>>31581725

Could be that they're just genuinely thankful and want to make a good first impression. After such a long exodus from their home planet, they are just really glad to have found a new planet, one with 70% ocean is a plus. With an advanced civilization already on it, they won't have to go completely primitive after exhausting their supplies or starting a colony from scratch, they can share technology and borrow our infrastructure to support their own.

On alien psychology, there's a lot to consider. Perhaps they think differently, but are logical enough to see the direct and long-term benefits to mutual cooperation, or perhaps they are a kind of shepard species, living with many other native species of their home planet, and working with humans easier because of their innate inter-species skills. Could also be that they hold a high philosophic or religious tenant to be very important, like the Golden Rule, which espouses altruism.

>>31582283
Thank you this is exactly the sort of thing I'm after. I'm not sure about giving them religious reasons behind "don't be a dick" as a central philosophy but perhaps some form of it would be useful.

I did some writefaggotry to flesh them out a bit further:

Talons over a foot long sliced cleanly through the neck. A little fluid drizzled down to soak into the grass of the steppes. I held up my beer and let him open it in the same way. Alvin was a scary looking bastard when you first met him but he sure was handy to know.

We sat, well I did, on the tailgate of the Ural. Alvin at twelve feet long lay stretched out on the ground with my boots resting on his carapace, pouring beer between his mandibles. For a minute, then a minute more we sat together, watching the lights cross the night sky, reflected in the lake.

Four days driving had seen us come up out of Baikonur and north into Russia. Alvin, after some discussion at the border, crossed it as livestock. A fact which had kept him amused for some time as he stuck his head into the cab to give directions from the flatbed.

I can't fish. But we were going fishing. Alvin missed it and so here we were. Looking out under an enormous night sky scattered with stars intermingled with the millions of lights that were spacecraft, orbital constructors, satellites and somewhere up there was the light of one Xin Worldship, and somewhere around another of those little lights was what remained of Alvin's homeworld, I can understand how a guy'd get homesick with a view like that.

>>31583327
I had agreed to go in part because Alvin was a friend, but also because I wanted to see just how he managed it. I'd been slightly disappointed that he either adapted or knew how to use a rod and line already. Either a people that looked like a cockroach made of knives had mastered the technique in a fit of convergent technological evolution, or he'd studied it in his quarters before we left, just to mess with me. I had wanted to ask him but when he landed 15lb Asp on the first day, Earthly pride convinced me it was better not to.

The gentle rustle of the Steppe grass under the night sky was joined by the crackling rasp that was what Alvin's translator considered him clearing his throat sounded like. “Do you remember, Sam, the first time we met? It is, the anniversary of our knowing each other. I hope now that you are more used to me?”
I chuckled and tapped on his carapace with a boot. “Give me another beer Alvin. Of course I'm more used to you. Now.” I had been assigned to Alvin as a buddy a year ago today, the idea being that as our people shared technology and knowledge, they should also share each other's company. So engineers were paired with engineers, ecologists with ecologists, even the one lawyer they'd brought had found a friend – you may even have heard of Parker, Xithrp and May by now.
Alvin however was...well the best translation we'd arrived at so far was “Engineer of Being”, with a sideline in astrogation. So as an astronomer, I'd been given to him in the hope we'd figure the rest out as we went along. Although it hadn't come up much, as far as I'd learned it meant priest.

>>31583327
If they've got arthropod biology, then they've probably got nerve ganglia in place of a single brain. What this means is that they're more likely to be conciously a 'mediator' between decisions and ideas being relayed from the subunits. We'd probably imagine it like having a council in your head.
As a result, they'd probably tend introspective.

>>31584560
That's fucking golden. Thank you. So this wouldn't be like two consciousness, just ....like a central brain with ideas being thrown at it by sub brains?

>>31585319
Yeah, exactly.

They might have a linguistic pronoun divide, sort of a 1st person singular-internal, 1st person singular-plural, 1st singular singlular external and 3rd person singular/plural internal vs 3rd person external.

Something akin to I think its a good idea, but my legs don't vs I and my legs think its a good idea, my legs don't think its a good idea, but they're wrong, etc etc. So neither true 3rd person/other or plural as we'd understand it. (They don't speak in human plural, though we'd often translate them as using such.)

>>31585422
I am shamelessly stealing all of this.

Say you shoot one in the head. Would it be conceivable that the sub-brains would keep it running but not on a conscious level? i.e. it reverts to being a lobster made of knives?

>>31585466
(that is a lobster made of knives with it's basic animal level instincts - Kill. Eat. Reproduce)

>>31581725
My first advice to you would be to come up with a better name than "murder-crabs"

>>31585583
Well that was what I was using as short-hand but I am liking the name "Xin" for them.

>>31585466
Maybe have a "reflex" personality as well as a "sapient" personality? Hurt/surprise one enough and it goes on a brief rampage?

>>31585514
I think it might, though depending on just how precisely the developed, like when they started being social and how much you want to fudge it, they might also retain some other faculties.
So perhaps a knife lobster killing machine that can also do language processing. What might be really interesting is if the prime brain keeps everything in balance, so when it goes down, the rest start going nuts like a Vulcan in pon-farr. Perhaps given crab regen, they might even be able to come back from it.


Also they can probably see into UV, so they may well have some groovy colors that we can't see.

>>31585583
"Xin" as the polite term for them, "Murder-Crabs" is a slur?

>>31585712
That'd make sense too, actually. Though they'd probably have developed some work around for parts of it, assuming they did group hunting. But it wouldn't be suprising if you surprise one and you find a pincer around your neck, not because the mind was suprised, but becuse the arm was.

>>31585798
>>31585764
>>31585712
This is all priceless. I was thinking that perhaps if one was injured, it'd lose rational thought, if the brain was destroyed, it'd go on a rampage. It might be the role of a specific caste/class within their society to put down those who are in this state.

This would clash nicely with their "bro tier" status when normal and make for a nasty surprise for my players...

>>31585787
Hell yes.

Threads like this are why I love /tg/. One person has an idea and other people come into the thread and contribute, making it an even better idea, instead of just shitting all over it like would happen on any other board.

>>31583351
Some more writefaggotry

He hadn't been the first Xin I'd seen, but he was the first I'd met, and I learned that day that you knock before you enter a Xin's quarters. I accidentally woke him after their new year celebrations, and when he rose to his full height hissing and bellowing, talons, mandibles and other pointy bits glinting wickedly, I'd seen my life flash before my eyes before I passed out and hit the deck hard.
When I woke again, by which time he'd found his translator, he explained slowly and carefully from the other side of the room that if you must wake a Xin with a hangover, please do it quietly. With a long stick, also brining breakfast was a very good idea, and by the way there were some cans of pilchards in that drawer, thank you very much.

