[Note: The author admits that the supplement is not complete, but would like suggestions. If this sparks your interest, send him email.]
ALIEN: The InvasionBy Henrik Andren
Chapter One: IntroductionThe log of SS Callisto"Captain, we are entering stellar system 22Xb-QPZ22", the young ensign said to captain Jokkut. "Thank you ensign," he replied, mostly by standard reaction. He was seated besides his console, over viewing his crew. Twelve men on the bridge, but an uncountable number of engineers, gunners, scientists, entertainers, cryo field operators and even priests were under his command. But for the priests he couldn't know; 'the Cult' always seemed to have some kind of second thoughts by their actions. Well, he leaned back in his armchair and again fell back to his drowsy slumber. He never slept, his personal force instructors had since long taught him how to rest in hyperzone and therefore was always awake, even thought he could still sink back in deep thoughts momentarily. Soon their mission would be ended, and they could return to the fleetbase of Cygnius #5. "I sense you want something.", said the young Mrrshan by his side. How tired he was of the priest telling him his thought. But he blamed it on the fact that he was quite young and wasn't quite familiar with starship etiquette. "Yes, I want to come home, to see my family again.", he answered, "Don't you?" "No, my mission is my life.", the priest answered back. The captain sighed to himself and continued his train of thoughts, ignoring the probing mind of the young scholar. Suddenly the intercom sprang to life. "This is engineering section HD-0 02; we might have a slight problem here," a metallic voice came from the speaker. The captain sprang to attention and snapped the interlink. He could see how the priest strained his ears to hear the conversation. "Explain.", he said shortly, ignoring the spying youngster. "It seems like the hyperspace aggregates are unstable via the quadruploid interface and the hyper signature detector/calibrator, and..." The captain interrupted him. Meklars, he thought, always technical details. "And the point is?" he asked. "Something is entering the engines and loading them with some kind of unknown particles." was the reply, and the captain could hear how worried his engineer was. "Communications, send out emergency call 2B." he shouted to the Jugginto by the communication panel. The whole bridge turned to him. "The hyperspace aggregates are overloading; we may have to abandon ship," he explained. "Quick now, sensors, scan for non-hostile planets. Communications, send a distress call, magnitude 4. Navigation, set course for the planet. Security, calm the crewmen." He said the orders in a quick but not stressing pace, meaning it was an emergency, but everyone should keep calm. "Priest, call your mentor and say that I request his help." he said as he turned to the priest beside him. "You can't request anything from a master of the Cult." he said outraged. Before he stopped, the doors to the bridge opened, and in stepped Cha'dracul'na, the high master of the Cult present on the ship. "He did right by requesting my assistance. Some of us have already foreseen this event, and I am most willing to help." He hissed to the young Mrrshan, "Step aside." He floated into the room, seated in a levitating chair and gently slid in position by the captain. He was a Cygnan as the captain, but they had had their differences for a long time. Suddenly the intercom bleeped again. The captain talked for a moment, then he said. "It seems that there is an emergency, I want everyone here to volunteer to sacrifice themselves." One of the scanner operators stepped up and walked away. "Excellent, we will be remembered." The young Mrrshan looked worried, but stayed seated. "You may go if you wish." the Grand master said. "Or do you think I am not capable of helping the captain on my own." "Of course not." he answered and quickly walked after the others. "Communications, call abandon ship. Man the escape pods. Engineering, do you read me." the captain continued. "Loud and clear captain." the Meklar, loyal to his post, answered. "How many of your crew stayed?" the captain asked. "197 out of 230." he said "But 44 more have signed on." "Excellent, try to hold of the explosion as long as you can." "We may be able to buy us 199,724552 cassions captain." "Do your best." the captain said. "I always do that." was the bitter remark, but the captain knew that. "Captain, our signal is blocked by hyperspace fields." the communicator said. "What! Send a radio message." the captain said, "And get me in touch with Lechroon." "At once, sir." "Give him the following message: You are now in charge of the colony on this planet, your orders are: Try to survive; make no contact with inhabitants, try to contact us." "Message sent." "Excellent. How is the evacuation going?" he asked his security officer. "Out of 180, 0 capsules launched." was the reply. "Too few." the captain muttered "Many will die today." He leaned back and watched the evacuation on the monitor. Then he leaned over to the grand master of force and asked. "Why did you stay, it is nothing you can do." The grand master smiled wryly. "I have kept everyone calm, and those bones of mine would not survive down there." was his hissing reply. "Well, let us settle our differences here and now then." the captain said. "We may have had our struggles, but we have also beaten the Hivemind lots of times." "We have our memories, youngster." the 30 0 years old man answered. And then the Cassiopeian spaceship 'Callisto' exploded in a ball of flame; only a few survivors ever managed to land on earth. This is a document from the automatic log that was sent out of the ship until the bitter end. One of the most well known media for the earthen Cassiopeians.
