| Headquarters: | Lemnos Station, Sol |
| Motto: | Our Chariots Carry Beyond Olympus |
| Founded: | 2100s |
| Major Sectors: | Ship Hulls, Robots, General Equipment |
| Minor Sectors: | Material Processing, Mining, Prospecting |
| Affiliates: | |
| Rivals: | Charon Shipping Services |
There is no greater display of the raw industrial power of humanity than in Hephaestus Industries. The mega-corporation provides almost two-thirds of all galactic equipment in terms of robots, ship hulls, vehicles, and other finished goods. The fervorous and almost manic scale of fabrication is often credited as the primary reason the United Nations Interstellar Protectorate, and humanity as a whole, was able to explosively expand through the galaxy. The biggest monument to their capabilities remains the small asteroid in orbit of its much larger Lemnos Station HQ; the asteroid being all that remains of the former planet Mercury’s core after a single century of strip-mining and fabrication.
Playable Departments
On the ship their playable departments are Engineering and Operations.
Their involvement in engineering is almost mandatory for many ships and stations. This is especially true for the New Horizon ship, as it flies a No. 3 Hephaestus-Class Hull, and the mega-corporation contributed to retrofitting what modern infrastructure is on the ship at time of play.
Hephaestus-Class Hulls
There are four confirmed generations of Heph-Class hulls, with a new model released roughly every century and completely revolutionizing space travel when it does.
- The No. 1 hulls were the first general-purpose interstellar-capable ship created by humanity in the 2180’s. It was much smaller than modern ships and lacked the ability to be customized by the user beyond cosmetics, but boasted a record of being the safest transport available at the time.
- The No. 2 hulls appeared in 2300 and featured greater customization, life-support efficiency, and was the first generation to use interstellar-capable plasteel, which previously was used only for reinforcing terrestrial buildings. The hull is still common to spacers and shaft miners on the periphery of known space as no No. 2 hull has ever been known to break down under stress any less than enemy fire, and what damage the hull does take can be quickly repaired from common materials.
- No. 3 hulls were launched in 2400 as the cutting edge of spaceflight. Design changes and a refinement of plasteel production allowed ships to skyrocket in size. This is the first generation of interstellar ships indefinitely holding dozens or even hundreds of passengers at a time. Every single floor tile, pipe, and piece of wiring could be fully customized while in the field without the ship having to dock for a retrofit. This radical change meant No. 3 hulls were on the forefront of exploring the frontier, with the ships out in wild space for months at a time, able to do maintenance in the field with materials present in most common asteroids. The New Horizon ship is one of the earliest of the No. 3 hulls. This hull type remains the most ubiquitous across human space, with proliferation even among alien powers.
- No. 4 hulls instantly made all other hulls obsolete when it hit space in 2505. No. 4 boasts an even greater hull strength than earlier ships, and the ability to fly through the atmosphere of a planet or the crushing depths of a water world without losing hull cohesion. Part of this comes from the novel energy shielding that this generation of hulls use. They also incorporate on-board manufacturing and fabrication equipment, turning every ship with a No. 4 hull into a mobile factory that can even, with enough time and raw materials, fabricate an entire other vessel. This has created a new era of spaceflight where many are wondering if “spaceports” may be on their way out, as more and more No. 4 hulls - while being exorbitantly expensive - slowly proliferate through known space.
- No. 5 hulls remain entirely within the realm of the hypothetical, but unsubstantiated sources have periodically claimed Hephaestus is sketching preliminary concepts for a new generation of hull to be released in the early- or mid- 2600’s. Very little information exists about its capabilities. The only rumor of substance known at time of writing is that a laboratory test allegedly proves the new material used for a No. 5 hull is impervious to all known forms of energy and physical damage. There is a frenetic and fervorous scale of corporate espionage as other mega-corporations attempt to steal any scrap of knowledge of the No. 5 hull types that they can.
Hephaestus Robotics
The ubiquity of robots in stellar craft is partially owed to the influence of Hephaestus. Its robots - also known as ‘borgs’ colloquially - are renowned for their relative ease of fabrication and repair. Prior to Hephaestus’ break-out in the field in the 2XXX’s, robotics were expensive, high maintenance, and could only be repaired in specialized robotics bays. The introduction of the Heph-Brand General Purpose Robot completely upended hundreds of years of conventional wisdom in robotics. Hephaestus borgs began their life as a generic template that could be customized to fit into any necessary job from engineering to medical.
Time has allowed other mega-corporations with a stake in robotics to catch up to Hephaestus’ explosive arrival in the field, but the new conventional wisdom is still built on Hephaestus’ original idea. Now robots tend to arrive at a customer as a factory default template robot, but can rapidly re-assemble itself to fit into any necessary role and then operate immediately. These configurations can then be changed by a machinist, so that an engineering borg may be reconfigured into a medical, service, janitorial, or many other types of borg.
Modern robots also remain relatively simple to repair for engineers, with most maintenance needing only re-wiring, or a welding patch job. However one area where this philosophy fails is with the Man-Machine-Interfaces themselves; the incredibly complex and delicate devices and cyborg brains themselves remain exclusively within the field of specialized machinists, must to the chagrin of Hephaestus engineers.
