When we took that first grand leap across the stars, we expected to find many things

> The species of the Dyson Sphere, commonly referred to as "Bulb-heads" or "Bulbies" are roughly two-thirds the size of humans, and their massive craniums make up almost half of their body mass. They are obscenely intelligent, and have come to depend on advanced mechanized suits to support their skulls and augment their naturally pitiful strength.

...

>53 years ago, the Dyson sphere dispatched a small probe, that flew to the edge of a relatively barren solar system and slowed to a halt.
>Beliving the Bulbies intended to make first contact, humanity dispatched a probe to attempt to meet with them.
>It went... poorly.

> "..."
> "The recordings were rather... traumatizing, to say the least..."
> "Magnets, were involved"
> "Very, very high powered magnets, that is"
> "..."
> "To be honest, we don't have the slightest idea how anyone survived to relay the recording."

Magnets? How do they work!?

But seriously I'd read this books.

>creatures that evolved to survive in the area of 2D space have sent threatening messages that they will cut us if we don't get off their turf, man.

>They did try warning us in 1947
>but the ship crashed
>the crew was killed and the government covered it up

>Occasionally, scavengers will find mysterious shapes floating in the void
>They're frequently discs, but hexagons, triangles, and yet more unusual things have been known to appear
>We finally figured out what they were when we found a crossection of a person within one

> This is the reason the Bulb-heads didn't bother to negotiate this time around.

>After words they began abducting humans to find out our weakness and to test weapons

This could possibly be a new Veeky Forums project please help keep this thread alive

> Several native livestock specimens were captured and had their genes altered, to be cultivated on hastily terraformed moons and planets, to replace synthetic meat.
> Granted, the natural meat is only slightly more flavorful than the synthetic meat, and cultivating them is a wasteful endeavor, arguably more trouble than it's worth.
> Then again, reality as we know it will cease to exist within an eon. In light of that, they figured, why not indulge ourselves a little?

>The Zealots are a group of aliens that believe the end of this universe will herald the coming of their Messiah, the math they use as proof is rather convincing.
>They use themselves as bait to lure the more mobile doomsday weapons towards peaceful regions of space.

> The Zealots are a tight-knit alliance of almost a dozen alien species, united under a strict caste-based theocracy.

>They aren't that powerful, instead relying on subterfuge and the infiltration of other societies to draw doomsday closer.

>Zealot ships (or at least openly Zealot ships) are easily identifiable by the odd transmission pattern they emit. While human linguists are still working to decode the Lingua Franca of the Zealots, the fragments we can understand indicate it to be a constantly looping recitation of their holy book.

>others slow the speed of light to a foot or so per second
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_light

> The leading species, called the "Watchers" are levitating cephalopods almost completely covered by tentacles, eyestalks, and sensory appendages. They are allegedly able to perceive dozens of separate wavelengths and higher dimensions, and psychically bend them to their will, hence, the levitation.
> The eldest Watchers are allegedly able to see into the future, and they have prophesied the coming of the Messiah. In addition to levitation, they are able to levitate objects, induce combustion, and send one-way messages into the minds of those making eye contact with them.
> They use this as evidence of their "miraculous" nature.

>They are also one of the older races that survived the "great wars" that has brought the universe to a near end

>There are those within our government agencies that believe we only achieved FTL due to their hidden intervention. That the entire situation we find ourselves in is a trap for the many refugees coming to out region.

> The only Zealot species to openly show themselves and communicate with those outside of the faith are the Ohjbah, very asymmetrical creatures resembling terrestrial starfish.
> The Ohjbah are miniscule and dimwitted, but are very skilled linguists and mathematicians, and are happy to trade relics and ancient secrets for the right to proselytize.
> Most species kill them on sight, but a few allow them to speak, and as a result, they have a sizable minority of Zealots among their ranks.

>These ships are often destroyed on sight, as they only reveal themselves in such a manner when they're trying to grab the attention of an ancient doomsday weapon.

