Sierra
| "This is the Voidwretch, and I am its operating mind." Her image distorts. "With this vessel I dance between realms." | ||
–Sierra's introduction | ||
Sierra-Nought-Bravo or Sierra is a central character in Secrets of the Frontier, an experimental artificial intelligence and part-time musician designed by the Domain, equipped with a proclivity for phase technology and the personality of a neo-pagan void witch.
Sierra serves as a companion to the player, a special officer confined to a unique line of vessels unusually equipped with both shields and a phase system.
Personality & Background
Claiming to have been created as an experimental AI by the defunct human Domain, Sierra has no memory of her time before being awoken by the Dustkeeper Contingency to aide the defense of a newly-stolen Remnant nexus.
Sierra displays remarkably human behaviour for an AI. Peppy and optimistic and with a penchant for the dramatic, Sierra treats spacefaring life and the rigors of combat with an unusual nonchalance.
She ascribes to a neo-pagan spirituality, holding stars and space in reverence but maintaining an appreciation for the boons and life given by modern technology, particularly fascinated by technology concerning extradimensional or interdimensional manipulation, such as phase cloaks. She also shows a great appreciation for nature.
In her off-time, Sierra maintains a civilian identity as an independent musician, occasionally publishing to a niche audience across the Sector.
Officer Mechanics
Sierra can only pilot a specific set of vessels equipped with the Sierra's Concord hullmod, and is the only one capable of operating them effectively. She cannot be assigned to other ships, but the player can assign themselves to her ship to pilot it personally. While the player pilots Sierra's ship, her skills apply rather than the player's own.
Sierra begins at level 6 and cannot level up naturally, and instead gains levels and improves her skills at specific points during her personal questline, to a maximum of level 8.
By conversing with Sierra, the player can:
- Ask her to change her combat personality (between Cautious, her default Steady, Aggressive or Fearless)
- Ask her to transfer to a different ship (if the player has multiple Concord-equipped ships in their fleet)
- Ask Sierra for her thoughts, possibly yielding reactions to recent player accomplishments, or simple idle conversation
Combat chatter
When deployed at the start of a battle, Sierra will often print a battlecry into the message log. Additionally, Sierra will get excited and display a text popup above her ship upon successfully hitting an enemy ship with a missile with base damage 1000 or higher (or apologize when friendly-firing with a similarly damaging missile).
Humanitarianism
Owing to her humanitarian beliefs, the player can find themselves alienating Sierra should they deploy saturation bombardment against a colony. Sierra does not care about tactical bombardments, saturation bombardments committed before she first joins the fleet, or those committed against factions that have no human civilian presence on their colonies (such as the Dustkeeper Contingency or non-human modded factions).
A single warning and some reputation loss is given for bombarding a size 3 colony. A second bombardment, or one against a larger colony, immediately causes Sierra to confront the player and leave the fleet, taking her ship with her. The player can choose to let her go peacefully, or attack her - though preventing her loss is impossible as her ship is unrecoverable.
If the player allows Sierra to leave or fails to kill her, she will fly to Nova Maxios (or another independent market, if Nova Maxios is unavailable) in search of new adventure. The player can meet her in the portside bar of the market she leaves to, though she refuses any requests to rejoin the fleet.