Chapter Two: SettingHyperspaceCygnan scientists made a gigantic leap forward in space exploration by the time they discovered hyperspace. It is a space parallel to ours, but with fewer dimensions. The biggest breakthrough was when the scientists learned that time didn't exist there. That meant that any ship travelling in hyperspace would go anywhere in no time at all in realspace. Soon hyperspace aggregates could be completely moved into hyperspace, and there travel to the desired point in no time at all, and there they will turn off the aggregates and appear in realspace. But hyperspace travel is not without its difficulties. Ships have disappeared when entering, never to appear again, or in a completely different location, sometimes as debris. Other strange things have also happened in hyperspace, which is far from completely mapped.Hyperspace communicationIt is also possible to communicate faster than light by moving particles into hyperspace, and let them move faster than light to the desired point. Therefore having instantaneously communication over huge distances in space. But such communicators are huge and power consuming, usually not even applied to smaller spaceship.The earth's hyperspace fieldThe earth's magnetic field bends hyperspace particles emitted from the sun around it, efficiently jamming all hyperspace communication. Hyperspace aggregates will also be attacked by the particles and so far they have all exploded, stopping all kind of hyperspace travel close to earth. It is earth's placing in the stellar system, it's configuration of it's magnetic field and the particles from the sun that makes this hyperspace cloak possible. None of the other races have ever considered that such a thing existed.The CassiopeiansThe Cygnan's breakthrough in space travel gave them a headstart in space colonisation. They already had some colonies when they came upon the other races. As the Cygnans were a peaceful race they soon allied with the Mrrshan, Meklar, Jugginto and Zanirion, to form the Cassiopeian community. They usually call themselves Kithrian, which means 'Community'.The CultAs science was more and more widespread, religions was pushed back. To prevent the loss their followers they had to do something. The answer was the Cult, a bureaucracy of religions working as one force. This only slowed down the downfall. As religion became less needed, the Cult soon controlled, directly or indirectly, all religious groups within it. Then the turning point came. The Cult still had great funds, and they soon started to study the Force in which they grew in strength and knowledge. By the time the Cygnans went out in space, the Cult had grown strong. It still had the power over all religion. It was the Cult that tried the most to make the Cassiopeian unity work, and much of the peace and prosperity of the agreement is the doing of the Cult.The SilencersThe AzingariThe HivemindThe Hivemind was another race who discovered hyperspace travel so there was only a matter of time before they would meet the Cassiopeians. The first meeting did not end in quite as peaceful way as the Cygnans would have wished. The Cassiopeian diplomats were nearly completely killed; only some of the high guard and some other diplomats could escape. Since then the Cassiopeian community has been at war with the Hivemind, as they call it.The Hivemind is a species consisting of sentient insects, named Seltorians. Their nickname comes from their ability to link their minds together, to form hyper intelligent communities. Each Seltorian is stupid. But higher ranked Seltorians can connect their _?_ and become more intelligent. This means that the more Seltorians there are, the more intelligent they will act. A Seltorian completely cut off from its comrades would only rummage around, or go into a berzerker frenzy, they have even been reported to die of loneliness. High commanders know what their soldiers think, and can therefore use group tactics efficiently. The link seems to weaken with length from source to linker, and with the age of the linker. Their community is also split up in different species, all tailor made for their work. Everyone is completely loyal to their superiors, and would work until they dropped if commanded to do so, which is not unusual. The greatest ones are the leaders; it is they who focus and link all the thoughts from their loyals. They have developed grotesque heads to literally hold their and others thoughts. To be able to interact with human society, they have also developed humanoid insectoids. They appear human, but usually act with little regard of other things than the Hivemind, but as their leaders are very intelligent, they know how to melt in with human society. The neighbour next door, who usually walks around in the garden with a wide hat on him, working for the community, could be a Hivemind spy. ForcesSomewhere in the development of hyperspace theory a Cygnan scientist learned that the mind also worked in hyperspace, and affected it somewhat like gravity did to realspace. With extensive research, sponsored by the Cult, the religious caste of the Cygnan, soon his team achieved great success. Then the Cult stepped in and took over the whole research. Nobody protested because other scientists considered the forces as research, only consuming powers. But the Cult was proven correct, and soon they could start training their scholars in the use of force. Many different schools and techniques