>their religious traditions have a chilling similarity to ours, leading some to believe their hidden intervention has gone on for a very long time

> In sight of impending oblivion, most species have fallen into one of four schools of thought. Many species are split between two or more, and there are those don't fall into any philosophy at all.

> 1.) Those who see the coming end of all things in a religious light, and either do all they can to hasten its coming, or do all they can to prepare themselves spiritually.
> 2.) Those who refuse to accept that oblivion is inevitable, and do all they can to preserve a future for themselves and their species as a whole, either by attempting to stave off or reverse the coming end, or by attempting to escape it entirely.
> 3.) Those who see the coming end as inevitable and seeing no possible avenue of escape, resolve to do all they can to enjoy the time they have left, either by falling into destructive nihilist hedonism or attempting to seek some kind of purpose in life.
> 4.) Those who realize that oblivion isn't coming in their lifetimes or the lifetimes of their grandchildren, and consequently, don't care one way or another, living as normally as possible.

The first thing I thought of was Dr Who for some reason. Perhaps some of the last remnants of those vastly powerful stellar empires feel guilty about everything and want to help. Of course their culture and technology is so above ours they appear to be blabbering eccentrics who come and go randomly after dispensing seemingly non sensical metaphors and phrases.

>Some of them actually are blabbering eccentrics
>In the end, they probably end up doing the most help

> The "safe space" is made up of little over half a million stars in an oblong circle, containing the Sol system.
> The aliens didn't reach the safe space in significant numbers until humanity managed to colonize a solid fifth of the territory.
> During the earliest era of expansion, humanity was blissfully unaware the universe was coming to an end, and were it not for humanity's inherently violent, tribal nature, their weapons wouldn't have been nearly advanced enough to compete with the encroaching alien refugees.
> As it is, humanity is roughly half as advanced as the typical aliens, but are far more numerous and are able to bring many more resources to bare.

We'll be ready for them.

>Upon learning all of this, human intelligence and military groups formed the Saccades, a transnational group with the single goal of using any and all means, tactics, and resources to repulse the incoming aliens and protect Sol.
>After 10 years of relentless exploitation of alien artifacts, Saccade personnel were disconcerting, if extremely effective.
>After 20 years, the Saccades were hard to understand and their ethics and tactics were terrifying, though through the blood and fire and human experimentation no one could contest that Sol was safe against these impossible odds.
>After 30 years, the Saccades were no longer recognizable as a human organization, or as individual humans, furiously destroying, vivisecting, and incorporating the genes and tech of each alien group that moved on Sol. Their reports back to Earth are now completely indecipherable when they arrive at all.
>The Saccades are now considered as great a threat to humanity as the aliens.

> Humanity is very much fragmented, and many factions of almost every outlook and ideology feud with another and vie for supremacy.
> The only thing they can agree on is that they'd rather not be driven extinct by the ancient superweapons and desperate aliens.

> The Saccades are among the largest and most powerful of these factions, even if their humanity is questionable at best.

>One of the most disturbing things about the Saccades is a small 'signature' that began to pop up at the end of their reports. While most of the report is garbled and untranslatable, this signature is always written in clear and simple Basic.
>"We still remember home."

>The Saccades are indecipherable in action as they are in speech, sometimes rushing to the aid of a human faction's colony one month and destroying their main fleet the next.
>Sometimes human intelligence groups piece together a method to the madness, like when the destruction of that fleet led to improved colonial defenses in just the right subsector to delay a massive invading alien fleet six years later until the Saccades could destroy it.
>For most such actions, though, no human reasoning can be determined.

> While the Saccades are undeniably the largest, strangest, and most powerful group of transhumans, they certainly aren't the only group of transhumans.
> Over the past millennia, dozens of human subspecies have arisen, genetially designed to better perform certain tasks, or survive certain environments.
> The vast majority of these subspecies are barely distinguishable from baseline humans, and can produce fertile offspring without issue.
> However, several subspecies have diverged from the human genome to the extent they aren't recognizable as human, and for all intents and purposes, are no different from the alien invaders.

