Roughdraft Submission - FE Sequel

[General_Hoohah]

[Nielk1]

It just seemed to describe the bad guys in many of the Scifi B-Movies I have seen. Most of your list I mean.

[Mr X]

By the way, what is a Hzarzk?

It was my suggestion for the war criminals' name, I thought it was a good one because I think alien names are better when its hard for an English speaker to pronounce them. If you make it something like the Darg or whatever, I just sounds like someone has made it up.

Oh by the way, don't mean to get picky here but I doubt they would call themselves the ISDF, even if just for the sake of their alliance with the scions.

I've come up with a new name alternative back story, if anyone thinks its any good:

The government of Great Britain had always perceived the AAN's restrictions on biometal usage as a dangerous mistake that would leave Earth badly undefended. Because of this the BRF(Biometal research facility) was founded in an abandoned world war 2 bunker beneath London, with the intention of creating technology that could be handed to all the nations of the AAN should a threat too great for the EDF to handle reveal itself. The exact date that the facility was founded is hard to trace due to the limited records, but it is estimated to be around 2010. They made great advancements in technology through their studies, but in the year [insert year relative to story events here] the project was unearthed by the AAN when they received an anonymous tip off. Britain was cast out of the AAN and told that they would not be allowed back in until they turned over all evidence of their research over. Britain refused.

Unknown to the world, America and Russia had also sought to create similar schemes, but because of their known tendency towards the use of biometal for military purposes, the AAN had decided to strictly monitor their movements, which had meant that they could not find a way to keep it secret. When they heard of Britain's plight the American government almost immediately turned their back on the AAN to help their long time ally, and it was not long before Russia followed suit. Before long Canada and Australia also joined this alliance who, much to the bemusement of the Russians, dubbed themselves the New Commonwealth. Together they formed the New Commonwealth Space Taskforce, NCST for short, to counter the threat posed by the EDF.

With the technology of the BRF and the manpower of the other nations the NCST stood ready to counter anything, be it alien of the EDF. It was then that an unidentified object entered the solar system...

Then the two factions of Earth could have a race to be first to retrieve the object (NCST winning).

Sorry if no-one likes it, but the name ISDF has had a lot of shame brought upon it, and it would be hated by scions and humans alike.

And I quite liked the idea of calling them the New Commonwealth, because Commonwealth implies empire building.

[General_Hoohah]

I don't think the actions of one man should shame an entire group to be honest. We don't hate germany after all.... time moves on and we learn to forgive and move on. We can't hold on to every little scrap of grudge and hate. It would consume us. Besides I like the ISDF, I always have. They're good, they've just been caught in the middle of bad circumstances. Other than what braddock did... I don't remember much else. What else did the ISDF do, and what where the circumstances?

I really like the name of the race you thought up of though. Kudos on that. I've been trying to find a name for them for weeks, but I couldn't think of anything.

I really want to see the ISDF return, and reinvent themselves with new technology, new morals, new ways of doing things... and keeping their noses clean from that point on, and being the symbol of hope for the earth they were supposed to be from the beginning.

[Mr X]

Ok then, do you want me to adapt my origin story so it fits with them being called the ISDF, or do you want a completely different one altogether?

If its the latter, then could you give some guidelines about what you're looking for? And I'll write an origin story around them.

[General_Hoohah]

 

There already is an origin for the ISDF. I think I need someone like Avatar to provide details about the Prometheans, and all these other races, and events... and what led up to them. He's pretty much the story guru. Calling Avatar! We need you! *puts up the avatar signal*

I'm not interested in ripping up large parts of my story and redoing it, its already good the way it is for the most part. I'm just looking for details and explinations for stuff thats already in it.

Like for existance. The Hzarzk were created by the scietists of a super intelligent ancient race of beings who were once one of the major players of the biometal wars. Maybe we've never heard of them, which would give us a chance to be more creative.

Anyway, this unnamed race commited horrible genetic experiments on their own young, resulting in a great deal of pain and suffering. Eventually they create the ultimate super soldier. Immune to most forms of biological warfare, stronger, faster, better eye sight. They announce the project as a success and create a huge army of super soldiers. However, something goes horribly wrong. A generation later, the offspring of the super soldiers develope a powerful bloodlust. They start to slowly mutate, and become even more poweful than the super soldiers. They grow to be up to 10 feet tall, grow larger boneier jaws, longer jagged teeth, cold black eyes, longer arms, stronger legs, and become more hunched over. They also develope powerful pherimone tracking senses, and the way they fight also develops into an animalistic nature. They become masters of geurilla warfare, often surrounding their prey quickly then ripping them to shreds with their claws and teeth.