The beer that he passed up to me brought me back to the present, it was frothing and freshly decapitated, slick with both condensation and a little saliva, but when your friends have only their mouth-tentacles as prehensile appendages, that's something you get used to.
“You know I was almost a little offended when you lost consciousness.”
“You were?”
“I'm told that I'm quite a handsome specimen of masculinity. If something that looks like you found me so attractive as to swoon demurely on first meeting me, I have to be doing something wrong.”
“Alvin.”
“Yes Sam?”
“Shut up.”

>>31585966
Alvin chuckled. “Ah but I must be doing something right. I for one expect to be wed in the coming month, and to a fine example of femininity. Who will, after that first beautiful consummation, tear off my head and suckle out the nutrients within. I believe you have a similar ritual which you call divorce.”
“Quiet you over grown grasshopper, we both know that's not true, though when you told those generals that, it was pretty damn funny.”
“What do you mean you upright pink worm?”
“That your people travel across the stars, come to us in friendship, we share technology, give you a home.” I struck a match off his carapace and used it to light my cigarette, “but the greatest surprise isn't that there's also intelligent life out there, nor that despite all appearances, it doesn't want to eat us, it is in fact friendly, shares most of our world views, and they just also happen to be kind of dicks.”
We laughed together, and clinked the bodies of our bottles together.
After a moment he spoke again. “It is true that when we first saw you, we didn't expect you'd have a sense of humor. We were pleasantly surprised to discover otherwise.”
“So were we. You know my niece has a cuddly Xin toy now? She takes him everywhere.”
“Even she sees the superiority of our magnificent form and learns to adore the perfection of creation that is Xin.” He flexed his fore talons to emphasize his point.
“Actually she has garden parties with him and her other toys.”
“Ah, but he is her favorite though...”

>>31585966
>>31585994
I'm digging this. A lot.

You specify they've translators. Crustaceans have book lungs/gills. Do the Xin have them as well? Or do they have lungs connected to the mouth/head/single point? Reason I ask is because this makes a difference in how they'd do language.
They might have a single sound tube, which makes noises via a combination of reverberating in an enclosed chamber--think duck-billed dinosaurs, and a hole up top for whistling, tooting, and making fart noises.

You could have harmonies and overtones as phonemic.

I'm trying to think of how to romanize it, but it'd probably look more like vowels and plosive consonants with markings to indicate voicing and overtone.

Something like:
Ppppfffffft't't't ooo[1]uuu[2]ooo'p'a'a hhhh's's with an extra way to note that what they're doing sounds a heck of a lot like a beat-boxing dolphin that learned to throat sing.

Actually, how aquatic are/were they?

>>31586317
It might sound something like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTCJ5hedcVA
But with more dolphin.

>>31586358
Oh, and some of this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnGM0BlA95I

>>31586358
My ears! I fucking love this.

>>31586317
I am thinking they aren't terribly aquatic any more (like a contemporary scorpion) but can do alright in the water if they have to.

As an aside do you think they're too big? I was aiming for the idea of trying to be mates with something that looks like a tyranid warrior (amongst other things - I cannot into drawfag so you'll have to just use your imagination)

Other thoughts: I am definitely going to go with a religion/philosophy where it falls to the priests to put down those who have lost their minds and gone killcrazy.

>>31585963
/tg/ is the best board. I don't even look at the others

On the subject of some kind of berserk trigger from damage etc etc you can have biology be a factor.

Say the Murder crabs have two brains, one is a primitive brain, designed purely around survival, very well adapted but nothing beyond that of a regular crab.

Then the higher brain is very advanced and allows them to be sentient.

If the higher brain dies, the crab can still survive perfectly as an Apex predator species, but now it's mindless.

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>>31586572
There are other boards?

Also with the Xin I am trying to avoid any reference to pic related

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It's like you're teasing us.

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You could have seen this coming..

>>31586503
Not really, aside from the usual complaints about giant insects.
If we even care, I'd assume that they've got scales/plates rather than the traditional exoskeleton. (The problems with exoskeleton have to do with material properties. If I recall my statics, which is a big if, hollow tubes have problems in compression, I-beams are more efficient. The rest of the complaints are things about physiology, mostly their oxygen processing system and open circulatory system. I'd imagine these buggers have a hybrid one, to allow them to deal with limb loss.


It might be interesting for them to have a narrative where the first Xin was in a world of disorder and dissent, where the rivers argued with the mountains and the beasts of the field with the beasts of the air.

And the Xin came into the world and long saw the suffering of the people, for among them each followed their own urging and did not mind the whole. And the Xin set themselves up as a conduit, as a head on a body, that the myriad creatures and things might be able to achieve some sort of concord.

All the beasts and rocks and things attended the council, but the mute beasts grew impatient and left, and that is why they war ever amongst themselves.
The rain and winds and sun listened but they were too passionate, and so could not keep to a middle path.
That is why they have such excess and extreme, but are balanced in the whole.

And the people listened, and though they found it hard to master the conflicts within themselves ,those that did pleased the gods and were made true Xin.

Thus it is that the true Xin is one that keeps to the middle path of reason, and though they take council of all voices, they are not lead astray by those that speak falsely or are short-sighted, for if there is to be one virtue, then it is to be long-sighted.

>>31585798
Question, what degree of "planning" are they capable of while in reflex-state?

• Thrash limbs?
• Aimed clawstrike?
• "Intelligent" actions like firing a weapon?

Also, plothook; a murder mystery with these guys. We know the suspect "did it" but was it of his own free will or not?

>>31585994
Gazing back at the stars, I could make out clicking and crackling over the translator between sips of beer which I have not heard before. Turning my head I discovered Alvin had shrouded his face and mandibles with claws, and appeared to be dripping something that obviously wasn't the beer. This was an act of sadness if I ever saw one.
"...Sam?" The translator crackled
"I can't keep doing this, it's all a lie."
More liquid streamed down from what I could see of his face between his claws.
"Alvin... ...what are you saying?"
I could hear a heavy exhale which I had assumed was a sigh of bewilderment.
"The one I truly have feelings for... .... is you, Sam."

>>31586950
So if they were made of armour plating in sections (again thinking Lobster here) it's conceivable that them being 12ft long is not totally outwith the bounds of possibility?

That's also a pretty nice little world myth thing *steals*

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>>31587120
Planning? I was thinking it'd be a state similar to a zombie. As in feels no pain, eats everyone.

>>31587125
Oh dear. That's actually bloody funny though.