> *genetically

>Pluto is our early warning system. Festooned with sensors, hyperspace searchlights and telescopes pointed in every which way
>The asteroid belt's spaces are now filled with disruption fields, hyper-oscillating titanium razor wire and sentry bots
>What's on Mercury is top secret, but whatever it is, telescopic photographs show it's pointed at our sun

> For all intents and purposes, the Sol system is the galaxy's most impregnable fortress, and despite the efforts of countless traitorous factions, raider hordes, and alien species, not one has been successful in the destruction of mother earth, though several have come close.

I imagine Saccades as "what would happen if I put a dick in this alien" organisation

>It remains to be seen whether this is a comfort or a threat.

The Men In BLACKED mayhaps?

...

>en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccade
>"Asaccade(/sᵻˈkɑːd/sə-KAHD,Frenchforjerk) is a quick, simultaneous movement of both eyesbetween two or more phases offixation in the same direction."
>"Areflexive saccadeis triggered exogenously by the appearance of a peripheral stimulus, or by the disappearance of a fixation stimulus."
>"Saccades are one of the fastest movements produced by the human body."
>"Once saccades are underway, they cannot be altered at will."

> The core concept behind the name Saccades is that the organization provides a vision for humanity's future, and that their righteous goal cannot and will not be denied.

Saccades are involuntary jerks of the eye to respond to threats that cannot be stopped or dissuaded once started, that's what I was going for.

And Saccades are just jerks.

>Radical life extension is now cheaply and easily accessible.
>It is very uncommon.

> In ancient times, before the war that tore reality asunder, a pacifistic deep-sea dwelling species advocated for neutrality and peace. Unfortunately, they were ignored and their efforts failed. Like almost all other species at the time, their civilization was almost completely annihilated and the few survivors were driven to the brink of extinction.
> The species, the Phiss, haven't changed a bit despite the circumstances in which they find themselves. In ancient times, they refused to participate in any side of the conflict, barring a direct and imminent threat to their existence. Instead, they traded their knowledge, accommodated any and all refugees willing to assimilate into their civilization, and did all they could to reduce the death toll.
> When the apocalypse came, they scattered throughout the cosmos, fleeing the coming end, uplifting as many primitive species as possible. Several species owe their existence to the Phiss and as a result, do all they can to protect them from the more warlike species.
> They are extremely intelligent, not from sheer volume of knowledge like the Bulb-heads, but from sheer speed of thought, they perceive time several dozen times faster than humans.
> They live for centuries, and view other species as hopelessly ignorant and tragically short-lived primitives, but nonetheless, do all they can to help.

Both are good ideas, and they aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. There's no reason both can't be canon.

>The most successful raiders reached the belt before grinding to a halt against the asteroid barricades
>The wrecks still lie tangled in the defences
>The passengers and crew still haven't been fully exterminated
>Some ships' hull design contains a memetic thought-virus
>Quarantine and research into immune subspecies is still ongoing
>Mercury has already spotted the newest incoming threat

>following ever increasing incursions into human space, and the subsequent build up of more and more defenses, a nascent dyson swarm is starting to be constructed around Sol
>due to anthropocentric fervor, it was deemed "unacceptable" to disassemble all but the most minor of celestial bodies in the solar system, as well as the motion to starlift heavy elements from Sol being denied.
>as such, humanity has begun harvesting and dissasembling the nearest neighbors to Sol, at least those that currently don't have colonies or habitable planets.
>A steadily growing dead zone around humanity's core worlds expands as more and more resources are put into constructing the trillions upon trillions of habitats, foundries, and defensive platforms
>And amidst it all, the natural worlds of the solar system hang within the cloud, like rocks in the fog, just enough of a channel in the swarm's orbital paths to allow for light to reach them

You guys think we can fit psychics into this?
or would that ruin the humanity vs otherworldly feel

> The Bulb-heads, with their monopoly on Dyson Spheres, are doing everything in their power to prevent humanity from completing its construction.
> They believe that upon completion of the Dyson Sphere, humanity will become their equal, and within the century, it would be within their power to exterminate their species.
> The Bulbies cannot allow this to come to pass.

