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Simian_Prime posted:So are 99% of the Alien Archive entries just “a D&D monster, but with a laser gun”? Works for me. Also the dragons/dragonkin look rad. Alien Rope Burn posted:
That just comes across as like a campaign starting critter. Space ship crashes into your home world, and then devils over run it, PC's escape and see the 90' source of it all and swear vengeance. I hope there's a good version.
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Nov 16, 2017 00:46
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So far starfinger is not hitting one interesting monster per letter, a good goal.
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Nov 16, 2017 01:13
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kommy5 posted:I totally want to run a game about dragons coming up with crazy schemes to artificially inflate the worth of their hoards. Dragons of the South Sea Company. Entire kingdoms would be ruined and plundered through stock manipulations and debt derivatives. And only brave adventurers putting together investigative committees could hope to stop them and would struggle mightily to slap the dragons on the wrist.
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Nov 16, 2017 02:39
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I swear someone once described a (council of wyrms?) campaign that sounded a lot like that
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Nov 16, 2017 02:56
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Cassa posted:Works for me. Also the dragons/dragonkin look rad. Necromonger vessels. Slam into the planet, disgorge frenzied suicide troops, leave the planet and scour it clean. You just need a ranger who can see in the dark, a partial air elemental wizaromancer and a former theif-now-fighter lost friend of your ranger.
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Nov 16, 2017 04:04
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kommy5 posted:I totally want to run a game about dragons coming up with crazy schemes to artificially inflate the worth of their hoards. Dragons of the South Sea Company. Entire kingdoms would be ruined and plundered through stock manipulations and debt derivatives. And only brave adventurers putting together investigative committees could hope to stop them and would struggle mightily to slap the dragons on the wrist. Jean-Leon Gerome--master academic painter and the guy who did that gladiator painting everyone knows--did a painting called The Tulip Folly, a depiction of soldiers ordered to trample tulip gardens to prevent tulip inflation.
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Nov 16, 2017 04:09
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Kinda neat but stuff like the teleport and portal to hell means its heavily dependent on a GM not to just say "And then it just barfs up a demonic army and you lose, campaign over." I mean, yes, the GM can just adjudicate that properly, but it helps to have some guidelines. Also, CR 19 creatures may as well not exist, given that few games will have characters leveled up enough to have direct confrontations with them.
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Nov 16, 2017 04:33
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Cassa posted:Works for me. Also the dragons/dragonkin look rad. Pretty sure that's the opening of Mass Effect, for the most part.
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Nov 16, 2017 05:17
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kommy5 posted:I totally want to run a game about dragons coming up with crazy schemes to artificially inflate the worth of their hoards. Dragons of the South Sea Company. Entire kingdoms would be ruined and plundered through stock manipulations and debt derivatives. And only brave adventurers putting together investigative committees could hope to stop them and would struggle mightily to slap the dragons on the wrist. I had a fantasy campaign where the ruling class was born from a group of dragons that had realized that going and plundering was nothing compared to opening a bank. People come and give you all their money to hang onto! And nobody's going to rob the bank because it's got dragons sitting on the money... Terrible Opinions posted:I'd actually say it's more useful than you'd think to have CR 19 creatures than you'd think, given how woefully underpowered pathfinder default monsters are. A CR 19 is generally a "boss" encounter for level 12-14 characters without issue. Unless you're going for the "endless absurdly easy combat" the way most pathfinder premade adventures are. Well, I'm not sure how well Starfinger compares in that regard without proper playtesting, but given the advice in the book is "have a level 19 party against a CR 19 monster", I have to judge it on its actual intentions and instructions.
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Nov 16, 2017 05:20
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Well, I'm not sure how well Starfinger compares in that regard without proper playtesting, but given the advice in the book is "have a level 19 party against a CR 19 monster", I have to judge it on its actual intentions and instructions.
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Nov 16, 2017 05:25
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Ultiville posted:Pretty sure that's the opening of Mass Effect 3, for the most part. FTFY Mass Effect 1 is you stumbling across someone's insane plot to bring about the doom of the universe and just barely staying one step behind him the whole way there. Mass Effect 2 is you foiling the doom of the universe's back-up plan. Mass Effect 3 is the Doom of the Universe going "Nope, gently caress this poo poo, we're going to take over your home planet and put a stop to this bullshit right the gently caress now."
