New Aliens: Needed-Unwanted-Unwelcome ?

[GypsyComet]

Most of them are encountered fairly close to their homeworlds, though. The Bwaps is one exception to this; there may be others.

The Virushi also get all over the place.
On the Minor Human Race list, the Geonee used to be spread across much of what is now the Imperium, and the Suerrat still comprise 60% of Ilelish Sector's population.

This stated tendency to stick close works in favor of the "small list" folks, since they don't have to worry about more than a handful in any sector other than the GURPS-populated Spinward Marches (no seriously, that's a LOT of aliens), or Dagudashag. Minor races are going to be much thinner than those two regions in general.

That still leaves you with Humans, Vargr, and Aslan just about everywhere in census-visible numbers, and Bwaps and Virushi in their ones, twos, and HR Departments across much of Imperial space. Hivers and K'kree do get out, but only at embassy strength in important places.

 

[aramis]

The Virushi also get all over the place.
On the Minor Human Race list, the Geonee used to be spread across much of what is now the Imperium, and the Suerrat still comprise 60% of Ilelish Sector's population.

This stated tendency to stick close works in favor of the "small list" folks, since they don't have to worry about more than a handful in any sector other than the GURPS-populated Spinward Marches (no seriously, that's a LOT of aliens), or Dagudashag. Minor races are going to be much thinner than those two regions in general.

That still leaves you with Humans, Vargr, and Aslan just about everywhere in census-visible numbers, and Bwaps and Virushi in their ones, twos, and HR Departments across much of Imperial space. Hivers and K'kree do get out, but only at embassy strength in important places.

Unlike K'Kree, Hivers are driven by curiosity. A GM can justify them ANYWHERE in Known Space, including the Zhodani Consulate and the far reaches of the Aslan Hierate. And not always by themselves, even.

A pretty good setup for them is chartering a ship "on a leisurely trip to X"... two hivers, and they want adjoining staterooms, with the partition between rearranged to be horizontal rather than vertical... (Double the floor space, but half the height.) And, like Virushi, they'll happily pay for that to be done. And, once done, the manipulation begins....

 

[shadowcat20]

Seems most of Imperial space is known, but how about the edges of the other empires away from Imperial space? Things found in the Zho drive to the core or odd rift bound planets hard to get to. Grandpa has set in stone the 6 majors but there could be a lot of one planet races out there of lower tech levels. Then early generation ships way out in the middle of nowhere with colonies of the main six that have had time to alter a bit. Or colonies lost in the long night that never came back to higher techs. Then there could be the odd higher tech planet shielding itself from lower tech Imps.

Still lots to work with out there.

 

[robject]

[...] Then early generation ships way out in the middle of nowhere with colonies of the main six that have had time to alter a bit. Or colonies lost in the long night that never came back to higher techs. Then there could be the odd higher tech planet shielding itself from lower tech Imps.

That's collectively called "Faraway Sector", assuming that there are little pockets of civilization too far from Charted Space to really interact with it. It's indeed wide open for development.

 

[Timerover51]

Seems most of Imperial space is known, but how about the edges of the other empires away from Imperial space? Things found in the Zho drive to the core or odd rift bound planets hard to get to. Grandpa has set in stone the 6 majors but there could be a lot of one planet races out there of lower tech levels. Then early generation ships way out in the middle of nowhere with colonies of the main six that have had time to alter a bit. Or colonies lost in the long night that never came back to higher techs. Then there could be the odd higher tech planet shielding itself from lower tech Imps.

Still lots to work with out there.

When you look at the map of the Imperium, the focus is on Coreward from Terra. There is an enormous area to the Rimward of Terra that is essentially unexplored. Grandpa is not apt to have done a whole lot there, and the aside from the Aslan, the main aliens are all to Coreward. So have at it.

 

[Carlobrand]

There's a canonical statement to the effect that there are about 100 known minor non-human races in the Imperium and about 300 more (400 in all) in the rest of Charted Space. This works out at around one per three subsectors or five per sector. On the average, of course, some subsectors and sectors have more, some less.

Most of them are encountered fairly close to their homeworlds, though. The Bwaps is one exception to this; there may be others. (ISTR that the writeup of the Hlanssai (from the Vargr Extents) mentions that they can be encountered in the Spinward Marches -- I could be wrong, though).


Hans

I am presuming we're talking alien sapients or semi-sapients, at least Chirper intelligence.

We have a heck of a lot of O2 worlds. We have a heck of a lot of life on those worlds - pretty dangerous life sometimes. However, that doesn't necessarily translate to a heck of a lot of sapient life - Earth got along quite nicely with nothing more intelligent than a rather bright carnivorous animal variation for whole chunks of its history. Five per sector sounds workable.

