The Silexians

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Underling
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#16 Post by Underling »

Krikkitone wrote:The Humans are descended from a subject race of the Orion Empire.. all the Orions themselves were byby. (although you could postulate the Orions also Modified themselves to Fit different environments, and different factions of Orions made the different races of Silexians)
Oops :oops: . I stand corrected. That does open a lot of possibilities for environmental preference.
And as for form=function, I was just trying to figure out what would be a universal 'function'... I guessed 'Eco sensitive' types probably wouldn't use treads except in extreme cases.
Hmmm.... I was visualizing something akin to a John Deere tractor that planted saplings or thatched fields, etc... However, since treads would pretty much chew up the terrain, I'd agree that their use would be limited to specific jobs only. I do think that the Silexians don't have to favor virgin untouched lands per se. They could pursue an environmental policy similar to what you would see in a world class zoo. Bring order to chaos, classify and control- in other words, impose thier own vision on nature.

Food for thought.

I did like the hover idea quite a bit, as that could really be a low-impact method of locomotion. We'd have to wait on the tech tree to be sure of the early game feasibility, though.

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Bigjoe5
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Re: The Silexians

#17 Post by Bigjoe5 »

The Silexians: Redesigned as discussed here.

Intro: The Silexians are a race of ecological mainenance robots. They see their own existence as a means of bringing biological beauty and balance to the galaxy. They are trying to become an interstellar power in order to achieve this goal.

Homeworld: The Silexian homeworld is today a lifeless, Barren world, in preparation for its transformation to Gaia.

Physiology: As each type of Silexian is customized for a specific task, there are (sometimes large) variations in appearance. The majority of Silexians however, share many similar features.

Silexians were wholly artificial robotic beings. Their bodies are made primarily of metals, and they each have visible antennae which are used for short range radio communication. They have advanced tactile sensors as well as wide-frequency photon detectors situated in various strategic places depending on their function. Some Silexians have advanced sound-wave detection mechanisms and others have the ability to scan the genetic codes of organisms and alter them via retrovirus injections.

Silexians generally have a flat base equipped with wheels and rocket boosters, but the occasional model is bipedal, to allow greater agility. Many have pincer-like appendages and injector tubules for manipulating objects.

History: The Silexians are a wholly artificial race whose existence, as they rightly believe, was originally meant for the task of developing and maintaining beautiful environments. The Silexians were created by the Caretakers in order to increase the efficiency and automation of their environmental maintenance projects. Eventually, all of the Caretakers worlds were inhabited and maintained by the peaceful and loyal Silexians.

The Caretakers were pleased by this and tried to improve the Silexians further by programming them with the ability of Gaia transformation, an ability previously limited to elite teams of the most educated and experienced Caretakers. The project was a success, after a fashion: The reprogrammed Silexians gained the ability to transform any planet into a Gaia world, but only by first purging the world of all life, reducing it to a barren world. The Caretakers were horrified at this outcome, and an intense moral debate ensued regarding the justifiability of destroying all life on a planet in order to create a Gaia world. Eventually, they decided against the reprogrammed Silexians and began taking steps to decommission them.

This was a relatively easy task for the Caretakers, being a highly advanced precursor race, but there were others who had a vested interest in keeping the new-model Silexians the way they were. The Experimenters raided the facility in which the new Silexians were being decommissioned and managed to capture a sizable number of them. Yet, the Experimenters attempts to recreate them ended in failure, as the techniques of Gaia Transformation were beyond even their ability to code into a machine. The Experimenters’ Silexians still had their terraforming skills, and their urge to cleanse planets of all life in order to prepare it for Gaia Transformation, but the Gaia Transformation methods themselves were lost. The Experimenters declared their Silexians a failure, and abandoned them at a nearby Swamp planet (which they promptly terraformed to Barren). Now, the Silexians seek to return to the stars and regain the lost knowledge of Gaia transformation

Culture: The Silexians have a hierarchical caste system under a dictatorship government. Each Silexian is created for a specific job, and fills that job until declared obsolete. There is no social mobility. In fact the very idea would be alien and somewhat unwholesome to a Silexian. The race is led by a caste of supervisors whole dole out work assignments and determine when to phase in upgrades and declare models obsolete. Alien races are considered repugnant to the Silexians, as they are an obstruction to Gaia Transformation for which all planets are destined.

