Zhodani without Psi

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by copeab

The problem is that psionics is the only area where the Zhodani are superior to the Imperium, and use it to good effect with their commandos. When you strip away psionics, they are inferior to the Imperium in every way ad, frankly, not very interesting anymore. Better to replace them with another race than nerf them.

It would be possible to replace the creepy psionics with creepy cyborgs and end up with the same basic relationship.

[copeab]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

It would be possible to replace the creepy psionics with creepy cyborgs and end up with the same basic relationship.

Turn them into the Borg?

[Drifter]

Originally Posted by copeab

Turn them into the Borg?

A more interesting model would be the Comprise, from Michael Swanwick's Vacuum Flowers. Obviously the model for the Borg. Much more interesting is the character Winter (I think - been a long time since I read the book).

Where the Comprise was all of humanity on Earth linked in a hive mind, the light speed limit of communication did not allow it to leave the planet. Winter appeared to be an 'agent' of Earth - a group mind of several individuals in communication with the overall mind but not a part of it.

The aristocracy could be such group-mind beings. Maybe vast hive-minds are not tenable, but group-minds of several dozen, at most, individuals work. Not everyone has to be in a group mind, (its expensive? takes extensive training? is dangerious?), so proles have human-normal minds, and while they don't have their minds 'read', the nobility is smarter, faster, stronger than they are.
Intedants are those proles which are receiving training to enter the nobility. They learn to control their emotions, have been cleared of any psycological problems, etc. Like monks or some type of zen initiate.
The 'nobles' are group minds that replace members as the individuals age and die. The basic 'personality' survives centuries, with only gradual change as the components are replaced.

Then again - this isn't the Zho and I really don't see a need to replace them :)

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

It would be possible to replace the creepy psionics with creepy cyborgs and end up with the same basic relationship.

To really work you would need implantable FTL communicators to stay linked to the hive.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

To really work you would need implantable FTL communicators to stay linked to the hive.

Overkill. After all, the Zhodani thought police don't have interstellar range either.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Overkill. After all, the Zhodani thought police don't have interstellar range either.

Then it just becomes a more realistic cell phone, just implanted. That's a bit boring in my opinion.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Then it just becomes a more realistic cell phone, just implanted. That's a bit boring in my opinion.

You could add automatic functions to reproduce soem of the effects of psi in the consulate.

Something like the Neural Verifier from UT would be about right. Zhodani territory is a place where no one lies in court or commits crimes of fraud. That's one of the deliberate amibiguities about it that makes it more than a place run by a psionic gestapo.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Then it just becomes a more realistic cell phone, just implanted. That's a bit boring in my opinion.

Implantable FTL communicators are a bit setting-breaking. No what I was thinking of was that commoners would have a baseline implant that could be used by them to access the net, but could also be used to monitor their activity, location, physical health, and emotions and incapacitate them as needed. Meanwhile the soldiers have massive and blatantly intimidating body replacement and the upper classes are chic would-be transhumanists with glowing LEDs just so you'll know they're upper-class. Although possibly, the planetary AIs are the ones really in charge. Or maybe upper classes graduate to having their brains added to a ruling immortal collective intelligence of networked brains that stand-in for true AI...

Even if you went full on Hive mind, it would be more interesting for different planets of the of the confederation to have distinct and different personalities. The Borg are fundamentally boring in their own right after all. That's why they were rewritten with every appearance.

[Malenfant]

Why do we need the Zhos to have a psi-like ability at all? If we're looking for "Zhos without Psi", then make it actually be without anything like psi too.

I think you can have an very effective 'bad guy' (and one that is much less morally ambiguous than the current Zhos) through extensive, invasive brainwashing and monitoring and ruthless 'efficiency' - combine Nazi Germany, North Korea and the worst elements of the Chinese and the USSR systems and add a dash of The Prisoner and 1984. Keep the Thought Police around (and they don't actually have to be psychic) and the population will stay cowed - Fear and paranoia has proven rather effective historically in "keeping the proles in line" without magic powers.

Plus it gives you opportunities for Resistance, guerilla warfare and memetic countermeasures too. It makes the Zhodani much darker than they are currently, but if you really want them to be the bad guy of the setting then why not go the whole hog?

OK, you lose the invisible teleporting commandos or whatever, but let's face it, those are game-breakingly stupid anyway.

[David Johnston2]

The reason I suggested creepy cyborgs was for contrast with the Empire, which certainly has the technology for such things but apparently not the social environment.

Apart from that the Zhos need to be a credible threat. A smaller state that expends most of it's energies on crushing it's own people doesn't qualify.