I'm working on a random table of weird mannerisms and customs for aliens the PCs encounter. Any suggestions? Off the wall (even gonzo) is fine.
Thanks,
VS
Are these like, humanoid aliens, or is there going to be a random generator for species typles like bipedal, centripedal, tauric, giant frog, etc...?
- Constantly peeling dead skin off of various fast-growing body parts.
- Manual moistens eyes with waxy fingers.
- Takes a quick step back as a form of greeting.
- Prefers to stand with back to solid surfaces when socializing, even if it means not looking at the conversation partner.
- They scrape each others' claws together as a soothing social gesture.
- Chews cud like a cow, but it's a very private activity so never does it when observed.
- Names every weapon and firmly believes they have personalities. Will spend considerable cash to install A.I. in weapons if possible.
- Considers blood spilled by accident lucky.
- Horrified and fascinated by the humans' comparatively high pain threshold and ability to undergo the brutal intrusion that is surgery.
- Removes brain every night to soak it in nutrition fluid.
Quote from: Harime Nui;861298Are these like, humanoid aliens, or is there going to be a random generator for species typles like bipedal, centripedal, tauric, giant frog, etc...?
Great question! At this moment, I've no idea...
VS
Quote from: Shipyard Locked;861340- Constantly peeling dead skin off of various fast-growing body parts.
- Manual moistens eyes with waxy fingers.
- Takes a quick step back as a form of greeting.
- Prefers to stand with back to solid surfaces when socializing, even if it means not looking at the conversation partner.
- They scrape each others' claws together as a soothing social gesture.
- Chews cud like a cow, but it's a very private activity so never does it when observed.
- Names every weapon and firmly believes they have personalities. Will spend considerable cash to install A.I. in weapons if possible.
- Considers blood spilled by accident lucky.
- Horrified and fascinated by the humans' comparatively high pain threshold and ability to undergo the brutal intrusion that is surgery.
- Removes brain every night to soak it in nutrition fluid.
Nice job! I'll digest these. Thanks for the inspiration.
VS
There was that one French movie that inverted the social customs of eating and defecation. A "dinner party" table where everyone sat on toilets chatting merrily while going about their business. And then everyone individually at times excusing themselves to the "bathroom" to eat frantically and with much awkard self-consciousness. I forget its name right now...
Social pooping v. private eating.
And then there's the human stuff from other cultures and time periods that gall our mdern sensibilities:
Offering your wives or daughters to consort with strangers as a form of hospitality.
Strangers propositioned for marriage within the day or so of meeting, because it strenghens foreign relations.
Being the physical safety (pimp?) as your wife plies a sexual trade among strangers.
Reading the entrails of an animal for the auspices of a fortuitous meeting of strangers.
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It really helps though to get an idea of the aliens because then we can slip into even more alien mindsets.
I rolled up crystalline race with chainsaw mouths on a radioactive planet for SWN. I read it as they use radiation as a means of digestion. And further I made it a communal endeavor and sign of welcome to newcomers.
So when SWN humans arrived on one of their homeworlds to colonise, much unintended conflict occured. Humans were surprised when crystalline beings broke into their fusion and fission reactors, took them out of most of their shieldings, and brought them into the center of the human town. There the aliens stood around the lethally radiating content and "sang" songs of greeting to the newcomers (vibrating in high pitches with their chainsaw mouths and glowing in alarming colors) to come and "break bread with them," if you will.
Those first few human colonies failed. A level of peaceful accord came many decades later and from a safer distance.
Suggestions for entries or sources of inspiration?
For sources, CJ Cherryh and Larry Niven tend to have aliens with mannerisms that fit into the biology and/or culture of the alien species. Not sure how weird you'd think they are. For myself, having the mannerisms fit is more important than weird mannerisms, unless we're playing something with a 50s sci-fi movie vibe. :)
- Offering of gifts to people that they meet, but the proper etiquette is to politely refuse these items. To accept such gifts will make things awkward and confusing.
- They only communicate via changing colour hues in their skin (alien colours, of course, like Jale and Ulfire). Only androids can safely become translators because other races go completely mad studying this language.
- Shape-changers who find it super polite to change their form to match the one to whom they speak... but not perfectly! Deliberately including a visible imperfection is just tactful. Other races need constant reminders not to get upset at the caricatures.
- These blind cuttlefish-faced humanoids must use their face tentacles to "feel" the expressions of the one who's speaking to them because they cannot grasp tone and intonation.
- They smile and laugh... only when they're furious and upset.
I remember there was a greeting custom in some cultures for men to shake or clasp genitals instead of hands.
Belching, flatulence or other bodily noises considered complimentary, polite or completely innocuous.
Greeting strange with a good solid slap or punch as a sign of respect for their strength.
Sex is completely casual but some other activity, like sleeping in the same room or eating together is treated with the same level of taboo, ritual and hangups.
Race with strong pheromones regularly get very close to communicate as smell is a major source of information and nuance for them and gets muddled easily in multiple person environments.
- Each one has a speech impediment that sounds absolutely hilarious to Earthlings (Elmer Fudd, Daffy Duck etc...). Willpower save not to chuckle.
- They self-taught earthling languages by watching re-runs of Wrestling shows from the 1980s. They believe that "Hull'Kssterr" and "Maa'chowmann" are significant human deities.
- Normally they are small, cute reptilian gnomes, but if they accidentally consume food around midnight (their planetary time, which could be hard to figure out) they transform into angry, cruel furry monsters that wreak havoc on everything nearby.
Quote from: Tod13;861477For sources, CJ Cherryh and Larry Niven tend to have aliens with mannerisms that fit into the biology and/or culture of the alien species.