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Nov 16, 2017 05:26
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Terrible Opinions posted:Yeah your point is absolutely correct if CR functioned as intended, and taking the book at its word is fair enough for a review. I just know that Pathfinder monsters are ludicrously weak for whatever CR they are given and starting by level 6 or so you need things that are 2-5 levels above your plays for them to even register. Well, also CR is problematic because neither characters or NPCs are particularly well balanced, and a party of veteran d20 number-mashers and a party of casual RPG babbies are going to have completely different levels of competency.
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Nov 16, 2017 05:49
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Completely agreed.
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Nov 16, 2017 06:07
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So I'm in the midst of reading through 2bsidian right now and have a question. I did not play a whole ton of TTRPGs in the late 90s early 2000s so I'm curious if insanely lethal combat was a design thing everyone did back then or is it just small press publishers tend to make that mistake in their games?
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Nov 16, 2017 06:10
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Barudak posted:So I'm in the midst of reading through 2bsidian right now and have a question. I did not play a whole ton of TTRPGs in the late 90s early 2000s so I'm curious if insanely lethal combat was a design thing everyone did back then or is it just small press publishers tend to make that mistake in their games? Insanely lethal combat is very common in many, many TTRPGs because they start out trying to avoid what they think is the D&D 'everyone hits one another a dozen times before anyone falls over' model and then end up with rocket tag.
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Nov 16, 2017 06:13
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Barudak posted:So I'm in the midst of reading through 2bsidian right now and have a question. I did not play a whole ton of TTRPGs in the late 90s early 2000s so I'm curious if insanely lethal combat was a design thing everyone did back then or is it just small press publishers tend to make that mistake in their games?
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Nov 16, 2017 06:30
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I was reading a certain 80s game for review recently and it has the line regarding character death, "Characters should not be a dime a dozen.", which raises the question: if you died too many times, is the implication that you get booted out of the game, or what? Of course, it includes the instructions that all combat should be rolled and all rolls should stand with no fudging.
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Nov 16, 2017 06:56
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I've never seen a game with a good answer to 'What does the player do if their PC dies in the middle of a dungeon crawl or combat zone without reinforcements available.'
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Nov 16, 2017 07:32
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Well, also CR is problematic because neither characters or NPCs are particularly well balanced, and a party of veteran d20 number-mashers and a party of casual RPG babbies are going to have completely different levels of competency. Or for example I remember something (it might have actually been in Dragon magazine and not an actual sourcebook which is double lol really) where they admitted 3e dragon CRs were based around the idea that the party was intentionally going after the dragon in question and at some level had prepared countermeasures for its abilities, so they by design weren't really appropriate encounters for the level if they were a 'surprise'.
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Nov 16, 2017 07:35
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Yeah, I remember reading that dragons were deliberately made stronger than they "should" be because they were iconic and supposed to be more of a challenge.
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Nov 16, 2017 07:38
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Feinne posted:Or for example I remember something (it might have actually been in Dragon magazine and not an actual sourcebook which is double lol really) where they admitted 3e dragon CRs were based around the idea that the party was intentionally going after the dragon in question and at some level had prepared countermeasures for its abilities, so they by design weren't really appropriate encounters for the level if they were a 'surprise'. Yeah, dragons were deliberately under par for CR to ensure they were "challenging". I found this with a near-TPK or two as a GM the hard way. I'll always remember there was a creature in the Creature Collection by White Wolf that had a CR of 1 or 2 with an AC of 22 or so. There was a moment in the game we were playing using that setting, and I realized my ranger needed like a 18 or 19 to hit the "mooks" we were fighting. After the game the GM was like "Well they were the right CR." and I had to say "Yeah, well, you actually have to look at the numbers and not just trust that." But at least they got that book out in time to beat the Monster Manual to market! 
