Development of Project Daybreak

From Halo: Daybreak

This page covers the development of Project Daybreak, up until now and in the future. Ongoing projects to focused on the development of specific parts of the Daybreak Continuum are also listed here.

The project's development is loosely split here loosely into phases (the first two retroactively). Each of these phases represents a major stage in the development of the project, and is defined by the primary milestones and/or overarching goals of that phase. On the high level, the phases beginning with Phase 2 are organized to correspond to the major in-universe epochs of the Daybreak Continuum following the Human-Covenant War. However, since they deal with future development that is still some time away, the exact timing and nature of the mentioned plot beats (or plot beats that might only come up later) is approximate and cannot be entirely predicted this far ahead. Additionally, the plot beats and ideas associated with each phase merely indicate some of the main focal points of those phases; there will always be development happening across the entire timeline regardless of the ongoing phase.

Phase 1 (2016-2019)[edit | edit source]

Project Daybreak first emerged as an aggregate of miscellaneous fanon ideas collected over the years. For the creators' personal motivations for the project, see the write-ups at Tacitus and Quirel.

The most notable output of this era were various astrographic mapping efforts, the basis of the Covenant's political makeup and the overall broad strokes of our version of the postwar setup. In this phase, the confluence of Not All Who Wander and Daybreak became official and the project was established on the SpaceBattles forums after a brief stint on the now-defunct Archive Installation forums.

Major developments

Phase 2: Schism and Solace (2020-ONGOING)[edit | edit source]

In-universe, Phase 2 has been marked by continued development of both the post-war era and the setting overall, including the emergence of more detailed ideas for the Interplanetary Wars. Out of universe, it has seen an increase of interest in the project and a steady growth of its contributor base. The overall goal of this phase is to satisfactorily chart the universe's course from 2552 to the 2580s, setting the stage for the next major event.

This phase remains in progress. Once done, we should have a good picture of what happens in the setting until 2580 and a fairly solid roadmap for the future after that. Hopefully, we'll also have the wiki situation (e.g. possible migration) figured out by that point, along with most of the wiki's contributor guides set up to make the Daybreak Continuum more accessible for new readers and contributors.

High-level meta/wiki setup
  • Possible wiki migration
  • Finish setting up the wiki (e.g. better introductions & main page, finish adding staple articles & templates), pave the way for more potential contributors in the future.
  • Timeline setup
  • Pages for most of the important subjects like locations, events, characters, concepts, etc.
Worldbuilding and narrative development
  • Finish figuring out the politics of the Concord of Reconciliation and its major sub-entities + major figures in the post-war scene
  • Definitively establish other major post-Covenant factions at this time (2552-2580), what they want + their development over the decades and rough ideas for their future.
    • The True Communion
    • Factions' diverging tech bases in more concrete terms!
    • Banished as a later development
    • Future of the Strewn Shore (ersatz High Charity + worldships?) & Via Casilina Community and Sagittarius colonies
    • Beginnings of a larger technocrat splinter polity
    • Possible rising border tensions with Covenant outliers and ulterior civs?
  • Blue Team & Halsey plot. Outline what the GoO crew encounters in the shield world and how and when exactly they escape + what happens with Halsey. Surviving Gammas & Blue Team's subsequent activities; Gamma missions; Incorporation of Ferrets & Veta Lopis and the Gao conflict? Other S-IIIs and SCPO Mendez.
  • Define the post-war UEG, Phoenix Initiative and colonies' politics better - what are the degrees of cooperation within the PI. What about the major political splits and major points of contention, like the extent of alien cooperation - isolationism vs. integration. Political movements like revanchists and influence even within the UNSC. ONI's shenanigans - interference with post-Covenant warlords near the Human Sphere, propaganda reversal from demonizing the Covenant to pro-cooperation (+excesses the other way by fringe movements). How does this look and feel from the civilian perspective?
    • The colonies' governments-in-exile and their status after the war
    • Where exactly is the UEG's capital? South America (Especially if founded symbolically on a Rainforest Wars battleground; possibly even a new city) - Geneva - Australia - New York (Predictable but boring)
  • Define the timeline and nature of the UNSC's post-war modernization initiatives (new ships, naval weapons, defenses, gear, etc) and the changes in UNSC doctrine to fit the post-war era. (+Human technological development)
  • The HOPLITE program
  • The rise of augmentations within both the UNSC and the private sector
  • Colonel James Ackerson's activities; Delta Company, TITAN-II & the search for Cole
  • The Assembly's activities
  • The ANVIL Initiative
  • Minor Flood outbreaks & scale and extent? (possibly not plot-relevant yet)
  • Relevance of the Gryunjalla? (possibly not yet)
  • OUROBOROS Directive & continued relevance. War-era colonial diaspora fleets / arks; covert or semi-covert efforts to settle humans further out out of fears of a Covenant resurgence?
  • Outline of other galactic societies / Ulteria, namely ones the Covenant knew about.
  • Outline of Covenant history/named ages (timeline)
  • Not All Who Wander part 2: The return to the Holy Ecumene.
Ongoing projects

Projects are listed in descending order of priority.

