The Factions of The Rig: Expanded Profiles
The political stability of The Rig is an illusion held together by the absolute rule of the Bosun and the uneasy balance of power between five core factions. Each group operates as a specialized arm of a larger Wasteland Society, vying for control over the ocean's resources, scientific secrets, and the flow of trade.
The Dock Masters (The Bosun’s hand)
The Dock Masters are the visible manifestation of the Bosun’s will and the ultimate enforcers of order. They control all points of entry and exit to the Rig, managing the movement of ships and cargo, and levying the crucial docking and transit fees that fund the settlement. Their presence is cold, professional, and ubiquitous, utilizing advanced, non-lethal restraining tools and overwhelming force to settle disputes immediately.
Every Dock Master is sworn to the Bosun through oath and Iron Pact Debts, which means they adhere strictly to a code of detached, calculated justice. They are not interested in the morality of a situation, but only in the violation of the Laws. This impartial rigidity makes them feared and respected; they treat a Black Tide Hunter and a Wells Acolyte with the same swift, clinical severity. Their methods include summary punishment via public exile into the freezing water for any violation of the "No Blood on the Deck" rule.
While they are the Bosun's shield, they face constant tension. They must aggressively tax the neutral ships like the Kharon, manage the constant flow of Wine Dark Enterprises resources, and deal with the territorial swagger of The Skip Jacks. When the Dock Masters face resistance to great or a citizens case requires more than the Dock Masters own eyes to solve. The Dock Masters will request the Assistance of the…
Jury of the Mast (Arbiters of the Bond)
In the past The Bosun and his Dock Masters have been forced to admit several hurtful truths.
First and most important is that they are above all else concerned with the survival of The Rig and will grind and grit required to see that happen regardless of cost. Second, biased overseers were the cause of many bouts of near mutiny of the rig in years past. Finally, that their ability to enforce their will stops at the edge of the dock. This unsustainable system almost saw the Rig go under, until the first Arbiter arrived. This first justice seeking captain was rumored to be a famous pirate hunter. The Bosun and this Arbiter met and a deal was struck. The Jury of the Mast (Consisting of every Arbiter aboard) is called upon by Dock Master and citizen alike to do what the Dock Masters can not, to seek justice for and beyond The Rig. What they are called for varies by the tide. A crew may ask them to save them from an exploitative captain holding them in servitude with low wages or threats, The Dock Masters may find a crime scene well beyond their talents and seek an investigator from among the Jury. The Bosun may ask them to seek out pirates and smugglers at sea and bring them in or send them down. Service on the Jury is compulsory for Arbiters visiting The Rig but they are granted free access otherwise and are exempt from the “No Blood on the Deck” law when pursuing any known criminal they may be hunting from the land.
N.O.A. (New Ocean Acolytes - Wells Society)
The New Ocean Acolytes are the Rig’s intellectual powerhouse, a dedicated subsidiary of the Wells Society. Their singular purpose is harnessing the deep ocean as a living laboratory. They occupy highly sanitized, sealed platforms dedicated to distillation, biological analysis, and the reconstruction of pre-fall technology recovered from sunken vessels. They view The Rig not as a safe port, but as a temporary staging post for the advancement of human knowledge.
Their core research is centered on two urgent goals: finding a permanent biological countermeasure to the rising epidemic of abyssal Horrors, and developing deep-sea habitation tech. This mission constantly thrusts them into conflict. They desperately need the same specialized deep-diving equipment favored by Wine Dark Enterprises for resource extraction, leading to intense equipment wars. Furthermore, they view the brutal hunting practices of The Skip Jacks as a destructive loss of irreplaceable scientific specimens.
Publicly, N.O.A. members are often viewed as sheltered, aloof intellectuals, more concerned with microscopic samples than the immediate threat of a Bad Brain raid. However, their research is vital; without their water distillation process and their search for biological salvation, The Rig would not survive. This critical necessity gives them influence, but their general lack of combat training means they rely on wealth (funneled from the Wells Society) and political influence to protect their vital labs.
The Skip Jacks (Black Tide Hunter Mercenaries)
The Skip Jacks are a company of Black Tide Hunter Mercenaries—professional sailors and leviathan hunters who thrive on danger and profit. They are the Rig’s primary source of defense and its most consistent harvesters of high-value monster materials. Their crews are scarred, boastful, and masters of their trade, capable of tracking, fighting, and field-dressing a mutated sea creature the size of a ferry.
Their lives revolve around the pursuit of the Bosun’s Hunting Rites. These contracts are extremely lucrative, trading in monster parts used for fuel, rare poisons, and exotic materials. Their swagger is backed up by skill, and they spend their nights in WDE grog houses, telling loud, often exaggerated tales of their battles. They are constantly looking for their next contract, which can come from the Dock Masters for escort duty against rumored sightings of the Red Flag Fleet, or from N.O.A. for specific (but dead) samples.
