Fractal Galaxy

[Hibou]

The evig are very cool as a concept, although there doesn't seem to be much of a role for them, other than as a random monster trying to eat you. Not that you can ever have too many of those! :D

Yeah, that made it hard to determine which section to put them in. They're definitely meant to be usable in that way, but I also want them to be an important aspect of the setting's science and play a role as part of a series of alien species who are intelligent, have colonized other worlds, and in some way actively travel the galaxy, but are difficult or impossible to communicate with by humans and their humanoid allies - I've actually got quite a few of these that I'll be getting around to posting. :D

Contents
The Milky Way, Night Between Worlds, Hilbert Sector, The Iasilath, Other Ideologies, Thaxus
Uvanlic, Earth, Other Things Lost, Technology
Mechatroids
Mercenary Groups, The Division, Other Organizations
D.R.A.E.C.H., Military and Police Forces of the Galaxy
Anomalies, Psionics, Strange Creatures, Spacefaring Species
Mechanics Thread

[Hibou]

Updates to the posts on D.R.A.E.C.H., Earth - The Lost Homeworld, and now to the first post ("Night Between Worlds"). I'm very excited for the setting at this point because I think I'm almost to the level where I feel there's enough information for me to run a game!

Would you guys find it easier if I made an index of post links? Should I do that on every page and/or update post?

[Hibou]

Aaaand more has been posted. You will now see "The Uvanlic Sector" heading one of the reserved posts. I'm going to go ahead and start setting up convenient links... and perhaps I should move to the wiki?

[Hibou]

Updated again with some talks about the FTL-travel options that exist in the setting, and also I've made an effort to detail how long-range communications end up in FG. In ways it might remind one of the limitations on communication and movement prior to the development of radio and other comm techs in the 1800s and beyond. This can be found in the first post.

[Hibou]

Updated with some navigation links.

Contents
The Milky Way, Night Between Worlds, Hilbert Sector, The Iasilath, Other Ideologies, Thaxus
Uvanlic, Earth, Other Things Lost, Technology
Mechatroids
Mercenary Groups, The Division, Other Organizations
D.R.A.E.C.H., Military and Police Forces of the Galaxy
Anomalies, Psionics, Strange Creatures, Spacefaring Species
Mechanics Thread

[Nomadic]

Took a good look over your species section and first off I want to say that I love the rich detail you've put into things. The fact that you include multiple factions within singular species is great for avoiding mono-cultural stagnation. I liked with the humans how you used the difference in lifespans to affect their culture and generational perception. Overall each species seems distinct and unique and I like where you're taking things. I think perhaps that I would like to hear more about the vorvoka and most of all the mechatroids. These both seem like potential focus points for some fascinating background and opportunities for interesting conflicts. I'd say probably the mechatroids are what I'd most like to hear more of.

[Hibou]

Took a good look over your species section and first off I want to say that I love the rich detail you've put into things. The fact that you include multiple factions within singular species is great for avoiding mono-cultural stagnation. I liked with the humans how you used the difference in lifespans to affect their culture and generational perception. Overall each species seems distinct and unique and I like where you're taking things. I think perhaps that I would like to hear more about the vorvoka and most of all the mechatroids. These both seem like potential focus points for some fascinating background and opportunities for interesting conflicts. I'd say probably the mechatroids are what I'd most like to hear more of.

Working on several additions to the mechatroid page on the wiki. Should have them up in a few hours. :)

[Nomadic]

Not sure if you're done working on it yet but I'm already liking what you have, it has a bit of a geth undertone to it (the swapping around of minds and cold logic) while remaining distinctly its own thing. Thoughts here... The first thing that I started wondering about was your mention of wars with malicious machine races, I'd like to hear more about that. In fact that could be a good area to build an example of one mechatroid species to give us an example of what we might expect from them. I'm thinking things like how they approach culture (do they have one? what drives them?), what sort of technologies they might have in comparison to the biological species. How do they handle governance? Popular agreement perhaps? How do they deal with space flight? To be honest if the actual mechatroid itself is merely software I'd imagine they might just upload themselves to orbiting spaceships. Perhaps they are able to act like computer viruses by uploading into an enemies network and causing havoc. If so that could have some potential consequences for the other species and how they interact with or defend against them. Lastly I just wanted to say that I really like how you related them to a linux distro = species and OS installation = individual. That made me chuckle a bit (but it does make alot of sense). Anyhow I'll check back later to see if you've added anything else, I'm really enjoying this.

[Hibou]

Not sure if you're done working on it yet but I'm already liking what you have, it has a bit of a geth undertone to it (the swapping around of minds and cold logic) while remaining distinctly its own thing. Thoughts here... The first thing that I started wondering about was your mention of wars with malicious machine races, I'd like to hear more about that. In fact that could be a good area to build an example of one mechatroid species to give us an example of what we might expect from them. I'm thinking things like how they approach culture (do they have one? what drives them?), what sort of technologies they might have in comparison to the biological species. How do they handle governance? Popular agreement perhaps? How do they deal with space flight? To be honest if the actual mechatroid itself is merely software I'd imagine they might just upload themselves to orbiting spaceships. Perhaps they are able to act like computer viruses by uploading into an enemies network and causing havoc. If so that could have some potential consequences for the other species and how they interact with or defend against them. Lastly I just wanted to say that I really like how you related them to a linux distro = species and OS installation = individual. That made me chuckle a bit (but it does make alot of sense). Anyhow I'll check back later to see if you've added anything else, I'm really enjoying this.

