The Aliens

[Jeremy Buloch]

I agree to the fullest extent. The Alien would not want to trade. Thats just a waste of time. Now of course they might be interested in art and literature but not goods.

Maybe there could be a 3rd species? A species and like the humans they are refugees from another planet. Saved by the Tal'Shians. They see a planet habitited by Humans another species and they make contact. That could be a way of making trade and/or having alien units. For example some of the aliens could be nice but some not so nice so they send units down to kill but the nice ones trade. Get it?
-J.B.-

[Mark123jansen]

But arent they involved in a great big war? so they could use every bit of raw resources or maybe every human soldier they can get?
Maybe they have been ravaged by this war and their mining operations are shattered, so they need the humans to do their dirtywork

[DeathByTheSword]

I like LElands idea of the goody hut.......the aliens drop some of them on the surface of the planet

[Leland]

For Tal'Shians to ask humans for help would be like US asking for a small South-American tribe to help them beat Hitler by reasoning "we need every bow and arrow and pointy stick we can get". Humans are like ants compared to these folks (or, at least they should be... anything less and it's just pathetic) and what they consider "war" is quite likely to be beyond our comprehension.

Anything we can do, they can do better, even the "dirty work". Why send a child to do a man's job?

[Gateway103]

To be sure, the Tal'Shians and the Alliance did not like interferring with the natural development of any species. They had to intervene, however, because of the Drazan threat. Bearing that, they will not give humans too much advance technology save those needed to ensure the human's suvival and future prosperity on those unfamiliar planets.

Regarding the Alliance-Drazan-"War". This is a strange war, to be sure. [Spoiler info not included below ] As eluded above, the Alliance knew little of the Drazans either. They have never seen a live Drazan, or a dead one for that matter (all Drazans' vessels, as far as those the Alliance have ever fought with, were unmanned). And the Alliance have little ideas as to where the Drazan's actual bases of operations are located.

Bearing that, the Alliance do know that the Drazans are highly advanced, for if engaging in space battles, ship class to ship class, the Alliance will lose almost every time. Only through sheer number and outclassing enemy ship-size do the Alliance stands a chance. Fortunately, for some reasons, no Drazan ships bigger than a Light Cruiser have ever showed up, and they tend to be solitary or accompanied by only a small handful of other vessels.

Just a little bit of (not most intriguing) info on Drazans ^_^

-Gateway103

[Jeremy Buloch]

I like it! Very Nice Gateway!
-J.B.-

[Gateway103]

I have a few things to add about the "third species," or more specifically, aliens that are at most as advance as (or just a bit more advance, not too much) the humans that may live independently or share system/planet with the humans (probably due to the Alliance's moving effort).

It may be possible to incorporate these "third species" in ones faction/empire. Depending on your faction policies and ideologies, these "third species" may be treated as equals, or less so. And having these "third species" as members of your faction/empire may have interesting benefit/detriment and surprises (good and nasty).

Note conversely, it may also be possible to have humans as citizens (or less) in an alien faction/empire (you better think twice before you nuke that settlement to oblivion, especially if half of the population may be humans ).

Just a thought.

-Gateway103

[Jeremy Buloch]

I like all of it, as I always do.
-J.B.-

[targon]

Originally posted by Leland
For Tal'Shians to ask humans for help would be like US asking for a small South-American tribe to help them beat Hitler by reasoning "we need every bow and arrow and pointy stick we can get". Humans are like ants compared to these folks (or, at least they should be... anything less and it's just pathetic) and what they consider "war" is quite likely to be beyond our comprehension.

Anything we can do, they can do better, even the "dirty work". Why send a child to do a man's job?

Ups! You still think it was US who defeated Hitler... Propaganda does wonders, isn't it?
You see, human warriors (after training form early youth and possible even cyborgization/genengeneering) may adopt many of alien warfare. You see, humans fight at least last 50,000 years and we're well suited for that activity. So aliens may employ humans as guerilla soldiers, shock troops, guard, police and whatever they like due to very big bang/buck ratio. Of course, ancient, long-living civilization will appreciate their costly soldiers much more than one-time human meat. For reference, look at M.A.X., indeed good TBS strategy (greatly spoiled by terrific sequel M.A.X. 2)

[Leland]

I didn't say US defeated Hitler, didn't I? The point was that Hitler was not defeated with pointy sticks imported from South American jungles, even though the allied stick-sharpening technology was very advanced.

Same applies with aliens using humans as cannon fodder; they have robotics, genetic engineering and whatnot that fully supercedes anything humans may have developed during the last couple of dozen millenia. Besides, space is not very friendly for us fleshy creatures to wage war in.

(Besides, from gameplay point of view Aliens using humans as soldiers would detract from the empire-building aspect of the game, which I think wouldn't be very nice. Who wants to be play a foot soldier instead of an emperor?)

[Leland]

BTW care to summarize how this M.A.X game you mentioned deals with the situation? A quick google search was unfruitful...

[targon]

I needn't any Googles: I played this game thru several times and can find things by touch
The story of the game is the following:
The Galaxy is filled with sentient life; dozens of ancient, highly advanced civilizations. This civilizations are always resource-hungry, so they do need new worlds. Due to numerous terrific accidents, it was said that nobody can employ spaceborn weapons, nukes and other WMD in planetary conflicts. So everyone was ordered to use ordinary warfare to conquer that disperately needed worlds.
But that long-lived, highly developed civilizations were unwilling to lose their sacred lives in all-out low-tech battles, so they need someone to send instead.
And, as usual, it was human butt that was kicked. Aliens find Earth via its radio transmissions; at this time, humans were plagued by numerous environmental and social cataclysmes, so they were readily agreed to defend alien cause... not all, but enough.
So alient joint-stock venture created enormous base ships, moving at STL speeds, as human body is unable to withstand FTL jumps other than in hybernation. This ships become training and breeding grounds for human factions and almost endless shock troops supply for their respective alien sponsors.
The game begins then several human clans (more strictly speaking, several M.A.X. commanders, cyborgs specialy crafted to withstand FTL jumps and command battles from the orbit) begin a mutiny agains alien sponsors in order to attain "civilization" status for humans. Man, it was hard.

[Jeremy Buloch]

Thanks Targon!
-J.B.-