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Topic: Project 6014 – Ur-Quan Masters mod (Read 199422 times)
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scorpio803
Zebranky food
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Posts: 7
The name of the place: BABYLON 5
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Wow... been a while since the last post huh... Well if the projects still going, here's my two cents. I hope to be able to help out, while i have no coding or graphic arts expertice (and i know you don't need any more dialouge only people) I am willing to learn, have a wacom tablet, and i could probably persuade (give money) to my sister for her to design a web-page. My views might be a bit different seeing as i just got into the ur-quan masters sometime last year (and beat it last week). I don't think we should go for a "starcontrol 2.5" If our game contradicts the TFB sequal (if there ever is one) then that's just tough cookies. We should get into what happened to the androsynth, the purpose of the rainbow worlds, who the taalo are and all that good suff. One of the things that made SC2 so great was it's immense depth and persistent world. We just have to avoid making the plot half-A**ed, either it's just a bunch of BS like SC3 or it lacks the epic detail of SC2. Now heres an outline of all my ideas:
Ilwrath: I think that the ilwrath attacked the thraddash, but the thraddash fleet was already weakened by Ur-Quan and the captain, and the Ilwrath killed so many Thraddash that they didn't have enough sacrifices to appease Dogar and Kazon and immediatley turned to the Thraddashes neighbors, the Umgah and almost immediatley after that recieved a message from their divine gods of torment to return to their homeworlds. Then they became pirates in order to seek new races to torment and resources to replace the ships lost in the costly war with the Traddash. *refer to druuge*
Spathi: After the Sa-Matra was annighigalated the U-quan sent ships out to rally together the battle thralls, Seeing the spathi imprisoned on their homeworld, they sent a Kor-Ah (the ur-quan and Kor-ah temporarily teamed up, i'll get into that later) task force to take down the slave shield and destroy the Spathi. Being so terriefied when a fleet of black ships arrived and broke down the impenitrable shield the spathi sent all of their eluders out in one sweep attack, many of the spath ships were blown up through friendly fire but the Kor-Ah forces were defeated and the Spathi were forced to rejoin the new alliance.
Thraddash: The combined Ur-quan Armada, sent small task force to contact the Thraddash fleet which was so utterly destroyed that the force outnumbered their pathetic armada. Seeing the black ships the Thraddash immidiatley gunned up for war (there where ur-quan ships too but culture 21 after the captain's war and the ilwrath war considered themselves independent of the hierarchy and loved to show their former masters all that they had learned in the previous conflicts. But then a thraddash philosopher came up with the idea that, since the thraddash were already vanquised before the batlle even began, there was no need to fight, they had already learned their lesson and should escape the onslaught. He was excucuted as a coward of course but the Thraddash were forced to consider whether or not the inevatible result of them being vanquished meant that they already were, was capability the same as actual reality? At the Thraddashes final stand (the world with the Aqua helix) Half their fleet gunned their reenuk afterburnes and high-tailed it out of their. Ironically the other half, which were utterly vanquished, provided the thraddash enough time to escape to spathi space where upon they immediatley attacked the Spathi, the Spathi, becoming so frightened they attacked back, and the Thraddash were in awe of how the Spathi's cowardly tactics lead to victory. Culture 22 formed only a week after culture 21, dedicated themselves to the Spathi, who taught that that cowardice lead to a surviving and flourishing race, the thraddash ships should stay out of the way of enemy fire and fire their afterburners right in their enemies faces to get away when they got too close and destroy them. The Thraddash became like the Shofixti to the Yehat, This system worked for a while, but despite their cowardice the Thraddash remained warlike (as the spathi put "seeing cowardice more like a battle tactic than a way of life"), and began to rebuild thier fleet. This made the spathi a bit uneasy. The captain must return create a new culture that seperates the Thraddash and spathi.
The Druuge: While the druuge homeworld is not in the game map, they set up a star base within the games stars (not coincident;y in a mega-giant star system where the melnorm also are) that they bought from the Syreen in return for resources the syreen would use to rebuild their battle fleet. *SPOILER ALERT*
The Druuge are basicaly funding the Ilwrath and Kor-ah pirates, who trade slaves in return for rescources and in some cases Mauler starships (which both the ilwrath and the Kor-ah see as cumberson, clumsy, and downright awful vessels). The Druuge will refuse such claims and captain can who them wreckage from a mauler starship (attained form either pirate groups) they will become angry and say that it is not their reponsibility to check where upon their goods come from. *Soiler end*
You should be able to sell artifacts and crew in return for more artifacts, starships, and fuel. If the druuge leave, the pirate raids will end, just throwing that out there.