As to how much work you put into it: every sapient alien doesn't need a full work-up. You can grab something interesting out of Barlowe's Guide or the deep recesses of your nightmarish imagination and have it stroll by and turn heads, and not need a detailed breakdown of their culture and history. If the players are curious, be honest - it's still a work in progress, wasn't sure if you'd be interested, if you are I'll flesh it out a bit. If the circumstances permit, you can even say nobody knows yet - Imperial science might not have paid a lot of attention to this particular hinterland dweller, or if they have then it's an esoteric study that hasn't made it outside a few academic journals, or maybe it's a reclusive species that has resisted being studied.

Otherwise it can wait, along with the descriptions of the 300 worlds the players haven't visited yet, for that moment when you decide to use it for some particular campaign.

As I recall, the Marches feature the Humans in their various flavors, the Vargr, the Droyne and their little cousins, some insidious atmosphere pyramid builder I don't know much about, and ... hmmm. I have a vague idea there's someone I'm forgetting, but I can't recall at the moment.

 

[Vladika]

Why does all "space going" life have to essentially be of a size to conform to the tonnage rules currently used?

Why not life forms that are the size of mice? Elephants?

Assuming they couldn't have invented drives that would work in less that 100dt, just think how many of the little guys could/would be aboard even that 100dt ship? Given the current crewing requirements, that ship could very easily be a colony ship bringing 10's of thousands of a version of an intelligent "Norway Rat" to your home planet...

 

[GypsyComet]

As I recall, the Marches feature the Humans in their various flavors, the Vargr, the Droyne and their little cousins, some insidious atmosphere pyramid builder I don't know much about, and ... hmmm. I have a vague idea there's someone I'm forgetting, but I can't recall at the moment.

See: http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=32269

Documented races in the Marches include resident-but-not-native baseline Humaniti in all three flavors (Vilani, Zhodani, and Solomani), Dolphins, and the Darrian MHR, as well as the more recently geneered race known as Nexxies. Aliens include the Droyne/Chirpers, Crawni, Shriekers, Ebokin, and Dandies. Aside from the Nexxies, those were all documented in CT...

GURPS added the Mewey, Obeyery, Otarri, Saurians, Tashaki, Garoo, Ursty, Tethmari, and Viji. These all appear in only one place (GT Behind the Claw).

The newest addition is the Amindii, mentioned in some promotional T5 materials from Marc.

At this point, the Marches need pruning, but a lot of other sectors still need their fair share.

 

[aramis]

Why does all "space going" life have to essentially be of a size to conform to the tonnage rules currently used?

Why not life forms that are the size of mice? Elephants?

Assuming they couldn't have invented drives that would work in less that 100dt, just think how many of the little guys could/would be aboard even that 100dt ship? Given the current crewing requirements, that ship could very easily be a colony ship bringing 10's of thousands of a version of an intelligent "Norway Rat" to your home planet...

Too small, and the neural complexity won't be present. Too large, and too much of the potential neural capacity is spent upon the body.

Likewise, the reach needed to work metal precludes the small end. The requisite size is due to leverage, distance of work from the body for body safety, and ability to expose to heat without overheating.

Similarly, size limits free limbs. Too small, they lack leverage. Too big, and they're essential for locomotion In 1G, everything I'm aware of above 300kg median mass currently on dry land is a quadruped. Bears can do limited bipedal motion, but the big ones don't go far at all on only 2 legs. Elephant Birds are presumed to have hit 400kg, but are extinct bipeds... likewise the giant Moa.

Likewise, large creatures seem to almost all be 4-limbed on earth. The extra limbs past that are noses, lips, tongues, or tails.

The sensors are likely to remain close to the brain, due mostly to the biological expense of neural tissue. Almost no vertebrates on earth have significantly displaced mouths, eyes nor ears. (The Hammerhead Shark is the notable exception.) If the brain is in a cephalo-thorax, then the sensors are likely to be initially on the same, tho' antennae and eyestalks might be present... but that reduces the available biological energy for the brain by diverting neural tissue to transmission rather than sensory processing.

Also, larger animals have much harder metabolic regulation issues - an elephant mostly needs to shed heat, even in a mild snowy winter. A rabbit almost always is looking to retain heat.

Which leads me to suggest a lower bound of about 20kg. (Big enough to do useful metalwork.) Likewise, I'd expect an upper bound of about 400kg for a sophont in 1G, but I'd be willing to bet that scales inversely with gravity... but I don't mind that the Virushi are presented as 800kg and descended from octopeds...

