Dormant Stars
What is a dormant star in Old Light?
A dormant star is a star system nobody owns. Most of the galaxy is dormant: the generator decides where stars exist when the galaxy is created, and a system stays dormant until an empire claims it. They are part of the map rather than the remains of an empire.
A dormant star is a star system nobody owns. Most of the galaxy is dormant, and any empire can claim one, including whoever is closest to it.
Where they come from
Dormant stars are part of the map rather than the remains of an empire. The galaxy generator decides where stars exist when the galaxy is created, and a star stays dormant until an empire claims it. No event turns a rival's system back into one.
The generator only fills space near activity: it places stars around each player's starting position, and every owned system keeps a small pocket of stars alive around itself, so a region you conquer does not go blank when its original settlers are gone. That pocket reaches 2 hexes, which is inside the 3 hexes a new claim has to keep from every owned star, so the ones your own systems light up are stars you can raid but never colonise.
Abandonment is the one indirect route back. When a small empire is reclaimed for inactivity, its systems are released and their coordinates go back to being unowned. A large abandoned empire does not do this. It is handed to the NPCs instead and keeps every system it held.
Spotting a dormant star
Dormant stars are drawn dimmer, with no empire border and none of the coloured rings an owned system carries. You can see the whole galaxy from the start, so every dormant star in it is visible whether or not anyone has been near it.
Click one and the info panel names it Dormant Star with its owner shown as Dormant. The action button reads Attack rather than Send fleet, because the outlaws holding the star will resist whatever you arrive with.
Sending a fleet to a dormant star
What a fleet does when it lands depends on what you loaded it with.
A fleet carrying a Vanguard is colonising. The star resists, and the full rules are on the Capturing page.
Marauders or Sentinels without a vanguard raid the star for salvage instead.
Probes carry no cargo, so a probe-only fleet comes home empty.
Other people want them too
NPC empires colonise dormant stars on the same terms you do, including the spacing rule, so the good ones next to your border will not stay open indefinitely.
Raiding inside someone's borders is visible to them. If a dormant star sits inside an empire's projected territory, a successful raid there tells that empire who did it and where it happened, though not what you took or where you flew in from.
The universe is a pretty big place. If it's just us, seems like an awful waste of space.
Common questions
How do I take a dormant star?
Send a fleet carrying at least one Vanguard. The star resists with hostility, and driving that to zero claims it. A new claim also has to sit at least 3 hexes from every star that is already owned, yours or anyone else's.
What happens if I send a fleet without a Vanguard?
Marauders and Sentinels raid the outlaws holding the star and haul salvage back to your depot, so the trip is not wasted. Probes carry no cargo, so a probe-only fleet comes home empty.
Can other empires take the dormant stars near me?
Yes. NPC empires colonise them on the same terms you do, including the spacing rule, so the good systems next to your border will not stay open indefinitely.
