The Zoctol were an aquatic species until relatively recently. Their full grown height is about that of a human, but their mass and volume is substantially greater due to their octopus-like form. They lack the sense of hearing, and rely on digital devices to pick up on vibrations and translate them into writing to understand spoken languages. Zoctari languages are gesture-based, and the Zoctol often learn a modified version of sign language when in broader society. Each of a Zoctol's eyes is connected directly to a small brain, each of which connects to it's neighbors. All these brains work together to make the Zoctol quite intelligent by human standards. Each Zoctol has a single large orifice located in the midst of their tentacles that serves as the main gateway for eating, breathing, waste removal and reproduction. Zoctari reproduction involves a female Zoctol laying an egg in a nest (the egg is about the size of a basketball, and gradually expands until hatching), then the male and female Zoctol take turns sitting on the egg, slathering it in a viscous solution of half-digested nutrients to feed the growing child. When human explorers first encountered the Zoctol, their technology was transitioning from the paleolithic to the neolithic level, and most Zoctol lived in scattered tribes along the coastlines of their home planet.
Convergence Brute
The Convergence Brute is an engineered subspecies of Grey designed for heavy labor. Their genetic makeup shares considerable overlap with Cielioid Boxers, though any direct relation is, at this point, impossible to establish. Study of the Brute genome has consistently pointed to the likelihood that they originated in the Convergence. One distinct upgrade the Brute has over the boxer is the presence of multiple enlarged nostrils to facilitate rapid air intake during acts of extreme exertion. Brutes are rare in Grey clades outside the Convergence, but not entirely unheard of.
Standing at a towering 4 meters tall, the Brute is powerful enough to push over a tree or pick up and carry a cow.
Dionysians
Description
Dionysians are the native inhabitants of the planet Dionysus. Outwardly, they very closely resemble humans, except for some prominent ridges on their foreheads. Dionysus is a tropical world with a very mild climate, a plentiful abundance of edible plants, and few large predators. As a result the Dionysians faced relatively low survival pressure, and didn’t develop high technology.
Dionysian brow ridges likely evolved due to the warm temperatures of their home planet. In the tropical climes of Dionysus, the Dionysian body perspires considerably more than a similar human. Their brow-ridges act as an effective mechanism for channeling perspiration away from their eyes, while also being permeated by a substantial quantity of blood-vessels, so that they act as radiators to more effectively shed body heat.
Dionysians tend to have a relatively optimistic psychology compared to humans. Because of their tropical home-world, Dionysians tend to have slightly darker complexions than humans do. Dionysians and humans tend to be about equal in terms of height and weight.
The large areas of physical and psychological similarity between humans and Dionysians make relations between the two species particularly warm and close. Even though the two are separate species incapable of producing offspring together, there is a long history of intermarriage between the two. A common turn of phrase among humans in the old core worlds is to describe a spouse married for companionship with no intention of having children as a “Dionysian Wife”. (“Dionysian Husband” is also used, though less frequently.)
History
Before contact with the outside world, most Dionysians lived in small, nomadic bands, living off the land, with a few permanent settlements. Among these wandering groups were a very wide range of languages, religions and cultures. There was enough variety among these groups that picking a single name to describe the people and their world was rather problematic. Overall, most of the Dionysian cultures were peaceful, as resources were plentiful and life was easy. Warfare was uncommon, and short lived when it did occur.
Some of the early xenographers to study the Dionysians arrived at a time when most of the groups they visited were in the midst of a season of festivals, and their early reports commented on the “Dionysian” ways of the revelers. This turn of phrase was quickly picked up, and became the default descriptor for the people and their world. Also a factor in the rapid uptake of this name is the fact that Dionysus is also home to a number of trees that produce alcoholic fruit, most notably the del-brikki.
First contacted by scouts of the Astrophysical Survey in GSC 155, the Dionysians were relatively quick to join the Planetary League. Most Dionysians were favorably impressed with these outsiders and their alien technology. Within about a century of first contact, most of the various cultures had formed an ad-hoc government that quickly joined the Planetary League officially.
Early on, much commerce with the Planetary League and other outsiders centered around the del-brikki and other alcoholic fruit. This allowed many local gatherers to achieve a level of wealth previously unknown on their planet. As time went on, alcoholic fruit production became systematic, and as era-1 drew to a close, powerful corporate interests muscled their way in and began exploiting the local land and population for profit.
Spring-heeled Jack
The Spring-heeled Jack is a terrifying subspecies of Grey, engineered to hunt dissidents within the domain of the Convergence. Standing quite tall, (average height is about three meters), Jacks are capable of high speed and able to make extraordinary vertical leaps with their long legs. Spring-heeled Jacks have six arms, and two legs, and tend to be nocturnal. As a part of their horrific design, spring-heeled jacks have been engineered to be almost entirely carnivorous, preferring the challenge of hunting sentient prey.
