Ortagix War-Ecology

**Dev. Status** | Conceptual

The Ortagix War-Ecology is an artificially created species of alien plant-mushroom hybrids made by the people of the planet Gaia, itself governed by plant-based AI known as the Gardeners, meant to protect themselves when the Ecumene came and succeeded in not only beating back the Ecumene but also nearly took over the universe, that the Ecumene, Commune, and Imperium had a temporary alliance to fight the Ortagix to a standstill. Unfortunately for the Gardeners (and fortunate for everyone else), the Scrin soon came and destroyed the Gardeners, but even so, the Ortagix survived thanks to their many redundant designs.

Now without a purpose other than their wired-in love for war, battle, and bloodshed with the means to wage total war (such as a frankly savant-level of blacksmithing), no kill switches to stop them (since the Gardeners, intentionally or not, took it to their graves), and now fractured without the Gardeners to coordinate (rather fortunate for the universe since the Ortagix outnumbers almost everything). The Ortagix continue their original purpose in waging war across the universe, not out of conquest, ambition, revenge, or terror, but because they love fighting, winning, and losing, whether against aliens, humans, or even each other, where war is a great giant game where bets and competitions are made for the most kills, rather than the brutal, horrifying, senseless loss of lives it is.

In a twisted sense. The Ortagix can be considered the only faction that has already achieved its goal and reached its happy ending.

## Diplomatic Relationships

NOTE: Due to the Ortagix view of war and culture. They are always at war and will never make alliances, at best they'll work with another faction to fight a better opponent, and will freely admit that they will backstab their ally once there’s no one else to fight. And instead of alliance, friendship, peace, etc, diplomatic levels are instead graded in enjoyment in fighting them, the sole exceptions are N/A (since they love fighting with each other) and Unknown which remains unchanged.

 The best fights (Replaces Alliance)

Out of all the fights the Ortagix considers fighting them the best. A mixture of power, numbers, and brutality means the Oratig enjoys killing and getting killed by them. And whenever they hear their around most of the time their forces will switch whatever target they were fighting to fight them.

 The good fights (Replaces Peace)

 The fun fights (Replaces Friendly)

 The ok fights (Replaces Neutral)

 The boring fights (Replaces Hostile)

 The bad fights (Replaces War)

 The worst fights (Antithesis)

 The weird fights (Replaces Mixed)

Simply put. The fights against these factions are so esoteric/strange/ridiculous enough that the Ortagix can’t make head or tails on them. Only that they're good fights.

## Background

### A Weapon Against Oblivion

Brutal, bloodthirsty, maniac, and strangely honorable. These words are often used to describe the Ortagix, aliens whose size ranges from a toddler to a giant with green skin of various shades whose biology is a macabre mix of flesh, fungus, and organic metals, who weren't made by evolution or natural selection but was made by another race, as organic weapons to protect their creator, making them more akin to drones than human.

Their origins start with their now-deceased creators, the Gardeners, a race of plant-like being who inhabited the planet Gaia. On this planet the barrier between creatures, plants, and fungi is non-existent. Almost every living being on the planet was interconnected like a hive mind, yet each of them had their own personality. And for a few million years the Gardeners had lived in peace and harmony. All of that changed when the Ecumene came.

A tyrannical empire. The Ecumene began to attack the Gardener's planets, seeing them as weaklings only worth are as resources. At first, the Gardeners tried to peacefully talk with them, then they tried to fight back. But eons of peace had meant they had no knowledge of combat and tactics and were beaten back without effort but as they witnessed more of their worlds and people ripped apart to become resources they realise that to fight against monsters, they must create monsters of their own.

Gathering the most aggressive Gardeners they began to experiment with creating the greatest soldier, one who would be able to crush the Ecumene and force them out of their homes.

Thus were born the Ortagix, though other races would give them a better known name, "Orcs".

## Gameplay

### Build Mechanic

As a race whose life revolves around waging war with others or themselves. The Ortagix never set any long-term bases. Instead, they simply plant down “totem” beacons, literally sessile organism “structures” made of a fungus-flesh hybrid, that (rather literally) calls in all Ortagix forces to gather. Compared to other structures these are rapidly built but are one of the frailest structures. And their only defense, since the Ortagix never build defenses, is a small turret built on top.

### Resource

Compared to other factions the Ortagix don't really depend on money to build their forces. Instead, most of their units are built of two secondary, unique resources: Fightiness and Excitement. The Fightiness resource is required to build units with only a miniscule addition of resources, and Fightiness is gained through three methods, building more Screamer Banners (the lowest amount), number of units on the field (middling amount), and how many units are in combat (the highest amount). The Excitement resource is also required to purchase some units and to use their protocols, and also increases with the more Ortagix there are on the field. Thus the Ortagix economy is highly dependent on fighting their enemies.