have been developed.TechnologyOf course the Cassiopeians technology is widely above our. But much has been forgotten in the years that they have dwelled among us. The science labs that existed on the ships and in bases are not present on earth, tools and elements are not so easy to get hold of. This meant that one of the quests of the Cassiopeians is to build, maintain and find technology and labs.The DisappearanceBasesChapter Three: TraitsCygnan (Sig -nan)The Cygnan evolved on a water based planet. They have a humanoid body, fully capable of living under water. They are the most numerous in the Cassiopeian unity. They are a peaceful people, wishing to explore the galaxy and unite all. Their homeworld has not seen many wars, but the threat from the Hivemind has forced them to act forcefully. It was their few wars that gave them the opportunity to invent and construct hyperdrives.On earth the Cygnans have some underwater research stations where they are not yet in any danger of discovery. They had one in the Bermuda triangle, but as the shipping through the area increased they first tried to scare them away with defence systems, but as the humans got interested in the disappearances they had to move. The Cygnans are talkative and interested in humans, which they have kidnapped on occasions and examined, usually clearing their memories after and sending them back. The silencers don't like this but the Cygnans are allowed to continued as they need more information about us to be able to hide among us. The Cygnan "kidnappers" co-operates with The Silencers. Appearance: The Cygnans are not strongly built, as their homeworld has low gravity, but are instead very agile. They have thick grey skin, especially adapted to water and cold, because the ocean bottom always is around four degrees Celsius. A complicated array of decompression bladders allow them to rise and dive deep without sustaining decompression injuries or diving illness. They also have a number of gills on their chest, allowing them to breathe both water and air. The gills have also been mutated to not take up dangerous substances and give them an ability to constantly breathe in. Mutation: The Cygnan's gills and anatomy allow them to dive freely in water; they can even swim at great speeds, far beyond any humans. They also have good eyesight because of their large black eyes, and good hearing, giving them a -2 difficulty on perception rolls. This however is a drawback in loud or light areas, as they can get a difficulty of up to +4 on perception rolls. Camouflage: The Cygnans take use of their medical skills, and research on humans, to create living tissues. They resemble human skin and anatomy and the Cygnans dress in them. This gives them a adequate camouflage among humans. But they tend to dry up and die, having to be replaced. This process is also more rapid if the Cygnan can't give them their need in _?_. Wounds also tend to damage the masks, and therefore subtract one from humanness for every wound the Cygnan gets. But the masks heal as much as the Cygnan. Humanness: 6, subtract one for every month and one for every damage the character has. Technology: Medicine, 4 others. The Cygnans have had a long experience with medicine and the Cygnan doctors are well known throughout the galaxy. Force: Sense, 1 others. The Cygnans have for a long time known how to use their eyes with the force to increase their sight and other senses. Jugginto (Jog-into)The Jugginto is perhaps the strangest sentient race in the known universe. They originally lived on a hothouse planet, and crawled down in the caves and cracks under the crust. Down there their bodies used the ability to modulate themselves to fit in the different compartments. Under the earth they developed a great community by using tools to widen their rocks. But they still like the randomness of cliffs, which makes some of the Juggintos the best sculptors in known universe.Appearance: The Jugginto are plastic creatures, capable of changing their bodies in different shapes. This is used on their homeworld to flow in between rocks and out the other way, and the ability to manipulate things. Mutation: The Jugginto main ability is their skill copying the appearances of other things. They can for example take the shape and colour of a chest, cupboard or even human. This requires an Appearance + Performance roll, the number of successes deciding humanness, and difficulty varies by the difficulty of the object. For example a safe or other fixed furniture is around 4, a couch_?_ is around 2 and such a complex thing as an animal or human around 8. No moving parts, like the inertia in a clock or gun can't be copied. But of course the pendulums movements can be copied. This transformation takes around a quarter of an hour to metamorph fully, to do it faster means that the task becomes more difficult. Camouflage: The Jugginto camouflages themselves by copying humans. They have a special human which have been trained to look like, and this form they can always take in a matter of minutes. But as the special form is exhausting to hold this shape for long, therefore they lose one point of humanness every hour, if they do not spend one willpower point that hour. They may regain their shape after resting for half the time they were human. Humanness: 4, subtract one for every hour; this process can be halted for one hour by spending one willpower. They may regain the shape after half the time