> John Atkinson writes:
[Could Kra'Vak...]
> A)Be bribed into attacking one particular group of humans vis another?
> (And if so, how? I don't see aliens being particularly tempted by
Considering what I have read so far - some notes in the FT games, a
little fanfiction on webistes, there may or may not be a great,
over-weening
KV (Kra'Vak) gov't. They seem to be oriented in family/clan groups,
some quite large, and somewhat matriarchal. I think that after the First
Contact is finally settled (a few wars fought, systems exchanged, etc., KV &
Human could work together, as long as mutual differences are observed. Humans
may fight for cash money, glory or duty, but KV may be very different.
Territory? Resources? Their economy is not very well defined yet, and may be
very similar, or very different.
Maybe the leader-types come to a decision on what to do, and all of
the KV in that clan work towards that end. Money is not a concept, because
some work to feed others, make ships, whatever. Labor is allocated as needed
by a particular endeavor. The more labor the better. Slaves are desirable.
Leaders may be judged on how they provide for their family members. If you
don't wnat to follow the leaders orders, tough. Leave, find a new clan,
whatever. A Leader is checked by enough followers saying 'Bye!' that very
unpopular leaders have no-one to order around. Families/Clans may be
absorbed by others, or new alignments may surface out of older organizations.
Barter might exist between clans. Espionage would be very important. Humans
could contact the Leader(s), and offer them something they need in return for
services of the Clan. I tend to like this view of them, because an evil alien
empire seems so, well, cliche. Maybe the Humans have run into one powerful
Clan, or a Clan alliance. I also don't like to project Human assumptions onto
aliens, especially psychological (which economics is, in the end; 'What do you
want?' (said Mr.Morden)).
This would also make them interesting in battle - they start losing
too
many troopers/tanks/ships, they start changing leaders, and maybe
confidence states. Probably more than one KV Clan war has dissolved into
splintered internecine squabbling, as the various groups decide to settle
differences by force of arms...the one who wins, obviously can provide the
best, so they pick up more followers who want to become family members. KV
probably believe in luck very strongly, as a personal trait. Strong leaders do
their best to minimize it. Who wants to be replaced because of bad die rolls?
KV military organization would be all over the place. Every unit is a
'kampfgruppe'. They would be quite familiar with the military principle of
economy of force. Intelligence gathering would also very important. To
properly choose 'enough to get the job done', they would have to know what
they are up against. KV may be naturally cautious, prefering not to risk
resources and family members on a unsure venture that may not work. The
concepts of entrepeneurism (sp?), forlorn hopes, and other treasured Human
concepts may be competely, well, alien to the KV. Such caution has made them
build good ships, have excellent equipment, and train competent, yet cautious
soldiers. Flexibility may be key to their doctrine. With proper C3I
equipment, a commander (+ staff) might be able to command nearly any
group of soldiers. KV may be able to reorganize into different size units very
quickly. They may also be more susceptible to EW attacks. OK, I realize now
that I'm way off the original questions; sorry. A) Humans could probably
exchange something for KV attacks on other
Humans -
to them, it would be a Clan war with proxies - nothing new.
B) KV would probably need to have a better long-term prospect than cash
to
fight for Humans as mercs - but it could still happen.
> Tony Wilkinson wrote:
> 2)How do they reproduce?
[Gulp...] Well... When a girl Kra'Vak and a boy Kra'Vak REALLY
like one another...
Sorry, I couldn't resist an opportunity like that.
Theres quite a few things we have to consider about the Kravak before we can
really work out what they are likely to do. I have made some assumptions the
main one being that life on Earth is a preety good guide to life in the
universe because lets face it, so fact it is the only place with life.