### Experience

The Ortagix gains double the experience compared to other factions, the experience required is significantly lower (x2 their cost compared to other factions x4), and 50% of experience gained by a unit will be given to nearby units, while 25% are given to every unit (these stacks), allowing the Ortagix to reach heroic in seconds, including unlocking their ability. However, their Heroic upgrade only triggers on death and instead of the standard veterency boost they gain "Bloodlust".

Blood Lust is a short-term change to stats, it's automatically activated, an indication that the Ortagix are excited for further combat. Each time they get Blood Lust, the effects are increased. Blood Lust has its advantages, but at the same time, it has disadvantages. Blood Lust pushes the unit to ignore all risks; dealing more damage at the cost of (their already atrocious) accuracy and allowing them to take more damage before being mortally wounded. However, while the unit becomes much harder to suppress; it's lack of care for its own safety makes it an easy target for enemy soldiers, often leading to the Ortagix to die and disperse their spores.

### Abilities

Unlike other factions, Ortagix unit's abilities are locked off until they reach heroic rank. But in turn, they are rather powerful, but they also kill the unit who used it. Which, due to their heroic only triggering in death and how they reproduce and tier up, isn't really an issue. The exception to this rule is their commando, epic, and super units.

### Tier Mechanic

As a race of warmongers, the Oratagix tech up through war and only war. All Ortagix structures, even their superweapon, can be built immediately but production structures can only produce tier 1 units, and their only Superweapon is the weakest of PEQAN PIES. Upon death, the Ortagix releases spores that after some time, which is lessened when in a Cultivation Field and/or number of nearby bodies, would produce the same unit, potentially multiplying the amount, but lose all veterancy and leave behind special spore piles that could create the next tier unit, the chance and numbers of these special spores increasing with the unit veterancy level prior to death. Just beware of fire, desolator defoliant, and a few other damage effects as they could potentially lower the number of units produced, including simply eradicating them. Flood the battlefield with the Green Tide to increase your ability to bring even more Ortagix and their war machines to the battlefield.

### Power Mechanic

The Ortagix Power Antenna differs from other factions in that it doesn't make power, in fact none of the Ortagix structures uses power, but small but stacking boost to surrounding Ortagix units and a similar small but stacking debuff to surrounding enemies. Thus spreading these “Scrap Eater” on the field can rip the battle.

### Superweapon

The Ortagix superweapon system differs from others in that they can immediately build it when the game begins - the Warband Gathering. However, the Warband Gathering is highly reliant on Excitement to determine the Warband Gathering potency. The higher the Excitement the more Ortagix units are summon when fired. The Ortagix only have one superweapon, and its also the weakest in all of PEQAN PIES, as their super units are powerful enough in their own right.

### Flesh, Blood, and Steel

Due to actually being living creatures. Ortagix vehicles, upon death, will produce a handful of special, weaker, infantry units that will burst from the destroyed shell, ready to fight again. Weak, but perfect for slowing the enemy down, and if they die they'll spread more fungus lumps to grow more units.

### Ceremony

Once a Ceremony Site is built the Ortagix can perform ceremonies, which replace the defense tab, that provide special bonuses when units are garrisoned Ceremony Site, which can hold up to 25 units; the more units garrisoned in the Community Plaza, the more powerful the ceremony becomes. These bonuses are further increased by the amount of Excitement, which can be spent to activate a ceremony.

### Ortagix Super Units

Units that fall into this category are listed below in their own section, which also holds their epic and commando. These units are (literally) the largest and oldest veterans of the Ortagix forces (some of whom are even the first generation made to fight the Ecumene) and are the pride of the Ortagix, with each one being a superweapon in its own right that surpasses the epic, but are notoriously hard to build - and very expensive. Properly used, these units can easily turn the tide of a battle around with their superior stats and abilities. A Total War Totem needs to be built on the battlefield before these units can be deployed to battle - they take orders only from the biggest, deadliest, and meanest warboss, and need the Coordinating Brain to relay the orders, a Big Boss Bar to build them, and finally both the commando and epic must be built first before the super units can be called in. All the super units have limits imposed on them - only one of each can be built, however, only one super unit can be on the field at any given time. If a second Coordinating Brain is built, you may deploy a second, different super unit. Theoretically, all super units can be brought on the field once ten Coordinating Brains are built.

Ortagix players must decide between using more conventional forces or using the super units - the more risky path being using the super units as they must save up credits, Fightiness, and Excitement to build them with. Even with the super units on the field, victory is not guaranteed, as the super units themselves still have their shortcomings. Plus, should the Coordinating Brain be destroyed, all super units will power down until a new Brain comes online.

## The Green Tide

### Aircraft

 File:IconOrtagix.png | Fight Bird
 File:IconOrtagix.png | Bomb Choppy

### Super Unit

When the Battle has gone so awry the normal forces of the Ortagix can't deal with the enemy, these units are called to battle. Dating from time Immemorial, the powers these veterans wield is immense, none really knowing the full extent of their capacities, their age also shows just how scarce and valuable they are.