Race Categories

Species suggestions, story ideas and contributions.
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eleazar
Design & Graphics Lead Emeritus
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Re: Races Category

#16 Post by eleazar »

Feyd, i see you've worked hard on your list, but, as i've mentioned in other threads, there seems little point in categorizing alien life like this.

If you (or utilae, etc.) would skim through the alien ideas which have been submitted, you'll see that many/most are quite creative, and don't fit well into the overused MoO, and/or Earth-biology Stereotypes.

What we've decided for sure about alien races, is that each will be most at home on a particular type of planet. I haven't seen any race ideas in this thread that would reasonably prefer an inferno.

Other useful "categories" would actually address the special qualities of a race, as it effects the game. It's useless to argue over how to "catagorize" alien species, because if the catagory doesn't include a gameplay effect, it won't be mentioned in the game.

In other words , these are useful categories because they includes an obvious game-play effect:
Lithovore/Metalovore: don't eat biomass, but instead rely on mining for food.
Parasites: can turn conquered populations immediately into their own citizens, or possibly only be able to reproduce that way.
Feyd wrote:I dont like thinks like "magical" or something like this, that is not serius,we are talking about a future, a space era, and actually we reject magic and religion in the science
You may reject magic and/or religion, but that has little relevance to it's inclusion in the game. Weather or not magic/religion has any basis in reality, this is a game that is not particularly interested in being realistic,but instead focuses on being fun. Also, the rules do not encourage religious debate.

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Krikkitone
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Joined: Sat Sep 13, 2003 6:52 pm

Race Categories

#17 Post by Krikkitone »

Well possible ideas for race categories

Ideally concepts should be mutually exclusive (if you have Ethereal, Humanoid, and Hiveminded... then what about a bunh of mindlinked ghosts... all fitiing into 3 categories)

1. Native Environment... nice.. but there is no reason that the native life form on an Inferno world couldn't look and have the same picks as a Terran human... (not carbon based... but who says you have to be carbon-based to be a bipedal mammal with opposobale thumbs and binocular vision)

2. Appearance/Anatomy... interesting way to group races, but not necessarily the best (as mentioned No gameplay effect.. and little connection to thinking about the race)

3. "Concepts" ... disadvantage that they are not mutually exclusive

4. Structure... mechanical, crystalline

Ideally the 'race category' should be the one word you use to describe the race... but probably it is best if that is a special category

Probably grouped by some special characteristic seems best
PS there is a race that dwells best in Infernos (the Eggasem... when you need rocks to be liquid for your metabolism)

In any case the best way to categorize races would probably be a combo
1. Appearance: ie the Animal it resembles OR plants/fungi OR mechanical OR amorphous
2. Environment
3. Special (Hive mind/Parasite/Telepath)

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