Each model of Silexian is hard-coded with its designated task and the directive to fully obey its designated supervisor, so there is dissent only in the case of a malfunctioning Silexian. Supervisors themselves defer to the Prime Operator, whom nobody has the authority to deem obsolete, and therefore is practically immortal.

Gameplay Effects:
Silexians have an EP of Barren, and citizens become much happier whenever a world in their detection range becomes barren. Silexians also have excellent environmental skills, with terraforming ability at maximum.

The Silexians are technically out to destroy all life in the galaxy and recreate all planets as Gaia worlds, this is a long term goal, and the Silexians have no qualms about allying themselves temporarily to achieve that goal. As a result, they have no diplomatic penalty, and citizens are ambivalent to treaties. They do, however, like war somewhat, as they see it as a method of actively achieving their goals.

Being precisely designed machines, they are able to be mass produced, enhancing population growth. They are also good at industrial production, though fairly poor at research. To summarize:

Industry - good
Mining - average
Environment/Terraforming = excellent
Research = poor
Diplomacy = average

Silexian populations consume PP instead of food.
Warning: Antarans in dimensional portal are closer than they appear.

Underling
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Re: The Silexians

#18 Post by Underling »

wow! I'm happy to see that someone is playing with this idea. This looks like a very nice retcon that brings them in line with current thought & keeps the core concept. Thanks for taking the time to look at them.

The 'Ling

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Tortanick
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Re: The Silexians

#19 Post by Tortanick »

Hey underling, glad to have your approval.

Ok, here's my comments:

1) Why destroy all life in the galaxy? Why not just relocate it temporally then move it back once they've finished work? I could see quite a few species who make a deal: Don't touch our planets, but teraform the rest of the solar system first then we'll peacefully relocate to the Gaia worlds and leave our old homes to you.

Their tendency to leave worlds as Barren might cause a short term (for a very long definition of short ;)) problem, but so long as they've got other worlds to keep them busy and a reason its in their interests to leave you alone (say your giving them research) there's no reason for them to attack, maybe not even until they've mastered Gaia tech.

2) I really liked the idea that they'd invade you to stop pollution, I say we keep that. Perhaps divide the race into subsystems: the primary subsystem is environmental improvement: the one who Gaias up worlds, but there's supporting subsystems like: logistics, forward planning, internal maintenance, etc and "short term rapid response": deals with incoming asteroids, prevents ice-ages, and beats the crap out of anyone polluting.

3) On the one hand what your doing with barren worlds makes perfect sense, but on the other hand something isn't really clicking. Something about seeing the Gardener race with an empire of barren worlds.

P.S. Anyone else thinking they should ironically reference Captain Planet? A few ideas:

Saying "The power is yours" when you cave in to a death threat from them.

(American) Fair Use allows parodying so maybe the play the theme tune without lyrics when they're about to go eco-terrorist.

Beginning Gaia transforming sequence: EARTH!... FIRE!... WIND!... WATER!... HEART! *error* *error* *data corruption* *reboot planet and retry* - not sure where we'd fit this one in.

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Bigjoe5
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Re: The Silexians

#20 Post by Bigjoe5 »

Of course, you're right about a lot of those things, Tortanick. I was very tired and had strep throat while writing those. I'll definitely work them over a bit when I'm feeling better. Glad to have your input, of course.

As for the Captain Planet thing, having that as the default would be a bit... corny? Maybe only if the player deliberately activates it by naming his empire "Planeteers"?
Warning: Antarans in dimensional portal are closer than they appear.