they were in the shape. Technology: Materials, 2 others. The Juggintos have always been close to the material around them and therefore are the best of the Cassiopeians in this area. Force: Body, 3 others. The Juggintos control of their bodies are well known, some of the best force users in body have studied under Jugginto teachers. The fifth form of body mean that the Jugginto also can take the form of gaseous substances, floating around in the air. Meklar (Meck-lahr)The Meklar early discovered the use of machinery and by the meeting with the Cygnans they have left their original living bodies and instead use mechanical android bodies, with their brain implanted in them. This is to be closer to the science that they love. Soon they agreed on the community and were the first ones to join the Cygnans in the Cassiopeian union. This was to acquire the advanced tech of the Cygnans and soon they mastered it.Appearance: The Meklar's bodies are different for each Meklar, as they usually engineer, construct and rebuild themselves. But usually they are quite humanoid, with two to eight arms, usually equipped with different tools and objects. When a Meklar dies his brain may be intact and if he is put into a new body he will survive. But the shock this gives him forces him to take their nature as demeanour and take another nature. This to reflect the psychic change inclined by death. Mutation: The Meklar's greatest advantage is their mechanical bodies which are usually fitted with huge amounts of cybernetics. This is why they get an extra three dots in the cybernetic background from start. The trouble is that they do not heal; instead they have to repair themselves, more of this later. Camouflage: The Meklar camouflage themselves by creating humanoid bodies, which with the right makeup look human. But their minds are more difficult to camouflage, because they are usually pretty cold and calculating. If they are damaged they also lose one humanness, which is not given back if they are repaired. They have to remodel their human-like body separately. Which is also described later. Humanness: 4, subtract one for every wound the character gets. Technology: Mechanics, 5 others. The Meklar have always mastered mechanics, and also know the Cygnan tech by heart. Force: None. But Meklars can learn force. Mrrshan (Meer-shun)The Mrrshans lived on the same planet as the Zanirion, which they avoided because of their special abilities. When the Cygnan came and talked about their mission of peace they had a hard time convincing the Mrrshan, and contact was tense in the beginning. The Mrrshans had already learned to avoid other sentient species. But soon the Cygnan succeeded in convincing the Mrrshan about their actions, and the Mrrshan planet was involved in the Cassiopeian union. The war against the Hivemind was already at bay, and the Mrrshans knowledge of battle was needed; soon the Cassiopeian union could count important victories to their favour.The Mrrshans are a people whose history is much more forceful than any other of the Cassiopeian union. Therefore they usually serve as guards or soldiers. But they are also renown for their technical knowledge. Appearance: The Mrrshans are predators, and one of the best on their planet. They have powerful jaws and long claws on feet and hands. They also are equipped with two small extra arms, usually folded up by the sides of their upper abdomen. Those are used to hold prey in close combat. Their skin is light green to dark brown in colour, and they have prominent boning around their head, neck, shoulders and chest which grows bigger with age. They do not have any ears on the sides of their heads, but instead have two tunnel looking slots on top of their head, which goes down on each side of their necks. This gives them very accurate hearing forward. Their sides are watched by their eyes, which are located on the sides of their heads, and are able to watch both forward and backwards. Mutation: The ability which is mostly connected to the Mrrshans is their extremely quick reflexes. They have reaction times which is greatly below human average, and therefore may subtract four form the difficulty of every initiative rolls, naturally this can't get the difficulty below two. Camouflage: The Mrrshans use special cloning apparatus and body reformations to make their bodies humanoid. Therefore they get no minuses when damaged, but they still look strange if they have a low humanness. But their bodies tend to take back their original shape; therefore they must treat themselves with hormones and other medicals to stay in shape. But the humanness still deteriorates. Subtract one humanness for every week without treatment, or one humanness for every month if the character is treated. They have to visit a genetics lab and take use of the special machinery in there. Rules for that can be read later. Humanness: 6, minus one for every week without treatment, or one for every month with. Technology: Genetical engineering, 3 others. The Mrrshans are well respected for their knowledge with modulation bodies, in which field they even are more capable than the technical geniuses the Meklar. Force: Body, 2 others. Some of the Mrrshans are masters in fight, and therefore they have learned to take full use of their bodies to achieve even greater speed and agility. Zanirion (Sanirion)The Zanirion lived on the same planet as the Mrrshan, but they did not interact well. The Mrrshans