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Exhumans vs. Singularity Seekers vs. Ultimates

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davethebrave davethebrave's picture
Exhumans vs. Singularity Seekers vs. Ultimates
As a GM starting their first campaign of Eclipse Phase next month, was wondering if other people have done any conflicts where the common goalposts and differing methodology of exhumans, singularity seekers and ultimates were used as hooks/backdrops/crisis points in their adventures/campaigns? How do you distinguish them from each other? Where do you smudge the lines? Where do they wear the same pair of underwear? I'm planning an arc right now. It's centred around TITAN data that different groups of singularity seekers are deceiving and murdering each other over in a race to figure out where it is and how to utilize it/misdirect their competitors about the same information...which draws the attention of different groups of exhumans who do the same thing to each other and the various singularity seekers...and then word gets back to Go-Nin that this data is accessible through Discord, and the ultimates lock down traffic to/from the extrasolar locale from which you can crash through to this abandoned(?) TITAN dataplex...except for them. Firewall, on the other hand, is scared shitless by the x-threat potential of this data. More twists and turns await the characters after that point, including what the data might actually be amongst the red herrings, tracing the initial rumours back to their unexpected source, surprises from varying ideological directions in the chaotic soup of future-thinking eccentrics and psychopaths, plans within plans (and plans beyond the concept "plan"), but since I fully expect that at least one or two of my players lurk these forums, I'll keep a lid on that. I just thought I'd see what other people have done/thought of, since I could use all the ideas I can get to jam-pack this arc with bizarre variations (and even venn diagram blurring) of factions of exhumans, singularity seekers and ultimates. The arc is being planned for much later in my campaign, but seeding the early arcs with all the delicious variety of the bleeding edge of transhumanity is more than my cup of tea, it's the whole teapot.
Yours, Dave the Brave
nerdnumber1 nerdnumber1's picture
Ultimates have their own code
Ultimates have their own code and philosophy that centers on perfection of the trans-human self. Unlike the other two groups, their humanity is still quite important to them, favoring high-quality humanoid morphs. They are also very individualistic and would not consider merging into a permanent group-mind. Exhumans encompasses a far more diverse array of groups, characterized by an eagerness to use new and experimental methods to alter their bodies and minds. They generally find the concept of "humanity" antiquated and will abandon almost any of its core tenants in the pursuit of personal improvement. It is rare to find an exhuman which uses a humanoid morph when given the option, preferring heavily optimized, custom morphs. Few exhuman groups are able to fully participate in transhuman society, often keeping to their own, small community. Singularity seekers believe that combining one's mind with a seed AI should be a life goal, thus becoming a part of a god-like intelligence. This is unpopular with most of society because the most famous seed AIs, the TITANs, ate ~95% of the transhuman species. A significant number of singularity seekers believe that the TITANs took all the uploaded egos from the fallen ~7,500,000,000 people and merged them into its collective consciousness, making them "one with god" in a manner of speaking. Some would prefer to merge with an non-TITAN seed AI, but either way they want a seed AI and want to become part of something that is very powerful and very much not human (making them one hell of an x-threat). Do note that there may be some overlap between some of these groups and often the latter two labels are applied to a group by outsiders.
davethebrave davethebrave's picture
Yeah, although I've always
Yeah, although I've always thought a group of people trying to achieve seed forkhive singularity with transhuman non-AGI minds would make for a great singularity seeker cult who wants a verrrry "non-TITAN" singularity to fuse with. That's one of those "exhuman/singularity seeker" overlap points. ...needless to say, that's one of the groups I've concocted.
Yours, Dave the Brave
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
im doing an arc around discord too...
just love that locality... corporate ninjas and samurai, Ultimates, exhumans in the methane ice mine, "well outfitted" lizard and frog aliens, brinker cults, belter pirates and anarchs, I mean with all that crazy you gotta find some fun!
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
davethebrave davethebrave's picture
Yeah, and the threat of
Yeah, and the threat of exhumans pouring back through to retake the gate is something I'm interested in! The Gate War adventure arc by Anders Sandberg is really appealing, especially since he leaves it barebones enough for a GM to really fill in their own personal flavour.
