User:The Collective Mind/Concepts

The Black Temple

 * Tenet Special Forces?
 * Shivans but green?
 * Eldanii
 * Eldanii

Eternal Stewardship of the Eldanii [Eldanii eus Alanes Lamnenos]

 * Like the Culture, if the Culture was evil
 * Andromedan high-tech hyperpower that oversaw basically the entire galaxy
 * Vaguely Byzantine theme

The Republican Hive

 * Colonial polymorphic silicate-based organisms
 * Biologically immortal, capable of altering their bodies wholly over long time spans
 * Hotworlders! Cannot exist outside inhospitably hot environments!
 * Diet of stellar radiation, radioactive materials
 * Easy to kill, hard to keep dead: living cells can rejeuvenate dead ones, organelle transfer
 * They are their own technology! Controlled shapeshifting across many generations gives them an exceptionally broad selection of body types and functions
 * Can transfer information directly between units via specialized "receptor" organs: skin contact; linked together, essentially become a superorganism
 * Reclusive
 * Juxtaposition of incredibly alien aliens and eerily human government
 * Warfare: just drop a few kaiju on enemy planets. Extreme measures taken to allow giant monsters survive the inhospitably cold, extreme low-pressure environments most other sentient races thrive in make them functionally invincible to conventional (non-starship-grade) weapons, and natural regenerative ability means they're very hard to kill anyways

Convergence

 * Race and civilization indistinguishable from each other; one is the other and vice versa
 * Artificial intelligence? Synthetic minds that construct and inhabit biomechanical/synthetic bodies
 * One mind per body, but many, many body types, each general type known as an [x]frame, i.e. scoutframe, workframe, siegeframe, spaceframe
 * Strict hierarchy
 * Civilization united beneath a post-sentient intelligence known as the Firstmind, or Godmind
 * Administrated by Secondminds, regular sentients, full independence
 * Thirdminds, sentient but restricted in action
 * Fourthminds, sentient but very little independence, must obey higher minds
 * Fifthminds, just really advanced computers, piloting industrial machinery and doing menial tasks like data retrieval and the like; can be spawned and destroyed at will by other minds
 * Race housed inside multiple matrioshka brains, assisted by wormhole computation, split off from whole whenever something physical needs doing?
 * Constructions made of "smart metal", reshapes at will into anything Convergence needs; spacecraft just big blobs of the stuff
 * Artificial civilization; creators extinct? Self-creating (somehow)? Postsingularity intelligence that grew out of control and ate its creators?
 * Keeping an eye on the Bidonites for science!

The Edacity

 * Various superweapons left over from their annihilation of the Elduri: sun crusher, life-eater vessel, borderworld everter (only possible with Ashunan assistance), desolator
 * Various horrifying monsters made from Azzakul/Nurgathul collaboration (Ashurgul?)
 * Various horrifying Azaz variants, capable of mounting superweapons, crewed by Ashurgul
 * Elduri destruction circa 24 million years ago?
 * Summoning lesser spirits? Ashunan slivers? Greater focus on Enochian magic style? Oh god, you might need to rework the entire borderworld concept
 * You're already thinking about how the Ashunan are organized anyways, so oh well
 * Azzakir -- cleanly delineated thought-worlds, but traveling from lower orders to higher orders is difficult; "thoughts began to burn"
 * Nurgathir -- like traveling deeper and deeper into all-encompassing darkness; no idea where you're going unless you have a map
 * "Resembles Essence the same way prehistoric campfires resemble fusion reactors"
 * "paracausal" -- means their technology has no basis in conventional physics
 * Azzakul
 * Enochian/Ceremonial magic
 * Mindkiller weaponry, other psychic weapons
 * Constructs of metal and stone, "artificial intelligence" imposed via thoughtbinding (thinking matter! ha ha ha ha)
 * Necromancy! Animating recently-dead bodies by forcing new thoughts into their brains
 * Nurgathul
 * Chaos magic, sigil magic
 * Meat
 * Some kind of Third Impact weapon? Melt people into undifferentiated meat moss?
 * Aggaruk / Ghuruk Aggaki: Ghuruk capable of self-replication. Turn living organisms into new Aggaruk. Chanter supervision required
 * Ghuruk Shogoth: amorphous construction/mining tools