considered the Zanirion as parasites and tried to kill them, forcing the Zanirion to withdraw to other parts of the planet. The Mrrshans were not even aware that they were intelligent. It took a lot of work from the Cygnan to end this conflict, and though they still are not friendly with each other they have learned to accept each other in the battle against the Hivemind. The Zanirion is perhaps the most integrated in human society, because they have always known how to hide themselves among others. Therefore they control many high officials and so on, giving the Cassiopeian union the power they need to stay hidden.Appearance: The Zanirion mostly resemble trilobites. They have six sturdy legs with strong climbing claws. The small body is perhaps the size of a hand, half closed, and coloured in dark brown and red. The head is perhaps the most interesting bodypart, as they have the ability to drill into a victim, to take control of its movement and thoughts. This is a painless process due to the special design of the head, and it is hard to be aware of the Zanirion until it controls you. Mutation: The Zanirion have the ability to take control of people by fastening on the base of their necks. There they probe for the brain and take control of the victim. If a Zanirion controlled body is killed, the Zanirion may survive, if the Zanirion itself wasn't damaged. The Zanirions body has one in all physical attributes, but it can still withstand seven injuries, due to its shelled body. Camouflage: The Zanirion takes possession of other creatures, and interacts via them. When a Zanirion has successfully sneaked up on a victim, it makes contact with the brain, and overpowers it with the control force. Then the Zanirion fasten its body and lets it interact with its victim's. The Zanirion body starts with a humanness six lower that its original score, but this value then increases with one each week to the Zanirion's original. This reflects how the Zanirion learns more about its victim, and that his body is more covered by the victims flesh. Humanness: 8, minus six in the beginning, but increases with one each week it possesses it's victim. Technology: None, but they may learn. The Zenarions have never been very much interested in technology, and therefore their knowledge is sparse. Force: Control, 4 others. The Juggintos capability of control is infamous throughout the Cassiopeian union, but they are great manipulators of force in other fields as well.
WillpowerHumannessThe humanness is a value of how well the alien has adapted to the human world. This reflects both how human the alien's body looks, and how human it thinks and acts. Higher levels of humanness means that the alien can be passed on as a human much easier. You can for example not be surgically operated without puzzling the surgeon if you have a humanness below 8. For more information, see table below.
Chapter Four: TechnologyTechnology is a rating for how much alien technology a character has. Bigger amounts are stored in secret places, but as much as three points can be carried on a person. This is usually stored in or around a lab or secret hideout.Architecture (Engineering)Architecture was a highly respected technology in the space, but on earth it has little use. Still the architects are necessary for the Disappearance, and the creation of bases. But no now living Cassiopeians remember the glorious City of High Hopes on Cygnius.
l Construction: This is the basic skill of architecture. To build
ordinary facilities, such as skytowers, and underground secret bases, undetectable on radar or other deep scanning probes. With this skill you can construct the huge underwater or underground facilities that the Cassiopeians use to hide their secret labs in.
Computers (Computers)The Cassiopeians use a system which resembles ours remarkably much, but they have achieved higher transfer rates by using a quadrary system instead of a binary. Superconductivity has also cut down on the power requirements, and nanotechnology has meant that it was possible to create very small IC-circuits, with high efficiency and low power consumption.
l Supercomputers: The alien super mainframes are what they call
outdated. Those are the machines who human engineers have wet dreams about. They are superfast, have gigantic memories, and do not require much energy to work. But they are mostly based on similar technologies as the human computers, and can therefore be easily constructed by the materials available on earth.
Elements (Science)This is the knowledge of the basic elements of nature. The alien knowledge of those are far greater than ours; they have discovered that there exists superheavy elements that have greater stability than we have achieved. Elements without this stability can also be sustained in specific fields, that stop the deteriorating reactions in the atoms nuclei. This is also the science of anti-matter, elemental particles and hyperspace particles.
l Superconductors: The technology of superconductors that operate in room temperature was discovered a long time ago by the Cassiopeian scientists. They discovered that the crystal order was best built in super high gravity environments, and so they soon took gravity generators to use. Now the technology is widespread. Although superconductive cables are difficult to produce, much could be obtained from the gigantic factories spread though Cassiopeian space. On earth it is a completely other matter.