Yours, Dave the Brave
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
read it...
meh, I like my exhuman black hat antagonists to be scary as hell, giant cyber human centipedes etc... (+gore!) of the totally irredeemably unquestionably "we must kill it before it breeds!" evil variety. not misunderstood accidentally insane well meaning nerds.
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
davethebrave davethebrave's picture
I see there being a few
I see there being a few different kinds of exhumans, and some are definitely the posthuman striving nerds of transhumanity amidst the weird, human-distant or human-absent minds. In fact, one of the exhuman orgs I've started developing is a group called the Posthuman Rights Coalition who, like the ultimates, don't think that what transhumanity is currently at is the limit, but unlike the ultimates have absolutely no desire to keep with even vaguely human physical or mental templates as their goalposts forward into infinity...but also unlike the ultimates (and like some AGIs and uplifts) desire to be recognized and included in the greater mess of transhumanity/posthumanity, and find the term "exhuman" to be (depending on their mental space) unpleasant, hurtful, irrelevant, some alien emotion equivalent to a displeasure not requiring the deaths of others, etc. because they love and accept (or weird thought-analogues developed in a lab) the diversity of posthumanity (except the variations that think murdering transhumans on sight is the thing to do) and love and accept the diversity of transhumanity as well, for a variety of reasons ranging from "More diversity among the posthumans of the future emerges from a greater diversity of transhumanity now!" to "I'd rather keep them stupid and exploitable while my mind becomes networked with a bunch of other smart dudes so we can run a scam off the hypercorp markets in the background and have slave stocks unharmed by other exhumans/posthumans for our eventual master plan." A good exhuman org for players to encounter after many battles with bizarre and horrifying exhuman murderfreaks, with an eclectic mix of uncaring, unfeeling sociopaths with unknowable goals sleeved in bizarre custom morphs and transhuman psychosurgeons and genehackers who think "exhuman" is a little too strong a label for what they're doing. I just thought of two flipside orgs though, one who thinks exhuman is apt and opposes the Posthuman Rights Coalition even though their goals are the same, all over the name. Proud Exhuman Syndicate! The other is a splinter faction from the PES, one who thinks using "human" anywhere in an appellate is disgusting and hates transhumanity and transhuman language. No organizational acronym or linguistic appellate though, they're beyond all that. The thoughtstate approximating their union's designation causes 1d10+7 SV when read off of a brainprint or hacked cyberbrain.
Yours, Dave the Brave
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
yeah, um about that...
see there's this org called Project Ozma, and besides infiltrating the hell out of anything called the "post-human rights coalition" (which would likely be about as popular as NAMBLA is now) I doubt they would wait long before giving the PRC what they wanted... namely a TITAN at a support rally... http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/eclipse-phase-austin/wikis/projec...
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
davethebrave davethebrave's picture
I pictured them as
I pictured them as broadcasting from a brinker hab rimward from Titan, but actually it would be more interesting to have them pop up in the inner system, maybe with the closest thing to a physical HQ being on a Venusian aerostat where the eidolon exhumans that lead the PRC have quietly taken control and digitally merged themselves into psychosurgical union as one mind sleeved into the aerostat. Maybe they've been broadcasting with a hacked signal that masks and misdirects as if they're broadcasting from the outer system, pretending to come from the Kuiper Belt or the Oort Cloud in Posthuman Rights broadcasts. The PCs get involved when some Oversight AI or infomorph tasked with monitoring and analyzing the signal gets the bright idea to cross-reference with reactions to current inner system events and broadcast speed, and catches them slipping up on timing twice in a year, having the radio show "reach the inner system" just minutes too short of a time after an explosion and breaking news about a major scandal leaking for the news to have hit their supposed locale and had live reactions bounce back. Now a Firewall embed in Oversight has spurred the PC's proxy/server to call on them to help them stop the spread of this information/erase all traces of it throughout Oversight and to find the true location first, but more importantly to conceal this information's existence from Project Ozma! Do the PCs find out things on the aerostat about the PRC that have them asking permission up the chain for a 180 on this situation? Do their intentions to be respected and recognized by transhumanity as aliens living among them contribute to them quietly and discretely creating an optimized, upgraded and more efficient station beyond what even an AGI designed as a habitat ops computer could accomplish, making the gestalt exhuman station that doubles as PRC leadership a boon, albeit a boon that would terrify its inhabitants? And if the PCs don't stop Ozma from finding out, what will the PCs do if they know Ozma is going to get there before any backup could?
