Hierarchy (Universe at War)

The Hierarchy are an alien species that features in Universe at War: Earth Assault.

History
In the distant past of the species, at least ten thousand years ago, the race neared extinction but were saved by another alien race which were the Masari. The peaceful explorers provided the Hierarchy with technology to survive and for that they were treated as gods by the primitive Hierarchy. Amongst the ancient legends of the Hierarchy, it was said that they were capable of creating energy out of nothing which was the only source as to their technological capabilities at that time. However, according to their myths, the Hierarchy's ancestors turned against their saviors the Masari who were believed to had been destroyed in the process with legend stating that they were extinct as no Masari had escaped the genocide. Utilizing the advanced technology given to them, the Hierarchy set about making itself a galactic power that believed that only the strongest could survive and thus became a terrible force that swept across the galaxy. It was said that the Masari made the Hierarchy what they were and some members of the species believed that they had surpassed their gods. A select number of their kind being the rulers of their species who became known as the Overseers and directed the Hierarchy's forces across known space. During this time, they were known to had stripped entire worlds of their resources be they organic or inorganic in origin after which they purified the planet leaving nothing but a dead husk and its native inhabitants either extinct or dying.

Their campaigns of conquest included invading the homeworld of the Skinwalkers who fought against the Hierarchy onslaught and the attackers faced heavy resistance from them. However, one of their kind known as Nufai betrayed them to the Hierarchy and the species was rendered extinct as a result. Later, the Hierarchy moved their resource gathering fleets to another technologically advanced homeworld and exterminated its native inhabitants after ravaging it of resources. However, unknown to them, the species had left behind their artificially intelligent machines who decided to avenge the death of their Creators. Calling themselves Novus, they believed themselves to be the immune system of the universe to combat the insidious infection that was the Hierarchy. The machines followed the Hierarchy in their wake and whilst they battled; Novus never inflicted heavy casualties on the Hierarchy. In fact, everytime they arrived they came to a dying world that had been purified by the Hierarchy.

Eventually, the Hierarchy grew impatient by the constant meddling of Novus and desired their destruction. It was a young Hierarchy Controller by the name of Kamal Re'x the Abductor who wanted to gain prestige in the eyes of the Overseers who hatched upon a plan to lure Novus into a trap from which they would be destroyed. The Hierarchy later traveled to 21st century Earth where they invaded the planet in order to claim its resources. They effortlessly pacified its populace during the resource gathering phase but halted on purifying the world until Novus came. As Re'x had predicted, the machines arrived and fought against the Hierarchy forces but Novus was confused as to why the world was not destroyed. Thus, they dispatched one of their commanders Mirabel to infiltrate a Hierarchy command ship to learn the reason for this being the case. This was also a trap as Kamal intended to self-destruct the ship to kill the Novus commander but she escaped. This matter little as the Hierarchy assaulted the main Novus base and destroyed their Portal thus preventing them from leaving the planet. Kamal Re'x had finally achieved his goal and intended to now purify the Earth with the trapped Novus forces on it.

With Re'x's plan set in motion, the Controller set loose Orlok the Eternal to begin the cleansing of the Novus base in Egypt and deploy the Purifier in order to bring ruin to the planet Earth. Initially, Orlok desired a Walker to complement his squad but Kamal denied his request. When Orlok began suffering casualties, Kamal reluctantly decided to provide the commander his Walker which proceeded to destroy the Novus base. As Novus forces retreated under the Hierarchy onslaught, a stray energy blast from the Walker struck the Egyptian pyramid which began emitting a strange planet wide energy signal. Whilst first it was believed to be a Novus weapon or virus, it was revealed that the signal was hard wired into all Hierarchy systems forcing them to retreat as they lost command and control capabilities. Controller Kamal Re'x was enraged at Orlok's retreat but before their argument continued, their command ship was hit by a nuclear strike. At first, Re'x believed it to be a Novus attack but was informed by the ship officers that it was from the "primitives" which led to Kamal dispatching Orlok to eliminate the humans nuclear stockpiles in North America. Whilst on his mission, the Hierarchy forces faced opposition from the humans along with their Novus allies. In addition, Orloks officers deciphered the alien signal from Egypt and determined that it came from underwater but they were unsure of its location. The mission was completed the nuclear stockpiles were destroyed and secretly Nufai the last of the Skinwalkers approached Orlok with a proposition; as the troops respected Orlok he wanted to lead a rebellion against Kamal Re'x to which the commander ultimately agreed to a secret alliance that would strike at some point.