  • Projects/Post-War Era - Creating a basic overview of Daybreak's version of the post-Covenant War situation: Who are the key players and where, what are their motives and goals, and what are their relative strengths and weaknesses.
  • Projects/UNSC Fleet Modernization - Closely related to the post-war era project, this one is a more in-depth look at the modernization of the UNSC Navy in the post-war decades, along with the technologies used.
  • Projects/Interplanetary Wars - A kind of side project covering everything on early human history, from the 21st century to the Interplanetary Wars in the 22nd, including the political, military and technological underpinnings of that era. Due to its many differences from mainstream Halo, can be treated as almost its own sub-setting.
Ongoing Stories

Stories are listed in descending order of priority, with published stories first, stories in the outline and writing stages second, and planned or projected stories last.

Phase 3: The Sundering Age (2022?-)[edit | edit source]

C. 2580-2700 Phase 3 will be very much focused on the next major conflict in the setting, involving the Blooding Years, the seizure of the Kenyan Excession and Mankind's scattering throughout space in the New Diaspora, as well as associated conflicts. Much of the Orion Arm will remain in a decentralized state, with numerous smaller conflicts being fought among factions. Both human and Covenant factions continue to diverge and diversify, which will be the main legacy of this era going forward: a cultural, political and technological scattering that is very much a continuity of the Great Schism. This is where Daybreak starts to diverge more radically from the familiar Halo comfort zone and becoming even more of its own thing.