They quickly overwhelm their own people, killing, torturing, and mutilating anything alive they can find. Their own race suffers the consiquences of their own horrible acts towards their own young.

The Hzarzk begin to breed, populate their new homeworld, and eventually learn to control the biometal technology left behind by their creators. By now their blood lust has grown, they need to kill. They leave their homeworld in search of other lifeforms to murder.

At about this time the Prometheans make the mistake of contacting them with peaceful intentions. The Hzarzk quickly attack, nearly killing them all. The Prometheans retreat back to their military stronghold, a planet made entirely of biometal (unnamed). The Hzarzk eventually overwelm them with their larger numbers and equal stength in biometal technology, and gain control of this massive biometal resource.

The Prometheans, desperate for help, form an alliance with a number of other species of life from near by galixies, which strike back at the Hzarzk, pushing them back. Millions of Hzarzk are exterminated, and they retreat to their homeworld. There, they begin to breed, doubling their previous numbers.

Twenty or so years later, the Hzarzk return, more determined than ever. A large number of them attack the Promethean homeworld where they learn of a new gate technology that can instantly transport them to other galexies where they can kill more than ever before. Over the next fifty years, they slowly invade the Prometheans' civilian world, killing every form of life they can find. They eventually destroy that world, killing everything off, leaving only billions of bodies rotting in the industrial wastes of a once thriving species. For now, fortunately, they do not know of the Prometheans homeworld. A holy place dedicated to the history of their species.

However, the automated defences and allied forces make their efforts to find the gate peices very difficult.

They do however learn of one peice being held in a battle ship holding orbit over a planet named Wren. They immediate attack this battleship, board it and nearly kill everyone on board in search of the second peice of the gate, while their main forces continue to fight for for the first peice on the Promethean civilian world. The captain realizing they're after the gate, activates self destruct, and the cargo section of the ship is mistakenly hurled away towards earth. The Hzarzk search the debris and planet for years, trying to find the missing gate peice but never locate it.

I guess the first meeting between the ISDF and the Hzarzk could happen on wren. A small outpost of scouts.

But there's a lot of information missing. Who is this race who created the Hzarzk? What's their backround? What kind of immoral genetic experiements did they commit? Why did it go wrong? Where they at war with the Hadeans? What about the other major players in the biometal wars? Where did they fit into that? What's the history of the Prometheans? Their language is similar to greek, so did they contact earth thousands of years ago? How did that effect the human race? What is the name of their original homeworld? What's the name of their civilian planet? What is the history behind it? What is the name of their biometal planet and where did it come from? Did they make it? The prometheans ARE rumored to have created biometal, but it could be a myth. Didn't the Cthoneans create it? Or was the the Hadeans? I'm rusty on my BZ1 trivia.

I've already figured out what the Hzarzk look like and what their vehicles generally look like. But what about the Prometheans? What did they look like, what kind of biometal technology did they use? What do their ships look like? Does the ISDF get to talk to the last remaining Prometheans behing guarded by the allied forces?

Who's in the allied forces? What are their names? What kind of biometl technology to they use? What do their ships look like?

Like I said, there's a LOT of missing details!!!

[Mr X]

I don't know if you've considered this, but perhaps the vehicles of the Hzarzk should look like animals to reflect their nature.

For example, you could have a walker with multiple pairs of legs that looks like a scorpion, it could have a weapon on its tail (I'm thinking mortar, because it would have an elevated position), two rockets where a scorpion would have pincers, and guns on either side of the mouth.

Either way I think that they should be dark reds and black, with spikes protruding from them.

If its alright with you I'll fill in the missing details about the Hzarzk and their creation,
I'm thinking that they are made from the DNA of the race that made them, but they changed their name to Hzarzk to shed the association with lesser beings. Anyway, I think I have some pretty good ideas for filling in the gaps, and I have nothing to do at the minute anyway.

[Nielk1]

I've been holding onto this a long time for another mod, but I can say it will not look like it does for that mod and I will not mention what mod so no real issue:



Yes the tail bends in game to aim.

[Avatar]

Calling Avatar! We need you! *puts up the avatar signal*

Like most of us I have my own take on what the story of biometal is all about.  I've stated it personally over and over again but I'll do so again.

BZ1 tried to show us a cycle by telling us that our myths were real.  In BZ1 we learn that an ancient race came before us, reached a high point of technology, and then destroyed themselves with it.  That technology ended with biometal, and the unleashing of the Cthonian Furies.  The story of Icarus is used to illustrate a race reaching for the stars, but being burned by their own desire for more...

In the end of the game we watch what's presumably a chunk of biometal head towards Earth while the narrator states that he hopes it doesn't all happen again, but if it does he hopes that whatever race finds biometal is lucky enough to win their own battles against their own Furies.