As the Novus forces were driven off, the Hierarchy detected the strange energy signals that were emanating that much stronger at this point. A ship flying over the ocean discovered that the source was actually of Masari origin which shocked both Kamal and Orlok. The large city ship began to rise from the waters with lifeform readings becoming active and its power source as well. In desperation, Kamal ordered his fleet in orbit to fire all their weapons on the city ship which depleted their orbital arsenal. Whilst the strike was effective, the Masari ship was damaged but remained intact which somewhat impressed Kamal who ordered Nufai to prepare the Purifier to cleanse the planet Earth and complete what the Hierarchy's ancestors could not. This was also in an attempt to gain leverage over the Overseers for Kamal for such a victory but Nufai reported that the Purifier was deactivated by the Masari signal. Thus, the Controller decided to send a strike team led by Orlok into the Masari cityship and cease the source of the disruptive signal. A saucer managed to penetrate into the damaged cityship and drop the strike team led by Orlok where they uncovered that much of the vessel was still in stasis and its automated systems were active in order to repair the damage done to it. Fighting living Masari after thousands of years, Orloks forces sought to destroy three transmitter towers that were projecting the disruption signal to the Hierarchy command and control facilities. They were successful and Orlok intended to retreat from the cityship though Kamal intended to send more troops to kill the awakening Masari. However, Orlok the Eternal judged the act being a suicidal one and instead departed the Masari vessel with the remnants of his forces.

On his return to the command ship, Kamal was infuriated and intended to execute Orlok within an hour. However, Orlok bargained for his life by stating that the death of the Masari would be an achievement but an even greater achievement would be the capture of a member of the species. This suggestion pacified Kamal who considered it but before he could proceed; Novus began attacking the Purifier forcing Orlok to be sent to South America to defend it. It was there that Orlok decided to take the first step in his conspiracy by relocating the Purifier and teleporting it to a secret location which Kamal was not aware of at the time. He intended to use it in order to bring about his rebellion and whilst he was doing this he battled Novus forces led by Mirabel who were defeated in this engagement.

Background
The Hierarchy were a blue skinned humanoid race and were capable of psionic abilities but this would have to be amplified by technology. The race varied in their behavior with some not caring for the lives of their troops while others were pure warriors that held onto the concepts of honor and the preservation of their race though there appears to be more examples of the former then the latter. One example of this is the Hierarchy Lost One, a mutated member of their race that serves as scouts and assassins. Their appearance resembled that of the Roswell Greys that were reported on Earth in the 20th century.

The highest authority within the Hierarchy were the Overseers. Impressing them meant advancement for ambitious Controllers. Other positions include Ground Commander of Hierarchy Resource Operations, Hierarchy Intelligence Adviser and Under-Seer of Hierarchy Remote Mining Operations. Another position was that of the Manipulator who served as key administrative personnel and computer technicians that reported on findings as well as operated the various types of equipment and handled communications. The lower ranking members of the Hierarchy were expected to follow the orders of their superiors; the more loyal the individual was meant that their "masters" would remember them when the time came for advancement. Though their lower ranking Grunts sometimes questioned why they were always sent to die in the field - it was stated that it was part of their nature since they were part of the Hierarchy which brought destruction but promised death for its soldiers. Thus, it was the duty of such warriors to defeat death in order to live and fight another day. Their troops were stated to hold only one purpose which was expansion of the Hierarchy and if they died for that cause then they were fulfilling their purpose. The lives of their soldiers were ultimately secondary to their objectives and the standing of Hierarchy commanders was rated on their successful completion of their missions. Any words that hinted upon treachery led to the execution of those involved.