Spring-heeled Jacks are a non-reproductive subspecies of Grey. They lack the spore-depositor gland in the center of their chests that other Greys have, but do have a vestigial nub of sensitive flesh in the same location that is one of the few vulnerabilities they possess in hand-to-hand combat. This is guarded, however, by their long, sharp tongues that never retract fully into their mouths, but are often used as a deadly weapon.
Spring-heeled Jacks were first deployed against the Bleen during the war that founded the Iblexian Empire, as a way to terrorize them into accepting Convergence rule. This did not end well for the Convergence, but the Spring-heeled Jack has remained a viable tool in their campaigns of dominance and manipulation ever since.
Their tall stature and eerie appearance earned them the name in comparison to the figure from Victorian folklore, and at a distance, their coloration may cause one to mistake a Spring-heeled Jack for a tall, slim man in a suit. Although no clear records are intact, the stories have caused some speculation if the Convergence may have visited Earth as early as the 19th century.
Vorgons
History
Vorgons evolved on New Albuquerque, (the original vorgon name for the planet has been lost to time) the lone native life-form that we would consider to be properly intelligent. Early in their prehistory, however, a large cosmic impact left their home-world largely arid, and the species which had evolved to live in a tropical, rain-forest-like habitat had to adapt to deserts and scrubland. Life was hard for the early vorgons, and as a consequence, their strength and stature diminished considerably.
New Albuquerque is a rare planet in that it exists as a habitable world in the midst of a stellar graveyard. Many of the planet’s neighbors are white dwarfs, black holes, or neutron stars. As a result, the region is constantly subject to cosmic storms, and is the site of a remarkably large number of shipwrecks. As a result, the vorgons learned, early in their history, to be scavengers and engineers, using the available cast-off materials to maximum advantage.
About 50,000 years ago, during the height of the 1,000 Years war, a fierce battle was fought on and around New Albuquerque by the Empire of 1,000,000 Suns, and the forces of Troniac. The battle of the three moons left many additional scars on the planet, and saw many vorgons conscripted into the imperial army, or subjected to various genetic engineering experiments. Most of the vorgons who live beyond the confines of New Albuquerque are the descendants of the diaspora from this period. After the war, the Empire made New Albuquerque into a scrap and salvage -yard.
Later, the lost colony ship Garcia’s Hope from the newly-formed Planetary League crash-landed on New Albuquerque, giving it the name that it bears to this day. In the meantime, the descendants of the vorgon exodus were gradually spreading tenuously throughout the galaxy, often serving as engineers aboard the vessels of the Nomad Armies and Breakaway States that cut loose from the Empire of 1,000,000 Suns around the time of the 1,000 Years War.
Biology
Vorgons are carbon- and water- based life-forms, like most in this galaxy. Omnivorous in diet, they still prefer a carnivorous cuisine. In desert environs, though, they will eat basically whatever presents itself. They have two biological sexes, of which, only females posses hair (usually black in color). Vorgons tend to be nocturnal in habit.
Names
Download: Vorgon Name Generator for Windows
“Oh, goody! I jus’ finded this beautiful golden ring jus’ rattlin’ aroun’ out here in the junkyard. Finders keepers!”
Lärkians
Lärkians are an intelligent species descended from deer-like ancestors. From the outside, it appeared that their home star was gradually dimming over time for unknown reasons. When scouts from the Planetary League arrived to investigate they discovered a burgeoning swarm of space habitats built by the Lärkians. The Lärkians didn’t have expansionist tendencies, but their population exploded after they exterminated all the large predators on their home-world. Running out of room and resources, they began to build space colonies to stave off famine.
A female Lärkian.
Biology
Lärkians are naturally shy and timid, owing to their history as a prey-species for large predators. However they did adapt to become omnivorous in the swampy biomes of their ancestral home. Hunting and gathering was their main means of sustenance, and most of their space habitats are filled with carefully tended ecosystems, and only sparsely populated.
Lärkians have their eyes at the end of stalks growing out of the sides of their heads. This gives them the advantage of 360° vision. Females have short horns on their heads while males grow large antlers. Lärkian skin is covered with short, velvety fur, usually brown in color.
Most Lärkians are female, with only one male per 50 on average. The few males are kept in the clan-houses that form the basic unit of Lärkian society.
Society
Lärkian society is based around clan houses of about 30-60, mostly unrelated females, and their children with a single male whose main role in life is reproduction. Each house has a name, and a ranking (at least compared to its nearest neighbors) rankings are based on reputation, the productivity and skill of its working members, and a complex series of alliances and deals. There are several large house-ranking bodies (and many more small, local ones), and every clan-house belongs to at least one.