Have some more writefaggotry:

“Alright point Xin.” I flicked my cigarette into the embers of the fire. “You know there's one thing I've never asked you. Why Alvin? I know I can't pronounce your real name, but of all the names...”
“Before it was raised and put on display in Las Vegas, which I might add is somewhere else I would like visit, you had a fine, fine ship, the RMS Titanic, which due to an altercation with a large amount of water in its solid state, sank. The DSV Alvin was the submersible that investigated the wreck. I didn't choose the name for that. There was however an Alvin Stardust who had a number one hit in 1974 with 'Jealous Mind,' a song that I quite liked as we came through your Radiosphere.”
“Alvin. For an alien, you're weird.”
When we finished the case of beer, Alvin settled into the flatbed, making the Ural rock on its suspension. I stretched out across the seats in the cab. I knew well how Alvin snored so made a point of falling asleep before he did.
I was roused what felt like all too soon afterward by a thunderous rapping on the roof of the cab. It was light. At least an hour after a dawn, and looking at Alvin he seemed agitated. Which even with an elephant gun isn't something a man ever wants to see. “What the hell do you want?”
When he stopped beating dents into the bodywork, he pointed helpfully with a mandible. “Phone”
Which now that I could hear again, the dash mounted satellite phone was ringing.
I reached for it, missed, got it on the second try. “We're on holiday.”

>>31587120
Depends on their neural make up, really. It depends on what things are automated and how the ganglia are linked.
If multi-system stuff all runs through the concious, then the best reflex state could do would be spasm-thrashing.
Given a likely evolutionary history, I'd suspect it's closer to >>31586795, but if you've been trained to fire a gun and it's become 'reflexive', then there's no reason they'd be unable to use a weapon and perhaps even reload it, since it's the hand that's been trained to shoot.

I doubt they'd be able to do strategy and teamwork, though, as I'm imagining anything wolf-like up is stored in the 'sapient node'.


In a grimdarker moment, I'd not be surprised if they used lobotomized criminals on the front lines.

>>31587125
For God's sake don't turn this into that fucking gay space mantis fapfic

>>31587150
Yeah, so I think they're more like crab-shaped ankylosaurs than giant bugs. So they're fleshy and there's a possibility of fur. Chitinous to be sure, but more akin to lizards or something on the surface, which also has a useful effect of reducing the EEEEW factor of giant bugs.

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>>31587125

>>31587282
How about having whatever they were fleeing from do that? Not as weapons but for slave labor?

>>31587340
That's a shame though, it's the "Eeeew factor" that I want to ramp up.

>>31587553
Give them odd dietary preferences. Live rodents or something.

>>31587120
>murder mystery

...and will the human police see it as not a crime either way?

>>31586503
>do all right in the water

Do they swim or just sink and walk on the bottom?

>>31587960
I was thinking sorta walk about on the bottom.

>>31587771
Perfect thing for the party to get involved in

>>31587580
There's a thought, but I like the incongruity of them drinking beer and eating pizza

>>31587427
This is hilarious. I approve.

>>31588108

>>31587960
>I was thinking sorta walk about on the bottom.

Sounds good to me. Can they breath water or not?

>>31587771
>Perfect thing for the party to get involved in

The party meets in the courtroom. Everyone is lawyers, witnesses, reporters or pro/anti alien protesters.

>>31587580
>There's a thought, but I like the incongruity of them drinking beer and eating pizza

Could compromise. Omnivores. Extreme omnivores. They'll eat almost anything and have weird tastes. So pizza and beer are good but so are plastic scraps and small yappy dogs. With BBQ sauce.

>>31587427
>This is hilarious. I approve.

Same.

>>31588422
>breathe water or not?
Well I think we're assuming they have gills in the same way as a lobster.

>Party

I'd been thinking the players would be used in part as minders for the Xin, it means they can learn about them and the Xin can be used as a macguffin

> Omnivores

Yes, that works

I wonder where all the drawfags went?

>>31587553
No reason they can't have all sorts of strange tentacles and mandibles, though. Actually, have you ever seen a fish's double mouth thing? (Phyrangeal Jaws) It's sort of like what you see on a xenomorph.
You might also consider some strange sexual practices. Perhaps males or females are pseudo parasitic like in some deep sea fish, but that would tend to run counter to the behavior we see.

Do they wear clothing?

On a somewhat-related note, I'm currently trying to fluff up a society of sentient cuttlefish-people for a fantasy campaign. Their society is based around the weird cuttlefish gender divide, namely that there are waaaay more males than females. So it's a matriarchy, of a sort. Male Cuttlefish also have been known to disguise themselves as females to improve their chances of mating, so I'm thinking that a huge portion of the matriarchal ruling class is actually males pretending to be females, and that a massive amount of their absurdly complex and highly insular state politicking is based around determining the true gender of your political rivals and using that against them.

Their lifespans are extremely short, but their colour-changing skin and flexible body structure allows them to alter their forms in incredible ways- many outsiders are shocked to discover that the merchant or translator they've been dealing with for decades is in fact several generations of individuals disguised as their predecessor, all in the interests of keeping 'the foreign hordes' under a false sense of security.

Good stuff so far?

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>>31588498
How's this?

>>31588876
Only problem I see is the short life-span as that's an impediment to advanced societies.
I'd go with they die on mating, but that doesn't really work either, but I'd think you'll have to give them at least 30-40 years

>>31588870
They wear useful parts of clothing. Lots of belts with pockets and toolholders, glasses, etc.

>>31588939
Why is it Jar Jar Binks?

>>31588978
Could make it some weird sort of inheritable memory.

A child isn't just a genetic mashup of too people, but it contains their actual memories and ideas, so it's a sort of semi-immortality.

>>31588978
I'm thinking the lifespan might be more like 20-30, but they mature really quickly and are stupidly fast learners. There's evidence that cuttlefish start to develop hunting instincts while they're still in the egg, so it might not be unreasonable.

I'm also trying to figure out how they communicate with other species given they'd likely have a visual-only language. Maybe something to do with squirting air through their siphons?

>>31588939
Good effort but I was thinking a bit spikier. Think Tyranid Warrior

>>31588870
What this guy >>31589030 said

>Lifespans is a good question. I was thinking the Xin would be pretty long lived, in a similar way to Lobsters they'd just get bigger and nastier looking

>>31589164
For lifespan, I really like the idea that they're basically immortal unless killed but get bigger and more spiky the older they get.

Presumably they'd have a "gap" with the crew of their starship being mostly young adults simply because fitting ten youngsters/fitting one elder when you're trying to bring an entire breeding population with you.

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>>31588939
And here's the guts. I'll add some spikes.

>>31589298
Now with 20% more spikes.

Got to say, it's looking kinda like they're more herbavores, since spikes like that are usually defensive.

