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Original post by ahw I dunno why you would want to change their appearance. I think you have got a pretty solid concept here. One thing you might wanna try, to give them more expression, would be something akin to what cuttlefish uses for their camouflage. Have various patterns appear on their skin to reflect emotions/expressions.

I think that multicolored gas for their emotions/expressions is good enough.

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Original post by ahw Oh, another little thing that bugged me. They have no eyes, nor hands. WHY would they have books ? I would have thought something more like the pools and fountains of various liquids of the Treants, or maybe what would to an observer look like a garden, or some other sort of organic assemblage.

I think that when he said books, he meant books written in their "chemical language" that these creatures would move on top of and absorb the chemicals to read.

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Original post by ahw One thing you might wanna try, to give them more expression, would be something akin to what cuttlefish uses for their camouflage. Have various patterns appear on their skin to reflect emotions/expressions.

This would be visually nice, but if they have no eyes, why would they have any colored expressions? :P I'm not sure that they'd be able to hide that well, either, unless everything on their home planet was ultramassive by comparison (they're elephant sized).

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Also, for the fear of people shooting at them, why not use their basic time control abilities to ... can you say the Matrix... slow down bullets and other projectiles directed at them.

Yeah, a time shield would be cool. I'm also thinking their enemy would be busy dodging pockets of hyperaccelerated time aimed at their weapons, or hypoaccelerated (?) time aimed at stopping the enemy's physical body.

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I dunno why but I can totally imagine them giggle at your futile attempts and then talk to you with the voice of the doctor in The Simpsons... :-P

LOL!

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Oh, another little thing that bugged me. They have no eyes, nor hands. WHY would they have books ?

They wouldn't create books, but a book would be like an alien artifact to them. They would need some type of translator to read it (text to pheremones).

But like Nathaniel Hammen said, their library would be gaseous.

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I would have thought something more like the pools and fountains of various liquids of the Treants, or maybe what would to an observer look like a garden, or some other sort of organic assemblage.

Yes. Something to store and emit chemicals in a reliably organized fashion.

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I could totally see them appear in a show like Farscape :) They really give me the same vibe than the Pilots race, for some reason.

I'm poorer for completely missing this entire series. (Got to pick it up on DVD.)

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Maybe their only opportunity to travel would be to leave their massive frame behind and implant their core into the very structure of a spaceship (the spaceship becoming a body frame for all Ceticians on board)

Interesting. Perhaps some Ceticians actually grow their bodies at their new destination to conserve mass.

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Or maybe the bodies would be taken on board but wouldnt actually be used, rather they'd be stored somewhere safe (or useful ? Maybe the amassed bodies could be the time distortion engine itself) and the cores would be implanted on specific locations of the ships designed to receive them ? Mmmh...

I have to think about this. There are definitely promising possibilities and would make them even mroe unique! (The idea of near corpses powering the ship is kind of appealing, I don't know why, just because it's so bizarre.)

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Original post by Wavinator Quote: I could totally see them appear in a show like Farscape :) They really give me the same vibe than the Pilots race, for some reason. I'm poorer for completely missing this entire series. (Got to pick it up on DVD.)

*faints*
I cannot believe you have never seen the show. Stop now and go watch at least the trailer for the new mini series !
NOW !
:)
Oh and the background picture on the link shows the human hero hugging the Pilot. I think saying that the Jim Henson's company is in charge of all the creatures on the show should say it all...

Gee, I forgot what I had to say with all that.

Ponder this: Since earth is about 99% insects, how about a "hive" society, or perhaps a more insectlike appearence.

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Original post by Wavinator Well, the help I got from you guys on the last worldbuilding post was so invaluable that I thought I'd try again. The Ceticians are a playable alien race whose main ability is the control of time. They are very alien, which is probably going to freak people out (concept sketch, concept render).

I think you could find a better name. The first thing I thought of was Cetacea, the order that whales and dolphins belong to.

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Original post by Wavinator Here are there main concepts for this species: Communicate with pheromones Lovers of knowledge, books and culture

I think this is a big problem. Pheromone communication would be very ineffective. It wouldn't carry far, wouldn't transmit through surfaces. It would make electronic communication impossible. Pheromone libraries would be incredibly impractical. It would be inefficient. It would probably also make them very, very hard to understand and communicate with for species that speak.

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Original post by Wavinator Have a limited amount of regenerating energy that they can use to slow or accelerate time within a bubble

I don't follow here. What kind of energy is this? Where does it come from? I have a hard time believing something like that could evolve.