Yours, Dave the Brave
nerdnumber1 nerdnumber1's picture
I do like the idea that less
I do like the idea that less extreme ex-human groups exist. Just because they reject some notions of humanity doesn't mean that they can't coexist with other trans-humans in limited ways. The Exoglots from Rimward are a good example. Sure they keep to themselves, are creepy as hell, and speak little to outsiders, but they fulfill their responsibilities to the society.
thezombiekat thezombiekat's picture
nerdnumber1 wrote:I do like
nerdnumber1 wrote:
I do like the idea that less extreme ex-human groups exist. Just because they reject some notions of humanity doesn't mean that they can't coexist with other trans-humans in limited ways. The Exoglots from Rimward are a good example. Sure they keep to themselves, are creepy as hell, and speak little to outsiders, but they fulfill their responsibilities to the society.
There is some subconscious bigotry in your statement, although what you say is true. “Just because they reject some notions of humanity” ex-humans reject all or most notions of humanity. “coexist with other trans-humans” hear you have subconsciously included the ex-humans within transhumanity. This brings up an interesting idea. Consider a clade that has deliberately moved beond the definition of transhumanity, in both psychology and physiology but retains a willingness to coexist with transhumanity, and even bioconservatives like the jovians, considering each a parallel path. If you even refer to them as ex-humans they become offended because you are defining them by their link to humanity.
davethebrave davethebrave's picture
It's a semantic apocalypse!
It's a semantic apocalypse!
Yours, Dave the Brave
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
not really...
by the fluff an exhuman sees humanity as a flaw and does NOT want coexistence, or continued contact, if they are forced to coexist it would only be because they had not achieved full transformation yet. if one did desire coexistance... the desire to coexist makes the nearly exhuman part of tanshumanity as coexistence is a human desire... now a parasitical existence with transhumanity, namely where the exhumans grow in strength while the transhumans grow weaker is a good argument I think, namely because the biggest threat to exhumans (besides their own twisted actions) are transhumans but ultimately its just a con-job, they really just want to turn your brain into sentient tapioca...
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
thezombiekat thezombiekat's picture
Baalbamoth wrote:by the fluff
Baalbamoth wrote:
by the fluff an exhuman sees humanity as a flaw and does NOT want coexistence, or continued contact, if they are forced to coexist it would only be because they had not achieved full transformation yet. if one did desire coexistance... the desire to coexist makes the nearly exhuman part of tanshumanity as coexistence is a human desire... now a parasitical existence with transhumanity, namely where the exhumans grow in strength while the transhumans grow weaker is a good argument I think, namely because the biggest threat to exhumans (besides their own twisted actions) are transhumans but ultimately its just a con-job, they really just want to turn your brain into sentient tapioca...
That being so, we need another term. To refer to those that alter their minds and bodies as greatly as ex-humans while being happy to see transhumanity continue on a parallel path
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
no, your missing it.
you can alter your mind and body as much as you want, exhuman is a philosophy not a physical state. the term your looking for is "transhuman" fully transformed exhumans are aliens in nature, they don't act, communicate, or feel anything like a human does. how does transhumanity "coexist" with an unmoving mutated alge that only communicates by particulate sent? what motivations or emotions would they share? the issue is there IS no bridge for coexistence. "godlike intelligence" does not make one an exhuman.