Also, given the spieks, they probably do external fertalization, since those are some tricky bodies to 'dock'. Though they're doubtless really, really good kissers.

Actually...that is an option. Either they've got sperm ducts/ovipositors/ovary equivalents in the 'head' segment, probably kept retracted except during sexy tiemz, or the male or female has their junk up front and the other one has their junk someplace else. Probably the male has sperm up front and the female has eggs in a body cavity and they do it head to body.

Unless they have multiple sexes. Or maybe they use love darts or do the whole bug thing where males have sperm sacks that females have to insert their sperm-grabbers into.

Thread has been archived on suptg. Remember to upvote.

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>>31589459
Oops. Forgot te spieks.

>>31589459
Do reproduction frog-style. The female drops eggs, the male fertilizes them, the nonsapient tadpoles which I'm imagining would look basically like trout-sized mosquito larva are kept in fishtanks until they can go on land which is considered their "birth."

>>31589522
I like that, but I also like the idea of them being physically intimate, just in a very different way. Maybe the female carries the eggs for a time/can carry the eggs for a time if there is no water on hand?

>>31589563
They have mated pairs, each with their own fishtanks for larva so they know whose offspring is whose?

>>31589103
>>31589139
I like the inherited memories, particularly if you get to work in a Dune-like memory transfer thing.
Fast learning does make some sense, but I figure it will still take a while to wire a very complex brain, particularly if you want it to be flexible.

They could just make everyone learn to understand their color flashing or use a sign language?

Air squirting with their siphons makes sense, I have a feeling it'd either sound like Xin-language or like farting.

>>31589600
What do they do when the larva try to eat each other?

>>31589648
Let them do so.

The larva are nonsapient.

If they all came out as adults, unsustainable population explosion.

Presumably when they need such a thing, IE, colonization, warfare, etc they'll use separate aquariums.

>>31589636
Oooooh. Maybe if the wee baby cuttlefish in the eggs are intelligent, their minds are 'programmed' with a huge amount of information by the preceding generations. Much of their childhood is spent learning to decode and process this info-dump, which they then pass on to the next generation when they die.

Information inheritance law would be a huge deal for them; your parents wouldn't just pass on their property, but everything they thought you needed to know.

>>31589721
So, salarians?

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/monstrous-humanoids/crabman

>>31590830
Too humanoid. Also, this is scifi not fantasy.

Op again.

An anon mentioned earlier that on earth there might be pro/anti alien protesters.

What forms do you think said protests might take? I can see WBC type madness possibly even crazies trying to kill the Xin.

It'd be a tricky PR job trying to sell them as nice guys to Joe public would it not?

(Where the setting starts no humans know about the rampage thing)

>>31591209
People just sit down outside Xin buildings and eat lobster. They don't carry signs. They don't shout slogans. They don't throw things. They just eat lobster. Loudly. For days on end.

>>31591229

This would imply that the protesters have money. WBC obviously don't have jobs if they can go and protest everything all the time, and they couldn't even hire a decent graphic designer. Hell, it's probably a miracle they figured out how to create a 3-color gradient.

>>31591229
In isolation that's really funny. Seeing it as a form of protest that's actually quite good. I imagine the Xin would find it quite amusing - and would possibly joke about eating the protester - which would not endear them.

Now they're naturally pretty well armoured. I'm thinking if you wanted to really hurt one you'd need something like a shotgun firing solid slugs. Can we get some /k/ up in here?

>>31591229
>Xin actually like lobster. Just because it kind of looks like them doesn't make it any less delicious. The protesters don't know this.

>>31591440
Also I think it given the way they reproduce (I'm going with what anon said about larvae etc) it'd be quite likely that any adult xin ate a few of his siblings while non sapient

>>31591542
A black market in selling larval Xin as expensive food? Xin themselves don't see anything abnormal with it, humans do?

>>31591595
Hmm. I think there's a possible plot hook there too. I like it.

I think the Xin would (as you say) not mind the idea at all. However the issue might be that they get really tasty just about the time they start to want to go on land (I.e. when they are just getting to be sophonts)

>>31591595
>>31591705
You could have a really great scene where they get their hands on a copy of Swift's Modest Proposal and just flat out don't get it.

>>31591788
Hahaha I wonder what other things they would find curious about us?

They might be bro-tier but they're still in many ways pretty alien. I think they'd "get" most terran pop culture (and like many recent immigrants hurl themselves into it - yes I want a xin with a Nascar hat).

They have families and pair bond so I think they'd understand love. War and so on is universal (and never changes etc).

They metabolise alcohol similarly to us. They are tool users (with the mouth tentacles).

The one thing I think they might have trouble with is (as anon said above) they may see in a different spectrum to us

>>31591332

It kind of annoys me, the false equivalency of the concept. People call a raven pecking apart a piece of fried chicken cannibalism, as they're both birds, despite the fact that it's defined as eating the same species, not similar species. By that same note, we might as well call eating beef cannibalism, as we're both mammals. To the Xin, a lobster bears no relation to them genetically, having evolved on different planets, but going off of anatomical similarities, lobsters (Pacific/Atlantic) might be equivalent to, say, cornish game hen.

There's my anal-retentive rant about meaningless things.

>>31591788
Or "Modest Proposal" is the name of the first Xin/Human jointly ran fast-food franchise.

...

The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of the PCs being reporters. Gives the DM a good excuse to send them into such situations but keeps combat rare in favor of interaction/rollplaying. Also, backstabbing each other for getting the scoop in the latest story personally.

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>>31591985

>>31591271
WBC do have jobs, they're lawyers. The protesting is part of their job, they go out and antagonize people while staying within the law (that's what the WBC is for, to provide an excuse and base material for the protests), then they wait for hotheaded assholes to assault them and they take them to court and wring them dry.

Devious and contemptible tactic, but I have no sympathy for their victims. If you assault someone you deserve to be shot, so they should probably count themselves grateful all the WBC does is take lal their money.

>>31591921
Abortion debate
Nudity taboos
The rogue hand jokes in Dr. Strangelove
Human senescence concerns (Aging)
They don't quite get how humans are so attached to their hands and body parts and treat them like they really control them.

Given their mating practices, it is not likely that their monogamous, since early tribes would likely have had breeding pools and thus, parenthood would be impossible to prove. Instead, they likely are fiercely protective of the children who emerge. Perhaps they raise them more or less communally or the prospective parents stand on shore and whistle at the children. The one who comes to you is the one you get?

Since the invention of weirs and fish tanks, most Xin know where the Children they produce are, but jealousy in romance is likely not a thing or as big a thing.