You're right about some of them just uploading themselves to spacecraft, and I haven't gotten to the viruses yet but I think you'll like them :D. Mechatroid governments often look as much like dictatorships as they do democracies - some operate one way or another. Because of what some would call "ambition" among many mechatroids, there are cases where entire cities are actually just one OS rigged up to thousands or even millions of terminals. Some cultures are odd mockeries of the species that created them, others are strange and incomprehensible. In many ways their technologies are much more advanced than the Alliance and other factions just because they can reason so much faster provided they have sufficiently powerful hardware (and this isn't all that hard to acquire). Most mechatroid intelligences don't see much need to rapidly expand and conquer other civilizations, hence the reality that they haven't destroyed most other species yet. I wanted to really capture the essence of the geth, so the analogy you're making is dead-on - my favorite aspect of the Mass Effect universe is the geth and how they're logical, intelligent machines that despite being unable to feel are very inquisitive, cunning and in a strange way, religious.

I'll definitely try to detail a major mechatroid kernel for you so you can see what they're like. Physical traits are harder, as mechatroid factions are very unattached to specific builds and individual terminals can vary widely in appearance and function and an effort is made to make them as modular as possible. One thing to note is that you're likely to see terminals with tracked bases like tanks and quadrupedal set-ups as you are bipedal forms.

I'll see about adding some more stuff tonight.

[Nomadic]

Took a look at the wiki and noticed the blurb on ageless crusader (please do tell me if you've added anything else as I'd love to check it out :) ). I read the bit about super accurate biological reading and just knew he (she? it? what is the default pronoun when referring to a mechatroid? heh) was going to wind up as a surgeon. I wonder if he's ever used that power for other things, like say finding weak spots on an attacking opponent.

Can't wait to hear more about the notable individuals. In fact having said that perhaps you could detail other individuals of note, not just mechatroids but from various different species.

[Nomadic]

I checked out your creatures, definitely alot of interesting information to go over so we'll take it in parts.

The arc angels (love the name, very punny yet not overly cheesy as most puns are) are perhaps my favorite creature on here. They present a unique and authentically creepy danger. The tortured ghosts vibe you gave them certainly adds to this and the result is a creature that I can honestly say I'd probably poop myself a little over if I ever had a run in with one in your game. My suggestion for them would be to run them as a psychological terror (if you ever do any games/stories with them). I'm talking akin to Amnesia where the terror is less from a scary thing that jumps at you and more of an unknown factor that gets under the characters' skin with sudden appearances and disappearances, strange noises in the distance, frightening visual hallucinations, etc. Make them a genuine poltergeist and I think you'll probably end up with something that will abuse peoples fear better than anything else in your setting.

The Usikkryte are an interesting creature. Almost a combination of Vorcha and Shapeshifter. I think however with them you put too much effort into saying they were scary or dangerous without really explaining why they are. Obviously there's the underlying thought that a creature that can adapt to anything could cause chaos but it isn't really driven home by the writing. This is more of a prose issue than a design issue. I think they could make for an interesting encounter, the wiki information on them however could use with a bit of modification. Explain to us why scientists and explorers are so afraid of them, drive home the kinds of things they could do. The best way to do this I'd say would be with a story, give us a short blurb about an event that has stuck in the galactic mind, some horror that people shudder about whenever it crosses their mind. They have alot of potential here.

Now the Etterlikn I think you did much better with in giving reasons why they are fearsome. Some interesting speculation, some truly scary abilities. In fact you might consider dropping the Usikkryte in favor of the Etterlikn or combining them in some way. Seriously a swarm of tiny beings that can mimic anything object or creature with the ability to mess with peoples heads, that's nightmare fuel. I can picture a group of explorers on a derelict being driven slowly mad by an Etterlikn that is using its abilities to screw with their heads. Making members of the group appear or disappear, making strange items show up in strange places, mentally whispering into peoples minds. That crap would break even the most hardened person after awhile. In fact I'd say the Etterlikn fill the Usikkryte niche much better. You did a great job on crafting them into a unique and disturbing creature.

The section on Aproticoids seems unfinished so I'll leave it to you to write more before I seriously review it. I think however you do have an interesting idea here. Insects naturally creep people out and giant insects that can burst from the shadows only add to that. The suggestion I might make is to perhaps do some more initial speculation on where they might come from or allude to references of their unnatural creation. They seem contrived, which I take is your intention, which actually adds to the fear factor. I'd say though that you may want to make it more clear that they aren't natural.

Anyhow, great start. Arc angels are incredible, Etterlikn are appropriately disturbing, Aproticoids show promise. Only real thing is that the Usikkryte need to be reworked or possibly combined with the Etterlikn. I'm looking forward to more stuff from you. It's looking amazing.