Taro8

Join Date 01/2009

Need help with concept of new aliens

Making humanity more awesome

Hello everyone!

Following HUMANITY FUCK YEAH! idea of humans being fucking awesome, I decided to create set of aliens that could show that humanity is badass while still posing a threat to mankind. I think that the best way is to do this like it happened on Earth. All of opponents will have an edge over humanity in one or two disciplines, but humanity will be one, all-around badass package. I wanted brand new aliens as I prefer custom stuff.

So lets start from dividing the humanity into 2 opposing factions, this is to make it clear that humans are individuals at first and always look to murder one another first. Both factions start the game at war with each other.

United Humanity (UH) - representing humans from Earth, created after yet another world war. Governed by rather oppressive regime led by Collective Consciousness (few leader's brains linked together). These are most normal humans in this setting. Expansionist, rather high numbers, totalitarian and untrustworthy.

Independent Space Colonies Armed Forces (ISCAF) - remnants of population that was, almost literally, nuked into space after last world war on earth. Due to low starting numbers they turned into bioengineering and robotisation. However bio and androids were given a lot of human traits and are part of society, yet humans are the one in charge. ISCAF also possesses the first "unbound" human, Dr. Carmen Waleraz, a person who exist completely separate from her body (Ghost in the Shell style). Remnants that left the earth consisted pretty much only from military personnel so ISCAF is pretty much only military, they look for any enemy weaknesses, always try to create some new instrument of murder. Militaristic, low population, very creative, high research, but low culture and diplomacy, prone to turtling.

Both factions are in state of mild-hot war, ISCAF put a huge distance between them and UH, to take time to rise an army capable of defeating UH. So now both factions know the other is out there and both are racing to create bigger guns then the other.

So this for humans, now to the main thing: the aliens. I dont have ideas for names, also I did get quite a few ideas from Mass Effect. Also only few ideas are more honed.

(some name) AKA. the Space Jellyfishes - pretty much Hannar from ME. Very peaceful as their bodies do not allow them to fight, however they are great diplomats, capable of creating huge alliances that can take down even biggest of threats. When at war they depend on mercenaries and allies. Otherwise they are pretty much space hippies. Peaceful, VERY weak military, but very strong diplomacy and high culture.

(some name) AKA. the robots, or Necrons - a "race" of robots. Long time ago some race decided to switch to robot bodies. Many ages later they are but shadow of former selves. Completely bound by logic they lack the "spark", our "Necrons" arent able to create anything, they only analyze. Because of this they are forced to pray on other civilizations and their techs. While they have big technological edge from the start they are VERY slow to progress in anything. Very aggressive, VERY low creativity, culture and research, strong military (they are fucking robots), LOTS of extra space on ships due to complete automation.

(some name) AKA. the Proud Warrior Race Guys - hailing from death world similar to Catachan, these guys are Warriors through and through. However they arent able to congregate because they are very prone to infighting. That is why they arent able to create any fleet that is bigger then ragtag bunch of ships belonging to one of the clans. They are similar to orks, but they cant tell "'ho's bigga" so they fight a lot among themselves. Very strong military, start on death world, penalty to fleet size, naturally discontent, rather large numbers.

Thats it for my more defined ideas, I still would need 5 more, so here are some basic ideas:

*some hive minded space bugs, huge numbers

*some religious freaks, culture bombing

*some faction with completely rigid social system, content population, but extremely inflexible

*some very short lived creatures that are permanently on sugar rush, huge research

*some Teladi-like space businessmen, powerful economy, low military (?)

So, we have divided humanity and some basic ideas for aliens that can pose a threat, but if humans put their mind into it they can kick every single one of them in the balls, unless aliens will ally themselves against them. Now how to expand this?

Locked Post

Advanced Search

Watch this post

Do not email me updates for this post Email me updates for this post

Successfully updated karma reason!

qrtxian

Join Date 03/2010

+30

Um, what is this?

Anyway, if there's one science fiction cliche that deserves to die, it's the idea of humans being special. I really don't know what the issue with this is - do writers really think we need all that ego-stroking? - but I honestly never want to see it again in my life. So... yeah.

Successfully updated karma reason!

The other cliche that needs to die is idea of humanity sucking at everything . I only wanted to create some custom aliens that I would feel confortable to play with.

Successfully updated karma reason!

qrtxian

Join Date 03/2010

+30

Well, for what it's worth, I do like the Space Jellyfishes.

Successfully updated karma reason!

I just got an idea for those religious fanatics. Why not, in great stroke of irony, make Imperium of Man (from WH40k) an aliens? Homeworld 2 had an faction that was inspired by Imperium: Taiidan Empire. They would be led by "God-Emperor" and instead of armies they would have "chapters" of that carry out "crusades" instead of wars. Throw in "inquisition" that is everywhere (and whom nobody expects ) and you have pretty nice enemy faction.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Inspiring, I have been thinking of customazing new civilizations too. For example creating the Darth Vaders empire and the New Republic (Star Wars).

Successfully updated karma reason!

Saint Mina

Join Date 07/2007

+20

Quoting Taro8,

reply 4

I just got an idea for those religious fanatics.