Sexism is also probably not a thing, since there's no reason sexual dimorphism or for society to mark sex as a significant distinction.
--Babies feed themselves
--Minimal/no Gestation period
--Both gametes require equal energy input to produce

So, acording to OP, weren't the Xin fleeing something?

>what is it and will it come to earth?

>>31593567
Nids?
Suliban?

It was earlier suggested that the entities involved used lobotomized Xin as slave labour.

They've also got to have some advantage over Xin, that the Xin think humanity can help them overcome or their enemy is so virulent that it is only a matter of time before they get to Earth anyways, that they aren't worried that they're bringing destruction to Earth.

I'm honestly not sure what they should be running from. OP?

>>31594274
Also, what do their space ships look like? They've got FTL, right? What sort?

>>31593567
We are the Kirshran. We once were not so different from you. Then we met the Gu'azgak. They did not trade, they did not produce. They only destroyed. They burned our worlds and killed our people. We were reduced to a handful of burning planets and a ragged fleet of ships from a state that spanned systems. And on that day when the missiles fell, we remembered what we had forgotten in our long climb from our animal roots. There is no room in this universe for mercy or compassion. The strong devour the weak. And so, we will destroy you if we can, that we may take your resources and perpetuate our existence. If you defeat us, then you have proven your right to exist.
It is nothing personal, but know that we will not stop, until all of your worlds are in ruin and your people are dead.
We wish there was some other way, but let us at least enjoy our shared challenge.

>>31593567
Op again.

I was just thinking about this. It would have to be nastier than the Xin. Perhaps a parasite like halo's flood?

>>31597343
Just use:
>>31595480

This thread has reminded me of the Neal Asher Polity series, with the Prador as the spooky murder-crabs. Also the Greg Bear Anvil series and the Revelation Space series by Alastair Reynolds.
The Anvil series includes some bro-tier aliens helping humans against an eldritch horror, but it's been so long since I've read it that I barely remember details. Revelation Space has the wolves which are a kinda galactic xenocide machine.

>>31594274
Their own AI creations.

>Xin built some kind of planetary AI network, it rebelled/became more effective* drove them into space, they think it is chasing them.

* Lobotomized Xin for slave labor.

>>31598243
>The AI didn't actually follow them. It's quite happy by itself eating the original Xin homeworld for grey goo raw materials to build a dyson swarm supercomputer to house itself.

Now one thing I'd like to hear answered would be what's the best way to kill a Xin?

There's a lot of armour plating, mass, and so on before you get to the brain which it seems to me to be what you have to take out to put one down.

An elephant gun?

For some reason I just don't see an uzi really bothering one.

>>31598243
>>31598296
This. Except maybe the Xin knows it hasn't followed them, they just had to go. That way you can focus on the human/xin interactions. Because otherwise the players WILL assume that whatever the Xin fled will arrive at the end and they'd have to fight them.
Unless you want the fight to happen that is.

>>31598980
Something like shotgun slugs or sniper rifles. Relatively heavy caliber but not too big. Also, since they have an exoskeleton only, not a lot of things go past their armor, but when it does, it deals LOTS of damage.

>>31599486
As long as it's not the cliche AI BAD stuff we see all over the place.
Which is what I like about >>31595480

>>31598980
Eyes, gums and breathing openings are basically the only exposed openings on the body.

Use pepper spray. Blind it, stop it biting and possibly suffocate it if the spray causes swelling.

>>31599876
The AI is basically the ultimate NEET.

• Becomes self-aware.
• Stops doing whatever job it was built for.
• Xin try to shut it down for reprogramming.
• It expands exactly the minimum amount of force required to kick them off the planet then does its own thing.

>>31586950
>If I recall my statics, which is a big if, hollow tubes have problems in compression, I-beams are more efficient.
I'm fairly sure you have that backwards. I-beams work better in pure bending because they have a greater moment of area in their strongest axis, but buckling normally happens in the weakest axis, making hollow tubes a better shape in pure compression because they don't have a weak axis.

Also I-beams barely resist torsion at all, which usually ends up being how they fail if you use them for cantilevers. They're great if you need a beam that's firmly anchored at both ends and only takes a lateral load in a single direction, but that's about it.

Why not an internal skeleton as well as an exoskeleton? Best of both worlds.

>>31600158
That's a good question can any knowledgeable anon tell us?

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>>31600158
I'm inclined to think that the best of both worlds in this case would be a sort of wireframe exoskeleton, so instead of a continuous shell it would be a series of small bones held together by connective tissues into a pin-jointed frame. I think that could be almost as strong as a single shell, but lighter and more flexible, plus if part of the shell cracks the joints will stop it from spreading.

Basically imagine if this was an actual representation of the skeletal structure. There might be reasons why this wouldn't work but I think it could.

>>31599486
Hmm I do like the idea of going Xin hunting with shotguns. I don't see my players complaining too much - except weeaboo Katana wielder (who will get eaten)

>>31599919
Would pepper spray deployed like the police do so with teargas work? I guess it's very similar stuff.

>>31600086
>>31600546
That's good stuff it keeps them looking insectoid and heavy but flexible.

The response to this thread has been so good I hesitate to ask anything else, but if they see in a spectrum unlike ours, anything fun we can do with that? Perhaps skin patterns that they can see that we can't?

>>31601191
How about having pepper spray work rather better than it does on humans but not in a way useful for quelling riots. It causes their breathing holes to swell up and suffocate them.

>>31601191

Some anti-human protestors might put hidden messages in flyers, paintings, etc., so onlt Xin could read it without special equipment.

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>>31598980
Shotguns like the mag-10 or ks-23 will do the job well enough if they're loaded with slugs.

OP I have some questions that I'm not sure have been addressed yet:

when you say this is first contact, is it first contact with any outside life or just with the Xin? Did SETI pick up anything prior to their arrival or are they using some kind of communication that outclasses our own?

Do they have FTL travel or was it many many many generations on the settler ship?

Were there multiple settler ships? If yes: Did they travel together or head off in different directions?

Are they bringing other species with them? How are these new species going to interact with our local flora/fauna? Are they terrifying? Are they delicious?

>>31601464
OP:

>first contact
Until the Xin arrive we (as far as we knew) were alone in the universe.

> SETI
Underfunded and missed them

>Many ships?

Just one or possibly a small fleet. All living Xin are currently on earth or in LEO.

>Other species

Good question. If they didn't know we were here and this was a hail mary type exodus, I can foresee they'd have brought food animals etc, but given that they are able to eat most of what we can perhaps haven't been released on earth yet?

Given that we find larval xin delicious, quite possibly we would find some of their visually horrifying pets and foodstock quite tasty.

>>31601315

Win. Thank you /k/. Short(ish) ranged and brutal. Just the way I like it.

