Re: Bio-Forces -- Was: SG2/DS2 help wanted...

On Tue, 4 Nov 1997, Sprayform wrote:

> I like Alexander W's ideas but would try not to make S'V's immortal
> (individual but connected brains that can go adventuring if they
choose to
> disconnect IIMO better than making a copy. The reason is copies are
always
> expendable thereby making S'V tactics that of the K'V's ,where as
> immortality due to lack of old age makes for caution a
better/different race
> point of view) and would assume S'V's absorb all casualties on both
sides,
> that could be used for repairs.

Actually, you misread me here; while the Transcend culture that gave
rise
to the S'V are, effectively, immortal, the S'V themselves are not, at
least as I envisioned it.  The S'V are a 'waste product,' of sorts, of
the
way the Transcend culture reached their Singularity Point, albeit a
waste
product that the current culture is deriving great amusement for.  I
don't
expect that the Transcends send out copies to get involved often at all;
its a bit 'crude' for them, I'd wager.	The ones that did would be the
fringier elements of the culture.  After all, within the Caches, any
member could build a hyper-realistic 'game' of a battle and play with
it.
The 'lure' of reality would be a fairly rare thing.  In a sense, the
Transcend culture is well beyond anything we, as embodied sentients, can
understand (want to rule the world?  go off in a corner of the Cache,
sim
up a planet and make a billion variant copies of yourself and your
friends
to populate it with).  What it /does/ give us, however, is a race with
very little culture of their own, with dictates and needs that come down
from 'on high' and a need to go to war for the one resource that you
can't
simply /take/ without a fight: individual identities.

Where the K'V fight without pity or remorse because if they didn't,
they'd
overpopulate massively, the S'V fight carefully, intently, with very
little reckless abandon, because you waste valuable resources that way. 
The S'V use just the right tool for the right job when they can, because
it maximizes returns.  Sometimes, even most of the time depending on how
energy-hungry you make S'V biotechnology, they just have to 'make do
with
what they have.' In one area, they may have bases of supply and
industry,
and field massive bio-cybertanks backed up with hordes of near-mindless
dog-sized Drones, and elsewhere, in a much more tentative holding, the
best they may be able to field are biologically repaired ESE equipment
manned by bio-zombies with minimal restructuring with much the same
minds
as they once had, only turned to serve the S'V.  This makes the S'V
excellent fior fielding very diverse sets of troops, depending on what
one
really likes to play with.

> ...I would like to think that S'V ships "grow up" . Take a large DN
this can
> spit like n ameoba into two (say cruisers) these would then live and
absorb
> genetic material to grow up and become DN's themselves. I think a
lower
> limit would need to be set on V's (ie anything smaller than a frigate
is a
> snip of an original V's brain core and it wants it back)

I don't imagine that S'V bioship development would take place at a scale
of time likely to be relevant, unless you're playing a campeign game
and,
if so, using the same sort of numbers for how long it takes as everyone
else with just a different explanation would be the balanced way to
handle
it.

I can definitely visualize a S'V 'space dock,' an enormous lump of
hardened mucusy structure, tugged from an embedded asteroid at one end,
perhaps, supporting a lattice vaguely reminiscent of a hydroponics
laboratory.  Ships might reproduce by cuttings, or by cloning, or even
sexually through a vine-like support structure alongside the trellis if
this is an experimental growth station ...

> Non-S'V opposition can be absorbed but due to the energy required its
more
> efficient to NV the sample (ie a dead NAC marine has his brain
transformed
> into that of a std. ground force trooper leaving his equipment as is.
Why
> try to break-down the gun ammo etc to use as raw material when its
more
> energy efficient to just modify the biological 'trigger')

As above, it depends on how much energy you have to play with.	If
you've
got enough to make the trooper into a more efficent killing machine,
perhaps by welding he and another soldier into a two-headed Cerebroid
canine with a built in short-range missile pod on his back, then you'll
do
so.  If you're rationing energy heavily, you may just do a bit of biomod
to toughen the skin, mindwipe him (in the process, uploading him into
the
Cache, though no one knows that) and send him out again.

[One of these days I'll novelize this idea ...]

-- 
[  Alexander Williams {thantos@alf.dec.com/zander@photobooks.com}  ]
[ Alexandrvs Vrai,  Prefect 8,000,000th Experimental Strike Legion ]
[	     BELLATORES INQVIETI --- Restless Warriors		   ]
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