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
nerdnumber1 nerdnumber1's picture
What about this thought
What about this thought process: "Trans-humanity is flawed, however it is our origin. Therefore it is proven to have the potential to produce fruits greater than its current state. As such it should be observed and allowed to exist for the time being." While any exhuman group would put the survival of its own kind above trans-humanity, this does not necessarily mean that it finds the extinction of trans-humanity to be a pressing goal. As long as resources are plentiful and the trans-humans do not take aggressive action, they could very well be tolerated, especially if dealing with them peacefully allows access to useful resources at a lower risk/cost than taking taking said resources by force. Also, while ex-humans find that clinging the meme of "humanity" is foolish, many are not so foolish as to reject ideas merely because "humanity" shares them. Rejecting an idea based on its association with an unpopular idea or group is a logical fallacy, e.g. Hitler drank water, so I should not drink water. It is very possible for an ex-human to share certain traits with humans if it were to find said traits useful. Therefore you can't judge something antithetical to all ex-humans by stating "x is a human desire". Ex-humans are by no means a homogeneous group. The only constant is a rejection of humanity as an ideal. I'm not saying that many, if not most, ex-human enclaves are antagonistic or a danger to humanity or that almost all have an outlook that clashes with most trans-humans, but it is insane to generalize the behavior of such a diverse and strange group. There are likely exceptions to every rule.
thezombiekat thezombiekat's picture
Baalbamoth wrote:you can
Baalbamoth wrote:
you can alter your mind and body as much as you want, exhuman is a philosophy not a physical state. the term your looking for is "transhuman" fully transformed exhumans are aliens in nature, they don't act, communicate, or feel anything like a human does. how does transhumanity "coexist" with an unmoving mutated alge that only communicates by particulate sent? what motivations or emotions would they share? the issue is there IS no bridge for coexistence. "godlike intelligence" does not make one an exhuman.
That sounds vaguely reminiscent of the factors, who we have established communication with and found sufficient common ground to engage in limited trade. And most ex-humans aren’t as different to humanity as the factors are.
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
right
until the friggin giant alien eggs they left in our solar system hatch and transhumanity goes the way of the do-do. Until then sure, they can pretend too.
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
davethebrave davethebrave's picture
While I like the way you
While I like the way you think, re: common assumptions to make the game more hostile and threatening to transhumanity, I'm with thezombiekat and nerdnumber1 on the more open interpretation of exhuman generally. I'm not going to close off possibilities as a GM just because those possibilities aren't falling in line with the most horrific thing every single time. It can make a group of players yawn if they know every time the word exhuman is used by a Firewall proxy, they're in for some horror, gore and we-might-as-well-be-Project-Ozma guns blazin'. Sometimes, a group of players needs a mindfuck with triple-crosses and moral greys when it comes to exhumans...otherwise, how you gonna keep 'em guessing when you unleash the true monsters? That said, to each their own. I just think the fluff as written allows for a lot more exhuman variety than "transhumanity must die for us to progress" or "transhumanity is beneath us as cockroaches to transhumanity and so we exterminate them as pests" or "(insert alien, unknowable reason for being aggro to transhumans)", and certainly some cross-over at the fringes with singularity seekers and/or ultimates.
Yours, Dave the Brave
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
your leaving out one...
transhumanity isnt worth considering, or spending time on. but in your model I still dont see the difference between "transhuman" and "exhuman" the physical nature of the exhuman does not matter, anything a exhuman could do physically a transhuman could be inclined to become as well... so in your view, where does transhuman end and exhuman begin? and dont forget, transhumans alter their human emotions and drives as well... so if its not eliminating some of their humanity, if its not altering their bodies in ways most transhumans dont, what is it that divides the two? the only thing I can think of is the proper ratio of crazy to cream in their coffee.
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
nerdnumber1 nerdnumber1's picture
Baalbamoth wrote
Baalbamoth wrote:
transhumanity isnt worth considering, or spending time on. but in your model I still dont see the difference between "transhuman" and "exhuman" the physical nature of the exhuman does not matter, anything a exhuman could do physically a transhuman could be inclined to become as well... so in your view, where does transhuman end and exhuman begin? and dont forget, transhumans alter their human emotions and drives as well... so if its not eliminating some of their humanity, if its not altering their bodies in ways most transhumans dont, what is it that divides the two? the only thing I can think of is the proper ratio of crazy to cream in their coffee.