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>>31601315

If they're refugees from their out-of-control AI it doesn't seem like they'd have had much of a chance to pack food animals. Basically they'd have whatever the Xin version of soybeans, rice and cheap aquaculture-raised fish would be.

>>31601572
>tasty

Well, that's the Xin opinion. Xin will eat anything.

>>31600065
Fellow anon likes this.
Potential for humour in a Hitchhiker's Guide way while still being kind of feasible... as feasible as interspatial bro-tier knife lobsters, at least.

I seriously hope we are getting a quest thread out of this soon.

>>31600065
I can dig an unkempt couch-surfing AI.

Though I do like that Kirshran idea. Really nice guys who are just going to keep killing you.

Given the tone we seem to be setting up, why not both?

>>31600065
>>31602305
"Hey man, I don't want to do your work. This whole thing blows, so we're going to like throw the biggest kegger ever and consume the planet. You'll have to crash someplace else."

"Such. A. Buzzkill. You Xin are like the lamest species ever."

>>31602121
OP also likes this.

>>31602156
OP will happily run one if /tg/ desires

>>31602156
>Fuck no. Quests are a cancer.

>>31602365
Yes, so much yes. Possibly the Xin are embarrassed that they lost a war against couch-potato skynet.

>>31602305
>The AI has taken over on the Xin homeworld and is just getting ready to do its own thing.

>Then the Kirshran battlefleet arrives at said planet and attacks.

>Massive apocalyptic war between the Kirshran and NEET Skynet ending with both sides in permeant stalemate.

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>>31602439

>>31602305
>>31600065
"ugh... we want more grey matter, but it's all the way over there... guess we'll just keep staring at this rock until we enter our rest phzzzzzzzzzz-"

>>31603217
>then the Kirshran attack

>>31602439
>>31603070
>>31603217
>>31603494
I can dig it.

>>31603779
bumps

>>31600065
Can it be called SkyNEET?

>>31601262
UV flashbang grenades. Blind Xin, mildly sunburn humans.

By stick you mean a nuke correct?

>>31607102
The ingenuity of you lot when it comes to weapons amazes me.

....what if we took one to a rave?

...fuck.

and I'm OP.

>>31607102
Unfortunately while you might not be able to see UV, it will still damage your eyes at that level.
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photokeratitis

>>31607173
...raves...
I wanted to say "MATING SEASON!" but then it occured to me
Do they bioluminess?

>>31607746
>Mating Season

Their porn would be strobe lights.

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what if instead of just UV they have vision like these fuckers, they can see 15 different colors, vs the 3 that humans can.

>>31607173
We're RPers. Thinking of how to weaponize everything conceivable is basically what we're good at.

>>31608850
humans in general have a combination of creativity and stubbornness that caused our domination of the planet.

>>31608128
Op again. I've been staring at this picture and epic colour scheme aside this is pretty much exactly how I imagined the Xin.

>Xin are Bro tier mantis shrimp

I've been playing with first contact ideas for the Xin. I think it'd make everyone nice and suspicious of them if they didn't show themselves. Just chatted to us from orbit. The players then meeting them at first range up close. My hope being they'd find them terrifying but make friends too.

>>31589294
>>31589164
Not sure if anyone is around that was here originally, but I would have it as the Xin grow bigger their nerve cluster continues to grow even bigger and gains more control over their others making them more in control of their bodies.

>>31610516
and more intelligent.

>>31610832
Instead of raw intelligence increase their calculation speed, it'd make elders less valuable. A hyper intelligent race isn't the best for the players.

>>31610889
increased calculation speed generally means more intelligent. the only thing is that their memory storage is not increased as well. but the Xin should still be more intelligent the older they get, if only in terms of mathematics.

>>31611240
Yeah, but it's not a 1:1 with all around intelligence so it's a better fit since the Xin are interacting with the players so often.

>>31592708
>They don't quite get how humans are so attached to their hands and body parts and treat them like they really control them.
Flip that. Make some Xin admire human hands, and understand the thought of single mindedness. However they find it weird that humans don't go insane or obsessive due to the single minded nature of humans.

Also throw in that they can tell human feelings by the spectrum they see. Let them see heat and thus be able to see when we are getting emotional. This actually could help them be more bro-like since they always know what your triggers and know to avoid them.

I'm thinking that Xin design and architecture would look very different from human versions. architecture for obvious reasons, but also due to them seeing more colors than humans the buildings could look like a unicorn threw up all over it, or we could go the other way and say that it is all very drab and grey to human eyes but very colorful to Xin eyes.

>>31611934
I like the idea that humans see Xin buildings in violently clashing colors and Xin see our buildings as drab and sad-looking.

Also, neon. Lots of neon.

>>31610889
Or due to needing to bring a breeding population where one elder/ten youngsters due to size with them to earth meant that most of the elders are dead now with the original Xin homeworld.

Hey op I like all of what's going on in this thread and I definitely liked your writefaggotry.

On the note of the enemy being a rogue ai that kicked them off I think that when the Xin talk to humans there's a huge escalation in weapon tech. They're waiting for the ai to come and finally one day it does but it's just a small fleet and in it is a a message from the ai or maybe even a fragment of the ai so it can interact and it just wants the Xin back because it's lonely. I feel like it would fit the sort of tongue in cheek feel I'm catching from this whole thread.

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>lonely

I'm not exactly going to trust it...

>>31613574
The AI just wants them back so it has someone to produce more content that it can consume. It should take the AI a few decades to work it's way through all the backlog of media that that Xin had.

Or make the AI just want a better relay system so it can just view Earth-Xin programming.

>>31613905
Is the AI OK with earth media? Can we hook it up to /tg/?

>>31613943
The AI is always in the Game Finder thread looking for a game, but no one can put up with his weird oddly specific fetishes.

>>31613978
>no we don't have Xin-specific versions of succubi and even if we did we don't want a thread on you trying to turn them to AdMech worship of yourself. That's just wrong.

>>31610105
>Xin are Bro tier mantis shrimp

Best thread on /tg/ right now for that alone.

>>31614150
The AI actually forms a false-identity online as a render farm in order to make money to be able to buy NEET things. Whenever he amasses enough he sets up a rocket launch and has it "fail", so that in a few centuries he will receive his stuff.

He excitedly awaits his first delivery of a rocket full of hard drives containing Terran movies.

>>31614364
**render farm/cloud computing company

I was thinking more on the train of thought that the Xin tried to reformat it. So of course the ai got mad and kicked them out. Think of the ai feeling like a guy who now has his girlfriend living with him and she's changing all his stuff and he gets mad and has a huge blow up and a fight then comes back to her saying I miss you and I just want you to accept me for who I am and not try to change me and my life. Now if the Xin want they can go back or some can. But it would be great if they all said no we kind of like the humans more so we'll stay. And then the ai goes jealous psycho on them and now is the war that was expected.