Like Battlestar Galactica, "All this has happened before, and all will happen again." seems to me to be the true central theme of biometal.  Each race that finds it, makes it, is attacked by it, or however they're introduced to it, faces their own destruction if they can't overcome their warlike desire to use it to conquer.

I expand this idea backward in time, as I see nothing that states that ONLY the Cthonians developed biometal.  Like many great inventions and discoveries it's more common than you think for multiple people to come up with roughly the same thing, especially in the fields of hard science.  I take the liberty of applying the cycle idea to multiple races across the universe as I see biometal as the ultimate expression of a Race's scientific achievements.

That being said there's room for all types of Races of biometal users, from the Swarm to the Mechana, from Humans to Hadeans.  I'd like to see Races that use biometal differently than the plain old NSDF/ISDF/Scion ways, but then again this is a game and it has to be relatively easy to get into the Race you're playing...  things that are TOO wacky or crazy probably won't get played...

So, there's room for all, but it's always good to put as much thought and creativity into your Race as you can.  Like RD says, think outside the box...

***

Just saw Nielk1's turret... and really wish we had the option of 'recoil' being a spinning motion... 

-Av-

[Nielk1]

The Gatling mesh came from Greenheart. Thank you again Greenheart.

[Mr X]

I think the body may need lengthening so that the recoil doesn't make it topple over backwards Does look awesome though.

I've just thought, what if the Prometheans created the Hzarzk from themselves? It fits with their name, as Prometheus stole fire from the gods in greek mythology, and messing with life is stealing something that only Gods should have. Prometheus got punished= Prometheans nearly wiped out. (Yes, I know that Mary Shelley had this idea with Frankenstein). Opinions?

[AHadley]

Sorry, mate, already done I was speaking with General Hoohah earlier over MSN and this is what we came up with. The name of the Hzarzk home planet is not yet certain. This also ties in very neatly with FleshStorm, though Lizard may want to chip in with his plans for the data in the Promethean Probe seen in Mission 7.



The race that originally occupied the Hzarzk home planet (Ares) began to experiment with genetic splicing. One of their experiments was to splice the DNA of some of Ares' more vicious wildlife with that of their own species, in an attempt to create a species of genetic super-soldiers. They immunised this new breed, which they named the Hzarzk, against all known forms of disease. Unfortunately, they miscalculated the amounts of DNA they were using, and their attempt to prevent the DNA spreading down bloodlines failed. This meant that the enhancements they had made to these soldiers were passed to their offspring, but they also discovered that they grew more potent too. The young were insane, almost envolving into a more intelligent version of the animal from which they had evolved. They mercilessly slaughtered all the life they could find on their planet, and once they had exterminated everything they began to move towards other planets, using their predecessors' primitive space travel technology.

It is at this point that the Prometheans first made contact with them. They had not realised the fate of the (name of predecessor race), and had intended to make peaceful contact with them, but their ambassadors were ambushed on Ares' surface and were killed, thereby giving the Hzarzk their own more advanced technology.

Using this new technology, the Hzarzk began to spread even further. They attacked the Prometheans' second planet Hephaestus, completely eradicating all life on it, and using the extra technology they found there to further advance their slaughter. They eventually reached Prometheus itself, and the planet fell amidst the unstoppable onslaught. Shortly before their destruction (though some Prometheans somehow survived), the prometheans launched many probes, which headed for different planets in the galaxy. They hoped that these probes would find sentient life, as they carried warnings of the Hzarzk and the dangers they presented. The races which had decoded their probes entered into an alliance with the Prometheans to attempt to destroy the Hzarzk.

One of these probes landed on the small desert planet of Oasis, though the life there had long since died out, leaving only their mechanical defender, the Mechana Defence Network, which guarded the probe ferociously. It was eventually defeated by a small human EDF force, who discovered the probe, and thus the Hzarzk.

The EDF were not the first humans to discover the Hzarzk, however, as we well know. The ISDF had encountered them decades before.

[AHadley]

Afraid the Prometheans' name doesn't have much to do with them either... Lizard named them, he gets rights on the storyline over anybody else. This isn't canon until he approves it.

[cheesepuffly]

Bio-metal is cheese exposed to cosmic radiation.

Nuff said.

In that  model  N1, how did  you get that background?

[Warfreak]

Lizard commented on the Purpose of the probes before.

The Promethians had discovered biometal late in their existance, after which the release of Nemesis happened, who inturn created and utilized the Swarm ancestors to fight against the Promethians. Durring the fights against them, the Promethians found that biometal can kill the Swarm, but it was too late. The Promethians were near extinction, so they created the probes of biometal and sent them out in the galaxy to provide any and all sentinent life that may face the Swarm the weapon to defeat them, Biometal.