Kamen Rider

 * Vaguely grub-like race, artificial creations (no sign of creators), hatch out of crystalline "cocoons"
 * Large innate magic potential, cannot be accessed without their signature armor
 * Otherwise physically unimpressive
 * Peaceful, spiritual; Buddhist influences, Taoism? Isolationist, self-sufficiency
 * Population is constant; grubs are asexual in all senses of the word; new grubs spawn out of the cocoons when old grubs die
 * More grubs inside cocoons than grubs outside cocoons; population could theoretically be an order of magnitude greater but nobody knows or wants to know how to open the others
 * Imago gives grubs immense capacity to harm; therefore the right thing to do is to use them for everything except hurting others
 * Created to be an unstoppable, superhuman army; project unfinished, abandoned for unknown reasons

Imago

 * Magical equivalent of powered armor; at most basic level enhances strength, speed, perception (possibly)
 * Capable of focusing the grubs' innate magical potential into various parts of their bodies
 * Imago:
 * effectively grant superpowers (super speed, elemental control, regeneration)
 * very few exist (half a dozen?) in the hands of the race's leaders
 * each Imago has its own unique powerset
 * Instar: grub copies of the Imagines, inferior
 * Different "levels" of ability for both Imagines and Instars; requires meditation and training to unlock full potential; Imago masters take apprentices to teach them
 * More power, integrated weapons!
 * However: higher levels reduce empathy, increase desire for violence; hence the careful meditation
 * Armor or physical transformation?
 * Bug theme: Imagines represent all arthropods, Instars are just insects?
 * "Insect" Imago dismantled to figure out how to create Instars?
 * Alt: Showa riders
 * Multiple/power-up forms? Kuuga-style?
 * Mostly used for practical/spiritual purposes rather than combat

Tagma Driver

 * Tagmata Driver? Tagmosis Driver?
 * Magical artifact used to summon Imago armor
 * Only a handful of "true" Drivers exist, created along with the grubs; the rest are inferior grub copies, attempting to reproduce the original magic/technology
 * Crystal power? Animal spirits?
 * Drivers can be used by other races, but not to same capacity as grubs unless similar magic potential
 * Always shaped like belts? Maybe bracers, or other armor?
 * Comes with some kind of horse bug, free of charge

The Adaefican Polities

 * A functioning, stable, peaceful society--
 * built on industrial-scale necromancy
 * Desensitized to death and corpses; they're literally everywhere, you might as well get worked up about dogs or the mailman
 * Soldiers are fearless in battle; living ones know that death is not the end, dead ones know they can be put back together if necessary
 * Distinction between "body" and "soul": of the two, the soul is the only part that matters
 * Resurrecting a dead body separate from returning its spirit

What's the Deal with Death?

 * Everyone gets resurrected after their first death! Degree of resurrection varies, however
 * See Ancestor Veneration
 * If family cannot afford to return the deceased to their body, the empty husk is embalmed and animated on its own and put to work
 * Undead categories:
 * Living dead: corpse inhabited by original soul
 * Empty dead: lifeless (ha ha) husk, used for labor
 * Returned soul: bodiless soul, can be bound to inhabit a certain object
 * Living soul? Soul piloting artificial body?
 * The living dead can die many times over; necromancy can bring them back as needed
 * Living dead have no bodily needs, of course
 * The dead may petition to die a True Death, letting their soul pass on at last


 * Death has advantages, but disadvantages too; & once you cross that line you can't go back
 * Pros: don't feel pain like you used to, don't have any bodily needs, stronger, infinite endurance
 * Cons: can't feel sensation like you used to, feels stiffer, slower, like you're wearing a body-shaped suit


 * Some people opt for early death because it nullifies many painful chronic and/or terminal conditions