I think it'd ruin it.

In fact, I think those Watcher guys aren't psychics at all. I think they've just got anti-grav generators and shit wired into their nervous systems.

tee-bee-aych, if we're going by even semi-realistic, the bulb-heads could have already destroyer humanity on near-day-one if they have dyson spheres.

youtube.com/watch?v=RjtFnWh53z0

I agree, and think the Watcher's abilities are possible because of Sufficiently Advanced Technology and an obscenely potent and versatile sensory system, augmented by their technology.

Fuck outta here with your memetic shit. This is a sci-fi thread, not cthulhu memes.

Perhaps their Dyson Sphere is ancient, decrepit, slowly falling apart, its sun is beginning to fade, and they can't restore either until they have an empire capable of amassing the necessary resources and exotic materials. Until then, it's its operating at a fraction of its full potential, and at the moment, humanity's full might can rival its destructive capacity.

The restoration of their Dyson Sphere is quite literally the only hope their species has of survival, and they don't dare to risk its destruction by attacking Sol directly. Instead, they're using remotely controlled drone swarms and splinter fleets to assail humanity and delay their efforts until they can come up with a solution.

Not that user, but what if the virus was just an extremely adaptive and vicious malware capable of irreversibly destroying any electronic equipment within a large radius around the wreckage, where the spiteful descendents of the original crew are broadcasting it as far as they're able?

How does FTL travel work in this setting? I like the idea of there being many different ways to achieve FTL travel, with different species, factions, and individuals employing different methods. There could be a gravity slingshot method, a warp drive method, a hyper-lane method, a wormhole teleportation method, a near-relativistic speed method, an outright physics bending method, etc. There's a lot of possible FTL methods that could fit.

Thanks for this thread guys. It inspired me to finally get on with writing up the setting and lore for the game I'm about to run. Barely related to this (interdimensional rather than interstellar) but still.

Cool, it inspired me to start writing a setting tangentially related to this one's premise. Hopefully we'll both come up with something worth playing.

>The FTL of the Zealots work in a variety of ways, but there is one predominant method. A downsized version of a dangerous weapon, one that generates a field wherein both Newtonian and Einsteinian physics hold no sway. The field is formed in a straight line, however, and so the ship must painstakingly align with its final destination.
>Bulbies have a simpler approach. First, a machine generates a wormhole at their destination. The farther away the destination, the smaller and more power-intensive the wormhole is. Then, the machine pulls itself through the wormhole, like a man slipping a bag over his head. Distance is limited, but accuracy is not.

>Humanity has taken a more brute-force approach to FTL. It took a considerable amount of time for us to engineer a power source capable of propelling a vehicle to over c, but we did it. Energy goes into the S reactor, and a brilliant spray of energized particles and exotic radiation comes out the other end. As a downside, human FTL travel is highly noticeable, and must be conducted far away from habitable settlements.

