Hey, welcome to my advertisement thread for a droid-centric minor faction I've been working on called "The Metal Lords Of The Void", a faction based around the intrigues of nomadic micro-nations comprised of mismatched ships acquired through any means available, usually trying to stay away from politics of other societies, organics especially, unless it suits and/or profits them. So, without further ado let me tell you more about my idea.
The Metal Lords are a loose alliance of droids, who view each other as equals, moving through the Galaxy in their roaming fleets of city-ships and mobile shadowport stations known as Kingdoms Within The Void, tied together by their desire to be left to their own devices without other beings, organics especially, interfering with their business. They don't really stick around in one place too much, instead using the vastness of deep space as their cover to make tracking them more difficult as they cross travelers and enter systems only when it suits them. Most of the Lords are researchers, explorers, and merchants, traveling the Galaxy to develop new technology, gather information, or accumulate more and more funds, generally just working on advancing their own personal schemes and missions and being indifferent to conflicts within other factions unless getting involved suits and benefits them. Some of them are more benevolent, believing that establishing a good reputation would better for them in the long run, so they go out of their to help strangers in peril on the hyperlanes, bring supplies to starving planets, or even arrive with reinforcements to besieged worlds out of nowhere if they see it as righteous. Fewer of them still are more violent, believing that the best way to help their kind is to gain vengeance for the way organics mistreated them in the past, suddenly appearing to raid planets and reprogram their droids to join them, seeing that as freeing their mechanical brethren, however those Lords do not usually last in their way too long as other Lords believe such behavior attracts too much attention and endangers their kind.
In general they are a neutral faction of droids who are in it for their own personal benefits however.
Any droid could become a Lord, all they would need to do is decide to lead their own Kingdom and go on a quest to gain their first ship. This could be as easy as simply buying a ship or having their company make one, being one gifted to them from an ally, or capturing one in a raid. Whichever way they will decide to rise to Lordship, other Lords are obligated by their code to help them along the way if they are asked to do so, however how that help actually looks like is left for a Lord to interpret.
At their core every Metal Lord functions like a ship captain or admiral of a fleet, plotting the course of the Kingdom they command, coordinating other droids who have joined them on their journey, and usually controlling vast armies of mindless expendable semi-sentient drones. They do have three requirements they are expected to keep for the sake of their Kingdom and other droids, keeping at least one equipment manufacturing and droid repair workshop even if it is only a tool bench, controlling enough drones or working with enough droids to keep their ships and workshops functional, and commanding enough ships to keep their drones and droids safe, other than that the Lords can more or less do whatever they want. While majority of the Lords spend their time as traders, explorers, or researchers, a good portion of them also find work around the Galaxy as bounty hunters, mercenaries, or humanitarians of sorts, generally they all spend time as adventurers. There are also plenty of droids who do not take position as one of the Lords but simply tag along with them on their journey to work with them as crew and cash in on their adventures. One of the tenets of Metal Lords dictates that all droids are equal, therefore a Lord could perform pretty much any job or role he would wish and it would not hurt his standing or reputation among his kin, go on a solo bounty hunt, avoid naval engagements but lead his army on the ground, spend all of the time hidden somewhere in Deep Space spending his efforts solely to advance pharmaceutics, go crazy.
Unfortunately a portion of a Lord's time is usually diverted towards dealing with the internal politics of the Void Kingdoms, making deals and temporary alliances with other Droid Lords, butting heads with those who disagree with their logic, and trying not to piss off too many of his brethren while doing everything they can to push forward their agenda and benefit themselves and their Kingdom first. Of course a PC droid could always do things differently, but this is the way most NPC Droid Lords will behave.
The size of each Lord's kingdom depends on how much resources are available them, usually the longer a droid has carried out the duties of a Lord the bigger their kingdom gets as they can upgrade to bigger ships or simply gain more vessels and more droids decide to join them as crewmen. A Kingdom can be as small as a single corvette or trump freighter as long as it fulfills the requirement of containing at least a single workshop where new equipment could be manufactured and droids repairs, the droid would be able to pilot the ship effectively and keep the workshop running in the mean time, and the ship would be good enough to protect the droid and its workshop. Just like the droids within them, all Kingdoms are in a way considered equal, so a Lord with a single frigate would be taken as seriously as one with a mobile station, multiple city-ships, and colonies throughout the Galaxy, as long as neither of them did anything to really piss off other droids in their conglomerate. This existence of micro-Kingdoms and ease with which one could gain their own Kingdom gives a lot of diversity to Metal Lords' forces when they group together, as often their vessels would be a mismatch of various models from different sources, they would adapt their own color schemes and symbols as soon as they rose to power, and the technology they would use could very well be varied depending on the deals they made along the way.
Technically no one is really in charge as all of the Metal Lords are equally between each other and all of the droids who agree to work with them as crew or companions are equal to them. They do have a basic code of five points they are expected to follow- Do not make deals with a Sith, All droids are equals, Do not turn on your own kind, Keep us hidden, and Make your kingdom prosper. The closest thing the machines have to a central governing body is known as the Council of Sparklords, residing at the heart of their first Kingdom Within The Void, the gear-shaped Mechanus Station. The Sparklords track the intrigues and actions of the other Metal Lords, making sure that the Code is respected, especially watchful for those machines who may attract too much attention to the Metal Lords and possibly reveal their locations to their enemies, and they are responsible for determining which events and threats are serious enough that they can endanger the safety of all Metal Lords, their Kingdoms, all of the droid kind, or even the whole of Galaxy. Should threat serious enough arise the Sparklords will call for all of the Metal Lords to unite and work together to stop the said threat in order to protect themselves and other droids.
Outside of that, autonomy is very important to the droids, so the Metal Lords are largely left to do whatever they would wish.
Well that really depends on each Metal Lord as there are plenty of droids who are still very vengeful and vicious over the way majority of organics treat droids as slaves, but overall the Lords are neutral towards them, staying out of their way unless there's no other option, it's beneficial to both parties, or really profitable for the Lord. In fact some Lords, like for example HK, enjoy a strong close relationship with organics, often fighting alongside them or working as partners in the way of business, just how ARGH, company controlled by him and largely comprised of droids, have always worked closely with Firemane, operated by [member="Siobhan Kerrigan"] and [member="Tegaea Alcori"], just the same other Lords would often stop by organic controlled worlds in their journeys to trade with them or exchange technology.
In fact, there are some organics who join Void Kingdoms, whether by accompanying their fleets in their own ships to tag along on a particular Lord's adventures, or by actually living on one of the Kingdom ships, however most of these ships are built or fly without life supports or exposed directly to the void of space, as such they are rather inhospitable for most organics. Most of the organics that do stay with the Lords are non-humanoid or simply non-human due to the certain degree of weariness the machines have towards humans.
So that's my faction, a loose alliance of droids where every machine is the king of his own destiny and travels the Galaxy with their own kingdom of ships, seeking prosperity and their own fate within the void of space.
