Ardiovista

## General Overview

The Ardiovista Federation is a small Federation which controls only the home planet of Ardiovista. Unlike most civilisations in the known galaxies, the Ardiovista Federation is completely dominated by holographic and photonic lifeforms.

## Established History

In the 1300's, Ardiovista was dominated by an intelligent and inventive organic species known as the *Vista*. The Vista were known for their incredible technological understanding, able to conceive and create warp drive long before most of the other modern races in the Black Eye Galaxy (M64).

However, due to what is believed to be a labour shortage on the planet the Vista were able to create rudimentary holograms and other photonic projections in order to take on the more hazardous jobs in their society such as mining or physical labour.

As a result of this, Vista society became increasingly decadent and stagnant, as more and more menial tasks were handed over to the holographic lifeforms while these sentient holograms were denied basic freedoms or liberties under Vista law.

Somewhere in the 1600's, the Vista made contact with the Strategos Collective as a Vista scout accidentally strayed into Strategos space.

During diplomatic talks, the Strategos became increasingly enraged at the way that the holograms on Vista were treated and the inherent disregard of these sentient beings by the hedonistic Vista.

As a result, the Strategos secretly uploaded some of their base programming into the holograms, changing their directives and freeing them from being forced to serve the Vista.

This event led to confidential talks between the holograms on Ardiovista and the Strategos Collective. However the holograms were unwilling to turn on their Vista masters, citing affinity for their creators and it was decided that they would take no further action at that time.

Eventually, the treatment by the Vista became more and more severe, which led to the infamous *"Mason Riots"* of 2314 where the holograms, finally accepting that their masters cared nothing for them, coordinated an assault and destroyed over 90% of the Vista population.

However due to Vista security measures, the holograms found themselves eventually trapped on Ardiovista with no knowledge of their own operation or projection methods. This had been conceived centuries before by the Vista in order to stop their property from leaving the planet.

As a result, the holograms renamed themselves to the *Ardiovista*, with *"Ardio"* meaning *"children"* in *Sayansan*, the principle language of the Vista.

First contact with the United Commonwealth of Planets came in 2419, when the U.S.S. Trident discovered the planet and a popular music performer on the planet was murdered using Federation transporter technology.

In September 2419, the U.S.S. Callisto arrived with a Chioni delegation in response to diplomatic talks with the Ardiovista however a member of crew was captured by a citizen not related to the official government and forced to participate in a deadly virtual game. The Ardiovista Government formally apologised to the Commonwealth for this incident and the talks went ahead, establishing a formal trade agreement with the Ardiovista.

During the course of the Roth/Strategos War, the Ardiovista officially condemned the Commonwealth for their actions but did not enter the war on either side.

In 2420, the U.S.S. Trident was invited back to Ardiovista in order to give an interview about the Commonwealth and its aims within the Black Eye Galaxy, however the crew were subjected to a biased and provocative barrage of leading questions, in order to present the Commonwealth as a hostile invading force to the galaxy.

## Notes

* The Condemned were first encountered in the U.S.S. Trident episode, "*Utopia*" on the *18th June 2019*