The Skip Jacks are aggressively territorial, often clashing with N.O.A. over prime hunting zones and fighting WDE for control over the gambling dens where they spend and potentially lose their fortunes. They are the strongest combat group on the platform, possessing the firepower and expertise necessary to keep the truly colossal terrors of the deep from destroying the Rig, making them too valuable to police too strictly.
Wine Dark Enterprises (WDE - Misunderstood Altruists)
Wine Dark Enterprises is the Rig's primary source of both luxury and essential medical care, led by the formidable married couple and members of The Ossuary Society, Professor Pluto Hade and Doctor Persephone Hade. Professor Pluto Hade handles the highly visible side of the operation: the glittering casinos, upscale grog houses, and general leisure facilities located in The Rig. These profitable and often eccentric ventures generate the immense wealth necessary to keep the entire enterprise afloat and functional. They are the flamboyant, resented and loved in equal measure , public face of WDE.
The true purpose of WDE's wealth is Doctor Persephone Hade's state-of-the-art hospital and research ship, “The Euridice”, which is funded entirely by her husband’s entertainment profits. Doctor Persephone is dedicated to developing complex, life-saving biological cures and preventative treatments for the Rig's inhabitants, particularly against the unique ailments and mutations stemming from the deep-sea environment. Her deep-sea salvage operations, therefore, are not focused on common resources, but on retrieving specific, highly mutated biological samples from the deep to fuel her revolutionary/controversial research. “The Euridice” is a marvel in its own right, the hospital overseen meticulously by Dr. Hade, is a trinity of repurposed cargo ships, their original function abandoned for a desperate new one. To achieve their stable, vertical orientation, their forward compartments were intentionally flooded, plunging the bows deep into the cold water. The result is three colossal, barnacle-encrusted hulls sitting straight up, bobbing gently in the tide like rusty, makeshift skyscrapers.
This dizzying architectural choice means the hospital is built across many thin, stacked layers, each corresponding to an old cargo deck or superstructure floor, now connected by precarious, windswept chains and swaying metal walkways. Getting from the trauma bay to say the research annex requires a steady head and faith in the Bosun's welders. High above the water, where the original sterns once housed their rudder controls, the massive propellers have been locked and converted into slow-grinding wind turbines, providing the volatile energy needed to power the hospital’s life-support systems and Persephone’s fabled deep-sea research labs.
The facility’s verticality is a constant, physical reminder of the Hade's dual nature. The lower decks—closer to the Rig’s base are dedicated to clinical care: the triage, recovery wards, and basic surgeries, humming with the sound of desperate healing. Yet, the highest and lowest decks, far removed from the public eye, hold the sealed research annexes where Doctor Persephone conducts her work, dealing in rare, deep-sea biological components and utilizing methods funded by Professor Pluto’s vast casino profits. The entire structure is a testament to questionable means funding essential survival, perpetually swaying in the grip of the ocean and the whims of the wind.
This necessary, but complex, structure makes WDE the most misunderstood faction. The Rig community resents the blatant excess and wealth generated by Professor Pluto's casinos while simultaneously depending entirely on Doctor Persephone's hospital. WDE is often the target of gossip and accusations of exploitation, as many suspect that Hade's questionable methods and vast fortunes must come at a hidden price. They remain essential, however, meaning any attack on WDE's infrastructure, be it Pluto's casinos or Persephone's research, is a threat to the Rig's immediate survival.
And last but not… well actually also least
The Coyne Company
The Coyne Company is the smallest and newest faction, operating solely as the Rig's financial custodian. They are the only legitimate source of Coyne scrip, the universally accepted paper currency backed by the Bosun's word and the Rig's distilled water reserves. They manage the exchange rates for all goods and services, acting as the neutral, bureaucratic nerve center of the economy.
Despite their lack of fighting strength, they possess tremendous passive power. Every transaction, trade fee, and debt must pass through their ledger. Their vulnerability is matched only by their indispensability; if The Coyne Company were to be compromised, the entire economy would collapse, reducing The Rig to a chaotic barter system overnight. They maintain armed guards, but their primary defense is the collective knowledge that their collapse benefits no one.
The company is constantly courted, bribed, and threatened by all other factions. WDE seeks favorable exchange rates to launder their profits. N.O.A. seeks stable markets for rare component imports. The Dock Masters use them to calculate tariffs. Ultimately, The Coyne Company is a tool of the Bosun, and its officers are fiercely loyal (or fiercely afraid) of the Bosun’s absolute authority over the monetary policy of the Rig.