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Nov 16, 2017 08:12
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The idea of making something "stronger" or "harder" or generally "better" by cheating at your own system seems to be more common than one might think at first. In a recent stream I watched this point came up about video games. FPSes where the first half of your life-bar is actually only 10% of the numerical value, but makes it more dramatic. Turn-based strategy games where shooting at someone at 90% chance is basically a guaranteed hit (unless its an actual RNG in which case it´s unskewed towards the human player) etc etc. The list can be continued endlessly, but Dragons being "iconic" is just another way to say "We want to skew this either towards or against players to create a certain experience when encountering them." which in this case means making them balls-hard as gently caress for their set challenge rating. Of course, this also makes it much more of an achievement to defeat such an encounter, but also proves that the whole CR system as written is basically pointless, because not even the creators were actually using it correctly. Which is asinine to the point of absurdity. But...well. DnD 3.X. I rest my case.
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Nov 16, 2017 09:18
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Speaking of fps examples, Bioshock gives a second or two of invincibility when the player's health is bottomed out, because barely surviving feels cool.
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Nov 16, 2017 09:50
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death on three legs Today's topic of discourse are the most civilized people in Known Space, or rather, WERE the most civilized people in Known Space - MY people - the creatures known to Earth as Puppeteers. As with the Kzin, we'll start with the setting details. First, anatomy and physiology. Puppeteers are highly intelligent, non-humanoid herbivores who formed large herds. They are tripedal, with two "heads" that combine eyes and "hands" (in the form of mouths). They are legendarily cautious and conservative, although their civilization arose during the Pleistocene on Earth, so their cautious and careful advancement has left them far and away the most advanced entities in Known Space, technologically speaking. Other than the Outsiders, of course, and perhaps whoever built the Ringworld.  a portrait of your correspondent, who is anatomically typical of a puppeteer. less insane puppeteers are typically better groomed and have mane ornaments. You may wonder what is up with their name. The first human to see a Puppeteer was struck by the similarities of their heads and necks to sock puppet creatures. (Indeed, specifically to Cecil the Sea-Sick Sea Serpent from a camp retro revival of Beany and Cecil.) Anyway, Puppeteer mouths are also able to serve as very agile hands - fine-control equipment made for Puppeteers requires tweezers or careful claw-tip usage (for humans and kzin) to operate. They are excellent vocal mimics and can speak alien languages fluently. Their voices, in human terms, typically resemble sultry female contraltos, although the emotional nuance tends to weaken or vanish entirely if the Puppeteer is under emotional stress. The Puppeteer sexual reproduction cycle is not well known in Known Space, although there are speculations; the truth of the matter is that there are, depending on how you look at it, three sexes or two sexes who are obligatory parasites on a third. Puppeteers don't discuss the matter with aliens, and in fact consider humans to be sex-obsessed. Puppeteers have extremely long, probably unbounded lifespans as individual organisms. (The Puppeteer home worlds, which are bound to a star that they are able to control, contain over a trillion Puppeteers.) They believe that their science has proven that there is, at least for their species, no immortal part or soul. This reinforces their extreme caution as a species, which comes off as cautious. Every Puppeteer that a human has ever met is congenitally mentally ill - not just in the sense of being judged by their culture, but in the sense of suffering from observable mental disorders. No sane Puppeteer would ever risk meeting an alien. Too dangerous. Or going into hyperspace. Too dangerous. Et cetera. Puppeteers, despite this defining cowardice, are practical, methodical, industrious, unsentimental, and will - when forced by circumstances - act ambitiously and daringly. They are also amoral (by human standards, anyway) and can be remarkably, horrifyingly ruthless (to humans - though the Kzin understand THAT better.) The main engagement of Puppeteers with humanity (and indirectly the Kzin) was General Products, a conglomerate of industrial firms that produced extremely high quality goods in a huge range of fields at reasonable prices. Notably, this included nigh-indestructible starship hulls. (How nigh-indestructible? It is illegal to sell them to the Kzinti.) They were straight dealers and at its peak, General Products employed (directly or indirectly) nearly