> The Phiss are a nomadic species, their fleets travel from planet to planet, marketing their relatively advanced technology and skill in reverse-engineering ancient artifacts, in exchange for raw materials and protection from raiders.
> Despite being one of the most advanced species, the Phiss haven't been able to establish an empire. There are several reasons for this:
> 1.) Because of their immensely complicated genome and intricate physiology, it takes decades for a single Phiss to gestate and mature, because of this, their numbers are slim.
> 2.) The few Phiss are scattered across a handful of fleets of as few as a dozen ancient vessels, and each vessel is almost completely unorganized. They see no need for governmental authority, each Phiss pursues his scientific projects alone, or with the occasional assistance of a colleague or customized drone.
> 3.) They abhor violence, seeing it beneath themselves, and prefer avoiding conflict to neutralizing aggressors. In the past, they have suffered many times for this, but in their pride, they stubbornly insist on violence as a last resort.
> 4.) They have no need for an empire, they obtain everything they need through trade, and if they were to settle, eventually they would be forced to exterminate lesser species, something they'd rather avoid.
> 5.) The species allied to them have agreed to allow Phiss to terraform and settle planetary bodies near the cores of their empires, both as an incentive to continue trade and as compensation for uplifting them to begin with.

> The Crith have lived since the dawn of the universe, and if it is within their power, they will live to see its end. A species of hulking, armored crustaceans, the Crith are shockingly similar to earthly horseshoe crabs physiologically, they have not changed the slightest in almost thirteen billion years of evolution, and they cling to life with an unshakable tenacity.
> They originally evolved on an oceanic hellhole of a planet, where every thing, living and nonliving, sought to consume and destroy them. In response, they evolved to consume and destroy their home planet. After several million years of hardscrabble evolution, they managed to develop crude FTL and rudimentary terraforming technology. Upon ascending to the cosmos, they shattered their home planet and vaporized the fragments out of spite.
> Their desire for revenge satiated, they proceeded to terraform, colonize, and ravage everything in their path, leaving a trail of plundered and polluted waste behind them. Having no threat to themselves, and being unable to comprehend the concept of intuition for the sake of intuition, Crith technology didn't advance beyond its primitive roots for eons.
> Crith fleets slaughtered and enslaved any and all alien species too weak to oppose them, and were responsible for the genocide of hundreds, if not thousands of minor empires. When they came upon an species too advanced for them to hope to defeat, the Crith fought regardless, the survivors learned from their foe, and a few millennia later, exacted a vicious and bloody vengeance upon those who wronged them.
> For billions of years in a repeating cycle, the Crith were slaughtered to the point almost none remained, and, without fail, bounced back from the brink within a million years and returned the favor, or if unable to slay their foe on a second try, fled and found an easier target.
> (1/2)

> Due to the constant rise and fall of their civilization, their technology never advanced beyond improved and more resilient versions of their original achievements. Because of this, they never came to rely on technology, and because of this, never changed as a species.
> During the war of the cosmos, the Crith were in the first half of their recovery stage, having been defeated by the combined efforts of an alliance of species half a million years prior. They fought as mercenaries for the highest bidder, and raided the frontiers of the species who wouldn't hire them.
> When the doomsday weapons were activated, the Crith viewed it as another obstacle to be overcome. They reasoned the best way to overcome the eventual death of the universe was to keep raiding and pillaging, figuring that eventually they'd steal a way to reverse the apocalypse from a more advanced species.
> When humanity took its first steps into the cosmos, the Crith ignored the signal, and focused on raiding the refugees, following them wherever they were headed, and terraforming, settling, and plundering planets along the way.
> Over the next six thousand years, they reached the safe space and promptly proceeded to plunder it as well. In the past millennia, they've settled almost ten thousand worlds, and sacked twice that number. They are on the far edge of the safe space, opposite from humanity, and steadily looting, raiding, and conquering their way to Sol.
> Already, humanity's frontier worlds have fought the Crith, and suffered greatly against them. Crith technology is only marginally more advanced than humanity's, but like them, it's damn near unbreakable and just won't quit! In the millennia to come, if they aren't stopped, the Crith will conquer an empire for themselves as large as, if not larger than humanity's, and then, as they always have, they will overcome.
> (2/2)

Cool concept.

Thanks. I figured we needed to fill the savage raiders niche, and I felt like ancient but primitive relentless, hate-fueled horseshoe crab-men would do quite nicely.

