Dark Lord but also the title Galactic Emperor. He immediately set about restoring Dol Gorath into an effective military-industrial complex in pursuit of this ambitious self-investiture. The people of Dol Gorath, bred for generations to be ideal Imperial citizens, quickly built an infrastructure capable of supporting a sizeable light-ship doctrine fleet. This mobile space force combined with a ground army of hearty Second Imperium veterans and eager Dol Gorathian volunteers to create a highly effective military.
This polished force easily overpowered the scattered militias of many neighboring systems. The former Empire of the Hand territories were ripe for such conquests. The warlords, pirate-kings and planetary governments of Hand space could not resist a professional military with fanatical devotion. Many other planets voluntarily joined Matas’ Empire, eager for a strong protector in uncertain times.
Matas realized, however, that he needed Force Users on his side if he ever wanted to expand his conquests into Republic space. Tarna was dispatched to recruit Force-sensitives from the more heavily populated areas of the Galaxy. Tarna soon set up a system of contacts that brought a steady supply of recruits for Matas’ Sith. Darth Matas himself would train some as Sith Lords to command his legions while Tarna trained others to be Inquisitors, preparing for the day when the Matasians would face the Jedi.
In time the growing Matasian Empire came into contact with not one but two other Sith-controlled powers. One was a secretive cabal operating out of a Deep-Core space station called the New Sith Order (which would later become the New Sith Brotherhood). Contact with the Order was minimal as the Matasian sphere of influence only barely overlapped with that of the Order. The second group, however, presented a far more immediate presence: the Ni’novian Ascendancy. The Ni’novians were, like the Matasians, a state that had arisen from the chaos of the Empire of the Hand’s collapse. They were led by the Sith Lord Darth Trivas who peopled the ranks of the Ascendancy’s leadership with members of his Sith cabal.
War with the Ni’novians:
For a time there was an uneasy peace between the three Sith shadow organizations. The Ni’novians did not attack the Matasians for fear that Darth Groznii (leader of the Order) would side with Matas over their mutual Neo-Imperialism. The Matasians were likewise dissuaded by the stronger diplomatic ties the Ni’novians had with the Order. The New Sith Order for its part did not have the necessary infrastructure or forces to go to war with a national military. This stalemate lasted until the Order was gripped by Schism. The conflict saw the death of Groznii at the hands of his Sith Council.
The reformations that the Order underwent afterwards permanently changed the balance of power. Of strategic significance was that the Order relocated from the Deep Core to the Stygian Caldera (specifically Dromund Kaas). But, perhaps more significant, was the ideological shift that the Order underwent. With Groznii deposed, Neo-Imperial sentiment began to dwindle among the Order’s members. Members of the Order’s Council such as Darth Rage and Darth Inferno (who would later come to be known as Darth Raziel and Darth Xaos respectively) began to advocate a post-Palpatine approach to Sith philosophy. The stated purpose of the Order shifted from restoring the Galactic Empire to restoring the Sith Empire.
With the New Sith Order no longer a potential strategic or ideological ally for the Matasians, the Ni’novians made their move. Trivas wanted to take Matas’ planets intact, so they could immediately be put to work for his Ascendency. Bearing this in mind, he concluded that the best approach would be to sack Dol Gorath first. With Matas dead and his throne-world destroyed, the Ascendancy could easily occupy the bewildered Matasian planets.
Gathering his military forces and Sith followers to him, Trivas set out for Dol Gorath. The invasion fleet followed a circuitous route (purchased from smugglers at great expense) that allowed it to slink into Dol Gorath’s space undetected. With the combined powers of all his Sith, Trivas temporarily redirected vast swathes of Dol Gorath’s asteroids to permit his fleet’s passage.
Dol Gorath’s space defenses had been planned around the enemy having to snake through the asteroid fields and were caught off-guard by Trivas’ ploy. The frigate-based fleet of the Matasians was forced into close confines with Trivas’ capital ships and crushed. With the space battle complete the ground invasion could begin. Most of the settlements on Dol Gorath were simply annihilated by orbital bombardment but the capital city surrounding the Citadel was protected by a planetary deflector shield. Waves of bombers soon knocked out most of the permanent ground defenses, leaving the Citadel courtyard open to ground attack. The Ni’novian’s mowed through the capital city, leaving none alive in their path.
Soon the invaders had penetrated the Citadel itself and a final showdown occurred between Matas’ Sith and Trivas’ Sith. The majority of the Matasian Inquistors had been killed by an orbital bombardment on their headquarters so Matas had only his Lords to aid him. Trivas’ larger and more diversely-trained Sith cabal won out swiftly,
The Interim Years:
The Ni’novians occupied the planet only long enough to purge its surviving citizens. They did not bother looting the Citadel’s significant military supplies as Trivas felt it important to immediately assert his authority over the newly-fallen Empire’s territory. The Chiss Sith’s predictions proved accurate as the majority of Matas’ former vassals simply capitulated. By the time the few resistors were dealt with, the Ni’novian Ascendancy covered nearly all of the Empire of the Hand’s former territory.
Only two individuals managed to survive the fall of Dol Gorath. One was Grand Inquistor Tarna Savvo while the other was his Apprentice and wife, Arluna Star. Both were unaware of the other’s survival. Arluna fled into the wilderness to escape Ni’novia’s wrath. Over the following years she became acclimatized to life in the wild and her Inquisitor training faded away to make room for the instinctually acquired powers of a Dark Side Witch. Tarna managed to board a small stealth ship and escape the Unknown Regions. He attempted to make contact with the New Sith Order’s leadership but was only able to reach a member known as Darth Byss. Byss pumped Tarna for information about Dol Gorath’s location and its weapons supplies before arranging for the Inquisitor’s assassination.
Dol Gorath would not re-enter the history of the New Sith Brotherhood until years later. It is known that a group of Gray Jedi occupied the Citadel briefly during this time but what they sought to accomplish remains unclear as they abandoned it not long after. In time, Darth Byss came to inspect his prize with his Apprentice, Darth Likhyi. On this sojourn they found Arluna, who had become a deadly predator in her years living in the wilds. Intrigued by the feral woman’s power, Byss captured her and tasked Likhyi with training her as a Sith. The knowledge of Sith Magic eroded Arluna’s connection to the Living Darkness of the Dark Side Witch’s ways and left her without memories of her time in Dol Gorath’s wilderness. This suited Byss, who arrogantly assumed that his teachings were superior. Taking the name Lady Hecate, it wouldn’t not be until she was retrained by the Brotherhood that she rediscovered her powers as a Witch. Byss had planned to use Dol Gorath’s caches in his bid to seize control of the Obsidian Union but, when his coup was prematurely revealed, he was forced into retreat. He would never get a chance to claim Dol Gorath’s armories as he was killed by Lady Hecate not long after.
Recent History:
Shortly after the Second Union Civil War, Lady Hecate and Darth Ares were tasked with finding Dol Gorath and securing it for the Union. After retrieving the coordinates and asteroid drift charts from Byss’ former base in the LiMerge Power Building, the two Sith assembled a fleet and departed for the planet. They were met by the Nemesis Armed Forces, a Force Dominate controlled army under the command of another of Byss’ disciples: Darth Nemesis. The ensuing battle over Dol Gorath ended with a Union victory and Nemesis’ death.