Good point. I guess that the definitions are fairly loose. There are some groups that are identified in the books as exhuman which are able to coexist and interact with trans human society in a stable manner. I think that rejecting the idea that 'humanity' as a concept has intrinsic value and intentionally seeking steps toward self-improvement that sacrifices one's humanity characterizes exhumanism. It is a pretty wide and subjective subject.
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
well yeah that'd be mine too...
but I sorta think, you go so far as to reject that humanity has any intrinsic value... your not only on the road to crazy town, your buying hotels.
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
nerdnumber1 nerdnumber1's picture
Baalbamoth wrote:but I sorta
Baalbamoth wrote:
but I sorta think, you go so far as to reject that humanity has any intrinsic value... your not only on the road to crazy town, your buying hotels.
Oh yeah, being an exhuman is enough to be labelled insane and tends to make integration with trans human society difficult, if not impossible. However, this doesn't necessarily mean you can't think logically or interact with transhumans, nor does it automatically make you overtly hostile. Many exhumans are hostile and almost all are at least a little anti-social with outsiders, but they are (or at least most of them are) sapient beings with goals that tend to be different than simply kill all humans.'
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
no, crazy dont mean stupid. infact...
a lot of crazy people are highly intellegent. but as a side note, I'd be careful with the "well meaning exhumans" idea. Heres why... once had a D&D group where one player was a bleeding heart druid, every time the group ran into orcs the druid would give an impassioned speech on the importance of diversity of life and the need to judge each orc by their individual actions rather than their species as a whole, release all captives, and not harm baby or female orcs, etc etc,... the other players had a different outlook, all orcs are born killers, they are born evil, and talk of sparing them is like arguing that cancer cells have just as much of a right to live as the sick guy who's body they are killing. personally, I like my BBEGs to really deserve killing, I go out of my way to make the players (not just their characters) hate them... why? because of the deep level of satisfaction the players get when they finally send them on their well deserved trip to hell with a well placed bullet. if players have to say "oh well, he's just a misunderstood guy trying to live the best life he can" or whatever they will miss out on all that highly enjoyable vengance, and they have to second guess their villians. naaa... I prefer the moustache twirlling, tied the princess to the train tracks flavor of evil.
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
thezombiekat thezombiekat's picture
Baalbamoth wrote:a lot of
Baalbamoth wrote:
a lot of crazy people are highly intellegent. but as a side note, I'd be careful with the "well meaning exhumans" idea. Heres why... once had a D&D group where one player was a bleeding heart druid, every time the group ran into orcs the druid would give an impassioned speech on the importance of diversity of life and the need to judge each orc by their individual actions rather than their species as a whole, release all captives, and not harm baby or female orcs, etc etc,... the other players had a different outlook, all orcs are born killers, they are born evil, and talk of sparing them is like arguing that cancer cells have just as much of a right to live as the sick guy who's body they are killing. personally, I like my BBEGs to really deserve killing, I go out of my way to make the players (not just their characters) hate them... why? because of the deep level of satisfaction the players get when they finally send them on their well deserved trip to hell with a well placed bullet. if players have to say "oh well, he's just a misunderstood guy trying to live the best life he can" or whatever they will miss out on all that highly enjoyable vengance, and they have to second guess their villians. naaa... I prefer the moustache twirlling, tied the princess to the train tracks flavor of evil.
You can have your cake and eat it too in this. Just because not all exhumans are not out to wipe out humanity doesn’t mean none of them are. Take the 2 example exhuman groups in the main book. One has sleaved themselves in big brains with little legs. Their minds have advanced to the point that they are difficult to deal with and they believe themselves sufishatly mentally superior that they have no need for the ideas of transhumanity. I see no reason however that they might not exist peacefully beside transhumans, even finding transhumans useful for such brute tasks as mining an asteroid or opening a pickle jar (seriously, they forgot to put thumbs on the big brain morph). The other has sleaved in super predator morphs and seeks to prove its superiority to transhumanity by eating it. They make a great BBEG that really deserves killing. Then there are the “descendants” of the exhumans who escaped threw discored gate described in gate crasher. Captures transhumans with their minds heavily altered to work in a multi ego morph with no boundaries between the egos. Modified to remove incompatibilities with that group of exhuman’s aggressive ideologies. They may not deserve to be destroyed but few would blame you for doing whatever you had to to stop them. Think of exhumans like outsiders in D&D. some subgroups are good, some varied and some subgroups are comprised exclusively of puppy kicking evil.
