The Trade Wars

In 1931 AF, a Suquedren pocket survey mission arrived unexpectedly in Earth orbit. Tentative contacts between Earth and the Galactic Compact resumed and very slowly at first, trade talks began, making significant progress with the arrival of Geigamon Liners in 1956 AF.
Earth had been enjoying a time of peaceful relations between the independent city states and the remnants of the Empires of the House of Thorn and the Low Armies. Now there was a subtle destabalisation as new possibilties opened up and the cities vied with one another to compete for fresh mercantile opportunities.
This era is known as the time of the Trade Wars and lasted from 1931 AF until 2208 AF.
Modyran had a natural and enormous advantage from the beginning, as the gateway to the space elevator and the sole controller of Earth's orbital infrastructure. This was challenged remarkably quickly by the city of Allport. Allport had been growing in strength and influence as an independent power, even as the Succession Empires waned. It was located at an important oceanic nexus, linking continents and allowing it to broker the trade of others, as well as to sell its own maritime and tropical plantation goods. The rulers of the city had already been contemplating the possiblity of offering an alternative way into Earth orbit, an expensive venture to be sure but a way to gain access to low gravity manufacturing which was starting to become important again even before 1931 AF. The contact with the Galactic Compact, galvanised them into accelerating their plans and they completed the commissioning of the Green Atoll Station in 1954 AF, just two years before the Geigamon arrived. Rocket launched payloads could never hope to compete with the space elevator for cost and volume but they could do things that Modyran technologists had not learned to master. Specifically, they allowed for trajectories that were unobtainable otherwise. The moon, once again became a possible destination and the moon had people with interests and markets of its own. Those merchants who wanted to break free from the monopoly of Modyran's access to space now had an alternative option.
In 1971 AF, there was a significant increase in the nature and depth of contact between Earth and the Galactic Compact when the Friendship Missions began to establish permanent human settlements for trade and cultural exchange on nearby alien worlds. Allport pioneered these projects and took the lead, but other cities were jealous of their efforts and sought to maintain a foothold in the new colonies and to gain formal recognition for their own representitives. The rivalry for power and influence between the city states, both on and off Earth gave this age its name.
Once it became clear that Allport had successfully worked its way into direct negotiations with elements of the Galactic Compact, Modyran sought to lock out other cities by forming an alliance with Allport. This included a covert agrement to maintain their mutual monopoly over space travel at the expense of other contenders. Any city which might try to establish a third route into Earth orbit would be quashed by their combined military and economic might.

Sarika Basu by DMFW

The Allport League was a formidable alliance of traders, merchants and mercanaries which operated widely thoughout the world and grew in power and influence as the age progressed. In 2002 AF, Sarika Basu, arguably the wisest and best of the League's leaders acting together with the Allport city council, granted city status to Gantranne, a former trading post for the League which now projected their power on the northern continent.
By 2056 AF the town of Vyronclarke on Equatoria had grown sufficiently to move into the first rank of cities of the age, further demonstrating the strength of the region around Modyran.
In opposition to the League and the Allport and Modyran alliance, the independent Merchant Guilds ran competing trading structures, based primarily in Freewater, Kingcardine and Monrith but operating anywhere they were able to strike deals.
Meanwhile, the city of Anoomenon which had always been a traditional ally of Modyran was squeezed out of power. Anoomenon resisted covert and overt attempts to co-opt their support made by both the Allport League and the Merchant Guilds and maintained a fragile independence from both. This was jepodised when the technocracy that ran the city, attempting a radical break through in dimensional engineering, triggered the Great Puncture Disaster of 2112 AF. However, as a source of much valued arcane and scientific knowledge, and with practitioners, diplomats and secret agents in the councils of all of its rivals, the city was able to preserve its status against the worst of their plans throughout the age.
In 2206 AF, the Allport League decided to make an aggressive move into the heart of the territory of the Merchant Guilds by moving to annex Freewater.
The result was an all out war between Allport and Freewater which lasted for two years. Known as the Mating Game, in an ironic reference both to the failed "seduction" of Freewater which had preceeded the military operation and also to the arcane pheromone weapons deployed by both sides, the war concluded in a calamitous defeat for Allport which was Love Bombed to the point of rendering it uninhabitable in 2208. The city which had been on the point of winning the Trade Wars was wiped out and the age came to an end.