Primary System Divisions

Established early in the design phase, the New Skies Initiative consists of separate, mutually cooperating machine systems, each designed to cover a set of related functions. These systems are properly dubbed Primary System Divisions, but are normally simply called divisions. Designed to interact with each other seamlessly, they together provide a way for the probes to cross the great void of space, land on a planet, and terraform it.

The Six Divisions — Non-Planetary

Though the probes will manufacture themselves, they cannot manufacture either of the two first divisions, which all come from the Earth System. These are known as Non-Planetary Primary System Divisions, a mouthful shortened to non-planetary divisions. As their name suggests, they activate in space, never landing, and thus are permitted to contain hazardous materials in their construction.

Founder: With their long, tubular chassis, Founders transport and protect the other machines through the long trek through space, then safely deposit their payloads into orbit or onto the surface. Though small by spacecraft standards, these dwarf all other machines by far. Their payloads make up only about 10% of their mass, an unavoidable result of their daunting task. The payloads, and by extension the whole Founders, are made as small as practical, minimizing the energy needed to accelerate them to cruising speed and back down again. However, each fleet of Founders still demands an unfathomably large amount of energy; a challenge even in the young space age. Each Founder is nearly identical, but their payloads are specialized. As a consequence of sacrifices made in size, each fleet contains more Founders than required in case of failures.

Quartic Orbiter: Officially known as Quartic Telecommunication Orbiters, these satellites relay communications across the target planet, as well as between the planet and deep space. Unlike Founders, which are consumed in the transport and deployment phase, Quartic Orbiters must endure for centuries. Further, though each fleet requires only one Quartic Orbiter, four are provided, the highest level of redundancy for Founder payloads.

The Six Divisions — Planetary

The other four divisions are Planetary Primary System Divisions, or just planetary divisions. They activate only on the planet's surface, traveling through space dormant. They can manufacture themselves save for special subtypes of each division, called primordial variants. Founders carry only these primordial variants, designed specifically for this purpose, across the void; upon landing, primordial variants will create the rest of their division. Given their importance and comparatively small number, primordial variants are allowed to contain hazardous materials.

Robot: Self-explanatory, robots are independent, mobile probes, engaging in all sorts of busy work on the planet's surface. They come in a wide array of forms and functions, from mining to repair to exploration.

Module: Modules include a wide variety of immobile structures, each performing a specific mechanized function. From manufacture to refining to recycling, this division is the nucleus of the terraforming and manufacturing efforts, processing materials and energy on a large scale.

Intertool: Short for "interchangeable tool", these are tools of standardized size and function that robots and modules use.

Auxiliary: The miscellany of the systems, these include temporary structures such as tents and packaging for delicate parts. They are non-intelligent, but are designed and manufactured by other machines.

The four planetary divisions will collaborate together in separate colonies controlled by a central artificial intelligence, forming a base. The artificial intelligence's official name is long with an awkward acronym, earning it the much simpler popular label of base AI. This AI resides in a special type of module, the AI module. While modules lack intelligence independently of the base AI and are thus under complete control, the robots are only loosely controlled, exchanging information and taking commands while nearby, but acting independently while not near the base. These base intelligences serve to make major decisions and collaborate efforts with their robots, other bases, and the Quartic Orbiters from above.