two billion humans. There was a profound interstellar depression when the Puppeteers closed up shop to gently caress off, several tens of thousands of years in advance of a radiation wave coming from a chain-explosion in the Galactic core. Their interest in the Ringworld is, in part, its potential as an even safer habitat for themselves. Anyway, character generation for Puppeteers begins with a note that the GM may wish to restrict them, or limit the number present. Name: Puppeteers typically have aliases for talking to humans. Their actual names are in their language, which they don't share. Gender: Irrelevant; the two Puppeteer characters of note in the Ringworld books were referred to as male, but this was a courtesy or Louis Wu's terror of a non-binary organism. Homeworld: All Puppeteers are from the Puppeteer Fleet of Worlds. They don't breed elsewhere. "Mad Puppeteer": You are encouraged to pick out 1D3 distinctive character traits (which, I suppose, was remarkable at the time) to emphasize your Puppeteer character's personality disorder. Examples include humorous, optimistic, mystical, hypochondrial, careless, curious, etc. It is noted that even a "careless" or "happy go lucky" Puppeteer will still appear colossally cautious by Human standards. Chronological age: There's a table. The maximum possible age for a Puppeteer is 159; it is noted that older puppeteers, even if they are mentally disordered, tend to either die somehow or level out as they cruise past their second or third century. Physiologically, Puppeteers are 30 years old, because that's when they start getting longevity injections from PuppeteerCare. Education: Every Puppeteer goes to school for at least twenty-five years. Rough. Characteristics: Puppeteers get the same stat rolls as Humans, and have comparable general body volumes, if obviously on a very different anatomical frame. Their INT roll is 2D6+15, and their POW roll is 3D6, presumably to represent a generally weaker will. Hit locations: As creatures who can lose a head and still survive fine, they have different hit locations. Mental disorders. As stated, Puppeteers who are willing to go on an expedition are nuttier than squirrel turds, to the point of having objective, organic disorders -- at least, by Puppeteer standards. Here is the table:   don't tell TFR about result #90 Puppeteers get action rankings as per humans. A puppeteer's base movement is 5 meters per impulse, and they can haul rear end at 10 meters per impulse. Leaving aside the occupation/skill points system, they get a few more bells and whistles.  in a tragic twist of fate, the first Puppeteer to address a sperm whale had chosen "Ahab" as a nom de xeno. they got off on a bad hoof, but fortunately for them, sperm whales went extinct in the 20th century in known space. suck it, whales! Despite their cowardice, Puppeteers who are pressed have a natural attack with a to-hit chance of DEXx4 in which they sight in with their two heads and deliver a bejesus of a kick with their hind hoof for 2D6+2 damage. In at least one attested case, this administered non-trivial injury to a Kzin officer. Puppeteers can also watch two different target arcs - their heads can track independently. Finally, if confronted with obviously superior odds, a Puppeteer will curl up into a ball and become catatonic, and thus no use to their comrades. Charming. This actually ends the Explorer book, other than a glossary of Known Space terms, some of which are painfully obvious but may have been much less so in 1984. Also, some terms have important details - for instance, the Pierin can see in infrared. Shall we explore the Technology book next, or shuffle over to Creatures, which will give us more details on the Ringworld itself, albeit indirectly? We could also dip into the more physical details of the Ringworld as well as its history, as best as is recorded by Ringworld hominids, if people have a mind. Vote! Ask questions! Express yourself, before the ARM comes and collects your brains!
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Nov 16, 2017 12:19
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Puppeteer section is probably the most fun I ever had in this thread. They're so charmingly weird! I love how having a sense of humor is a mental disorder. And the descriptions seem to be written by an another Puppeteer. By the way, did Kzin have a section on their religions, or do they all believe in being the best cat? E: Somehow, I had managed to write "buck" instead of "thread" JcDent fucked around with this message at 14:20 on Nov 16, 2017 |
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Nov 16, 2017 13:00
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JcDent posted:Puppeteer section is probably the most fun I ever had in this buck. They're so charmingly weird! I love how having a sense of humor is a mental disorder. As for Kzin religions, they don't really come up. The Kdapt religion (humans are god's favored creation; let's wear human skin masks to fool God long enough to win a war) suggests some things about kzinti theology, though, since it probably wasn't completely novel.