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Original post by Wavinator[/i ]Highly sought after for their ability to create exotic materials

"Highly sought after" makes it sound like they're being enslaved--is that the case?

How do they create exotic materials? What are the materials?

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Original post by Wavinator Sense cluster in the middle of the body can detach and float (using biological gravity machinery): This supports mating, personality transfer and exploration

If they're flying brains, why do they need the stalks? Can they re-attach to any body?

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Original post by Wavinator Immortal except for illness, accident or injury

That would lead to a huge population problem.

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Original post by Wavinator Asexual reproduction

Two things wrong with this:

1. You say above that the floating allows them to mate.
2. Sexual reproduction is essential for evolutionarily viable species.

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Original post by Wavinator Status in society is gained either by joining a Peacekeeper force which is dedicated to serving other cultures, or becoming a Time Sifter (archaeologist).

Why does this species need archaeologists?

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Original post by Wavinator They are probably a socialist democratic society that places a heavy emphasis on the group over the individual (like Japanese culture?).

This is problematic. Democracy probably wouldn't mix well with that type of culture.

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Original post by Wavinator Because they control time, they may have many inefficient methods: For instance, they might not think twice about taking a 3 or 4 century trip if they're skilled enough to place themselves in a bubble;

What's 3 or 4 centuries when you're immortal? Are you assuming they experience time at the same rate that we do?

Hey Wavinator, and everyone else. I had wondered where this game of yours had gone and HOLY CRAP MAN it looks like you've kept at it in my absence. =)

I'm short on time (school and part-time jobs will do that too you) but I wanted to chip in my two sense...sorry if someone's already covered this.

The ability to control/traverse/modify/alter time is MEGA powerful. If you really want to include this race in your game, which feels more and more like a Fable-depth type enviroment for Master of Orion, my one suggestion is to not make the race playable.

A race whose biology or tech can constantly slip back in time and drain the pools from which the predecessors of the predecessors of their enemies crawled from...? Not a good idea =) A cool idea, I'll grant you, and - if it's the focus of the entire game - rock in, my friend. But it seems to me a HUGE can of worms.

Now, maybe if you restrict time travel (because, if it's tech for example, it must take a TREMENDOUS amount of energy the further back in time you wish to travel)...so say it costs millions to go back in time a few minutes and actually change something...whereas it only costs a few hundred thousand to go back several years and see *exactly* what happened, beyond documentation and hearsay...that might work.

Hope this helps!

Forget pheremones. Make it a genetic sequence. Their language is "written" in genetics.

That'd be cooler, imo, and it keeps with the whole "memory is stored in their bodies" thing because their memory could jsut be piles of genetic-sequence information.

Information could even be copied from one to another this way, just by copying the DNA strands.

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Original post by serratemplar Hey Wavinator, and everyone else. I had wondered where this game of yours had gone and HOLY CRAP MAN it looks like you've kept at it in my absence. =) I'm short on time (school and part-time jobs will do that too you) but I wanted to chip in my two sense...sorry if someone's already covered this. The ability to control/traverse/modify/alter time is MEGA powerful. If you really want to include this race in your game, which feels more and more like a Fable-depth type enviroment for Master of Orion, my one suggestion is to not make the race playable. A race whose biology or tech can constantly slip back in time and drain the pools from which the predecessors of the predecessors of their enemies crawled from...? Not a good idea =) A cool idea, I'll grant you, and - if it's the focus of the entire game - rock in, my friend. But it seems to me a HUGE can of worms.

I think they can't actually go back in time, just slow or accelerate its passage.

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Original post by C-Junkie Forget pheremones. Make it a genetic sequence. Their language is "written" in genetics. That'd be cooler, imo, and it keeps with the whole "memory is stored in their bodies" thing because their memory could jsut be piles of genetic-sequence information. Information could even be copied from one to another this way, just by copying the DNA strands.

DNA is just data. You could represent it in any number of ways, such letters, like ATCGGCTA, or you could use flashing lights or sounds. I don't quite understand what you mean by "written in genetics." What is the mechanism of transmission?

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Original post by frankskye Ponder this: Since earth is about 99% insects, how about a "hive" society, or perhaps a more insectlike appearence.

Thank you for the suggestion. I've sort of got half and half of what you're talking about for some of the other races. There is a bipedal race with genetically engineered armor that gives them a very bug like appearance; and there's are a couple of hive minds, one a quadrapedal, somewhat insectoid (but mammalian) walking stump and another living spaceships formed from shards of an intelligent crystal planet.

Weird enough? [smile]