1)What are they? Reptiles, insects, crusteans, dinosuara (a few scholars think
that dinosaurs were distinctively different from reptiles in
physiology)..what? This will determine how they reproduce, grow and what
enviroments they prefer. I think we can rule out insects as they don't have
any form of lung which serverely limits their size. If your'e a crab you have
other problems. For staters you have to shed your shell. This is a very
dangerous time for a crab. They might tend to hide but it might also make an
alien species very aggressive. If some of the specis moulted at one time and
the rest at another then some of them at least are guarding the vulernable
ones and make not take kindly to any incursions no matter how threating. Also
if your'e in an armoured shell in tends to make sex difficult and some crabs
can only be impregnanted whilst they are shedding. A final thought on crabs,
they might only be able to learn immediately after a moult making size an
indication of intelligence. Now I'm no brain surgeon but if you only have a
small brain you can only learn so much be it because of the number of neuron
you have or how many connections they are able to form, brain size would put
an upper limit on both.
2)How do they reproduce? Eggs or live birth? If your an egg layer where you
lay your eggs is pretty important. If you stay with the eggs then you want
somewhere safe where you won't be disturbed. You might decide that you do this
on your own or do it as part of a "colony". Either case you or your mates are
going to be very defencive about the nesting site. If you lay eggs but do stay
with them you may not be so defensive about the nesting site but it is more
important to you that it's not likely to be disturbed and that it is the right
tempreture for the young to develop. Live young tends not to tie you to one
spot as much. Humans are born pretty much helpless but our mothers are still
mobile to a large extent. It might be possible for intelligent species to give
birth to young that are self mobile in the way that sheep and cattle are, at a
very young age. If you have multiple births, particularly litters this also
tends to tie you down as the young are less well developed than those that
tend to have only a single young.
3)Number of young and parental care? Parental care has been touched on above
in regard to egg layers. But how are they treated once they hatch? If there
are large numbers of young that all have good chances of surviving to be
adults then you might get a bit blaise about their indiviual lives. The young
could be used as cannon fodder without too much strain on the consicence. If
you have large numbers of young but very few are likely to survive you might
get very protective of them, or if no partental care then you might be very
indulgent to them allowing them to do or have anything but not taking much
care of them. Those that have small numbers of young tend to be more
protective as a general rule.
4) Hives and Castes. With creatures that are hive type animals, including at
least one mammal, you find there is only one breeding female and that that is
all she does. All other animals in the hive are her desendants and work for
her benefit. Insect hives tend to die with the Queen but with the Naked Mole
Rat at least one female within the soldier caste will bewcome sexually mature
and take the place of the dead queen. Hive animals tend to have specialist
castes for jobs within the hive, ants and termites being the classic example.
In this the castes are determined by what the grubs were fed before they
pupated and they can't change. With bees the workers don't physically change
but at certain times in their lives they do change jobs. With some species you
might find that caste is determined by size and age, as with Naked Mole Rats.
This has implications if the caste is determined by size alone because one of
the best was to increase your growth rate is to eat your own kind.
5)Higher organisation. I have noticed that most people tend to favour a clan
structure for the Kravak. But the question is how do the clans relate to one
another? If the Kravak are a hive creature then treat clans as indiviual hives
and you still have to figure out how the hives get along.
If there is a recognised overlord of all the clans/hives then
you might
face a realatively united race with perhaps one or two clans/hives that
are looking for a way to overthrow the current system. You might also have an
overlord who has no real power (I'm thinking Ireland in the Dark Ages)
which could make for very fluid/chaotic situation of alliances etc.
Another alternative is a system of patronage between clans/hives
where one
clan/hive owes obligations to a higher one say production or young in
return for military aid or protection. You might have no problems obtaining
troops from a clan in such a system but they might expect an awful lot in
return. One thing that nobody seems to have considered is that what if the
divisions in Kravak society are religous, that rather than clans one is facing
different sects. This situation might make it impossible to obtain support
from any Kravak but it may make them susceptible to manipulation that gets one
Kravak fighting another.
There are probably a million other things to consider as well but my belief is
that you'll get a better alien, rather than man in rubber suit, if you start
from the bottom up because some of the implications that biology makes on
society and culture. Anyway there's something to think about.
> Mark A. Siefert. wrote:
Mark, Don't be silly, they use XeroX!!!!
Bye for now,