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Nov 16, 2017 13:31
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Kurieg posted:FTFY Sure, I guess I quipped too much and wasn't clear. And maybe it's just me. But when I saw that monster my first thought was "oh, so devil Reapers" and the proposed scenario reminded me of Eden Prime specifically, not the whole thing or anything.
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Nov 16, 2017 13:41
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Nessus posted:I would hope they do. The fact that Kdapt-Preacher only had a half name but managed to amass a large enough following that everyone at least knows about Kdaptists suggests that religion's pretty widespread among the Kzinti, enough that an only half-named religious leader isn't unheard of. e: and also, IIRC, the secret of the General Products hull is that it's monomolecular, something something extremely strong nuclear bond, and the only known substaces that can pierce it are light and a particular chemical invented by Ringworld Protectors that can dissolve the bond and destroy the hull.
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Nov 16, 2017 14:38
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Mors Rattus posted:The fact that Kdapt-Preacher only had a half name but managed to amass a large enough following that everyone at least knows about Kdaptists suggests that religion's pretty widespread among the Kzinti, enough that an only half-named religious leader isn't unheard of.
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Nov 16, 2017 14:42
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what are the drat protectors
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Nov 16, 2017 14:42
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JcDent posted:what Okay so, all hominids descend from this alien race called the Pak. The Pak have three life stages; the third is 'Protector.' Protectors are extremely intelligent, sterile, have no genitals, and are instinctually compelled to protect their bloodline over all else. If they have no bloodline, they can generalize this urge to their species or, in some cases, anything that resembles it. The transition from Pak Breeder to Pak Protector is caused by eating yams infected with a particular symbiotic virus, known as Tree of Life, which requires certain chemicals in the soil, most notably thallium. Earth was lacking in thallium, so the Breeders evolved into humans and all the Protectors died out. However, any Pak-derived species can become a Protector if exposed to Tree-of-Life virus before the age that, in women, causes menopause. (Indeed, arthritis and other age-related issues are actually derived from a failed attempt by the body to trigger the transformation itself.) A Protector derived from a human or other sentient species is going to be much, much smarter than an original Pak Protector, because the Pak breeder stage started from a lower level. The Ringworld is inhabited almost entirely by Pak-derived hominid species, adapted to fill tons of ecological niches. During the Ringworld stories, several Ringworld characters become Protectors, most notably a few Ghouls, a species of hominid that feed exclusively on rotting flesh and which serve as a kind of garbage disposal for the other Ringworld species, as well as a communications network, as they are exceptionally widespread, and a few Vampires, a species of hominid who entrap others with sex hormones and eat them, but are nonsentient. The Ringworld Protectors that succeed best tend to be Vampires or Ghouls because they rely on the existence of other hominid species to thrive, and so focus on protecting the entirety of the Ringworld. The Vampires are more dangerous tho because they see other hominids as prey, while the Ghouls tend to see them as potential allies, because they usually just get given corpses.
