***dont know if this goes here or on the story forum*** Short Story (quite short and with a little humor) In the future humanity got tired of Earth and its living conditions with contamination and a depleted ozone layer as the prime examples(god knows how those came to be), so they decided they would be better off in space. They started by sending research ships to explore the solar system, then the neighboring galaxies. Exploration is good and all but colonialism is were it's at. The first to start this initiative are the Americans and the Chinese. Disputes over planets are non-existant, lots of planets out there´s no reason to fight over one, especially when you can find another 3 that are basically the same. All was great, the Americans and the Chinese helped each other and all was good in the western front (or is it the outer front?). Soon after, the other powers (or the other countries that mather) began making their space voyages too.(Germany,France,the UK and Russia). This one was one big step for humanity and one big step towards doom for the Universe. After some time the space-colonization capable powers began to set aside homeplanet problems and prioritized space colonization and exploration,long story short they decided to move everything to space. The Russians were the last one of the superpowers to have complete control of the homeplanet but they felt overshadowed by those snotty space country club members looking down at them from their satelites, so they decided to do the same and move their base of operations to space (the other small reason was that things were heating up all over the world--muslims VS christians VS everyone else that was unlucky to be caught in the middle). As soon as the russians were leaving on a jetplane the massacres got started. Prosperity was on the rise from then on for the imperial powers.A few centuries passed and the age of stability had come (and in a few years long gone). The first space war was fought between the british and the indians(hindu Indians of course) over a belt of asteroids rich in resources. It was unclaimed so the indians did the reasonable thing and began mining it, the british saw that it was quite profitable so the nicely asked the indians to give it to them as it was in territory of one of its moons, the indians said no so the british decided to show them who is boss by bombing every Indian outpost, base and colony into extinction (literally, no more future generations of mustachoed goosesteppers and cow worshippers). The british were the only ones with real combat expierence in space warfare, so they got all imperial again and started picking fights with everyone including their long-time life partners the Americans. They had enough courage, expierience and tea & biscuits to take on everyone. And thats how the biggest tradition of humanity was first brought to space (there´s nothing like a little large-scale combat to make life interesting). INVADING and CONQUERING A PLANET- in 7 E-Z steps!! +gather intelligence on the planet´s defensive systems. +Capture moons and space stations (if they have any) +Neutralise attack and communications satelites. +secure the area (by sending fighter fleets to clear the area for the big ships to arrive). +Pre-Landing bombardment on the selected LZ(landig zone). +set up a beachhead and begin pushing for the main sectors(industrial regions and military targets). +begin taking the capital cities and flush out the resistance CONGRATULATIONS YOU HAVE CONQUERED A PLANET. I'll be back tomorow for a few lessons in fighting fleet VS fleet in space.

Haha, I like this. Are you planning to make a war game, or is this just background? I think it'd be great to have a war game that doesn't take itself too seriously...making fun of humanity's stupid desire to beat someone up. You could even go so far as to make it Douglas Adams-ish if you wanted to. ("Captain, we're out of torpedoes!" "That's ok, we have a large supply of flowerpots." :P)