Why are things slowing down so much?

So, let's recap.

Greys in a dyson sphere
Zealots trying to end the universe
Zealot leaders, who may be psychic and may be bullshitting
Zealot starfish diplomats
Inhuman earth defense force
Ancient, advanced pacifists
Vengeful asshole crab people

Nice, I liked this idea of the Bulb-head's Dyson Sphere being decrepit and falling apart.

I also think we need to further flesh out the Zealot theocracy,

develop some human factions,

and elaborate on the several rogue transhuman species. I'll start up on that once I finish some yard work and have access to my PC.

The Zealot intro post mentioned their sphere being ancient.

It might not even be something they built. Maybe it's another old super construct they decided to move into.

Shit, not Zealot, I meant Bulbie.

But this is slow light in a vacuum

Hmm, here's an idea.

> The Bulbies ruled an empire of thousands of Dyson Spheres and countless star systems in a distant galaxy in the remote past, but their empire was shattered by a far superior civilization, and the few mobile Dyson Spheres that managed to escape their wrath have been wandering the cosmos for countless eons, harrassed and assaulted by their ancient foes and aggressive upstarts on all sides without respite, never able to re-establish their empire, reclaim their past glory, and have slowly begun to lose the knowledge of their ancestors.
> When the war of the cosmos came, their ancient foes destroyed each other, but in their hubris, condemned the universe to their own fate. The few remaining Dyson Spheres, once almost nothing in the grand scheme of things, became among the most advanced technological wonders of the universe. Without significant competition, the Bulbies were free to build an empire, but the doomsday fields forced them to flee every step of the way.
> Finally, when all seemed lost, the Final Dyson Sphere received a signal from the fringe of the universe, and its inhabitants soon realized the signal led to a safe space, were their kind could rebuild their ancient glory, free from armageddon, if only for a little bit.
> The only obstacle before them is the fledgeling, balkanized human empire, and the pathetic remnants of dying species. They will restore their ancient glory, and all inferior species will kneel, or be ground to dust beneath them!

I was thinking more of their territory eating shit against an ancient doomsday device and them loading into a decrepit Dyson sphere to survive.

Their super intelligence is what they used to get it barely working.

Love this setting.

It feels like this music fits:
youtube.com/watch?v=0BhUf4GgPwM

Hmm, I like the idea they're trying to restore the legacy of their past, but that's a good idea to... What did you have in mind? Where did the Dyson Sphere come from in the first place?

>It's believed that there in a small corner of the universe lays a gateway to another universe. Said corner also happens to be the most concentrated of the super-weapons and death fields. However many will chase it, even if it's just false hope. Still while one travels in space, they can find probes referring to such a portal every once in a while.

Wait, I don't understand why the aliens want human territory of its fucked anyway.

>Wait, I don't understand why the aliens want human territory of its fucked anyway.

It's the last un-fucked region because up until very recently (galactically speaking) we weren't broadcasting our FTL capabilities so all the doomsday superweapons were ignoring us.

damn, nice touch

Basically, it's why post apocalyptic survivors would fight to the death over a rocky wasteland of shitty soil, everywhere else is a radioactive mutant filled shithole.

It might just be an old doomsday machine that didn't hold up to the others very well. Or it wasn't finished, or the inhabitants died. Dunno.

Was this posted here before? I feel like I've read this before.

>and elaborate on the several rogue transhuman species. I'll start up on that once I finish some yard work and have access to my PC.

Not him but I'll toss in a few. The names are just stuff I asspulled though so feel free to rename them.

Keragians
>Tall, stocky humans with bone outcroppings across their surface
>Less flexible but more durable
>Primitive compared to other transhumans but sturdy enough that they can survive most planets with harsh weather conditions, like acid rain, blistering heat, or wind that slices into your skin.
>Usually on the border of human territory so they have to deal with a lot of the alien menace, causing them to be some of the most xenophobic transhumans.
>Cities are massive tangled heaps of industrial architecture sprawling across the planet.