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Nov 16, 2017 14:58
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Seeing that you are clearly hardy adventurers, a shabbily-dressed peasant asks for your aid in fighting The Deck of Encounters Set One Part 29: The Deck of Invisible Stalkers, Irritated Wizards, and Infant Tanar’ri 171: Guard Duty A wizard in the city hires the PCs to guard him in his tower for one night. He’s doing an important ritual for which he needs to turn off all his normal defenses, and he thinks a rival will try to attack him then. He’s right - the PCs will have to face an invisible stalker. If the PCs manage to destroy it and protect the wizard, he’ll reward them with a valuable potion or minor magic item. Works for me. Unlike some other quest-type cards, it’s easy to drop this plot hook in a city, and have the PCs follow up on it (or not) without going far, far out of their way. Keep. 172: The Stench (The Irritated Wizard, Part 1 of 2) A 20-foot cube of rolling horrible vapors approaches the PCs. There’s a human figure inside, dimly. It’s a man who pissed off a wizard, who put a cursed ring on him that produces a permanent stinking cloud. He needs a remove curse. There’s not much here so far, but let’s see the second part. 173: Invisible Woman (The Irritated Wizard, Part 2 of 2) An... invisible woman… taps the PCs on the shoulder in town. She’s heard through the grapevine that they can remove curses. She was cursed with permanent invisibility by the same wizard as the last guy, for spurning his advances. To help, “the PCs will have to figure out some way to remove the curse on her necklace, which is the item that keeps her permanently invisible.” Uh… you mean some way like remove curse? Which was the explicit solution last time? Is this supposed to be a puzzle? Anyway, the only thing is, if they remove this curse too, word might get back to the wizard and he might be annoyed that someone’s messing with his elaborate revenge ploys/wizard fetish activities. He’ll probably try to send them a cursed item. (I don’t see how that will be effective, since the PCs will still have access to remove curse.) A cursed necklace of invisibility? Dang, curse me up. Give me a cursed ring of regeneration and some cursed boots of speed while you’re at it. We should probably make these things not truly permanent magical items, but foci that make the wizard’s spells last indefinitely on their targets. (Could this woman have broken the spell herself just by punching someone?) I’ll keep these two. I like the idea of a high-level wizard poking around the setting who isn’t pursuing any major agendas, but is just a vindictive rear end in a top hat. 174: In the Phantom's Wake It’s a random ghost ship encounter on the foggy sea. 20 skeletons, 10 aquatic ghouls, and it’s captained by a spectre. The spectre won’t join in the boarding action, but if it’s destroyed, the ghost ship falls apart and sinks. I’d love a little more evocative description here. Are the undead chanting anything? Is there some particular flag flying? What does the spectre captain look like? As a ghost ship encounter, it’s pretty bland. Also, it’s a forced combat. But I like ghost ships enough that I’ll keep it anyway. 175: Birth Pangs In an isolated abandoned farmhouse, the PCs find a crying baby! It's a baby cambion (i.e., a half-demon). When they touch it, or after two rounds, an adult cambion appears to retrieve it (Why right this instant? No reason, just to screw over the PCs.) It assumes the PCs are baatezu agents here to baby-nap, and attacks. "It will not listen to reason." Great. Super interesting. The forced combat is lazy and boring, but a baby Cambion has more story potential than a baby goblin, and I said OK to #21: Changeling. I guess it’s a keep, but I might just let them take the baby without an immediate struggle, and only bring in fiendish forces trying to retrieve it later. (Probably it’s the child of a big-shot tanar’ri, and various planar factions are all going to have an interest in it.) 176: A Watery Death In a dusty bowl the mountains, there’s a small sluggish stream. It seems new and small and weak. It’s weird because this area is known for its rainfall, and this recession should probably have been a natural reservoir. Actually it’s because a high-level wizard got sick from eating a fish here, and cast transmute water to dust “several times” to destroy the lake. Detection will reveal that the dust radiates alteration magic. If you dispel it, all the dust will turn back to water: “the entire district is a natural conductor of magic, and the whole lake, several hundred tons of water, will spontaneously reappear.” (A lake holds a lot more than several hundred tons of water, but let’s not quibble over details here.) Player: “Doesn’t dispel magic only affect a 30-foot cube?” DM: “Ordinarily, yes, but in this case, gently caress you.” If that happens, everyone makes a save vs petrification to avoid inhaling the water. “Those who fail begin to drown and will be unable to cast spells or swim for 1d4 turns” which almost certainly means drowning to death, I would think. It reminds the DM that they’ll need Swimming proficiency checks (hahaha, sure) and/or to “drop all their possessions to survive.” Unfair. The main pleasure that I get from reading this is imagining how the PCs would then try to exploit a “district” that extends the AOE of spells cast within it to the whole area. Pass.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:32
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The weirdest part to me is Stinking Vapors guy is living in a cube of gas. It has corners.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:39