It was stated by one member of the race that the Hierarchy was far greater than a single battle and that their empire stretched so far that it was more numerous then the stars in the galaxy. They believed in culling the inhabitants of the galaxy and eliminated the weak. This harsh nature meant that conspiracies and plots were quite common within the race who often attempted to betray their leaders in order to ascend to power. Among their kind, trust was considered a weapon and not something to indulge in as treachery and assassinations were common place in the ways to advancement. The Hierarchy felt themselves as the ambassadors of the universe designed to cull the weak races from the cosmos for being unworthy of continued existence. As such, the leaders of the Hierarchy often took great delight in seeing the unspeakable devastation that they bring to the planets they invaded. Whilst some Hierarchy were capable of admiring their opponents courage, their leaders instead felt that this should not be the case. Instead, their enemies deserved the mercy of being slaughtered for being weak and unfit to live. This small minority believed that their species had descended into becoming a disease that destroyed monuments of civilizations greater than their own.

It was known that the Hierarchy were insatiable in their search for resources which they harvested ruthlessly and left dead worlds in their wake. Novus calculations predict that, if given the chance, the Hierarchy were capable of consuming the entire galactic core. They were often known to deploy their forces directly from orbit rather than establish fixed based structures on a world. When done with it, they often made uses of a Purifier device to destroy the planet. Furthermore, they were known to sacrifice entire command ships in order to entrap enemy commanders and kill them.

Technology
The Hierarchy are quite advanced and show little regard to ethics on the effects of their weapons against other races. Being a war-like race, they often research to enhance their weaponry range as well as their destructive firepower. They also make use of the mutagenic effects of radiation to add damage potential to their weapons or augment their forces. Their final specialty includes quantum technology which involves the use of phase abilities allowing certain units to move through solid objects. The height of their technology included shield generators that were present on their large walker based craft and starships the latter of which were able to survive nuclear strikes. Furthermore, an important aspect of their resource gathering operations was a Material Uplink Node which was the means by which they teleported gathered resources to their motherships. Whilst an efficient system, it was also a possible weakness that was exploited by others who were capable of using it to board their vessels.

Weaponry encompasses various types which include projectile weapons in the form of mass drivers which fires hyper accelerated canisters which is effective against structures. They also make use of beam cannons that fire superheated plasma in a sweeping arc which often causes secondary explosions. These include smaller variety ones which are deployed on their Lost One slave units which are plasma bombs while plasma grenades are authorized for use by the Grunts. They also make use of arc turrets to fire anti-matter at their targets.

Another technological addition includes the use of radiation based weaponry. Their vehicle reactors, often those on the walkers, include reactors which explode violently when damaged showering radioactive waste on potential enemies. Warheads are often equipped with radiation designed to spread across the battlefield. More advanced radiation technology includes the use gamma radiation which further adds to the weapons lethal potential. This also culminates in the use of advanced mutagenics allowing them to revive recently deceased organics and turning them into slaves by controlling their residual nerve impulses. Tissue decay is slowed down and extending the creatures existence.

A final field of the Hierarchy includes quantum based technology allowing them to place phase modules in Monoliths or Lost Ones allowing them to remove themselves from reality thus enhancing their defensive abilities. This technology has highlighted in their phase tanks which are beamed down to Walkers once the phase tank pods are installed. Weapons are also enhanced through the use of quantum plasma ordinance which explode violently when they impact their location. They also make use of molecular armour to enhance the defensive qualities of their forces. Another interesting side effect is the use of mind enhancing technology as well as mind control abilities.

The Hierarchy make use of numerous superweapons on the battlefield. One such destructive power includes the radiation cascade which is deployed through cascade generators on the Science Walker. This fires a short charged radiation pulse that is capable of destroying structures and leaving residual traces that damages the area further as well as any enemies in the area. They also use their Matter Conduit to send objects in pace smashing into locations dealing a great deal of damage and providing the Heirarchy with further resources to harvest.

One of the iconic aspects of the Hierarchy include their massive mobile walker units. These range from the large assembly walkers that create structures to the research based science walkers to habitat walkers which handles the deployment of infantry. This makes the entire Heirarchy battle force on a planetary environment mobile and moving through the battlefield. The Defilers are mini versions of the Walkers designed for more combat roles while Reaper Drones handle harvesting operations.

Being a space-faring species, the Hierarchy possessed massive command ships that were saucer shaped. These large vessels contained not only shields capable of surviving nuclear assaults but energy weapons though these were capable of being depleted. Material Uplink Nodes were used as teleporters between the ship to their ground forces and their Walkers. This allowed ground units to instantly beam up with resources or similarly to beam reinforcements down planetside. The inside of a command ship possessed at least three reactors and were large enough to hold their massive Walker craft as well as smaller flying ships.