The Living Galaxy

One galaxy, shaped by every captain

RiftCommand runs a single galaxy that all its captains share. Every mission you fly adds to a weekly Fleet Order. How the Orders end changes the map, the factions and the briefings that follow.

Play free How it works

galaxy every captain shares: 1
powers whose standing moves: 5
story weeks in a season: 12
Fleet Orders to work on: Weekly

How it works

How your missions move it

Your missions are your own: your crew, your orders, your choices. But they are all flown in the same galaxy, and each one also counts for something bigger.

Step 1
A mission
You fly it with your own crew, and it ends the way your orders lead it.
Step 2
A contribution
A mission in a sector that an Order covers adds to that Order’s progress.
Step 3
The week’s Fleet Order
All the captains’ contributions add up to one shared target.
Step 4
The result on reset day
When the week ends, the Order gets a grade from the captains’ total.
Step 5
The map, the factions, the Tightbeam
The result changes who holds which sector and how the powers get on with each other. The Tightbeam reports it.

Contributions count once per captain per day, so one captain can never count more than many. One busy evening cannot decide an Order, and a quiet week does no harm to anyone.

This week

Fleet Orders

A Fleet Order is a shared goal for the week in one or more sectors. Every mission flown there counts toward it.
The target is fixed when the Order opens and does not move, so everyone plays toward the same goal. When the week ends, the captains’ total sets the grade.
If the captains miss the target, it is a brave defeat. It is part of the story, and it never costs any captain anything.

How an Order reads

This week’s Fleet Order

Captains’ progress

Target, fixed when the Order opens
Graded on reset day

The story

Seasons

A season is twelve story weeks and a short interlude. It has four acts, with a captains’ vote in the middle and a change in the story after it.

01Act IThe season opens
02Act IIPressure grows
03VoteCaptains vote in the middle of the season
04Act IIIThe story changes after the vote
05Act IVThe ending depends on the results
06InterludeThe galaxy looks back

The finale can go different ways, and the captains’ results decide which way. The calendar never stops: the world keeps running even when no one is playing.

The factions

The powers

Five powers share this galaxy. Missions and Orders change how the powers get on with each other, and the Tightbeam reports each change.

Tessary Charter
The cooperative union of the five species, held together by shared safety and shared exploration. It is careful about any one power growing too strong.
Ravkhet Oath
A proud order that lives by its oath. It believes strength is the only way to survive, and that anyone can rise by proving themselves.
Ossamurr
A shared mind whose purpose no one knows. It keeps its plans secret, and the most dangerous question in the galaxy is what it wants.
Outmoot
Frontier colonies that value ruling themselves above all. It is the most mixed society of all the powers, with many species living together.
The Vessendry
A small, secret order of scholars and guardians. They study dangerous old technology so that no one else has to.

The map

The chart

Sectors change hands, face problems and have dangers of their own. Travel between them is part of the game: where you fly decides which Orders your missions can help.

A sector that an Order covers
A sector with a problem or a danger
A quiet sector

Canon

Legends

A great deed can become part of the official story. A Legend can appear in other captains’ briefings, and later captains can use it as an example. Captains are named by their public name and ship.

The season’s first Legends have not been written yet. The next one could be yours.

In-universe news

The Tightbeam

The Tightbeam is the galaxy’s news report inside the game. Every day it tells what the captains did, which Orders succeeded and which fell short. Its events are fictional.

News from inside the game RiftCommand. The events are made up.

Who are the ◆ Fleet captains?

Fleet captains are game characters, marked ◆. They help finish Fleet Orders when few captains are playing. They never vote and never become Legends.

Read the Tightbeam