The Melnorm: they will from an alliance with you if you get rid of the druuge (haven't really figured that one out yet) You can learn that that are really the mael-nom from the sentient milieu. Their philosophy evolved when they discovered it wasn't fair what the ur-quan were doing and decided that if anything wasn't a fair exchange for better or for worse, it was wrong.
*SPOLER ALERT* The Black Spathi: kind like a race of stunt doubles. they where the ridge-crest errr backbone of the spathi fleet, their pilots were so cowardly that they survived many battles and destroyed many starhips in the process. The Pkunk will explain that they became so cowardly that they wrapped around and became brave, like the ilwrath. They are a combat thrall but will gladly go with the alliance if it means bravely defying their overlords. The capatain must send the black spathi on a secret mission (before the other races find out about their existance ) to attack the Thraddash and overthrow culture 22. The Thraddash then join the black spathi in culture 23 where the black spathi happily take the, under their wing.. er... claw? *spoiler out*
Ur-Quan (both)
When the Sa-matra was destroyed the Ur-quan race, for the first time in millenia, new true fear. For the first time in history the Kor-ah and the Kzer--- the green ones--- joined forces. After all the battle thralls in the sector failed to respond, the kzer-ka (right?) agreed that the species of the sector were a threat, and needed to be destroyed. The combined forces however were overwhelmed. (mostly pyscologically, after the Sa-Matra was destroyed, they were in shock and terror) after there fleet was halved by alliance races in 3 weeks, they retreated from the sector. Some stayed behind and became the Kor-Ah pirates. The Pirates were dissillusioned about the fate and superiority of the ur-quan race but because the alliance destroyed ur-quan dominance forever, they hate it with a passion. After the Druuge leave they join the Crux (or another hegemonic organization composed of the VUX, Mycon, Umgah(only if the captain insults the umgah), yehat terrorits *refer to yehat/pkunk* and another insectiod (they kinda look like these guys in my drawings http://tommyyune.com/presto/journeyman3/imagegallery/J3-TSA.Jhess.cu2.html but not completely..) race that the VUX made first contact with and convinced that the Alliance, namely the human race was composed of bigoted and evil people. Back to the Ur-quan... Some time after they retreat, (not immediatley when the game starts) they loop around and attack the Utwig, Slylandro, Supox, and ZFP forces. (the Utwig Supox adn ZFP retreat, and the captain can save the Slylandro's but. They have two slave races helping them, the Androsynth who replicate artificially and the Ur-quan control their reproduction and another race uplifted by the ur-quan who emit a gas on their homeworld that sterilized all of them, give them starfaring technology, and keep in line through the promise of a cure. The captain has to re-initiate a doctrinal war, and during that get their battle thralls to defect to the alliance. Once this is done (depending upon the players involvement in the doctrinal war) the ur-quan will either leave swearing to return, leave and both groups go their separate ways, or a small group of them will join with the kor-ah pirates to colonize a small group of stars while the rest leave “hoping than no circumnstances force them back to this part of the galaxy. I want to be clear that getting rid of the ur-quan DOES NOT END THE GAME. It’s more of a sidequest really.
Umgah: One of the early missions should be to make formal contact with the Umgah homeworld on behalf of the alliance, this can either end with the Umgah joining the alliance, remaining neutral, or joining the Crux. It would be cool if this was somewhat of a moral decision, is it best to have the Umgah as an ally despite the cruelty they can show toward other races when playing practical jokes, leave them alone, or fight against their evil ways.
Androsynth/Orz: *MAJOR SPOILER NO JOKE TURN BACK NOW* As I said before the Ur-quan capture some Androsynth survivors, The Orz basically are the ultimate evil the Spathi talk about in the previous game. The orz are not composed of cells and cannot truly be seen by the human eye because they do not reflect light. Instead the orz project a mental image of how they want to look to the viewer a “smell”. The orz suck out the souls of other races to feed on, play with, and be together with. The orz are not aware that this practice is harmful to others. When the Orz came through the portal and made contact with the Androsynth, they formed an alliance, months afterward the orz began the process of sucking out the Androsynth’s souls. Some of the Androsynth survived and fled into another dimension like quasispace, they choose the nearest portal but because of temporal and space differences between the dimensions did not come out for a very long time and when they did they were above the sector of space the player had accesss to in SC2. When the Ur-quan fled they ran into the androsynth survivors and re-subjugated their colonies. When the Androsynth enter space the Orz start to bug out and go crazy but when they join the alliance the Orz all vanish. Orz ships can then be seen in quasi-space and they attack on sight. *ok it’s over*
The Crux: as I mentioned before I think that there should be a Crux, not like the one in SC3 but more of a counter for the alliance. The player must get each of the Crux races to join forces with the Alliance in order to stop the ultimate evil from destroying everyone and everything in the sector. This is more easily done if the captain eliminates the VUX and the Mycons
The Mycon: I just want you to think how the mycon responded if you said: “If Juffo-wup finds nourishment in decay, than must there be non to decay, lest the hot light burn out?”