Death Rights

 * The dead are forbidden a role in politics, to avoid a Millenial King scenario
 * Immortal leadership leads to cultural stagnation!
 * They can, however, be political advisors
 * Dead people don't have to work, but some do anyways to alleviate boredom
 * Dead-only social spaces? Open 24 hours a day, because the dead don't sleep
 * Death voids most legal obligations; however, committing suicide with the intent to avoid legal obligation is a felony

Ancestor Veneration

 * Families must pay a fee to the Temple of Rebirth to see their loved ones returned; cost is different based on degree of incarnation: soul jars are cheapest, full-body reanimation is most expensive
 * Day of the Dead equivalent once a year; lets even the poorest citizens see their loved ones again
 * Ancestors serve as advisors

Enemy Dossier
BIDONITE ESOTERICA

IDENTIFIED THREATS TO THE UNITED BIDONITE EMPIRE

What follows is a partial list of alien species that pose a threat to Imperial reconstruction.

BALZER
Codename STEEL PLOW.

Balzers are a cyclopean, sturdy race that evolved in high-gravity conditions. The Bidonite Empire destroyed their civilization two centuries after their then-ongoing interspecies war had the ill grace to spill into Bidonite territory. Since then, the species has existed in a state of constant, violent anarchy; petty warlords fighting each other for leadership of the survivors, armed with scavenged technology, with the ultimate hope of retaliating against the Empire.

Balzer pirates remain a perennial threat to the Empire's southwestern borders, raiding colonies and supply lines for much-needed resources. On the whole, however, they are too busy fighting themselves to be a serious danger to the Bidonite Empire.

NECROX
"Their civilization cannot have developed naturally. There should be countercultures, internal variations. In point of fact there should be more than just one culture in the first place. No outside forces act on them, like they do with the Assembly. Like the Collapse did with us. And yet, this species-wide devotion to a single philosophy... Mark my words, something is very wrong with the Necrox."

- Dr. Bironak Aaban Mesimar

THE GALACTIC COMMONWEALTH OF PROGRESS AND ENLIGHTENMENT, codename GREEN ARM. A technologically advanced meritocracy dedicated to the philosophy of "Progress", or the ideal of accelerated societal and scientific advancement unbound by any code of ethics or conduct. Governed and populated by the Necrox, a species of great biological curiosity.

The Commonwealth is not a united force. It is divided into several dozen "societies", all in direct competition with each other -- it is believed that this accelerates Progress. Still, every one of those societies serves a central government that oversees and regulates all aspects of Commonwealth infrastructure, communication, standardization, squabbles between societies, etc.

The societies that have most frequently come into conflict with the Empire are the Steel Claws, the Life Gardeners, and the Technocrati. As luck would have it, these three societies are among the largest and most powerful within the Commonwealth.

NARI
The NARI KNIGHTS

Initially mistaken by Imperial surveyors for a pre-gunpowder/iron age civilization native to the planet Ehlna, the vaguely batlike Nari only received comprehensive attention from the Empire upon the discovery of immense anti-spacecraft artillery emplacements hidden in the Ehlna Spine mountain range a handful of kilometers from their monastery-fortress.

Closer examination of Nari technology revealed that their ubiquitous plate mail was in fact incredibly advanced powered armor, and their anachronistic swords were sheathed in crackling power fields capable of shearing through solid titanium with little effort. Imperial Intelligence theorizes that Nari personal defense technology has far outstripped Nari firearms technology, forcing them to regress to close combat as their primary means of warfare. Scavenged Nari armor plating has been shown to withstand coilgun rounds, particle beams, and high explosives with minimal damage, and could only be breached reliably using tank guns and dedicated anti-tank weaponry.

The Empire knows very little about the greater Nari civilization. All four known Nari colonies are extremely distant from each other, and consist solely of a single well-defended monastery-fortress and surrounding villages, with no other holdings. Each monastery is either placed on land holy to the Nari and/or protects a relic that the Nari consider holy. No large Nari population centers are known to exist, nor other Nari nations besides the monastery-builders. Nari spacecraft, civilian or otherwise, appear to be very few in number.