On reaching maturity, most female Lärkians will leave their clan-house and join a new house. A few will take up single life, independent of the houses, but this is a fairly rare event. When the population grows to a certain size such that the existing clan-houses are at capacity, a group of females from allied houses will form a new “maiden house”. When a new male Lärkian is born, he will join an existing maiden house, and upon his reaching maturity, the maiden house will become a regular clan house.
When a male dies, his clan house becomes a “widow house”. If the house has a good reputation and many allies, a rite of purification will be performed and the house will become a maiden house again. If the house has a bad reputation or few allies, it will be disbanded and the former members will either join new houses or live independently.
Males have no personal wealth or political power in this arrangement, but are often publicly displayed by their clan-houses as a status symbol. Sometimes, the clan-houses even have competitions over who can groom and dress their house-husbands in the most impressive fashion. Males are forbidden from having productive jobs, but most do have at least some hobbies.
Male Lärkians are relatively rare.
After the arrival of the Planetary League, the majority of Lärkian clan houses voted to join the League, with the promise of mutual defense, as safety in numbers is an idea strongly ingrained in the Lärkian psyche. The rest of the clan-houses carried on as independent entities, with little conflict, as the Lärkians are one of the more peaceful intelligent species.
The Dogarri
History
The Dogarri were an intelligent species from a planet that was ejected from their solar system when their technology was comparable to that of the United States in the 1980s. For centuries they drifted through the void, surviving underground off the geothermal energy of their home-world, Dogar-dann. As the human race was starting to expand into the galaxy, around the time of the first Convergence war, human scouts discovered Dogar-dann in interstellar space, as it was also the target of Convergence aggression. Soon after the Dogarri and the Planetary League joined in an alliance for mutual defense. Dogar-dann maintained its independence, but many Dogarri joined the League.
Biology
Dogarri are short and compact compared to humans, with powerful muscles and stronger skeletons due to Dogar-dann’s relatively high gravity.
Engineering culture
Dogarri culture emphasizes engineering and construction as important fields. This is due both to the high gravity of their home-world requiring sturdy construction techniques, and to the fact that they were beset by cosmic catastrophe. Survival underground on a frozen planet caused the Dogarri to value these endeavors even more. The Dogarri are known throughout the galaxy for their prowess at architecture and engineering.
Egg-beer
Dogarri egg-beer is made when the eggs of a Dorrik-braagh (a large, birdlike animal) are slow-fermented in a broth made from vort-grass. The results are remarkably similar to Earth-beer, plus you get a tasty alcohol-saturated egg to eat at the end. (This does not taste as bad as it sounds.)
The Nalanda
History
The Nalanda are an ancient race, native to the twin planets Malana and Agwanda (“The Twins”) in the Ileyo (meaning Heaven) system. They have a highly developed culture, and their art and music are prized across the galaxy. Their culture emphasizes harmony and peace, and seems to have remained remarkably stable over the course of their recorded history.
What has remained a mystery to archaeologists and historians, however, is how they managed to build the enormous space-bridge between their two planets when their own technological level could be most closely compared to the renaissance era. Their own folklore makes vague references to an ancient civilization known as “Zanath” that is said to have built it.
Explorers from the Planetary League made first contact with the Nalanda in GSC 208, and in GSC 248 the Great Council of Matriarchs had decided to join the league. Malana and Agwanda suffered the depredations of the Holy Empire of Man during the Great Reckoning, causing a great diaspora of the Nalanda.
“The Nalanda are the last remnants of an ancient civilization. If you are lucky enough to meet one, you may be lucky enough to survive.” -The Ranks of Man
Culture
Nalandan culture is matriarchal in structure with women holding the reigns of power. Their highest level of government is known as the Great Council of Matriarchs, which resides in the capitol at the center of the space-bridge.
Nalandan religion is polytheistic, with local regions having their own patron gods who all fit together into a grand pantheon. Customs and festivals vary widely from place to place, but the core ideas of beauty, balance and peace pervade the whole culture.
Biology
The Nalanda are humanoid omnivores, similar to humans in most respects. They are immediately recognizable by their tripple-lobed ears, chocolate brown skin (often highlighted with bright colors), and some distinct ridges at the bridge of the nose. In appearance, the Nalanda are slender and elegant, often to the point of androgyny. Adding further to the mystery of the Nalanda, biologists examining their DNA as well as the other species in their home environment have found evidence of advanced genetic engineering. Apparently the engineering in the Nalanda themselves focused on creating a certain cosmetic appearance, as the most clearly edited sequences pertain to body structure, vocal properties, and coloration.
