Lava Slalom

## History of Lava Slalom

One of House Triangulum’s responsibilities has always been designing and testing new mech prototypes to develop in conjunction with House Fornax. The earliest stage of this work is to run computer simulations of various design changes to test them for validity, to prevent wasted work on unworkable designs.

In the year 3099, a bored House Triangulum vehicle safety engineer on his lunch break created a game out of the simulation assets. Using the Maja background environment already in the system, he designed a time trial, racing his simulated mech prototypes from the top of the volcano to the bottom, trying to beat his own best time. Another engineer, seeing the fun, joined in, modified the game to add a second player, and made it a competitive race. The game, known colloquially as “Lava Slalom”, quickly spread among the staff, and then beyond the lab, played by House Triangulum all over Habitat I. The original mech lab who made the game continued to modify and update it in their free time, refining the game over several years, adding mech vs mech combat, more mech types to race, and various racecourses (all volcanoes) by 3103.

Because the game was originally built in the simulation system environment, it never stopped keeping track of safety statistics of each race. One slow afternoon, several engineers were playing a 4-way race. As the last of them crossed the finish line, a console on the other side of the lab pinged. The engineers, knowing the sound but not understanding the cause, look at one another in bewilderment. They got up and floated over to investigate. On the screen they could see the expected automated congratulatory message indicating that their simulation was successful - they had broken safety records for mech use in general.

By 3104, the first live Lava Slalom games were being scheduled, and the first Slalom line of mechs were being assembled in House Fornax factories, with the first race being held in 3105. The sport gained popularity slowly at first, primarily among nobles, who held elaborate parties with Slalom races as a feature event. As word of the events spread, interest grew, and enterprising families began holding public races that commoners could attend. By the 3150s, the sport was popular among nobles and commoners both, although nobles alone could afford the expense to compete. When war broke out in the late 3170s, most racing died off.

## The resurrection of Lava Slalom after the war

After the war to combat an empire wide depression House Fornax, House Triangulum and The PRISM Network, with support from other minor houses and A.C.R.E, decided to launch Centennial League to revive Lava Slalom and reignite the life of the empire.

### Official launch of the Centennial League

The Centennial League was established at the 100th anniversary of the first simulation game by Trivox Eridanus Nivilion Claus to spread Lava Slalom to the whole sector and to help the citizens forget about the war.

*“Houses Fornax and House Triangulum with PRISM Network, in close association with Houses Reticulum and House Aquila as well as the other Houses Major and Minor and ACRE Corporation, are proud to announce the formation of the official "Centennial League" Lava Slalom League. What was on this day 100 years ago a start of a series of simulations to push the boundaries of MECHs has become a beloved sport on Maja, Diomikato, and other worlds and is now presented to the rest of the sector as a grand new sport. Houses and corporations are encouraged to speak with their local representatives on the formation of a team.”*

- Trivox Eridanus Nivilion Claus at the launch of Centennial League

## Rules

The rules are simple:

* 2-6 single-piloted mechs of the same weight class and type start at the top of a volcano course on Maja, Diomikato, or any number of other suitable volcano-bearing planetoids. The volcanoes are stimulated prior to the race so their lava flows are substantial enough for the Slalom.

* The MECHs make their way down the volcano by any means at their disposal. They may delay, damage, or even destroy the MECHs of their competitors, although the most common strategy is to avoid combat and focus on rushing the finish line.
* Some divisions prohibit combat, and some encourage it, but standard Slalom rules do not specify. Standard races often involve agreements between nobles to abstain from combat, though even when there is an agreement, occasionally some competitors will choose to break their agreement and resort to combat rather than face a loss.
* Buying power is absolutely legal in Lava Slalom, though races are divided by weight class and ability of MECHs - PsiMECHs compete only against other PsiMECHs etc - but otherwise MECH specs are not defined by the rules.
* MECHs need to reach a minimum of 97.1% safety rating when run through the Official House Triangulum Lava Slalom Digital Safety Test Environment, freely downloadable on all House Triangulum bulletin systems.