 

[Vladika]

Too small, and the neural complexity won't be present. Too large, and too much of the potential neural capacity is spent upon the body.

Likewise, the reach needed to work metal precludes the small end. The requisite size is due to leverage, distance of work from the body for body safety, and ability to expose to heat without overheating.

Similarly, size limits free limbs. Too small, they lack leverage. Too big, and they're essential for locomotion In 1G, everything I'm aware of above 300kg median mass currently on dry land is a quadruped. Bears can do limited bipedal motion, but the big ones don't go far at all on only 2 legs. Elephant Birds are presumed to have hit 400kg, but are extinct bipeds... likewise the giant Moa.

Likewise, large creatures seem to almost all be 4-limbed on earth. The extra limbs past that are noses, lips, tongues, or tails.

The sensors are likely to remain close to the brain, due mostly to the biological expense of neural tissue. Almost no vertebrates on earth have significantly displaced mouths, eyes nor ears. (The Hammerhead Shark is the notable exception.) If the brain is in a cephalo-thorax, then the sensors are likely to be initially on the same, tho' antennae and eyestalks might be present... but that reduces the available biological energy for the brain by diverting neural tissue to transmission rather than sensory processing.

Also, larger animals have much harder metabolic regulation issues - an elephant mostly needs to shed heat, even in a mild snowy winter. A rabbit almost always is looking to retain heat.

Which leads me to suggest a lower bound of about 20kg. (Big enough to do useful metalwork.) Likewise, I'd expect an upper bound of about 400kg for a sophont in 1G, but I'd be willing to bet that scales inversely with gravity... but I don't mind that the Virushi are presented as 800kg and descended from octopeds...

We are talking ALIENS. Why do we assume they evolved on a 1G planet?

Also, if humans could evolve in 1G and adapt to a range, why couldn't another species do the same from lower, or higher, Gs?

For that matter, just look at dwarfs and midgets and ask why they would need 3 meters, deck to deck?

We either break with stereotypical prejudice on "what's possible for an alien", or we don't. If we don't, we're stuck with pretty much what we have now.

As for large land animals needing their appendages for locomotion? T Rex? Velociraptors? We know they evolved their forelimbs for some reason, just not what. It certainly wasn't for locomotion.

Elephant? What they can do with a proboscis is pretty amassing. Just imagine if they had developed more sentience.

We postulate a dolphin like race. No hands, no ability to use fire, but we use them anyway. Whales are vastly bigger, so why no whale ships?

Monkeys, even the small ones, are quite intelligent, as well as dexterous. As humans apparently use only 10% of our brains, why not a space faring race beings about their size?

And a true "hive intelligence" like the bee, or ant? Admittedly, they are small, but what if they were bigger? Or possibly nothing like that except for a hive intelligence?

Maybe an Amorphous Crystalline entity.

I'm just not going to go for the "it didn't happen on earth, so, it didn't and can't anywhere else." Kind of Un-Traveller-Like to my way of thinking.

I'd really hope that the possibilities are endless, just we lack the imagination to see them.

 

[JimMarn]

Monkeys, even the small ones, are quite intelligent, as well as dexterous. As humans apparently use only 10% of our brains, why not a space faring race beings about their size?

The 10% of our brains thing was disproved by researchers doing CAT scans of people doing various things. The human brain lights up like a neon sign showing activity in most of the brain.

 

[Vladika]

The 10% of our brains thing was disproved by researchers doing CAT scans of people doing various things. The human brain lights up like a neon sign showing activity in most of the brain.

God help us then, if WE are the best the universe can come up with.

 

[JimMarn]

God help us then, if WE are the best the universe can come up with.

I don't know if we are the best...

or if we are the least,

interesting either way.

 

[Marchand]

I would happily, and do in MTU, toss the Zhodani, the K'kree, and the Hivers without any remorse whatever.

That's almost the opposite of my preference - although with you on the Zhodani (because I don't hold with psionics). But I like the Hivers and K'kree as interesting, actually quite alien species. I would junk the Aslan and reskin the Vargr. Anthropomorphic aliens are too cheesy FMTU (for my Traveller universe).

 

[tjoneslo]

Similarly, size limits free limbs. Too small, they lack leverage. Too big, and they're essential for locomotion In 1G, everything I'm aware of above 300kg median mass currently on dry land is a quadruped. Bears can do limited bipedal motion, but the big ones don't go far at all on only 2 legs. Elephant Birds are presumed to have hit 400kg, but are extinct bipeds... likewise the giant Moa.