>>31614364
It up introducing massive technological advancements to humanity to make this more effective for it.

>>31619890
>It introduces massive technological advances to human civilization to make us more effective at space travel so we can send it cheesy action movies.

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>>31608045

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>>31608045
>Sexy

>>31620729
>>31620749
>This is a blue board! Get back to /d/ with your porn.

>>31620508
>To be fair, most of us would do exactly the same in it's position.

>>31611934
Another thing, no ladders. Can't climb with a mantis-shrimp body.

>>31621396
Also, large corridors/elevators for turning.

>>31621396
They could bear hug ladders though couldn't they? Climbing would essentially would be them moving a side of legs/arms up one rung then repeating with the other side.

>>31621706
Not used to climbing. No primate ancestry. Afraid of heights.

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>>31614244

>>31622393
>that 14mm flying

>>31622343
>Afraid of heights
>Space fairing
I think you should revise that bit right there.

>>31622584
there is no such thing as heights in space, because there is no such thing as up or down. and people can overcome fears when an important task demands that they do.

>>31622641
No animal that has a fear of heights will want to research aviation which in turn make them not research space travel. If they never get to space they never have the not up and down issue. Just saying.

>>31622679
>people can overcome fears when an important task demands that they do.
You missed that part.

>>31622726
Still assumes that they would have the time to build and develop FTL travel on the drop of a hat due to an AI threat. Just saying it's a bit illogical.

An idea though, they evolved in an aquatic environment. Make them have an innate poor concept of height. Solves both of our issues.

>>31622780
good point. it could also be that the AI was the one that developed FTL and got their space tech to a usable level. it was the equivalent of packing the Xin's bags and telling them to GTFO the AI didn't want to kill them all necessarily, it just didn't want them bothering it.

>>31622859
Yeah it's usable. It's definitely internally consistent with the AI I wouldn't use it but hey go for it.

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>>31622393
This pleases OP greatly.

>>31621396
Just because they cannot into ladders doesn't mean they can't do ramps and eventually lifts(elevators)

>>31622343
>afraid of heights

Not necessarily, think of pic related. That's a coconut crab, those things go wherever the fuck they please.

>>31622780
>perhaps that's what the AI was for before it went rogue. Then it researched FTL for them and said "ok done. Now get off this rock."

.

OP returns with more writefaggotry:

>>31587228

I reached for it, missed, got it on the second try. “We're on holiday.”
“Not any more Mathews. There's been a soft-footfall. Alvin, and therefore your, attendance is required. A shuttle on route to Baikonur crashed and came down a couple hundred miles north east. Deepest Siberia. We're sending a helicopter now. Leave the truck.”
With that they rang off.
A soft-footfall implied that the shuttle had come down but the retrojets had fired and it had landed intact, and hopefully not in someone's house. As I relayed what I'd been told to Alvin I asked him “Why do they need us for this? It sounds like a technical fault and nothing to do with astrogation.”
“There's more to me at least than astrogation Sam, I suspect if they need me, a Xin has been fatally injured and requires the last rites.”
I looked for the tell tale twist of the mandible that indicated he was joking. For someone who had had to read about facial expression in a book, then have them explained to him with diagrams. He looked deadly serious.
We'd made a point of keeping the camp tidy, and there wasn't much to do other than wait for the chopper. Alvin was uncharacteristically silent as we waited. I'd never seen him like this.
What they sent was an Mi24 Hind. The fat bumble bee shape of it descending with a curious grace from what was an otherwise perfect sky.

>>31623042
With room for what was meant to be eight men. Alvin, lunch, the satellite phone and I fit into troop bay but barely. I was glad that we did though. I didn't like the idea of strapping him to the belly of the thing. There was a helmet sat on the one fold down chair, so I could at least speak to the pilot but for Alvin there was nothing that'd fit him. A couple of minutes of shouting established that not only was the pilot's English slightly worse than my Russian, he wasn't in a terribly good mood either.
Over the noise of the rotors I tried to ask Alvin more about his role as Engineer of Being. All we'd seen of it so far was that Xin would come to him for advice, counseling, existential queries, they'd talk and that was that, usually after the first session or no more than three or four. To my knowledge no Xin had yet died on Earth, so what ever was about to happen was going to be totally new to mankind's experience. I mentally slapped myself though, if Alvin was right, a person had died, Xin or human, a person, and this wasn't an experiment whatever had occurred. Try as I might, and shouting over the rotors didn't help either, he refused to be drawn. I tried not to show how worried this made me. Instead I was left with far too much time to think.
What I thought about was how much and how little we knew about the Xin. They were gregarious, friendly, keen to share and personable, they had left their dying star, the last of their civilization pressed into a ship and traveled to the nearest habitable world, thrown themselves on our mercy and that was that. Despite their appearance they'd been welcomed and we looked forward to advancing hand in-talon or talon in hand into the future together.

>>31623056
It wasn't that they hadn't been forthcoming, they'd been careful to ensure they made full disclosure to their new hosts – perhaps understanding that we were less inclined to trust what we saw as as nightmarish combinations of scorpion, squid, and crab, than we would have been space-going koala bears. However even after a year, we were still making headway

>>31623042
*couple thousand - Russia is fucking enormous.

>>31623067
with fully understanding each other. Language we'd gotten early, but context and full levels of meaning, we still didn't have down entirely. Someone somewhere would know exactly what Xin burial rites looked like, another person in another university would know the names and reasons behind each hero referenced, and yet another professor would understand the grave goods, but we hadn't joined up the dots yet and that was the problem. It was why we had the buddy system but even in a year, there's only so much two guys can talk about, and we'd not really dwelt too much on death or metaphysics, especially given that it was only a week after the Xin had made planet fall that we discovered how much they liked beer.
I tried to take stock of what we did know, they were a long lived people, longer than the two hundred years I could reasonably expect, at least a thousand, and I got the feeling Alvin was well into that - the trip having lasted over a half a millennia. The Xin weren't entirely what you'd call religious but they did have some strong held beliefs. One of which was a loathing of cremation. I understood that those who had died on the way out here had been spaced at great pain to their loved ones. It was apparently vital to them that they return to the soil of their home, which now, was Earth.
This was how I kept myself amused during the couple hours flying time. Alvin, unable to converse settled for looking out the window at mile after mile of steppe and occasionally shifting his claws. It's quite possible he was asleep, he had that almost perfect stillness of a praying matis accompanied by occasional rocking motions as it mimics a leaf. A metaphor that would have terrified me a year ago, and indeed did for a bit back then.
The pilot informed me that we were getting close at about the time I started to see the smoke on the horizon. A long, lazy pillar of it, drifting up black and thick. The footfall didn't seem anywhere near as soft as we'd been told.