Energy (Science)Energy has always been a useful force to control. The military has a specific liking of the science, as it can easily beee used in weapons. The science of energy is not based on kinetic or potential energy, but rather electrical, radiation or chemical energies.
l Radiation: This is useful when controlling electromagnetic radiation. With this you can focus rays into beams, or use it to do other things. New methods are found out on a weekly basis, as electromagnetic radiation can be used to so many things. Fields (Science)The field science also developed much after the discovery of superheavy elements. The first steps forward was, as usual, made by the military. This was the development of particle shields used to block, or at least slow down incoming objects. The blocking takes huge amounts of energy, therefore the technique of relapsing energy was found out. This meant that the field, if not encountering anything it can effect, simply bends back and recharges the generator. This meant that energy was only needed when objects tried to break in. Now the Cassiopeians could use superstoragers to store energy for those crucial moments when it was needed instead of deploying the huge amounts of energy which only dissipated though the universe.
l Particle deflectors: The first real field technology developed was particle fields. When any mass tries to penetrate the field, it is attacked by a force of high energy photons, which forces it to go another way. Instead of hitting the object, it is repelled in another direction. |
Genetic engineering (Medicine)The usage of genetic engineering has always been a subject of debate, but the weakening of the Cult allowed Cygnan scientists to start researching. Soon the good effects overruled the bad, and genetic engineering was not again to be forbidden. Even though the Cult still keeps a wary eye on its users.The skills of genetic engineering among the Cassiopeian races is much greater than ours. One of the biggest breakthroughs is the development of fast growth cloning. In special cylinders with the right mixture of different substances, the growth can be accelerated. This environment at first tried to copy the environment in the womb, but soon the technology achieved even quicker results. This has also lead to the development of the regeneration tank, as bodies can be quickly healed, without scars, in such an environment, and with the same genes.
l Duplicate organs: The Cassiopeians can regrow any organ, except for neural ones, in special machines. But they at least need a part of that organ.
Machinery (Mechanics)The masters of machinery are the Meklar; their android bodies represent the cutting edge of mechanical devices. The Cassiopeians mechanics have not developed far from humans, but the use of new materials and nanoscience has helped it greatly. Some of the latest breakthroughs have also contributed much in the belief that machinery still isn't a dead science, but are closing into the realm of life.
l Robots: The Cassiopeian robots are not extremely highly developed in comparison with human, but they can take usage in their special materials and computers, to create robots that are highly advanced. A robot factory linked to an AI is a most useful tool, as the AI has full control of the complete factory, and can create anything it is ordered too. Of course there exist ghost stories of such self-producing factories gone wild. Another useful thing about robots is that they are not affected by the same things that kill Cassiopeians or other organisms, therefore they usually take such missions as cleaning up radioactive or dangerous places.
Materials (Engineering)Chemistry has lost its usage in alien science for now they know how to create most compounds with machines, and in perfect solutions. Therefore the knowledge of chemists was passed down to the technology of materials. Alien materials have a wide variety of uses. Almost all are tailor-made for their special purpose.
l Plastics: This is the knowledge of creating and inventing different polymers. Alien plastics are widely spread. Some are harder than steel; others are lighter than aluminium; others are flexible as rubber and some are conductive. In short, they have a wide variety of uses and specifications.
Medicine (Medicine)This is the skill of using operation methods and other medicinal approaches to heal, damage or change the body. Of course this mostly applies to knowledge about the Cassiopeian races, but research, mostly by Cygnans, have resulted in methods applying for humans as well.
l Surgery: Alien surgery is far more advanced than what we know now. They mostly apply microbots to probe the inside of the patient to remove or treat injuries. The most used tool with this skill is the automed.
Nanomachinery (Mechanics)Nanomachinery is a pretty old science; even humans have nearly aspired the first level of this technology. But the development in this field has been slow; this is mostly to blame on the hardship in surviving the effect of different solutions. The world is very small, and therefore difficult to explore. Most nanobots are built by nanomachinery, that is constructed by the help of nanomechanics, which is made by the scientists. This procedure also meant that the construction takes a lot of time.
l Nanomechanics: The first thing to be learnt is nanomechanics. This is necessary when understanding the nanomechanical world. This level represents theoretical knowledge about nanomechanics, and the ability to create simple things as moving parts or levers.
Sensors (Engineering)With the knowledge of elements and electronic radiation, the Cassiopeians could soon develop highly advanced scanners. Now there exists a myriad of different scanners, of both varying efficiency and size,. The biggest, placed on orbiting platforms around bigger planets, are able to scan for lifeforms on other planets in the nearest solar systems, or for incoming vehicles, even in hyperspace.
l Communications: The most basic usage of scanner technology is to
create realspace communicators. These are compact communicators with a very quick and interference-free communication. This knowledge represents both simple handheld communicators and around the word relay stations.
Chapter Five: ForcesThe forces are the alien's means to control their environment and themselves. Some forces can be used at range; their difficulty is listed in the following chart. Of course those difficulties are very variable, and merely an example.BodyThis represents the control that aliens have over their bodies. Allowing them to heal quickly, or give them extra strength. Those forces can only be used on oneself. However, Zanirion has managed to extend this to their host bodies also.
l Strengthen: This force allows you to manage incredible feats of
strength, as hurling a man through a concrete wall. System: You may add Body to your strength total whenever you wish.
