INTRODUCTION TO THE ALLIANCE ATLAS

  The Alliance is the newest major galactic organization. The story of the Alliance began in 3230, in Alioth. The Federation and Empire could not decide who should own this high-population system, and bitter fighting between the two galactic powers was beginning to get irksome to the population, who didn't really want to be ruled by either of them. When seven billion people got annoyed at being constantly in the crossfire over two alternatives they didn't actually want, things tend to happen. The population literally went to arms, and in a massed insurrection, repelled both sets of invaders. Quickly, the new Government of Alioth realised it needed help if it was to remain free of both the Federation and Empire for much longer. Nearby systems had been watching the melee with great interest, and when the new Alioth leadership proposed an Alliance of Independent Systems, fourteen nearby systems immediately joined recognising that it would ensure their future remained free of both the Empire and Federation. It didn't take long for other systems to realise that this was a good thing, and between 3230 and 3250, a further seven systems joined the Alliance. The most recent member is Phekda, which joined in Feburary of this year.

USING THE ALLIANCE ATLAS

  Simply select the map or the system you're interested in from the left. A word about the maps: the maps are not designed for space navigation (they don't show the depth of the galaxy). Like the old Mercator projection, they are just a convenient way of showing the relative locations of systems within the Alliance. They are laid out as an observer would see the systems from a point approximately 100 light years "above" our galaxy. The starmaps only show Alliance systems for clarity. Veliaze and Phekda are shown in insets to prevent the map from being an awkward shape. The map is also an imagemap - you can just click on the system on the map to bring up its details to save you from searching for it in the System List on the left.

  Unless you have a very large display, you'll need to scroll around the maps. For convenience, information about the map is shown in the top frame in which you can scroll to the map's key to keep it displayed. The map itself will be shown in the lower frame.

  To exit the Atlas, use the scrollbar on the left to go to the bottom of the "Systems" list, and click on "Back to TSCA".