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
I'm just not interested in fighting fluffy evil
Steven King had a great saying in a book he wrote on writing... he said.. "if you have a kind old lady, and an empty elevator shaft you may think the readers dont want the kind old lady pushed into the elevator shaft... but they do, always push the kind old lady into the elevator shaft!" and thats my thing with exhumans, sure there might be all kinds of semi-exhumans out there who dont hate humanity, dont necessarily want human extinction... but why feature them at all? is it really that valuable to spend hours featuring one of those in your campaign? whats the point? I mean yeah the fluff is there, and its background schlag, and maybe if a specific player wants to delve into these semi-exhumans maybe donate some GM time to it... but other than that ultimately whats the point? if the word "exhuman" comes up in my game I want that word to strike terror into the hearts of the players around the table, I want them to be afraid, or get defiant, or start that "joking around but really kinda worried" stuff, but I do not want players going "humm... I wonder if we give them hugs and chocolate if they might change their ways.." see orc issue above... in a sense your arguing that in your D&D game some orcs are ok, some might be friendly, some may change their ways if you give them hugs and chocolate.... not my orcs, my orcs are meant for killin and once you meet them in my game theres no question that these sick evil sadistic brutal things deserve the fastest death your character can offer. did you watch buffy the vampire slayer? remember when spike was the most bad assed vampire on the planet? he was cool, and evil, and scary... remember what happened later? they put the chip in his head, made him friendly if a little sick and twisted, but his coolness, the fear, all of what made him a great antagonist was gone and the show suffered for it. I mean, your probably right about friendly exhumans... I just wouldent ever put that in there in favor of very unfriendly exhumans. I dont like friendly and sorta funny spike, I want bad assed slayer killer spike... get me?
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
nizkateth nizkateth's picture
Strikes me as a matter of
Strikes [i]me[/i] as a matter of tone, and game themes. If you are going for a [b]visceral[/b] sci-fi horror type deal, makes sense to have exhumans be [i]universally[/i] something the players can think "oh crap!" when seeing. No misunderstood or alien-but-harmless exhumans [i]needed[/i]. If you are going for a more [b]cerebral[/b] horror/sci-fi environment, one where battle is a lesser focus and the challenge comes from [i]puzzling[/i] together each situation and dealing with it, then it's good to have a diversity of exhuman options presented. So it doesn't become predictable. Since D&D has [i]already[/i] been brought up as an example, I'll relate a couple of my own: Had a game where the PCs were clearing out a goblin hive. All the goblin warriors were males, when they found the main warren-cavern with the females and young they assumed they weren't a threat. They wondered what they should do about them after killing the goblin-chief. Except, when they went to fight in the chamber (where the chief was), every square of females and young was not just difficult terrain, it caused damage as they scratched and bit at the characters. Made it clear the only difference was ability, not desire, to kill. The PCs cleared the cavern completely (wizards are good for that) and never looked back. Another game had different PCs encounter a tribe of orcs. They fought and fought, like a prolonged war of many skirmishes, and eventually got to the old fortress ruins the orcs had taken over. When battling through they saw that the females were kept, sometimes chained, in pits and individual homes of the male orcs. When the orc army was toppled, and the alter of Gruumsh destroyed, the party's cleric of Bahamut (who spoke Giant) had the females and very young (too young to be a threat yet) brought out and talked with them for a while. He eventually converted them, using healing and such to show divine mercy as a virtue. That group raised their young differently, and later on the PCs found out the tribe was being lead by lawful-good matriarchal knights. Each game was going for a different tone however. In the former, my goal was a more Diablo-esque dark and bloody type game. The world crawled with savage and vicious creatures to be killed. The latter was far more political and social, with battle being typically a matter of organized warfare with entrenched foes. The one time the PCs met an ogre they eventually got him working at a local farm to help an old widower who couldn't do the heavy labor anymore. The old man and the ogre becomes good friends.