You rang, We are the Orders Militant of Adepta Sororitas, that are female warriors of the Ecclesiarchy, a religious inquisitors that bear a resemblance to several Knightly Orders from Medieval Europe, and have a strong Gothic appearance of the Imperium to the extreme feel. Many of their heroines have the personae and attitude of Joan of Arc (especially in Martyrdom and Sainthood). Being an elite army of female zealots, they also bear some resemblance to the Fish Speakers from Frank Herbert's Dune universe.

AdeptaSoroitas

We are looking for players to join to be aggressive Admirals to lead my fleets across the Galaxy.

Saint Mina of Ophelia VII ofOrderof the Bloody Rose of Orders Militant ofAdepta Sororitas

When our Enemies win a battle, they called a Victory,

but when Saint Mina, Our Living Saint wins a battle, our Emenies called a Massacre.

No Mercy! No Respite!

Successfully updated karma reason!

As I said before the "Taiidan Empire" (I think I will keep this name) will be very close to Imperium in most aspects. Fanatical followers, oppressive system, fighting the change, strong military, utterly xenophobic etc. It will be Imperium, only without the magic warp stuff (whole my setting is devoid of supernatural stuff). Obviously they wont be humans, maybe something humanoid though.

Now for faction with completely rigid social system. I think they are pretty interesting as well. Maybe something that would give feel of Tau caste sytem: Workers, Warriors, Commanders and many more. All citizens are required to focus on one task, aspect of life and perfect it till death. Their warriors also perfect only one aspect of combat. All of this makes them extremely inflexible, however everyone there is content as everyone knows their place. While their military is inflexible they cover this with extreme coherency, their battle plans are carefully crafted, and they learned to use "best tools for the job", ie. they managed to master technique of using their warriors.

Successfully updated karma reason!

I personally like to use the "back from the future" theme, no not the movie, i.e. Something happens that has to be changed, and they send them back in time to change it. Obviously using Tholian or is it Thalian tech, which ever race is from the future.

One idea is to come back and stop one or more races from enslaving the galaxy, which ushered in thousands of years of slavery and torment. Or some race nearly wiped out your species and as a last ditch effort to save yourselves, you send back some colony ships and some advanced tech to try to stop it from occuring. Or many similar ideas.

Just another idea for you.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Nah that is too far fetched . I mainly want alien raaces that can pose danger to humanity if humans wont put much effort to destroy them. I just prefer situations where whole galaxy sits on powder keg with lit fuse, one mistake and everybody wants to murder one another.

Successfully updated karma reason!

In my current game I have human factions 6 total, and one alien. I have "Galactic Enterprises" in control of Earth, and they are Evil, what corporation isnt, and the rest rebelled at various times from the evil corps. The alien faction I used is an ancient neutral race, similar to Arceans. FYI

The biggest problem I have found with this game is the A.I.'s reliance on stats. I wanted to play something similar to what you described, a good "powder keg" situation. but....

The A.I. hates you and frequently declares war on you and almost refuses to make peace if they are "stronger" stat wise. As soon as you get a few good ships, they love you forever.

They employ this same "mentality" to the other A.I. as well. Galactic CIv does have a few things which affect this formula, like random events and good neutral and evil alignment. But more frequently then not, your worst enemy is your allies best friend, and everyone gangs up on the weaker civs till there are just a few powerful ones who love eachother good or evil.

Nobody wants to declare war or be at war unless they are stronger stat wise, I have quit several games that 5 or so civs were left and nobdy had any interest in fighting, and the only victory condition is conquest. they all have alliances, so if I decide to stir things up with war, I end up fighting everyone, even my allies.

The other situation I run ito alot is one civ becomes way to powerful way to fast and the game just isnt the funnest when one civ has 40+ planets and you and everyone else have 10, and they just declare war on everyone. I can usually put up a good fight in this situation, but the other A.I. cant, and unless I defend everyone they lose.

But occasionally things work out interesting, but the problem is you have to put hours into a game sometimes to tell how its going to play out. I am rambling so I'll quit now, but thought I'd share my insight from hundreds of hours of playing.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Is this thread necromancy?

If not, I have a further suggestion for your religious freaks:

How about their religion is exactly the same as some Terran one? One story floating around in my head has humanity discovering an alien race, and then being utterly astonished that the aliens are Muslim. Granted, that story took a heavily philosophical bent about God starting three separate monotheistic religions (sorta 'retrying') and just took the third try on multiple worlds all at once. But it could add some flavour.

Oh, and also, your rigid society - if you've read Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series, you might take the aliens as an inspiration: In addition to what you outlined above, they would start incredibly advanced, but advance slowly and have limited numbers and limited resources.

Hang on, that sounds like the Dread Lords.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Neilo

Join Date 04/2006

+128

Quoting talonschild,

reply 11

Is this thread necromancy?

Near 9 months...yup i'd say it qualifies!

Quoting talonschild,

reply 11

Except the Dread Lords are not addicted to Ginger!

Successfully updated karma reason!

I've been working with the idea of a race of Energy Beings, I call them The Supremacy and I created a custom tech tree for them (its only three techs) They receive right off the bat full access to all world types as well as speed, weapon and defense bonuses. However the third tech (the only one they have to research) gives them a wopping 1000% increase to both population growth and repair rate. They generally colonize 80% of the galaxy then get stuck because they have no access to translators or weapons. The idea behind them is that they were a race that won a tech victory then became energy but they have no idea how to truly use their powers.

Successfully updated karma reason!