Meta-level development
  • Better marketing & branding, increased online presence and evolving the Discord & contributor base
Themes, ideas and plot beats
  • The Excession Conflict & Siege of Earth. Beginnings of the Scattering of Mankind & the Diasporic Age
    • Jul 'Mdama (?): his persona, his grievances and arc; his faction, their power level and ties/allies and the circumstances that enable his rise to preeminence.
    • Political situation in the human sphere and crossing regions post-invasion; other warlords and conflicts. Human cultural, social and political splintering. Human/post-Covenant mixed polities & human vassal-worlds. Human worlds with feudal/aristocratic influences?
    • UNSC mobility increase and spinward flight. Slow waning of the human core sphere with focal shift toward Serpens-Cassiopeia. Centers of civilization in Pleiades, Cygnus Verge, Coalsack, Madara/Sagittarius, Serpens-Aquila rift.
      • UNSC societal changes. Mandatory military service in response to increased external pressure?
      • Phoenix Initiative and planned prefab societies
      • Ongoing DANDELION SEED protocols
      • Corporate-run zones: Pleiades Economic Community & Far Shore, Tempest Crossing colonies?
      • Mobile habitats? Former Ouroboros arks? Continued post-war contingency plans for Sol's evacuation? Megaships from Covenant sources?
    • First generation born after the war are now adults; Phoenix Initiative "prefab generation"
    • Final breakdown of the UNSC's monopoly over humanity. UNSC civil conflict, split with the Phoenix Initiative? UNSC becomes more Terran Federation-like and conventional & "for humans by humans", while the PI becomes more experimental with stuff like AI integration into society, possibly more autonomy on member worlds' defense forces over a centralized military, etc. (2590s/early 2600s). Over decades and centuries, these diverge between the "UNSC Humanity" which holds onto their rugged and angular "Big Green Style", and the sleeker "Phoenix Humanity" which is more eclectic and colorful yet still distinctly human. (Exact names of the final factions TBD.) Various smaller societies, like the Via Casilina Community's/Strewn Shore remnants' successor state or the handful of ex-Covenant protectorate-worlds, become even more experimental with the integration of Covenant technology and some of their aesthetics. The breakup is likely not a full-blown civil war because both sides understand humanity still can't afford one, but more like the two slowly drifting further and further apart.
    • Retake of Earth & strip-mining crisis. Ultimate fate of the Excession; continued presence or asset denial?
  • UNSC technological advances; opening the floodgates on the deluge of tech that's been in development since the war.
    • Continuing AI development (next-gen and significant lifespan extension - 49 years? Slipspace processing matrix? Eliminating technological rampancy?), percolation of advanced cybernetics, augmentation and cloning across society (commercial interests).
    • Mech suits
    • Phoenix Initiative security robots
    • Spartan-IV project and the next MJOLNIR
    • AI/networks and tech role in new government types. More involved Assembly role due to Diaspora? Survival of the Assembly?
      • Or no single AI polity but unshackled AIs become effectively independently operating entities with ships, etc?
    • Short-range teleportation? Better antigravity tech.
    • Rise of contrast between low-tech/high-tech colonies
  • Concord & Covenant Sphere civil wars; new splits in the Concord
    • Post-Covenant regional conflicts with Ulterior civ(s) and/or former Outliers during time of tumult
      • Trailing side war with the Cix-Tu / Cix-Tu conquest of Covenant worlds?
      • Joint Concord/UNSC campaign against Jul's allies/power base within the Covenant Sphere?
    • Ex-Covenant tech wars
    • Concord's evolution and further crystallization of its mission. Emergence of opposed polity/polities and cold war. The Arbiter's succession and new generations.
  • Increased crystallization of post-Covenant factions. New societal experiments.
    • New Prophet-led faction?
    • Rising prominence of the Ecumenic Mercatoria & commercial interests in the Holy Ecumene
    • Larger Ien-Djyrn (or other Solipsist) faction
    • Full-on radical apostate polity
    • Radical techno-polity (cyborgs? biosculpting?)
    • Larger Unggoy & Yanme'e-led polities?
    • Brutopian rebound - version of the Banished (Inner Corelight Reefs and beyond?)
  • Janjur Qom's healthy San'Shyuum & Stoic descendant civilization(s) enter the picture again?
  • Quest for the Ark portals & Restoration of the Ark
    • Exploration of the Orion Complex & discovery of Maethrillian? (Plot relevance to Ark portals?)
    • Eventual recovery of the Ark
  • More info on the Forerunners & Forerunner origins; conclusive answer to the Reclaimer question
  • The Spirit of Fire? (only if relevant)
  • Space Western feel
  • Return of the Covenant galactic circumnavigation fleet + more info on the state of other galactic civilizations. Upheaval across the Orion Arm.
  • Discovery of Installation 03? (occupation/involvement by a non-Covenant civ?) (could be later)

Phase 4: Truth and Reconciliation[edit | edit source]

C. 2700s-

It should be noted that from here on out, everything is very tentative.

Themes, ideas and plot beats
  • Resources of the Ark become available
  • Clarity on the fate of the surviving Forerunners?
  • Age of galactic exploration & reunification of scattered groups
  • Transhuman group(s); posthumans, cyborgs, bions (also aliens?)
  • Independent post-smart AI ships with biomechanoid avatars roam free across space
  • Other Halo ring locations - retrieved from the Ark? Discovery of at least one-two more rings.
  • Enduring UNSC - classical vs/post-UNSC splinter groups?
  • Beginnings of the next big Orion Arm/local galactic polity
  • Encounters with other galactic civilizations
    • Post-Optem / Jehioi remnants elsewhere in the galaxy?
    • Benefactor/Nomad war as next big galactic peer conflict for UNSC/Concord. Reveal of Forerunner backup sanctuary populations?
    • Hominid and/or Neanderthal sanctuaries in other spiral arms. Paleolithic hominids + Neanderthal proto-civilization and later integration to human population (or involved with Benefactors)?
  • Picking up the Master Chief and Cortana/Mendicant Bias plotline (when)? Chief's odyssey and later encounters with humanity.
  • Return of Onyx and Halsey + continued exploration of Onyx
  • Cortana Letters' dark sun?
  • Trih Xeem?

Far future[edit | edit source]

Themes, ideas and plot beats
  • The Golden Millennium
  • Descendants of Orion Arm metaciv gradually move on to the Tier 1/world builder stage
  • Shifting tides of population, old abandoned colonies becoming new frontiers in a used future.
  • Monastic orders of philosophers and historians seeking out Earth.
  • Other Local Group civilizations & outlying galactic civs
  • Sleeping giants?
  • The Flood & other galaxies
    • Forerunner survivors and intergalactic Flood megawar?
  • Ultimate fate of the Universe & the Real Great Journey
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