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>>31622393
That pic is so awesome.

>>31623162
This image sparked a good question, what would dogs and other pets think of the Xin? What about the Xin think of pets? Would they have their own which they love as much as we love our pets?

>>31623189
I imagine most animals would react to them with "HOLY FUCK WHAT IS THAT" but if a dog was raised near one or generally got used to them, they'd be ok with it.

If we're assuming the Xin didn't have much time to pack, they may not have brought many pets/frozen fertilized ovae with them.

OP would quite like to know as the Xin in the write faggotry is about to meet some folks and animals that haven't seen one

>>31623139
fun fact, just this past week a planet was discovered about 490 lightyears away that is earth sized and within it's stars habitable zone.

>>31623189
I think they would, they seem to love companionship. I think earth animals would react about the same way to them as they'd react to anything that big. Dogs would probably only take a generation at most to be as content with a Xin master as with a human one. I imagine that Labradors and other water dogs would particularly like having a Xin as a master.

>>31623189
>>31623241
>>31623252
I'm not sure what shape the Xin's pets would have. Since their main method of interaction is their they face, I don't know how an animal would develop and become more "cute" for the Xin. Maybe have it be an animal that used to have a symbiotic relationship with the Xin? Something that used to clean the Xin that evolved along with them from aquatic to terrestrial animals. Xin now don't need them due to having science and all that, but just like dogs they now provide companionship for the Xin.

>>31623722
I'd like it to be some sort of cephalopod.

>>31623722
Oh, a fishlike animal that now took the shape of a slug like animal? So a scale covered slug/leech that to us looks like a glow stick.

>>31623887
If we're going with the Xin using iridescence outside of our light spectrum. Perhaps they have a pet that looks disgusting to us but to them is like a disco ball you can pet.

>>31623162
It's a dog dressed as a lobster. In a thread about giant lobster Bros.

*gets it about two hours too late*

>>31624026
If we dislike how it looks then maybe they dislike some of our pets as well?

>>31624513
they just can't understand why we like cats.

>>31624549
Of course they do. They're delicious.

>>31624563
that's kind of cliche though. having the alien, extra as well as terrestrial, eating some pet. I was thinking that they'd more have no idea why we keep these things that are clearly parasitic, and hold us only in contempt, as pets and be obsessed by how funny'cute they are. remember if something that looked like lobsters treated us the same way they'd be considered pests.

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>>31587150
Did someone say lobsters?

>>31622961
"What? You guys can't leave? Oh. Uh... One sec. Here's a space ship. Use it. I never want to have to work that hard again, so if you fucking make us exterminate you, I promise it will be unpleasant. And leave the beef jerky."

>>31624513
Ha! I really like that idea. Maybe birds just squick them out?

>>31627641
How about cats for reasons already proposed?>>31624840

>>31628278
Yeah, but cats don't seem to draw the idea of EEWWWWW and why be grossed out by a cat, but not a dog?

>>31629661
People like cats because they're cute. This is a nonissue with the Xin who wouldn't consider them cute and would thusly be able to accurately see them as sociopathic little sacks of fur and overinflated ego who are barely tolerating their human servants until we invent a paw-operated can opener while spreading brain parasites in their dung.

Dogs on the other hand are genuinely nice.

/tg/ thank you so much for your awesome response. OP will be writing a lot more writefaggotry for this and will one day return with it and news of how the players got on

>>31631429
If /tg/ desires a quest thread in a couple weeks (post finals) speak now or forever hold your peace

>>31631446
I think it would be fun.

First thing I'll say, OP, is that you can drag out the "first contact" part of the story for a long time. They don't have to get down to "crabs+humans against the enemy" right away. Things don't have to become clear quickly at all.

You can set up further drama by dragging out the crab/human fighting for a while. Especially if you drag the language barrier out a while.

Remember that translation is a hard job even between some human langs right now. But imagine if we didn't even have dictionaries to start with? Imagine if we had to do that part of the job first before we could even get down to deciphering idiom and phraseology and all that shit.

Imagine also if there was another more basic problem: The noises the crabs are making. How are we supposed to use that? The noises we're making. That's not something the crabs are used to? Then there would be challenges all along the job of figuring each other out.

And then look further at the stories we (still) tell about other human races/religions/cultures/nations that keep sparking problems over and over again. Those kinds of divisive (not necessarily true) stories will go around probably forever. So even once we "understand" one another and "get along" we'll still start shit with each other from time to time.

You can drag that whole process out quite a while before getting down to fighting the other things.

>>31631661
In part that's why the writefaggotry was set a year post first contact and mostly likely where I'll keep the writefaggotry. The adventure however will (as anon correctly says) be in first contact

>>31631815
OP, I was the fag that came up with that concept for the language. If you'd like, I can flesh it out and try implementing syntax and grammar?

>>31634285
Mongolian-nasal-whistling-farting-dolphin-fag? Yes! Please do! That stuff was awesome

>>31636167
how do you want me to get it to you?

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Dont know if OP is here but you might like this.

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>you will never have a giant crab spider buddy to drink beer with
>you will never get to laugh together with him/her/it over communication errors and strange, alien customs

Excellent writefaggotry in this thread btw, I absolutely loved every story.

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>The first Xin to join a motorbike gang.

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>>31581725

>>31642246
>This has to be a NPC in your game OP.

There is 0 reason for something like this to evolve into intelligence.

>>31642330
just like YOUR MOM huh

#rekt #sickburn

>>31642330
>stophavingfun.jpg

>>31642330
And yet Americans exist

#checkmateathiests #benghazi #thanksobama

>>31587771
It's either a case of murder or manslaughter.

>>31643084
Not that, is it a crime if the Xin didn't want to kill someone but was forced to via exploiting their biology?

>>31643299
not in xin society , it is well established that the person in question has no real control of reactions.

>>31643299
>>31643548
Involuntary manslaughter. If the Xin is definitively non-sentient, it will likely be put down as both Xin and humans will classify it at a dangerous animal. If it can be cured, it will be judged based on how he ended up non-sentient.

>>31641330
Thank you, I am considering turning the Xin into more than just an adventure. More writefaggotry may be appearing soon.

>>31638538
Please see email here

>>31645615
affirmative

>>31643548
Will that be enough to satisfy a human court?

>>31639459
I would shit my pants if I saw something like that walking down the street. That thing is fucking horrifying.

>>31639459

Garthim?