GURPS Aliens: what's most interesting?

[scc]

I'm torn on whether or not ones that could work in a fantasy setting would be a good idea

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I'm open to all of the above, but particularly partial to Real Weirdies. I have no opinion regarding "preexisting" vs "new", s'all cool, and I'm not really familiar with Aliens. I might have a copy of it in a box somewhere, but if so, I only read it once or twice a long time ago.

Ditto, for the most part. Aliens had a Star Trek / Traveller feeling, for me at least.
Anyone can write up humans in funny suits or those based on a single (non)human feature and shove everything else to the side.
Truly novel alien aliens are not so easy, especially if one wants to consider all the non-obvious repercussions of major psychological/physical differences.
I'm not a super detail-oriented guy.

[acrosome]

I have to admit that I never think of aliens as PCs. I think of them as puzzles for the PCs. I figure, if you want PC weirdness there is always parahumanity.

[Archangel Beth]

Originally Posted by nondescript handle

I would love GURPS:Kintarans!

Hee! I could do that... Though I'd want to get a modified contract, since I don't think I'd want them to be entirely work-for-hire -- and yet there would need to be stuff in place so that SJGames could use them easily in other books without having to come knocking on my (or my heir's) door each and every time.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

You get to that stage and they might as well breath Hydrogen Sulfide and only communicate with humans via text messages with weirdly scrambled syntax.

Those were in the Chanur books by Cherryh, as I recall... >_>

Originally Posted by scc

I'm torn on whether or not ones that could work in a fantasy setting would be a good idea

*cracks knuckles* I wager that I could make just about any of the various Aliens races work in a fantasy setting, with a greater or lesser bit of shoe-horning. But I do like challenges...

(I love all the ideas going on. Makes me hope they'll want me back. O;> )

[Anthony]

From what I remember about using GURPS aliens (can't find my copy atm, looking at the table of contents), a whole bunch of the races worked better as NPCs (mystery, threat, patron, or color) than as PCs -- notable, the Auroras, Banduch, Markann, Verm, Traders, Truul, Engai, Mmm, Liook Sujan, Purulu (easily adjusted, though), Riders, Crystal Computers, and Gloworms. I remember being fond of the Fasanni and the Pachekki for playable races, and the Memer&Saret were interesting but needed to be quite substantially different from their racial base to be playable (also, largely redundant with playing a robot).

[Flyndaran]

I think the Banduch suffered from the science fiction problem that physical difference barely matter with even minor ultra tech.
(I'm assuming those are the rock hard pacifists.)
So their hides are proof for fists and handguns. Enemies will carry armor piercing rifles. So they're super strong. Enemies will have power armor. Etc.)

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I think the Banduch suffered from the science fiction problem that physical difference barely matter with even minor ultra tech.
(I'm assuming those are the rock hard pacifists.)

No, they're the psychic dinosaurs. There are several races that suffer from "I put all these points into ST", and I think Banduch might have that problem as well.

[smurf]

To move them from 3e to 4e needs a lot of back ground reading to get the feel of what the race does before just converting stats. Many 4e rules can be done around talents rather than just iq upgrades.

Before I got the 3e book all of 25 years ago. We were doing are own races.

Esti - psychic lizards with a proteus virus for psis
Sens - TL1 'ogres' that were the baddest and toughest. Most were offworlders so had better TL - usually mercenaries for other races.
Kronin.

Experimented with some cat race (have to find them again).

Developed 2 other races.

Space crocodiles (sort of Judge Dredd Kleggs but not psychotic)
Space Geckos

The idea was some of the evolution chain developed at the divergence of lizards and mammals.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Anthony

No, they're the psychic dinosaurs. There are several races that suffer from "I put all these points into ST", and I think Banduch might have that problem as well.

Oh yeah. I mixed them up with a vaguely similar species from the one Traveller Aliens book I have. Live by the IDHMBWM, die by the IDHMBWM.

Some strength is very useful, especially in realistic Science Fiction. But we domesticated animals, created machines, and generally most of technology to avoid using and abusing our bodies.
I think armored aliens suffer even worse as artificial armor advanced far far faster than artificial strength, in my opinion.

[Johnny1A.2]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Not Hivers. I might believe they were real but I wouldn't bother dealing with them. After a few attempted manipulations and the odd abandoned infant or two I'd just tell them to go away and don't come back.

Hivers also violate the cantina/aircar rule. If you can't share space in an entertainment establishment or ride in the same small vehicle the PCs ability to interact with the aliens in question is too limited. A whole empire of them might be as realistic as anything else but the PCs wouldn't do repeat business with any individual npc.

You can't even have a war with the Hivers directly. They'd just send those big lizard guys (who I like much better) in their place.

You get to that stage and they might as well breath Hydrogen Sulfide and only communicate with humans via text messages with weirdly scrambled syntax.

Realistic as a setting feature and useful as detailed npcs just aren't the same thing.

This touches on a basic problem with aliens in general in RPGs and fiction too. To make them interesting as player characters or NPCs for one-on-one interaction, or as viewpoint characters in fiction, they have to be pretty human in mind and able to interact with humans readily in body. But if they're humans in rubber suits...why not use humans instead? There's only a narrow range of 'alienness' where such stories and games work very well.

In my own world, I deliberately made most of the aliens that serve as 'PC encounters' or PCs actually cousins to humans, with a recent common ancestor less than 200,000 years ago, and some genetic engineering thrown in. That let's them be 'just different enough' in a plausible way.

The real aliens, the ones not related to us, or distantly related (there's a race of sapient cephalopods, for ex) are not suitable as PCs and mainly interact as enemies, or strange encounters, or the like. Interaction tends to be tricky and sometimes nerve-wracking, even in 'friendly' encounters, because they are very alien.