The VUX: Are ZEX and DAX alive? Probably not. But it would be cool if you had to talk to their ancestors. The VUX are the defacto leaders of the Crux and obtained the sun device from the wreckage of the sa-matra (well the device was somewhere in a nearby system because of the power of the explosion). They use this to control the Mycon and threaten to drop it in any alliance members space so that the Mycon will invade them. Once the Captain tricks ZEX’s son into giving him the sun device than the captain drops it on the VUX homeworld and the Mycon are drawn to it and this causes a confrontation between the Mycon and the VUX who eventually attack each other and the entire Crux falls apart. The insectoids and Umgah can then be convinved to join the alliance.
The Faz: you remember the mhrmhrm, well it turns out that they are a Faz creation. After the Ur-quan slave shielded them they never returned. The Faz, after their hierarchy ship did not come on it’s routine mineral drop off, initiated their scheme. They designed and build mechanical sevants to mine the nearby star systems, and for years on end they had their machines search sector after sector for a way to take down the slave shield, when a mhrmhrm ship makes contact with the Chmmr, the Chmmr instruct them on how to do so. The Faz have become cold and bitter due to their many generations of slavery, and first try to order the chmmr to due their bidding. This causes the chmmr to become even more difficult and the captain convinces them not to follow the path of hatred taken by the ur-quan after the dynnari. The Faz then help in completing the process.
The Yehat:
Even with their new queen the clans remain wary of one another, and stay in their designated sectors of space. There are frequent terrorist raids by the zeep zeep (I think) clan who are still loyal to the veep-neep queen as true rulers of the yehat. After the Crux treaty the yehat terrorists can be convinced to rejoin the rest of yehat society, which is undergoing cultural changes because of the Pkunk. The result if a serious and fair society focused on the grand and spiritual meaning of things. The Shofixti become jealous of the Pkunk and will become neutral unless the player intervenes and the cultural influences of the Pkunk are shared wih the shofixti as well.
The Slylandro: One of the returned probes brought the Slylandro the coordinates of a rainbow world. The slylandro remembering what the Melnorm had told them used their probes to contact the melnorm and traded this knowledge for the ability to modify their probes programming. This way the Slylandro can use the probes to harves minerals to build more… probes and other things should the slylandro wish to do so and collect bio-data to trade with the Melnorm. Those gus are biology nuts huh? When the ZFP, Utwig, and Supox retreat to Cmmr, Earthling, and Syreen space, the Slylandro cannot follow. The combined ur-quan armada attacks them but they use their probes to defend Source. The captain can warp in and save the Slylandro’s but from the ur-quan dn in return the Slylandro will provide specifications for their probes (with missles now too!) to add to the captain’s battle fleet as well as data on mineral rich worlds.
The Utwig: I already talked about the Utwig and the Supox and ZFP retreating, well things get a little crowded and the Supox enter human space, and the ZFP and Utwig enter Chmmr space. The Utwig lose faith in the Ultron because they couldn’t defeat the Ur-quan dn the Captain must restore their faith.
Whew... that took a while... hope some of my ideas are used. Oh and i forgot to mention my cousin is a music major and would help with the sound track. thanks!
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Cedric6014
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Crikey Scorpio803, thanks for your interest!
It's funny because I was about a day away from posting an update on here. Keep an eye out for that
I didn’t realise that I had neglected this thread for so long. You’ll find a bit more recent dialogue here:
Anyway, I’ll send you a P.M. in the next day or so. Check your messages
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scorpio803
Zebranky food
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Posts: 7
The name of the place: BABYLON 5
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sweet, i got your pm, thanks. Bummer that the Utwig, ZFP, and Supox have to be dropped. Aw well... it would probably be better if they were just name-dropped and the Slylandro explained their fate:
1. They were totally annighalated
2. They got away?
3. They're still fighting and if the ur-quan aren't thrown into a war then the slylanfro tell you they are eradicated, ZFP, then supox, then Utwig.
I still like the druuge starbase idea... :-(
Alright, i'll end it now before it turns into five pages... anyways, what were you reffering to with "here:" I assume you linked to a new thread or something but i can't see it...
EDIT: wait, no thraddash? NOOOOOO!!!!!