ControlThis force is used to control other living beings. One of the major drawbacks is that you are unable to control beings if you are not touching them, at least if you haven't reached level four. Until then the victim has to be touched.
l Motoric control: With this ability you are able to force the victim to do one or more motoric actions, as pressing a button or hitting someone. Of course you have to touch the person, if you can reach his spine or head this is of course more easy. The victim knows what's happening and can resist. System: Roll Control + Investigation against a difficulty of the victims willpower. Each success gives you control over one action. The difficulty is increased by three if you do not have contact with the spine or head (i.e. with the nervous system). The victim may spend one willpower to resist one action. The controller does not need to touch the victim as the commands are done, but they have to be done simultaneously.
MindThis force is used to magnify your own mind. Mind was the first force to be discovered, and has developed much under time.
l Concentrate: This is used to focus your mind on one skill. System: Roll Mind + Performance against a difficulty of 7. Each success gives you that number of dots in any desired skill. This lasts for a scene. One of the drawbacks is that you can only concentrate on one skill at the time.
MindbattleMindbattle is one of the most aggressive mental usage of the force. With different tricks and ways of attack you try to disturb the nervous system, and on higher levels, try to knock it out.
l Disturbance: By inciting different understreams in the opponent's
mind, you try to disturb him, give him a headache or a muscular spasm. System: Roll Mindbattle + Streetwise against a difficulty of 7. For each success you may subtract one dice from the opponents dice pool. The effect lasts for one turn. Of course you can do other actions, but that requires that you split your dice pool.
SenseSense is useful when you try to see things. This represents the extremely accurate sensory organs that some aliens possess. This does not make you see better, but gives you the ability to see different things. But also remember that you are not blinded by all things you see, they are merely different colours. A source of strong electromagnetic radiation can blinded you though, and increase the difficulty seeing things in the same spectrum.
l IR/UV: This force allows you to see both in the ultraviolet and
infrared spectrum of sight giving you a limited heat vision, and allowing you to use ultraviolet lamps, rather than normal, which are undetectable by humans. System: Roll Sense + Alertness to spot things, rather than Perception + Alertness. The difficulty may vary, for example to spot a human in a dark room (the human's infrared radiation that is) has a difficulty of 7. To spot a vampire in the same room has a difficulty of 9, (Vampires do not radiate much heat).
TelekinesisThis is force affects matter, rather than mind. It is both the ability to move objects, and to change them.
l Switch: This force lets you move small movable object, like a
light-switch or a button. Even though this is not very powerful, it can prove very usable. This can also be usable to gear a car, or remove the parking brake. System: Roll Telekinesis + Computers against a difficulty of 4. This difficulty can change if the object manipulated is big, or is hard to move. Only one success is needed, but many can make it possible to switch quicker, if that is necessary.
Chapter Six: CyberneticsCybernetics is another way aliens can boost themselves. As production of such objects is difficult, and they tend to reduce the carrier's humanness they are not widely used by all aliens. The Meklar use them, to say the least, a lot.
Humanness reduction:For every second point of cybernetics implanted, you will lose one point of humanness. However, this may be reduced by using bionetics instead. A bionetic implant has the same characteristics as a normal cybernetic implant, but you can spend up to two of the implants dots to reduce the humanness reduction by one for each dot. However, this reduces the efficiency of the implant by as many dots. For example, a level five implant, which normally reduces humanness by 2.5, could be reduced to a level four implant, but only reduce humanity by 1.5, or could even be reduced to a level three implant, thus reducing humanity by 0.5.. The only way to create a humanness non-reducing implant is to spend four dots on it, using two dots to "heal" the humanness reduction. Of course any implant can't add on to humanity; any negative loss is treated as no loss at all. All decimals are rounded down. Humanness can also be risen with experience points or freebie points to ten, after implants have been added.
Implants:Armour plating: This is an extremely durable and thick skin. The higher levels are even fire proof, or acid secure. Each dot adds one to your soak total.