Playing a Hephaestus Contractor
The stereotype of typical Hephaestus Engineers is that they’re a culture of down-to-earth, blue-collar workers when things are quiet and manic MacGyvers when their skills are needed. Hephaestus engineering training encourages quick, out-of-the-box solutions to engineering problems and a heavy emphasis on recycling to ensure its engineers are able to solve any problems with a Heph-class hull even if they’re light-years away from a port. However this stereotype is becoming outdated as a relic of the No. 3 era, as a new generation of Engineers have boarded ships like the New Horizon experienced with the new model of No. 4 hulls.
No. 4 hulls are so impervious to most damage that No. 4 era engineers, with plenty of downtime, are stereotyped as dry, bland, and worried about paperwork and procedure. No. 4 era Hephaestus Engineers often clash with No. 3 era engineers when they board older hulls like the New Horizon, where the old mindset remains.
Hephaestus contractors in Operations are often stereotyped like their engineering cousins; unfriendly to paperwork and proper procedures but as reliable as a No. 3 hull. They’re considered by many to be mavericks who don’t play by the rules but get results. A new generation of Operations personnel are, like the new generation of engineers, more aligned with "stuffy", "white-collar" attitudes.
Relationships
Zavodskoi Interstellar
The arch-rival of Hephaestus Industries across the galaxy. The tension has flared off and on over the centuries around Zavodskoi's alleged shady morals. The two mega-corporations also ruthlessly compete in the exosuit market, with Hephaestus' cheaper, customizable exo-suits struggling against Zavodskoi's sturdier constructions. Hephaestus also draws their arch-rival's ire through the creation of IPCs. Hephaestus has also tried unceasingly to break into the internal market of Dominia which Zavodskoi has fully monopolized. Hephaestus would like nothing more than to force Zavodskoi into bankruptcy by outproducing their rivals over-engineered, expensive toys.
Charon
Charon Shipping Services competes with Hephaestus in operations-based markets, and Charon freighters have many exclusive rights to transit cargo in lucrative shipping lanes. Hephaestus also resents the fact that their own products often have to be marked up as Charon charges shipping fees, which makes non-Hephaestus products competitive in the destination markets. Hephaestus also artificially maintains their superiority in IPC production through stifling Charon's ability to create Hephaestus licensed chassis, which frustrates Charon's attempts to become competitive in the IPC market.
NanoTrasen
NanoTrasen is not a direct competitor in many of Hephaestus' direct industries but the two corporations remain locked in a power struggle. Both the mega-corporations hold immense political sway across the United Interstellar Earth Protectorate. The ability for the mega-corporations to steamroll other powers of the galaxy has long relied on the backing of UNIP's immense political, economic, and military strength. The struggle for primacy between Hephaestus' Board and CEO has allowed NanoTrasen to peel off many of Hephaestus' former political allies and court others. The internal feuding had even allowed NanoTrasen to purchase broad contracts across Venus, which before was a full and unquestioned Hephaestus monopoly. An intense and bloody campaign of corporate espionage saw NanoTrasen's foothold flounder and the contracts dissolved, but the incident has continued to spook Hephaestus so severely that it made the Board and CEO temporarily come to terms to coordinate a more expanded campaign of corporate warfare.
Corporate Culture - "The Herasts"
The maverick, almost blue-collar culture of Hephaestus has been increasingly chafing against the new generation of engineers, management, and even customers. The shift came after the release of Heph-Class No. 3 Hulls in the 2400’s which cemented Hephaestus’ status as a mega-corporation. In the almost two-centuries since then, the newer generations were born and raised that are almost all influenced by Hephaestus being an unrivaled power in hull making, or only knew No. 3 hulls and beyond.
This has created a more closed, complacent culture especially among the newer No. 4 generation. This newer generation was dubbed the “Herasts” sardonically by former CEO Alice Aeson in the 2550s. It references the original myth of Hephaestus and his relationship with his estranged mother, who wanted him to return to Olympus only so he could make her shiny crafts without actually loving her son beyond his tools. They are also called "The Fours".
The conflict has been going on for a century now, and is primarily portrayed through the bitter power struggle between Hephaestus’ current CEO Titanius Aeson and the Board of Directors. The new CEO assumed the mantle after his mother’s death in the 2450’s, and has fought to continue the meritocratic, maverick culture of Hephaestus that was present before the No. 3 hulls were launched.
The closed culture represented by the Board wants to keep the mega-corporation neutral in all affairs, wanting to sell to anyone and everyone in the galaxy without any statement of morals or values. This closed culture also means employees who voice disagreement with corporate policy with ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking are punished, either explicitly or subtly. This is also present in the new generation of engineers being taught to follow the company line, and to strictly follow regulations and procedures.
The more open culture championed by Titanius Aeson is a continuation of the generations before No. 3 hulls, where engineers, miners, and employees were encouraged to think on their feet and firmly commit to their values. Former CEO Alice Aeson was famous for sticking to her guns and refusing to ‘cheat’ her customers, while also keeping the company on the ‘right path’ by doing the unthinkable: calling out oppressive or immoral policies from star nations, even friendly ones.
The biggest controversy within Hephaestus is a rumor (fervently denied at every step) that the alleged No. 5 hull will not be repairable ‘in the field’ and would need to dock at a Hephaestus proprietary shipyard. This would be a monumental shift that would affect space-faring powers across the galaxy. Many believe that the shadowy struggle behind this specific change is responsible for much espionage striking the mega-corporation lately, which sometimes pulls in outside actors.