Some of this has to do with evolution of the specific creatures rather than any limitation imposed by biology. Examples of the dinosaur world include the Tyrannosaurus (topping out at 6800kg) as bipeds. Some of the smaller Theropoda had much longer, and capable fore limbs.

Likewise, large creatures seem to almost all be 4-limbed on earth. The extra limbs past that are noses, lips, tongues, or tails.

This is most likely due to the evolutionary success of the 4 limbed chordate over any of the alternatives. There is a biological basis for that, and it may well be that the energy requirements preclude many alternatives. But for Traveller I'm not sure that a great assumption.

 

[FreeTrav]

I don't have a problem with more aliens per se, but I want them to be interesting in some way, and I want to see them in their own cultural context. Another Minor Human Race whose only significant feature is a predominance of purple eyes and a second opposable thumb would be of less interest to me than a well-developed culture of otherwise 'stock' humans.

Andrea Vallance did a wonderful job on the Luriani in her Minor Alien Module..., but careful reading, plus reading the Funny Fish stories at Freelance Traveller, strongly suggests that there's a lot that she wanted to say about the Luriani/Mmarislusant/Verasti Dtareen combined culture that she had to cut from the Module; I can only hope that someday she'll be authorized by Mongoose to release, either under their label or free via Freelance Traveller, a Supplement to the Luriani Alien Module which includes that missing information. I'd rather see that than Yet Another Generic Alien With Rubber Facial Prosthetics.

The glimpses we got of ST:TNG's Klingons in their own cultural context made them far more interesting to me than the TOS Klingons, who were always in "ours"; three of the best Star Trek novels I've read were Diane Duane's Spock's World and The Romulan Way, and Janet Kagan's Uhura's Song. John M. Ford's The Final Reflection almost rises to that level, as well.

Other books that stand very high on my "Reread these every so often" list are the Jao Empire books (Flint and Wentworth), the Liaden Universe books (Lee and Miller), the Safehold books (Weber), Vinge's Zones of Thought/Qeng Ho books, and the Sime~Gen universe (Lichtenberg and Lorrah).

The common thread is that in all of them - including the Trek books - you get stories told that show you a culture from the inside, even if told from the PoV of an 'outsider'. They do their best to explore the ramifications of key cultural assumptions, and to make the result seem coherent and reasonable, even if distasteful in particulars.

If you're not going to do that; if you're only going to make humans with rubber ripples on their ears and noses; if you're only going to build stereotyped cardboard flats to stand on the stage... why bother?

 

[aramis]

We are talking ALIENS. Why do we assume they evolved on a 1G planet?

Also, if humans could evolve in 1G and adapt to a range, why couldn't another species do the same from lower, or higher, Gs?

For that matter, just look at dwarfs and midgets and ask why they would need 3 meters, deck to deck?

Hell - WE don't need 3m deck to deck - it's just that that is a comfortable height and works well as a game artifact.

As for 1G - ALL the data we have is 1G evolved, and O2 in the 0.15 to 0.30 Bar PPO2 range; all the living data we have is in the 0.15 to 0.22 Bar PPO2.

We can only validly extrapolate from what we know. We can make reasonable predictions.

The occasional exception to those predictions (eg, the virushi) is fine fiction... but needs to be carefully thought out. (Note that if a reasonable sentient biped tops at 400kg, then a multiped should top at about the same per pair of walking legs.)

And canon traveller races don't all require the same volumes nor deck heights.

3m Deck to Deck: Virushi take 8 Td per each. Eiboken 8Td each. K'Kree take 25 Td per adult (but that includes up to 6 preadults - if we assume maximal distribution and even growth to adulthood, 1+6/6+5/6+4/6+3/6+2/6+1/6=27/6=4.5 giving the real size per k'kree of about 5.5Td... There's your steerage rate). Solomani (in MT) only need 3.6Td each long term for military crews, but civil shipping usually uses 4Td. Droyne require 2Td per each, but dedicated droyne ships don't use single droyne staterooms. All can do double occupancy.

1.5m deck to deck: Hivers (still only 4Td).

Other: Graytch (prefer wider corridors) but still 4td.
Hresh (T4) - their workstations take 1 extra Td (thus 2Td or 3td), but their staterooms don't.
Nunclee - they're collective organisms...
Providers - NO game rules specific to their travel, as they generally don't. THey're intelligent jellyfish, after all.

 

[Timerover51]

The problem that I have with aliens that stray from the circa 1G oxygen breathers is that for humans and the alien to interact, one or the other is in space suits. A methane breather in an oxygen atmosphere is going to be in a space suit, and a human in a methane atmosphere is definitely going to be in a space suit. While a high-G creature can function at lower G, a Human on a planet with a 5G gravity is not going to be moving.

