A poisonous, boiling mud pit of a world, Tamra V's atmosphere is so caustic, filled with sulphurous and nitrous compounds, that a human body left unprotected out in it would dissolve into a puddle of slime within a standard hour, bones and all. Orbiting the system's star at a distance of ninety nine million kilometres, the blazing solar radiation, combined with the planet's thick layer of yellow and ochre clouds mean that temperatures on the day side of Tamra V soar to over five hundred standard degrees. By contrast, the night time temperatures are at least one hundred degrees cooler, leading to violent convection driven winds of over three hundred kilometres per hour scouring the planet's surface.

Life, apart from some hardy species of bacteria found deep underground is quite impossible. Adding to the scorching temperatures are vast lava fields, which cover almost a fifth of the planet's surface. Regular earthquakes often shake large parts of the planet, pushing up and tearing down mountains. Despite all this, Tamra V boasts a thriving population, housed in great moving cities. These cities, mounted on huge tracked chasis, move slowly across the landscape, fueled by the very corrosive elements in the air, which are extracted and turned into usable fuel by ancient technological processes found almost nowhere else in the galaxy. Life aboard these cities in cramped and hazardous, yet somehow, the inhabitants lead relatively stable and organised lives, brought together by the threat of extinction should any of the machines that protect them from the danger outside suddenly fail.