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Tortanick
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Re: The Silexians

#21 Post by Tortanick »

Its supposed to be a bit of a parody, they only reference Captain planet when they aren't being nature loving caretakers but outright eco-terrorists.

It would get very corny if we over do it though.

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Bigjoe5
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Re: The Silexians

#22 Post by Bigjoe5 »

Here's a revised version. I'm a bit hesitant to add anything about them attacking polluters if we don't know for sure that pollution will be in the game. IMO, it adds complexity without a lot of fun/strategic value, so it probably won't be. Anyway, here it is:

Intro: The Silexians are a race of ecological maintenance robots. They see their own existence as a means of bringing biological beauty and balance to the galaxy. They are trying to become an interstellar power in order to achieve this goal.

Homeworld: The Silexian homeworld is today a lifeless, Barren world, in preparation for its transformation to Gaia.

Physiology: As each type of Silexian is customized for a specific task, there are (sometimes large) variations in appearance. The majority of Silexians however, share many similar features.

Silexians were wholly artificial robotic beings. Their bodies are made primarily of metals, and they each have visible antennae which are used for short range radio communication. They have advanced tactile sensors as well as wide-frequency photon detectors situated in various strategic places depending on their function. Some Silexians have advanced sound-wave detection mechanisms and others have the ability to scan the genetic codes of organisms and alter them via retrovirus injections.

Silexians generally have a flat base equipped with wheels and rocket boosters, but the occasional model is bipedal, to allow greater agility. Many have pincer-like appendages and injector tubules for manipulating objects.

History: The Silexians are a wholly artificial race whose existence, as they rightly believe, was originally meant for the task of developing and maintaining beautiful environments. The Silexians were created by the Caretakers in order to increase the efficiency and automation of their environmental maintenance projects. Eventually, all of the Caretakers’ worlds were inhabited and maintained by the peaceful and loyal Silexians.

The Caretakers were pleased by this and tried to improve the Silexians further by programming them with the ability to perform Gaia transformation, an ability previously limited to elite teams of the most educated and experienced Caretakers. The project was a success, after a fashion: The reprogrammed Silexians gained the ability to transform any planet into a Gaia world, but only by first purging the world of all life, reducing it to a barren world. The Caretakers were horrified at this outcome, and an intense moral debate ensued regarding the justifiability of destroying all life on a planet in order to create a Gaia world. Eventually, they decided against the reprogrammed Silexians and began taking steps to decommission them.

This was a relatively easy task for the Caretakers - being a highly advanced precursor race, there was no chance for their machines to revolt and overthrow their masters - but there were others who had a vested interest in keeping the new-model Silexians the way they were. The Experimenters raided the facility in which the new Silexians were being decommissioned and managed to capture a sizable number of them. Yet, the Experimenters attempts to recreate them ended in failure, as the techniques of Gaia Transformation were beyond even their ability to code into a machine. The Experimenters’ Silexians still had their terraforming skills, and their urge to cleanse planets of all life in order to prepare it for Gaia Transformation, but the Gaia Transformation methods themselves were lost. The Experimenters declared their Silexians a failure, and abandoned them at a nearby Swamp planet (which they promptly terraformed to Barren). Now, the Silexians seek to return to the stars and regain the lost knowledge of Gaia transformation

Culture: The Silexians have a hierarchical caste system under a dictatorship government. Each Silexian is created for a specific job, and fills that job until declared obsolete. There is no social mobility. In fact the very idea would be alien and somewhat unwholesome to a Silexian. The race is led by a caste of supervisors whole dole out work assignments and determine when to phase in upgrades and declare models obsolete. Alien races are generally disliked by the Silexians, as they are an obstruction to Gaia Transformation for which all planets are destined. However, this is not a deeply ingrained hatred for its own sake, but rather a practical dislike, as other races tend to stand in the way of their achieving their goals. As such, it is not impossible for the Silexians to be friendly and diplomatic, and vice versa.