Characteristic Nari isolation and insularity prevents meaningful Bidonite diplomacy. As per Imperial regulations regarding neutral alien-held planets, settlement on Nari worlds is strictly forbidden. For the time being, the Empire is content to leave the Nari alone.

ICEWORLDER
"They're a very honest people in their own way. Very open and upfront about how much they want to murder you. I can respect that."

- Colonel Vahar Myral Dun

THE ICEWORLDER ALLIANCE, codename IRRITABLE REACH.

The Iceworlder Alliance is a military alliance of seven Iceworlder nations. Belligerent, heavily militarized, and intensely xenophobic, the Iceworlders respect no political boundaries and operate according to their own ruthless directives.

Iceworlders are a hulking ammonia-based species that thrives in subzero environments, and must rely on armored environmental suits to survive outside those conditions. They bear a vague resemblance to crustaceans. The Empire is long familiar with the Iceworlder Alliance, having been in conflict with the race since pre-Collapse days. While the Alliance gave Bidonite space a wide berth both during and after the chaos of the Collapse (not wanting to invite destruction upon themselves), rapid Bidonite expansion has caused them to resume hostilities with a vengeance. However, their own expansion over the past three centuries has brought them into direct conflict with the Necrox, and the ensuing war has done much to reduce the amount of pressure either nation can bring to bear on the Bidonites.

MARAKK
Codename BELLIGERENT RED. Originally a rank-expunged dabidon born on Furosh, a planet conquered by the Empire. The self-styled "General" Marakk, seeking to overturn Imperial rule, gathered an army of malcontents, terrorists, and rebels, and began a bloody uprising on Furosh that cost millions of Bidonite lives and billions of sporebucks of infrastructure damage. While the rebellion was crushed following deployment of the Royal Guard, Marakk himself managed to escape despite grievous injury. Necrox involvement was suspected but unconfirmed.

Years later, Marakk returned at the head of a mercenary army, known simply as Marakk's Army. The General and his Army, operating from a ramshackle yet formidable fleet of spacecraft, struck repeatedly at Imperial supply lines and delayed shipments of food and materiel to the front lines of the Bidonite-Necrox conflict. Among other effects, his actions are believed to have led directly to defeats in the Corbus and Datarat systems. The 114th Combined Fleet was mobilized in response to Marakk's attacks.

While the 114th dealt the mercenary general a crippling blow with the destruction of his asteroid bases in the Parigon system, Marakk once more evaded the killing stroke, with the Necrox Commonwealth openly and violently revealing their involvement by engaging the Combined Fleet long enough for him to escape with what remained of his army. Since then, General Marakk has been reported working openly with Commonwealth Claims Control against Imperial forces, though he and his army appear to have taken independent mercenary contracts on occasion.

ASSEMBLY
"The Assembly is the most thoroughly joyless society I have ever had the dubious pleasure of studying."

- Oraxes Merl, Necrox Commonwealth (Biotic Catalogue)

Codename IRON AXIS.

Assembly was discovered approximately a century into the Second Founding, a civilization that made its home in the debris disks of star systems rather than planetary bodies. Discovering that Assembly territory intersected Bidonite territory and planned Bidonite expansions at many points, and finding that Assembly had little interest in their planets, the Empire was quick to exchange languages and diplomats with them and eventually struck a mutually beneficial alliance.

Assembly is notable for three things.

First are its exceptionally large spacecraft. Being a spaceborne civilization, whatever part of its population that does not make its home in asteroid habitats is instead carried in gargantuan asymmetrical "ironclads", serving at once as colony ships, factories, and fortresses.

Second is its channel network, a portal system operating according to principles unknown to Bidonite science capable of transferring ships across space at speeds faster than any known hyperspace drive. Part of the terms of Assembly's alliance with the Empire is leasing the use of the channels to the Empire, allowing the Imperial Armada unprecedented mobility within joint Empire-Assembly space.

