Homeline is the "Prime" timeline of the Infinite Worlds setting, and the default point of origin for player characters in that setting. is an Quantum 5, TL8-9, alternate Earth which invented parachronic technology in 1994 and widely adopted it starting in 1998.[1] Homeline has since gone on to explore a variety of other Earths and became involved in a cross-time conflict Centrum in either 2008 (in Time Travel) or 2018 (in Infinite Worlds).[2][3]
Homeline is the home base of the Infinity Patrol, the organization which is chartered by Homeline United Nations to explore and supervise the other Earths. Infinity Patrol has (officially) a monopoly on the parachronic technology.
Homeline Factions[]
The most important interworld organization from Homeline is Infinity Unlimited (based in Chicago) and its policing dubdivision the Infinity Patrol (based in Calgary). Infinity operates under the direction of the United Nations Interworld Council and its own shareholders.
Government Organizations[]
Homeline is not a united planet and many of its nations posses parachronic capabilities. Those mentioned include:
- 3rd Special Warfare Group: China's crosstime military. Underfunded compared to other nations, with very limited operations. American military planners are suspicious of this and fear a "Great Leap Outward" that will rewrite the global order.[4]
- American government organizations, including the FBI's Parachronic Field Team and U.S Ranger Force Tau.[5][6][7]
- European Common Cross-Chronal Project (ECCCP): The EU's parachronics department, spearheaded by France and reigned in by Germany. The UK, still an EU member on Homeline, doesn't participate much.[4]
- Legion d'Outretemps: France's parachronics military force, which has racked up more missions outtime than any other - possibly due to a suspected French objective of turn outtime France's into satellite states in order to make a "super France." Most of its operations are in Africa or South America, but a mission in Gallatin's South America almost provoked conflict between French and American special forces.[4]
- Spetsnaz: The Russian Federation's outtime military, mostly focused on disrupting Russia's historical enemies (Nazis, Bonapartists, Swedes) on timelines where they won.[8]
- Special Conveyor Service: A British government taskforce noted as Homeline's most effective parachronic special-ops group, especially when it comes to using parachronics to attack Homeline targets.[4]
Corporations and NGOs[]
There are also a variety of non-governmental organizations and lesser corporations with interdimensional capabilities. These include:
- Amnesty Unlimited: The interworld counterpart to Amnesty International; it advocates for the rights of refugees, slaves, and political prisoners on other timelines.[9]
- Cliodyne Research Group: This Orange Country, California based research firm that offers services in cliodynamics to major businesses. Cliodyne began as a spin-off of Infinity, and still considers them its premier client.[10]
- Consolidated Mines, Unltd.: A major crossworld mining company and Infinity spinoff. Ran by a Cecil Rhodes duplicate who talked his way into Infinity. Only exists because Rhodes threatened to run for Infinity's corporate board, and Infinity couldn't risk blowback from every single African UN member state.
- Denarius Capital Holdings: A banking firm founded to stabilize Johnson's Rome, and promptly ended up filthy rich and moving to Lysander.[11]
- Duncorne Foundation: A group of secretive academics and rare books collectors, based in Oxford and Connecticut.[11]
- GeschichteTechnikStiftung (GeTS): One of Cliodyne's two major competitors. Based out of Germany. [3]
- Greenpeace: Opposes mining on other Earths, even empty ones. Supported by college students and, more covertly, companies left out of the interdimensional windfall - especially oil companies.[9]
- Hari & Boyle: A British crosstime trading firm.[4]
- Johnson Crosstime Incorporated: A Time Tours competitor whose founder, Alex Johnson, used outtime money and knowledge to drill himself into Rome-2's imperial hierarchy. [12]
- KMP Petroleum: The result over mergers between Homeline's oil companies after outtime fusion displaced fossil fuels, it mostly drills on empty worlds and trades to places in their industrial and modern periods.[11]
- Time Tours, Ltd.: A major entertainment company in every industry, whose bread and butter is running tour groups through other timelines.[3]
- Tombak & Change: One of Cliodyne's two major competitors. Singapore based.[3]
- Universal Exports: A British crosstime trading firm.[4]
- White Star Trading: This Boston-based firm was founded to fund the original, pre-1998, parachronic experiments and early exploration. It is the largest interworld trading company, and deals in everything.[11]
- Yugorovsky Group: A Russian military concern with ties to the Russian government and Mafiya.[11]
Organized Crime[]
Finally, many Homeline criminal groups have access to unauthorized conveyors, and even knowledge of other methods of interworld travel. These include:
- Swagmen: Small time con-artists and interworld smugglers originating from the outtime Australian mineral boom on many empty worlds in the early 21st century. From there they developed a culture of insularity and trust, and have a multiverse of potential marks.[13]
- The Mafiya: The Russian mob. Run around 80% of Russia's offworld mines.[14]
- The Outfit: Old school Chicago mafiosos deep in the crosstime drug trade.[14]
- The Triads: Various Chinese crime families. Usually work within the Chinese diaspora (on and off Homeline) in places out of the Chinese Communist Party's reach. Involved in illegal poaching.[14]
Centrum basic information[]
Centrum is located three quantum levels away from Homeline, and as such the two worlds cannot directly send travelers to each other. As a result, both parties fight out their war in the Quantum 6 in-between (and to a lesser extent, in the Quantum 7, as Centrum is attempting to shift Homeline Quantum 6 echoes towards itself. Homeline, which has a poorer understanding of cliodynamics, and is thus less likely to know how to shift worlds out of Centrum reach, is much more circumspect in this regard, but has shifted worlds to new quanta - either accidentally, or by trying to undo Centrum actions.
Alternate Homelines[]
- See also Known Realities
Homeline Dark[]
Homeline Dark is a campaign option wherein Infinity's negative qualities are accentuated so that Infinity (and, by extension) Homeline may be used as villains in campaigns focusing on I-Cops rooting out corruption from within, swagmen fighting for interdimensional freedom, or Centrum characters saving other timelines from self-destruction and exploitation.[15]
Alpha[]
Alpha is a proto-Homeline in the 23-Skidoo setting. Unlike Homeline, it experienced a limited nuclear war in 1992 and has access to backwards time travel.[16]
Homeline-2[]
Homeline-2 is fan-created alternate Homeline, using only material from GURPS Classic: Time Travel, without retcons and inconsistencies introduced in GURPS Infinite Worlds.
Additional Information[]
- Infinite Worlds Timeline (SJG forums)
- Known Realities
References[]
- Time Travel p.84-104
- Infinite Worlds p. 8-44
- PYR
- B523-525, 535-541
- ↑ GURPS Classic: Time Travel, page 85.
- ↑ GURPS Classic: Time Travel, page 106.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 8.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 43.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 12.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 42.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 189.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 42.
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 43.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 37.
- ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 40.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 9.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 71.
- ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 70.
- ↑ GURPS Infinite Worlds, page 36.
- ↑ Pyramid Magazine, 23 Skiddoo.