How does Lackland interact with Barlennan the Mesklinite on Mesklin in Mission of Gravity? Through a radio and while outside, Lackland wears a space suit. I would strongly recommend reading that book for some idea how non-oxygen breathing aliens or high-G planet aliens and humans would interact.

 

[Carlobrand]

Too small, and the neural complexity won't be present. Too large, and too much of the potential neural capacity is spent upon the body.
...
Which leads me to suggest a lower bound of about 20kg. (Big enough to do useful metalwork.) Likewise, I'd expect an upper bound of about 400kg for a sophont in 1G, but I'd be willing to bet that scales inversely with gravity... but I don't mind that the Virushi are presented as 800kg and descended from octopeds...

Hmmm.

Can't speak to the upper end, but the lower end for the human species tends to bottom with the various pygmy peoples at around a bit over a meter and around 20-25 kg for the adult, so those numbers sound good. Brain doesn't scale with the body, which is to be expected but sets a definite lower limit on how small live-birthers can get, assuming the human brain is reasonably typical.

An alien species that reproduced another way - say pouch-style like the marsupials, or the way the Hivers do things - could conceivably be a bit smaller. I'm guessing the lower limit for an adult sapient brain, assuming human equivalent intelligence is roughly 0.6 to 0.7 kilograms, and then you protect that and give it limbs and a digestive tract and so forth, you might get down to 10 kilograms. Balance-wise, at that size it might keep its brains in the torso to avoid being bobble-headed, might not have a head at all or might have a head consisting of little more than sense organs on a little turret.

One thought is that the reach needed to work metal is only significant if the species is to independently develop technology. Those early humans grabbed by the Ancients were not up to that. A very small intelligent species found by a spacefaring culture could be "jump-started," trained and put to work by the dominant culture doing something within their abilities - like doing assembly work in very small spaces with power tools - in exchange for those fruits of technology that were suitable to them. A long enough association might even see the species break through the exploitation barrier and rise to more intellectual pursuits.

A very small intelligent species could evolve in an environment suited to itself, warm with some habitat that provided refuge from predators, such as an arboreal environment where it could climb high to avoid the larger threats. A tropical environment might assure a plentiful supply of the kind of energy rich food such a species would need - likely also high in the trees. Maybe useful poisons could be put to the task of thinning the local predator population and putting meat on the "table", as some human pygmy peoples do. Such a species might achieve reasonable intelligence in the course of developing the brain necessary to identify and make full use of the local plant life, avoid poisonous plants and other threats, and organize for the hunt in a 3-D arboreal environment. Limited by its physical weakness, the species might never expect to advance beyond something equivalent to Neanderthals until some spacegoing species encountered it and decided to put it to work.

I'm also imagining a biologically engineered species consisting of a head-thorax and four limbs ending in hands, again in the 10 kilogram range, developed to work with tools in space. Because it is engineered rather than evolved, its relative weakness is not an issue since it's intended to work with powered tools in small spaces on specific tasks that don't require much strength. You could further take advantage of its manufactured nature, give it an external carapace, other adaptations and a hibernation mode to allow it to survive longer in the event of decompression until rescuers can recover it. It could be as intelligent as a human in terms of learning skills, might even be a wicked computer programmer or mathematician, but as a manufactured species it might lack some of the traits humans take for granted, like emotions or aspirations.

 

[aramis]

I avoid the potential ranges for Engineered species because, literally, they're baseless speculation. We have no basis to extrapolate from other than evolved 1G.

That said, the needed organs to support 1.4 kg adult human brain include (Parenthesis indicate adult human average):
Heart (300g)
Lungs (190g)
Liver (1500g)
Kidneys (290g)
Stomach (1kg)
Intestines (~6kg)
endocrine system (~1kg)
Lung requisite muscle (~1kg)

The brain uses 15% of a 65kg human's needs. the organs to support it are about 13kg of the remaining 63.5kg... so
15%+ (13/63.5) is about 36%... so about 36% of 13... so that's a nominal minimum gut mass of about 4.6kg...

before adding skin, mouth, skeleton, gut to support same... And note that we can probably reduce that to about 3kg (adult pigmies brains are about 1 kg, IIRC - it was mentioned on a show I watched a few years ago; that would reduce needed metabolic mass as well).

I could buy 10kg as a minimum engineered, but it's a stretch, and I'm not certain that's viable as a species, even engineered. I'd accept it as the minimum for a pod-person (such as in Palladium's Mechanoids or McCaffrey's Brain-Brawn series).