Each model of Silexian is hard-coded with its designated task and the directive to fully obey its designated supervisor, so there is dissent only in the case of a malfunctioning Silexian. Supervisors themselves defer to the Prime Operator, whom nobody has the authority to declare obsolete, and therefore is practically immortal. The Prime Operator tends to be the first to acquire the latest useful upgrades.

While the Silexians enjoy living in a Barren environment thanks to the knowledge that it will eventually become Gaia, they still feel the need to fill their worlds with beautiful mobile gardens, which can be moved out of the way when it is time for Gaia Transformation. These gardens can be used to produce food for other races, though they do not consume it themselves.

Gameplay Effects:
Silexians have an EP of Barren, and citizens become much happier whenever a world in their detection range becomes barren. Silexians also have excellent environmental skills, with terraforming ability at maximum.

The Silexians are out to recreate all planets as Gaia worlds, which requires removing all life from each planet, either through temporary relocation, or simply by elimination. This is a long term goal however, and the Silexians have no qualms about allying themselves temporarily to achieve that goal. As a result, they have no diplomatic penalty, and citizens are ambivalent to treaties. They do, however, like war somewhat, as they see it as a method of actively achieving their goals.

Being precisely designed machines, they are able to be mass produced, enhancing population growth. They are also good at industrial production, though fairly poor at research. To summarize:

Population Growth = good
Industry - good
Mining - average
Environment/Terraforming = excellent
Research = poor
Diplomacy = average

Silexian populations consume PP instead of food.
Warning: Antarans in dimensional portal are closer than they appear.

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MikkoM
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Re: The Silexians

#23 Post by MikkoM »

I just recently discovered this race. I am currently not that familiar with the ideas for the campaign mode, but started thinking if these environmentally nutty robots could have a less than traditional, special, victory condition. Something like: “get points (if there will be some sort of a point system) by terraforming planets first to terran (which is probably the most garden kind of world that we have) and then when the Gaia tech is discovered to Gaia. Win game when X amount/percent of planets has been converted to Gaia.” And possibly also something like: “the population is happy when dealing with races that also terraform towards terran, and not so happy when dealing with races that terraform away from terran”( if pollution isn`t in the game). This could possibly add more variety to the standard victory conditions and hopefully encourage different kinds of playing styles.
Tortanick wrote: 3) On the one hand what your doing with barren worlds makes perfect sense, but on the other hand something isn't really clicking. Something about seeing the Gardener race with an empire of barren worlds.
I have to agree with Tortanick here. I don`t think that we will have any shortness of races that want to kill everyone, so it would be nice to have also some races that don`t necessarily want to kill everyone, but can do it, if they feel that it is necessary. A gardener race that likes worlds that they can actually effectively use for their own purposes makes more sense to me. Although your story did have a nice twist that explained why they would like barren worlds.
Bigjoe5 wrote: Silexians generally have a flat base equipped with wheels and rocket boosters, but the occasional model is bipedal, to allow greater agility.
Are the rocket boosters intended for flying or hovering? Like some one already said in this thread, the idea of environmental nuttiness could probably be advanced even further by having these robots either hover above the gardens that they are taking care of, or touching the ground as little as possible, perhaps by having multiple flexible limbs that distribute their weight to a large area.
Tortanick wrote: P.S. Anyone else thinking they should ironically reference Captain Planet? A few ideas:

Saying "The power is yours" when you cave in to a death threat from them…
I would be very careful with using intentional humour in a game like this. If humour is needed, it can probably be introduced by having weird aliens trying to make sense of each other, or having races with very weird customs, but even in these situations it should probably be introduced so that it makes sense in the game world. If more obvious humour with clear references to real world is needed this can probably done in a mod. This is my humble opinion anyway.

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