Reapers: Do Not Taunt Happy Fun Ball. My watch also has a minute hand, millenium hand, and an eon hand.
Baalbamoth Baalbamoth's picture
well your right about tone... guess I'm just very opinionated
I'm trying to think of a horror sci-fi movie that had 0 or very little combat in it, IE pure investigation... alien (fail) pandora (fail) promethius (fail) preditor (fail) really can you think of any? oh wait, yeah the andromeda strain... and it was boring as hell. (best full metal jacket impersonation) "a game without combat is like a day without sunshine"
"what do I want? The usual — hundreds of grandchildren, complete dominion over the known worlds, and the pleasure of hearing that all my enemies have died in highly improbable accidents that cannot be connected to me."
nizkateth nizkateth's picture
Non-violent horror movies?
I can't think of any, but I also [i]don't[/i] really like horror. Well, unless [b]I'm[/b] the one inflicting it. ^_^ But I've had [i]plenty[/i] of non-fighting game sessions that were very fun, in many different systems and genres.
Reapers: Do Not Taunt Happy Fun Ball. My watch also has a minute hand, millenium hand, and an eon hand.
thezombiekat thezombiekat's picture
Ok you list orks as always
Ok you list orks as always evil and want something to fill that role in eclips phase. I refer you to the D&D 3.5 MM p203 Orc. Second line “Medium Humanoid (Orc)” This line defines a lot about the creature, its size is not relevant now. Its type is humanoid, the humanoid type includes all main book races some of which are usually good. It is the subtype orc that tells you it is a chaotic evil murder machine (since you house rule changed there alignment from often chaotic evil to always evil (and I am guessing often chaotic) The way exhumans are described in the game it is more like humanoid than it is like orc. It is a broad class with many sub classes within it. Exhuman (cerebral) exhuman (predatory) exhuman (genocidal) exhuman (singularity seeker) exhuman (titan hunters). Some of these subtypes are defiantly the type of creature you want. For example if firewall drops a dosea in front of the PCs (apparently the proxy likes the impact of a paper folder hitting a desk) and sais they have unconfirmed reports that a clade of cereberal exhumans may be researching titan artefacts. There is going to be some heavy investigation and the final fait of the researchers depends on what research they are actually doing and whether it can be stopped without killing them all. (you probably won’t run that adventure anyway) Some could even be useful: the proxy informes the PCs “while support for the incursion into the Martian TQZ is minimal there is an underground bunker 30km from the border containing exhuman titan hunters who may be willing to provide hardware.” Now the PCs need to convince a group so alien it is difficult to communicate with that they should hand over some gear. But there are some grounds for working together in the form of a shared enemy. (This you might want to run, it is a short bit of complex social work followed by shooting up half the TQZ, although the error message an empty railgun clip generates may be confusing “please insert teeth”) And of cause the proxy could pull up a hollow image of an exhuman predator and say “a group of genosidal, predatory exhumans attacked a supply ship. The first borders where sickened by the half eaten morphs they discovered that they failed to conduct a detailed inventory. Get out there ASAP and see if they took the 12tones of uranium ore that was on board” naturally they did. “If so you are to track down both the uranium and the exhumans and eliminate this very real threat.” (Hear you have exhumans in the role you want from the start it is abundantly clear that you will be killing them all and eliminating there backups. But the possibility of this scenario dose not make the others unreasonable) One of the things you seemed to want is a single word to induce terror and certainty of justified valance. In EP there are 2: Exurgant, and Titans. So effective are these words that when discussing items connected with one of these threats but not wishing to imply danger on that level people in the setting talk around the issue. “Asinks where infected with warts maclud strain” not “asinks where infected with an exurgant strain” or the fact that most people do not refer to Pandora gates as titan artefacts even though the dominant opinion is that Pandora gates where built by the titans. Those that actually use these terms in conjunction are usually trying to get the gates shut down and the asinks destroyed.