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Quote from: Tynan on January 06, 2014, 05:14:18 PMQuote from: Ender on January 06, 2014, 04:24:52 PM
well i certainly think whomever wrote this is quite the author and should be applauded, though i highly doubt this should give any real expectations of the actual game. And once again, to the author good damn job very well written!
I wrote it, of course, and thank you very much!
I do hope to have other xenohuman characters in the game, with appropriate stats, but it won't be till mid-year at the earliest.
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The adaptive and engineering processes that have branched baseline humanity into these uncounted variations have also applied to our flora and fauna. Where we colonize, we bring our ecosystems of plants and animals with us. These creatures subsequently adapt to their new conditions of moisture, chemistry, light levels, gravity, temperature, and seasonal cycles. In addition, plants and animals have been bred and engineered for countless purposes across the galaxy.
One consistent class of modification we’ve seen applied to a wide variety of creatures is intelligence enhancement. Dogs, pigs, monkeys, gorillas, whales, dolphins, and elephants have all been engineered and combined with human DNA to produce smarter variations. Some variants are created as pets. Other are made to do work too dangerous or unpleasant for humans, and beyond the capacities of a culture’s AI. Some are created as warriors and weapons - hyper-intelligent guard dog, a bird scout that can speak what is sees, a bomb-carrying suicide monkey. These brain modifications are often paired with physical changes - fingers so a pig can manipulate tools, or a humanlike larynx and mouth so a dog can talk.
Such intelligence-enhanced animals are collectively classified by their degree of brain power and called by a specific prefix like so:
Opti - Indicates enhanced but still sub-human intelligence. Optianimals can usually use tools, form long-term goals and organize into primitive social groups, but can’t speak more than a few words, read, or think abstractly. Optidog, optipig, optiwhale, optimonkey.
Trans - Indicates intelligence in the human range. Transanimals can read, use tools, form teams, hold conversations, and think about complex ideas. Transdog, transbear, transgoat, transsimian.
Many times, these modified animals have, during a regressive catastrophe, been forced into interbreeding with an unmodified animal population, producing descendants of widely varying levels of intelligence.
In a few cases, transanimals have become the dominant species on a planet, eliminating or enslaving the remaining humans.
Other than intelligence enhancement, humanity has applied a wide variety of modifications to its pets, crops, livestock, and houseplants. Sometimes these new species become part of the natural environment and thereafter evolve further into a new kind of organism. Some confirmed examples are:
Boomrat: A bioengineered rat that develops an incendiary chemical compound in its body which explodes upon its death. Originally engineered as a weapon, these creatures are now common in the wild on some planets where wars took place long ago.
Boomfruit: Probably engineered as a novelty, this explosive plant evolved to be larger and more dangerous until it became the equivalent of a hand grenade, complete with murderous shrapnel. Its explosiveness dissuades predators. After that, people learned to farm the plant, using its explosive fruit as a weapon.
Whip cactus - Created as part of a military defense system, whip cactus whips out and strikes moving creatures nearby.
Terraforming plants: Many plants - especially desert varieties - have been modified into terraforming versions that emit far more oxygen than the original species during photosynthesis.
Rocketrees - These trees form rocket fuel in their cores over many years. They were created as a fuel source and are extremely dangerous in a fire.