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Empires |
The size of an empire is determined by its technological and memetic superiority, the efficiency of communications, and the diplomatic, cultural, and military reach of the capital. Most empires tend to be tiny in relation to the vastness of Settled Space, and heavily reliant on transapient support and infrastructure. Big empires (larger than a single star system) are completely reliant on their relativistic fleets and the stargate links. Even the several dozen superpowers that dominate the galaxy at present are dependent on the power of the AI god memetic and noetopic with which they have aligned themselves. And whilst their control is strong indeed in their old core worlds and along the main stargate links, it decreases the further from the centers of communication and access one goes, so that in the provinces there is almost no control at all, and small local proxy states and barbarian empires flourish instead.
Even so, the great empires are nothing to laugh at. Mighty confederations and alliances of worlds that, guided and backed by near-immortal superbright rulers and supported hyperturing and archailect AIs and powers, they persist over interstellar distances for thousands of years. Smaller less well-organized empires aren't so lucky.
