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General Alien World Problems.

The denizens of Earth must be relatively stupid. They put signs on everything most of which tell you obvious things if you are sentient.

Then they have ones that are clearly just lies or wrong like, "One size fits all."
 
Turtledove's "The Road Not Taken"?

Rather, my own reaction to "Signs" and most Grays-themed sci-fi movies. But particularly for "Signs".

I mean, these butt-naked aliens decide to invade a world which is 70% made of the equivalent of a universal acid, where the same lethal liquid can fall from the sky at any given time, and where the denizens' body is mostly that same liquid and they cannot even take five minutes to invent a godamn raincoat to cover their ugly butts before sending their invasion forces in the US and Europe? A five-year old could cause them grave injuries just by peeing on the damn things!

That's the equivalent of Earth invading a Xenomorph breeding facility with a battalion of nudists and stadium flashers.

I'm pretty sure the grouchy look on their face is because they realize everybody makes fun of their bony butts. ;)
 
  • Those idiot earth-beings refuse your legal tender, and insist on flimsy, easily counterfeited, low-quality paper notes in outlandish colors and boring rectangular shapes.
  • Those pesky earthlings insist on haggling when its inappropriate, and not when appropriate.
  • In general, they have no proper appreciation of civilized customs, no sense of propriety. Why, they even walk around with bare hands!
 
Your encounter a human slower-than-light ion-drive starship in deep space.
They haven't developed faster-than-light drives or reactionless thrusters! Instead, they use ion drives, beamed-energy solar sails, and mass drivers for in-system transport at their home system.

Your ship's telepath reports that they're completely non-violent and pacifist, to the point where they don't even have a concept of "war" and medicate anyone with violent or anti-social tendencies into conformity.
You send a report back to your empire, which will of course proceed to assemble a conquest fleet -- this will be a curb-stomp battle.

Next you fire a heat-ray induction weapon at their ship to force them to surrender.

One of the humans goes off his meds and proceeds to slice your ship to pieces with his ship's ion drive exhaust.

Your battlefleet reaches the Solar System, knowing they're facing an enemy incapable of defending themselves, and without weapons if they tried...

Except for the lasers used to drive solar-sail spacecraft.
And the ion drive Belter ships.
And the mass drivers.
And what they learned from the wreckage of your ship.

Curb-stomp battle... just not the one you expected.
 
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After having your peace negotiations interrupted by an interdimensional rift that spews the most vicious and appalling insult imaginable, you and your former adversaries gather up your massive battlefleets to attack the planet from which the affront originated.

Due to a terrible miscalculation of scale, the entire armada is eaten by a small dog.


What are the High Guard stats and build sequence for the dog? Gotta get me one of those.
 
Your civilization has hoped for centuries contact with another sophont civilization would usher in a new age. When iyour observatories finally receive an insterstellar message, it's wall-to-wall Terran reality shows and "Dancing with the stars" re-runs.
 
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