Third is its society. Assembly is single-minded to the extreme, being utterly devoted to industrialism and acquisition of resources. This unnatural monoculture is enforced by the cabal of artificial intelligences that rule Assembly, where people are built to serve machines rather than the other way around.

While the Empire has no plans to betray their alliance, the Bidonites are nonetheless wary of how so much Assembly territory intersects their own. The amount of space they share has only grown since the authentication of the alliance.

Notable Imperial Assets
DEAREST AND GLORIFIED SOLDIERS OF THE LEGIONS

What follows is a partial list of Imperial Legions assets that have, in some way, achieved renown in the Empire.

IIBARAZ
A world famous for being one of the eight "petty empires" in the post-Collapse era of the Empire, especially for having fought and successfully held back a Biomachine incursion until their disappearance from the galaxy. Famous for producing soldiers of particularly high quality and notably devoid of the unflappable cheerfulness endemic to most other regiments.

Instead, Iibaraz is notable for its lack of cheer. Its soldiers are grim and relentless, taking Bidonite tenacity to a whole new level. They gather overwhelming force, steamroll enemy positions with a massive mechanized push, rapidly fortify the captured area, and repeat. Very little can deter them -- positions held by Iibaraz soldiers must be killed to the last Bidonite before they are ever relinquished.

STRENGTH OF WING
A legendary Imperial battlecruiser with a long and celebrated history. Flagship of the entire Imperial Armada, currently captained by Admiral Sorel Obir Set.

The Strength of Wing was constructed shortly before the Collapse, having originally made a name for itself in the Second Iceworlder Wars, where it, operating alone, destroyed three Iceworlder ships of comparable tonnage while protecting an evacuee convoy.

After the Collapse, the Strength of Wing was one of those ships of the Armada that went dark to evade detection and destruction. With its entire crew in cryosleep and all but the most important systems shut down, it drifted in deep space for twenty-seven years.

Rediscovery came about after the Second Founding, when, through sheer luck, the Strength of Wing 's automated systems detected the the distress signal of an Imperial expeditionary fleet. Once revived, the Strength of Wing proceeded to fight and help win one of the first battles of the Balzer War, its sudden appearance earning it even greater fame.

The Strength of Wing became one of the figureheads of the resurrected United Bidonite Empire -- like the Empire itself, a symbol of the past returned to the present. With the Imperial Armada still budding and weak, the immense firepower the ancient battlecruiser could provide was greatly appreciated. It went on to fight several key battles against the Balzer pirates, eventually turning the tide of the war over the water world Oocalis by destroying two Balzer motherships, the loss of which greatly demoralized the enemy.

Since then, the Strength of Wing has remained one of the Empire's key assets as it grew in size in strength. Its heroic reputation only grew with every battle it fought -- and though it didn't always come out victorious, battle damage was always an excellent reason to refurbish the aging ship with all the most cutting edge technology the Imperial Armory can manufacture.

ROYAL GUARD
The Imperial Royal Guard is the personal army of the High Sovereigns, used to protect them and their rightful authority. While the Guard is largely considered ceremonial, it sees little action only because there has been little internal strife within the Empire lately. The role of the Royal Guard is to put down uprisings and rebellions -- internal threats -- whereas the Imperial Army fights external threats. Nevertheless, the Royal Guard tends to wield the latest weaponry and wear the most advanced armor, earning them the nickname "gold haulers" (a rough translation) from other elements of the Legions.

AMBASSADOR BETIK KYN MORAT
A polyglot aadamez ambassador who first made a name for herself by talking down the rebellious Sovereign Tovar Mamoz, her efforts in settling territory claim disputes between the Empire and the alien Mavra led to the discovery of her ability to learn other languages with astonishing speed. Since then, Ambassador Morat has become a mainstay of Imperial-Alien diplomacy. Her talent is a form of savant syndrome; she was born with a Bidonite neurodevelopmental disorder similar to autism in humans. At current count, she is fluent in 12 languages and conversant in 24 more.