Built in tools: Each dot allows you to have one built in tool, or a high technology. But of course that technology has to be bought or constructed with technology points as well.. Drug injector: This device can inject drugs directly in you blood vessels and anyplace other they are needed. It also monitors you activities and can insert antidotes for many drugs and diseases. By this means it can increase your stamina with its own level. You may also have one type of drug for each level that you can inject at any time you wish. Extra strength: Each dot adds one to your effective strength. Impulse accelerator: Each dot gives you one extra initiative dice. Internal computer: This is an internal database that feeds you information. This means that you will get the database level in any knowledge skill. The maximum skill level the database can give you in any skill is the number of dots you have in this Implant. Each database can be bought from the beginning with one freebie point per dot. You can of course also program your own databases, but this requires an Intelligence + Computers roll against a difficulty of 5. The numbers of successes means that the database is programmed to that level. This level may not exceed the number of dots you have in the appropriate knowledge. If someone else feeds you with information, which means that the maximum level is his numbers of dots in the knowledge, the difficulty of the Intelligence + Computers roll is 7. Internal supply apparatus: This is a series of operations in which you replace, duplicate or toughen the internal organs. This means that you for every dot can ignore one wound penalty. You can also sustain this much extra damage above the original three under incapacitated. Secret compartments: The number of dots decide how big secret compartments you have.
Virtual Reality interface: Each dot gives you one extra dice when handling computers, or hacking into software. If anyone wants to do cyberspace rules, please send them to me.
Chapter Seven: High technologyThe aliens technical tools are another way to gain superiority over humans, and other creatures on earth. Even though they are not constructed in such an abundance as on Cygnius, there still exists a lot of them. The Cassiopeians have learned to recycle and reuse their own materials to produce their tools.Automed: Automed is short for Automated Medical Portable Bed. It is a foldable bed with a cover. It can contain an injured patient, which can be treated in various manners. You can hold a dead person alive for one hour for each success on a Intelligence + Medicine roll against a difficulty of 9. This may be enough to get the patient to a regeneration tank. You can also do surgery in the field with this, and heal a person's wounds that way. The automed is equipped with a multi-user interface, which gives you fingertip control over a lot of functions; this means that you can perform surgery which normally requires many persons alone.
Technology: 5 Gamma rifle: The gamma rifle is the latest in military design. It uses advanced sensors and computers to calculate an interference course of a lot of gamma rays of different frequencies. This means that the gamma rays pass through armour, to the interference point, where it blasts a small area with a lot of energy, melting the surrounding material to plasma. The effects of this weapon means that armour and walls are nearly ineffective against it. The gamma rifle is usually also equipped with a powerful life form scanner, that allows it to spot life forms on the other side of walls, and shooting them down. All this energy is stored in a small superstoragers, mounted behind the handle. This superstorager only has enough energy for 8 shots. The gamma rifle is as big as a normal rifle. The gamma rifle does 8 points of damage, but you may not soak with your armour. It can also shoot through walls.
Technology: 9 Gauss rifle: This is an old, but still effective, alien weapon design. This rifle propels small, magnetically charged projectiles with high speed. The calibre is very small, but the rate of fire is so impressive that it simply slices the victim apart. There is no such thing as single fire on a gauss gun. The shells are caseless and have a long reach. They are also armour piercing because of their small size. The gauss rifle is about as big as a submachine gun even though it has a long barrel. The gauss rifle does 2 points of damage per success scored. It also ignores the first two points of armour you have.
Technology: 4 Life form scanner: This is a standard scanner, made to detect moving living creatures. It also has a small computer, to help display the results, and to filter out static. To detect someone, roll Perception + Computers against a difficulty of 7. The roll and difficulty may vary, according to conditions.
Technology: 4 Flying saucer: Only a few of those technological achievements exist on earth, and they are closely monitored by the silencers. They fly by creating a zero gravity field around them, and propels itself by jet streams. It is also equipped with cloaking devices, rendering it invisible. Flying saucers are very agile in the air, and can land in almost any condition; it can also work under water. It is not extremely quick, and does approximately mach 2,5 at best. It can also reach orbit, but there the hyperspace particles of earth hinder it to go any further. Many Cassiopeians have tried though, but the saucers exploded.
Technology: 18 Micro medbots: These are the cutting art of Cassiopeian medical abilities. Small nanobots enter the bloodstream, to do their intended work, for example to operate a clogged blood vessel, or to heal a broken bone. They can also do brain surgery, and are very useful in neurosurgery. If you have micro medbots inside you, you are able to heal one health level per day.
Technology: 9 Personal cloaking device: This is the most lightweight cloaking device available today. It is a harness which you strap on. The controls are placed in front of the belt, easily accessible. It has an active lifetime of 8 hours, and can easily be recharged in any earthling socket. This device subtract four difficulty levels from any stealth rolls. At least when considering sight.
Technology: 7 |