Flast:
>Slender humans with two ovular organs situated on their back that produce wings made out of a biological non-Newtonian fluid, which squirts into shape when extruded and back into liquid mode when stored.
>almost no sexual dimorphism due to such things getting in the way of aerodynamics
>built for low atmosphere and gravity environments, can be found on many moons and planetoids. Can survive in space for a limited time.
>Most follow a dogma of self-sufficiency, and seek to create self-sustaining arcologies that jut out from their worlds like giant pyramidal spires miles in height and width.

Tegnos:
>Originally a sect of monks of an obscure religion that focused on self-improvement.
>Over time grew to see no distinction between flesh and metal.
>Citizens are all cyborgs, tools and weapons use organic parts, there is effectively no line between man and machine.
>Basically biotech Mormons who are generally pleasant to talk to but also want to convert you into becoming one of them.
>Have a small patch of space they control completely, no one knows what the fuck goes on inside of it. This makes some people worried.

In my opinion, these seem more like moderately altered humans than completely divergent transhumans. That said, good shit user. There's space for a shit-ton more subspecies, and factions, it all adds life to the setting. I have a few suggestions,

What if the Keragians originated from a fortress world on the border called Kerag, which is the source of their name and the revered centerpiece of their empire, and they're sentimentally closer to it than Sol?

What if instead of the Flast, they were called the Vlast? I don't know, I just feel like it rolls off the tongue easier. The Tegnos sound interesting, I feel like they should have a hollowed-out and revered vault world in the center of their space, the "Mecca" of their religion.

>In my opinion, these seem more like moderately altered humans than completely divergent transhumans.

Yeah looking back I can see I haven't gone nearly extreme enough. I'll have to think a bit and make something more alien.

>What if the Keragians originated from a fortress world on the border called Kerag, which is the source of their name and the revered centerpiece of their empire, and they're sentimentally closer to it than Sol?

This could work

>What if instead of the Flast, they were called the Vlast?

Works for me. Or maybe because their language is all weird, outsiders have like a dozen different similar-sounding names for them, which their efficiency-minded culture finds mildly irritating.

>The Tegnos sound interesting, I feel like they should have a hollowed-out and revered vault world in the center of their space, the "Mecca" of their religion.

I mean it sounds interesting but I don't want to rip off the AdMech.

They r "survivors" of the ancient wars like walkie talkies are survivors of ww2. Because that's about all they were to the other greater powers.

> Yeah looking back I can see I haven't gone nearly extreme enough. I'll have to think a bit and make something more alien.

I'll pitch in myself, it'll be interesting to see what comes out.

> This could work

I'm thinking the Keragians are a warlike race, not so much proud honorable warriors, as much as they are stubborn industrialists holding the line against any and all would-be invaders, not breaking before the ground beneath them and all that. I imagine with their resilience, they don't give a shit about pollution, and might actually cultivate it to toughen up their population and make conquering them that much harder for the aliens.

> Works for me. Or maybe because their language is all weird, outsiders have like a dozen different similar-sounding names for them, which their efficiency-minded culture finds mildly irritating.

I like the idea of outsiders having a bunch of interchangable names for them, maybe they have so many names because they're so widespread in human space.

> I mean it sounds interesting but I don't want to rip off the AdMech.

Right, right, I was thinking their religion is more focused on self-improvement than the preservation of knowledge. Maybe the vault is the storehouse of their bizzare mismatched fleet and all of the knowledge they've managed to accumulate, doubling as a sort of temple/holy site the Tegnos revere daily, and have a plan to flee too when the apocalypse comes.

> In ancient times, the Watchers maintained and operated the communications equipment of the great powers, and were genetically perfected for their task of perceiving and responding to metaphysical signals. Hence, the name.

This is a top-tier thread, late night/early morning bumping.