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JcDent posted:what Nessus posted:e: For those who don't get what the gently caress, the pencil sketch version here is that in Known Space, humans evolved from a failed colonization project by the Pak, who have three lifecycle stages: Child, breeder, and protector. The "protector" stage is dependent on a symbiotic virus in a common Pak food plant. The Pak colony on Earth failed because the root didn't take, and the surviving protectors tried to make Earth as cozy as it could be for the breeders before they died out, in the hopes that some other Pak would be along eventually. The Pak breeders mutated and eventually became humans (and potentially other higher apes) - however, the potential to become a protector remains in humans, if somehow they get hold of the virus.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:44
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Mors Rattus posted:Okay so, ... The other life stages of Pak are children and breeders, and the breeders are literally Homo habilis. The protector stage evolved because Pak are from near the galactic core and the mutation rate was sky high. The symbiotic relationship with tree-of-life gave them a way to weed out mutations and protect against competitors. This had the side effect of largely arresting Pak evolution after protectors came into existence. Protectors also can live tens of thousands of years, but few make it anywhere near that limit. After encountering Pak protectors, humans derived the life extending drug Boosterspice from tree-of-life. The window for transformation is pretty narrow - it will kill someone who is too young or too old. Young Pak and Pak derived species find the smell of tree-of-life repulsive, though. On the Pak homeworld the stuff is so common no Pak breeder gets by the transformation window without eating it, unless something weird happens. But if a breeder does age out of the window, they'll still find tree-of-life irresistible, even though it will kill them. Pak protectors are extremely xenophobic and ruthless, so the Pak are caught in an unending cycle of near genocidal, internecine war. Pak cooperation always ends in a series of bloody betrayals and (sometimes literal) backstabbing. This is half the reason there are a handful of worlds harboring Pak derived species - the protector population on early colonies tends to be relatively small, since they have to cooperate. This made it more likely accident or mischance could wipe them out (like on Earth) or that they'd all kill each other. Closer to the Pak homeworld those worlds eventually get invaded by a new colony that wipes out any remaining breeders from the previous attempt, but Known Space is distant enough that lost colonies can be isolated for millions of years. The other half of the equation is that there are plenty of worlds that can at least nominally support Pak. Way way back, the thrintun seeded a lot of potential colony worlds with food yeast in order to feed their slaves. As a result, many of the habitable worlds in the galaxy have biospheres that ultimately evolved from the same base stock. The Pak homeworld was one such.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:45
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Also notable: there are Pak that can cooperate. These are the Pak Librarians, so called because the Pak created them to mind their libraries of knowledge that would otherwise be lost to their constant wars. Librarians are made by wiping out a Protector's entire line, then convincing the Protector to serve the species as a whole. Typically, Librarians are led by a single Pak with a family still or a small group of temporarily allied Pak, but in theory they can work together to perform largescale projects for the good of the Pak species.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:50
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I imagine that stuff will come out when Nessus actually gets to the Ringworld stuff.
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Nov 16, 2017 15:51
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Mors Rattus posted:Also notable: there are Pak that can cooperate. These are the Pak Librarians, so called because the Pak created them to mind their libraries of knowledge that would otherwise be lost to their constant wars. Librarians are made by wiping out a Protector's entire line, then convincing the Protector to serve the species as a whole. Typically, Librarians are led by a single Pak with a family still or a small group of temporarily allied Pak, but in theory they can work together to perform largescale projects for the good of the Pak species. To be fair part of this is because on the Pak homeworld, every breeder that reaches ~40 years of age becomes a protector, so the basic unit of a Pak clan is pretty small, and thus there's lots of opportunity for protector-on-protector competition. Non-Pak protectors tend to be better at cooperating, in part because pre-transformation they learned how to (i.e. had an actual society made up of other sentients) and in part because there's usually fewer of them compared to the total population of their species. They're still usually ruthless amoral bastards though. Comrade Gorbash fucked around with this message at 16:04 on Nov 16, 2017 |
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Nov 16, 2017 16:01
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Appendix 1: Creating Monsters and Other NPCs I'm very late to this, but this whole system is taken from Pathfinder Unchained's alternate monster creation rules: 
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Nov 16, 2017 16:02
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Mors Rattus posted:The weirdest part to me is Stinking Vapors guy is living in a cube of gas.
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Nov 16, 2017 16:08
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