It's just that you said Alien , not nonhuman. There is a major difference.
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@shlimazel, on Sep 25 2007, 01:23 PM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
Usually Alien has a very specific non human meaning in sci-fi. And usually humans aren't referred to as aliens in sci-fi. Of course in the real world there's a big difference. In sci fi there isn't.
Wait... What's that quote? Eerg... It's on the tip of my tongue... Ah! The only difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to be believable. Also, the best fiction is reality-based.
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The only difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to be believable. Also, the best fiction is reality-based.
Sure, fiction has to be believable. That aliens act in a way that is totally incomphrehensable to humans is totally believable. Because they aren't humans, and there is absolutely no real reason to assume that they do anything in a way that humans do, and in deed there is no reason to assume that they would even be capable of understanding why we do what we do.
The fact is most sci fi aliens are funny looking humans, who do things for reasons easily understood by humans. Aliens that do inhuman, bizarre, and incomphrehensable things with the understanding that they find those things totally reasonable is uncommon. After all, there's no reason to believe in parralel physical evolution, so why should we believe in parralel mental evolution?
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@joshtigerheart, on Sep 18 2007, 10:44 AM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
Maybe you could make the humans the hostile alien race to them? That'd be a twist on things.
Well, that was partly done in Polycon. Every time you entered the Sol System, there was a lone Soyuz capsule floating around. Thing was totally clueless, though.
You could try something like the Anz'kalarad Principalities (featured in the Timeline Preamble of EVN:UGF). The Anz'kalarads (pronounced ahnz-KAL-a-rahds) are rusty-skinned, muscular humanoids averaging about 2.1 meters in height and 103 kilograms in weight (their homeworld, Anz'kalar, has just over half-again Earth's gravity) with a gorilla-esque protruding mouth full of sharp teeth. At the time when they invaded human space (1225 NC) and came about halfway to enslaving our entire species (the story is in the preamble), they were extremely warlike and militaristic. It was their custom to enslave conquered peoples, a custom dating back to their preindustrial days.
One other race they enlaved were the telepathic/empathic Orions, one of whom, Varen Harsimili Yalandas, was rescued by Heraani from an Anz'kalarad wreck, and eventually became their Thurokiir. (I won't go into it any further than that; that story's a novel all by itself). The Orions had been slaves for about a hundred years before the first Anz'kalarad battle force invaded Tekel space, and all organized resistance had basically been broken.
The humans, however, were another matter. Human slaves proved damn near intractable, going way out of their way to be a pain in the ass. (We're funny that way ;).) The Anz'kalarads tried to be reasonable at first, then later took to massecreing civilians by shelling cities at random from orbit, and then enslaving the survivors. One of the most brutal was the militarily brilliant Yanzo of Anz'moria, the scourge of the Human Alliance. In addition to orchestrating no less than eighteen billion civilian deaths on several Auroran and Federation worlds, he put together a trap at Tekel Over that cost us 79% of the more than two hundred ships we allocated to the attack. He finally met his match in Heraani Thurokiir Varen Yalandas, who met him under flag of truce and rightly accused him of ordering the slaughter of nearly three billion people on Aurora alone. He wasn't so much insulted by the truth of the matter as he was by her audacity, and challenged her to an honor duel. She killed him with two blows, then left his subordinates to pick up the pieces.
Nowadays (UGF time-frame) the Anz'kalarads are particularly valued members of the Galactic community, mainly due to their razor-sharp intellects and unyielding courage, which is particularly evident in the fields of journalism and politics. They've produced no less than fifteen Presidents, for instance.
This post has been edited by StarSword : 26 September 2007 - 04:26 PM
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@shlimazel, on Sep 25 2007, 02:18 PM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
After all, there's no reason to believe in parralel physical evolution, so why should we believe in parralel mental evolution?
All right, we don't want a big sprawling argument now, do we?
Also take into account that what may seem logical to you and me might go right over the heads of other people who haven't taken a few minutes to think about believability. If people were logical, there would be no junk food. How does the old adage go? "People are stupid. That's why I'm glad I'm not a people." 
This post has been edited by Cosmic_Nusiance : 25 September 2007 - 02:52 PM
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Well, who's to say its completely believable that aliens would do nothing in the way humans do? After all, have you ever met an alien before?
And the argumenet of "why should there be physical evolution but no mental evolution" doesn't apply to all universes either. Presently, evolution is merely a theory. In much sci-fi, that theory appearantly is true. But in others, such as my own main universe, evolution is false. While there is a pretty dang large variety of cultures, schools of thought, etc. etc. etc. in mine, there's startling similarities in cultures, enviroments, flora, fauna, etc. across the galaxy that baffles the scientists to no end. And there's a good reason for it all too, though I don't feel like explaining it right now. Maybe later.
This post has been edited by JoshTigerheart : 25 September 2007 - 03:50 PM
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I think humanity's history of randomly slaughtering each other would be a pretty good reason for aliens to invade us. out of disgust.
of course, they could invade because they want to steal our junk food.(
)in then our junk food kills them, and everybody goes Yay! Kinda like war of the worlds.
yet again, humanity is saved by twinkies!
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@yamfries, on Sep 25 2007, 06:59 PM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
out of disgust.
Ok. Who mentioned my halitosis?
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Or the aliens decide to destroy us because they saw a bunch of old TV shows and think we're too violent to be allowed to survive! Originality +1!
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@gray-shirt-ninja, on Sep 26 2007, 12:44 AM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
Or the aliens decide to destroy us because they saw a bunch of old TV shows and think we're too violent to be allowed to survive! Originality +1!
Haha!
the aliens watch star-trek and say "how dare they kill the glufanomions. They must Die!!!
(Glufanomions= gelatinous pizza monster. this is from the original star trek, but they weren't really called )
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@joshtigerheart, on Sep 25 2007, 04:49 PM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
Well, who's to say its completely believable that aliens would do nothing in the way humans do? After all, have you ever met an alien before?
Can't argue with that. My dad, in fact, prefers sci-fi that doesn't feature nonhumans (I personally prefer this term, because from their perspective, we would be aliens). I don't much care one way or the other, but the inclusion of nonhumans seems to me to make it more interesting.
EVN:UGF's UGF has a population of over nine hundred trillion sentients, from over a hundred million different species. The other governments are also nonhuman-ruled; the Varellavite Imperium in fact features four different races (Varellavites, Obralans, Katagans, and Vhusaeds).
The trouble is, it's almost impossible to imagine how a nonhuman mind would operate. That's why I think two of the most common science professions in any future would be xenobiology and xenopsychology.
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@zapp, on Sep 26 2007, 07:55 PM, said in Looking for a little inspiration:
EVO was my favorite of the EV trilogy, because of the aliens.
I just wish we were told more about them. We got some ideas about their cultures and homes, but that was it. Maybe Age of the Council will tell us more since the creator of the EVO scenario is doing it?