I second the Cherryh recommendation. The Chanur saga left an impression on me when it comes to doing aliens "alien" enough to be interesting yet not so bizarre as to be off-putting.
- It is considered polite and a sign of intelligence to greet someone with a whopper or tall tale instead of just saying hello.
- A society of lip-readers who silently mouth words to communicate. They can hear and can speak, but consider this quite vulgar, sort of like cursing. They also have especially good eyesight.
- They consider plant-life the most morally perfect and protect it by law. Meat is okay to eat because meat eaters are sinful by nature. But harm a plant and they turn you into fertilizer.
- An extremely patient but vengeful group of aliens. For even the most minor perceived slight or social mistep they carry a grudge for decades. They enjoy anger and hate, it makes them feel alive, so they nurse small grievances over years for them to bloom into unbridled rage. However in the intervening time, they make a point of befriending and being kind to anyone they have a grudge with, with the aim of maximizing the pain of betrayal when they go in for the kill.
Quote from: BedrockBrendan;861619- An extremely patient but vengeful group of aliens. For even the most minor perceived slight or social mistep they carry a grudge for decades. They enjoy anger and hate, it makes them feel alive, so they nurse small grievances over years for them to bloom into unbridled rage. However in the intervening time, they make a point of befriending and being kind to anyone they have a grudge with, with the aim of maximizing the pain of betrayal when they go in for the kill.
so the Terran internet is like a spiritual homeland to them?
Quote from: Nexus;861653so the Terran internet is like a spiritual homeland to them?
The Terran Federation from starship troopers (or other science fiction terran) or 'Terran Internet' as in the current internet on earth?
The current internet. It was a (lame) attempt at humor. :)
Quote from: Shipyard Locked;861550I second the Cherryh recommendation. The Chanur saga left an impression on me when it comes to doing aliens "alien" enough to be interesting yet not so bizarre as to be off-putting.
im with you there
and is this idea reminding any one else of urusei yatsura ?
Quote from: kosmos1214;861705im with you there
and is this idea reminding any one else of urusei yatsura ?
Not to me. Urusei Yatsura's aliens were remarkably human--usually exaggerated human traits, but were imminently understandable. I know a lot of aliens are exaggerated human traits/cultures. But there is a difference between exaggerated and understandable and exaggerated and inexplicable. Yes, invading and basing your invasion on a game of tag sounds silly but is understandable. The invasion was still for profit and to take control of the earth.
As opposed to CJ Cherryh's methane breathers, who finally understood the concept of "trading" but not how it works. One of them darted into the oxygen breather's dock, dropped off what it was carrying and took a dock worker in trade. It made sense to the methane breather. Nobody on the oxygen breather side knows how or why the methane breathers consider something an even trade or when or why the methane breather's are going to trade. They just know it might happen.
I was doing the Dad thing pretty much all weekend. Will read over your responses and comment sometime tomorrow. Until then... thanks!
VS
I liked the bizarre quasi-humor of the fox-like aliens in The Stone City by George R.R. Martin.
Good stuff, everyone! I appreciate the input.
I'm not sure if I should create a random table for stuff like that or assign a mannerism/custom to a specific alien race. BTW, this is not meant to be serious sci-fi, but closer to some kind of 70's and 80's cheesy B-movie or TV show.
VS
If the following people want credit for giving me a jumping-off point, let me know whatever name or handle you want included in the "thanks" section of Alpha Blue... Bedrock Brendan, Nexus, Shipyard Locked, Opaopajr, and Necrozius.
Thanks!
VS
I had an alien race in a game once that had really well developed colour perception and their communication and culture was based around it. Colours had deep linguistic significance, so a particular shade of red could be a literal red rag to a bull with them because it be associated with an insult. The idea was that though normally very peace loving they kept on getting into violent conflicts with other races who couldn't see and understand how they related to colours and would greet them wearing that insulting shade of red...
Quote from: Hybridartifacts;862406I had an alien race in a game once that had really well developed colour perception and their communication and culture was based around it. Colours had deep linguistic significance, so a particular shade of red could be a literal red rag to a bull with them because it be associated with an insult. The idea was that though normally very peace loving they kept on getting into violent conflicts with other races who couldn't see and understand how they related to colours and would greet them wearing that insulting shade of red...
I like that. Good suggestion. Thanks!
VS
When I was playing Rifts, I played a weird four armed pterodactyl-like creature, and decided that its greeting involved raising all four arms and making a clawing motion at the air... which always sent humans running because it looked like my character was threatening to rip their faces off. They just didn't understand that it is the polite way to say hello.
Quote from: Aracaris;862999When I was playing Rifts, I played a weird four armed pterodactyl-like creature, and decided that its greeting involved raising all four arms and making a clawing motion at the air... which always sent humans running because it looked like my character was threatening to rip their faces off. They just didn't understand that it is the polite way to say hello.
this reminds me of how the menbarie war got started in Babylon 5
Quote from: kosmos1214;863060this reminds me of how the menbarie war got started in Babylon 5
Did you ever play Living Steel? It was a Phoenix Command variant. The alien race in it was like a soldier version of the Predator. (They'd shuck off armor or weapons for a fight, to make it more fun.) When they first encountered humans, humans fired a laser into the ground between them, to indicate the aliens should stop advancing.
The aliens took this as a polite invitation to battle and proceeded to open fire...
Quote from: Tod13;863164Did you ever play Living Steel? It was a Phoenix Command variant. The alien race in it was like a soldier version of the Predator. (They'd shuck off armor or weapons for a fight, to make it more fun.) When they first encountered humans, humans fired a laser into the ground between them, to indicate the aliens should stop advancing.
The aliens took this as a polite invitation to battle and proceeded to open fire...
nope never played it its on that list of games i want to give a try though