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« Last Edit: November 27, 2009, 09:34:24 am by scorpio803 »
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CelticMinstrel
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Scorpio, I'd say that monster post you made is material for you to make a mod of your own. Go for it!
I think there are several things in your ideas which don't make sense, but your post is too long that I'm not going to go through again to point them all out.
Also, you know you can actually hide spoilers?
[spoiler]Like this![/spoiler]
Below are several very belated responses to the rest of this thread.
As for mod discussion I recommend the #uqm-arena on IRC freenode to talk.
That's a pretty odd idea – why not make a new channel instead? Possibly a secret and/or private one?
Actually, spheres dont have to centre on homeworlds, so I could just shift it down a bit. To me, it makes most sense for the Earthing sphere to encompass the Centauri constellation, Sol, and Sirius... and anything else that fits in that ring.
-conduct missions as either a regular human officer or as Zelnick on behalf on Star Control
[...]
-you play this either as Zelnick, or, if it is further into the future, as the young captain
Playing as Zelnick should never be an option.
Evil guyz stay evil. Good guys stay good, but can become evil. Evil NEVER becomes good. Amen.
Um... no, evil can definitely become good. It's called redemption.
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CelticMinstrel
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Oh, one other thing... this is the second time I've seen someone transplant the bottom left corner of the original map into the top right corner of a new map, and that doesn't really make sense to me. I feel like there should be a lot less stars below and to the left of the SC2 map than there are within it, whereas above and to the right there should be a lot of new stars. Is there a way to expand the map and make it four times bigger, so that the entire SC2 map is the lower left quadrant of a larger map?
Whether this would be desirable for Cedric's mod, of course, is quite another matter. I just think it's a more logical way to do it.
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scorpio803
Zebranky food
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Posts: 7
The name of the place: BABYLON 5
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Scorpio, I'd say that monster post you made is material for you to make a mod of your own. Go for it!
This is something i have already considered. While i would love to do so, i don't really think i have skills required, like a basic understanding of C++... besides, it seems that if more people collaborate on a single project, it gets done faster. Not that i'm crossing that option off or anything 
I think there are several things in your ideas which don't make sense, but your post is too long that I'm not going to go through again to point them all out.
Hmm... now that you mention it.... i'll go through it sometime and proof-read. thanks for the in-put
Actually, spheres dont have to centre on homeworlds, so I could just shift it down a bit. To me, it makes most sense for the Earthing sphere to encompass the Centauri constellation, Sol, and Sirius... and anything else that fits in that ring.
You could just expand the ring, and have it overlap with the chmmr ring, kind of like the mhrm and the chenjesu did in the SC2 map.
ALSO:
expanding the map while retaining the original stars would be great, this would allow more of my ideas to be incorperated into the project. It would probably change game-play though, because to get around that big a map would require enourmous amounts of fuel (not to mention planet landings). Maybe fuel would be less RU, or because you have a different ship it can travel farther with the same amount of fuel. Oh, and thanks for showing me bout the spoiler thing.
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« Last Edit: November 27, 2009, 08:31:10 pm by scorpio803 »
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SuddenDeath
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from Sunstrike's image pack
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Oh, one other thing... this is the second time I've seen someone transplant the bottom left corner of the original map into the top right corner of a new map, and that doesn't really make sense to me. I feel like there should be a lot less stars below and to the left of the SC2 map than there are within it, whereas above and to the right there should be a lot of new stars.
Yeah, this is what I think as more natural too.
If you look at the starmap (the paper one that came with SC2), you'll see that the galactic core is in the "northeast" direction.
The Ur-Quan subraces travelled spinward/antispinward, and each managed to traverse one half of the galaxy. So they would have started in the "northeast" end of it (where their homeworld is*), and met each other at the opposite, "southwest" end, which is our local space in SC2.
Canonically, we can expect Pkunk space to be on the edge of the galaxy or very near it. So there would be empty space in around 3/4 of Cedric's starmap, but since this is not a canonical extension of the SC storyline, I guess we can accept this and "forget" about that coreward-pointing arrow 
*and likely the homeworlds of some old Milieu races, notably the Faz, Yuptar and Mael-Num (Melnorme)
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« Last Edit: November 27, 2009, 10:30:32 pm by SuddenDeath »
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Cedric6014
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Could you explain why the direction of the core means there are no stars south west of pkunk space?
There is a much greater density of stars in the south-west corner of the original starmpap. The stars are very sparsely scattered along the north and east
I've extended what seems to be a high density cluster of stars into the new starmap. Why would the clusters stop at the edge of the new starmap
Also, the galaxy is 100,000 light years wide. while over this scale star distribution may become denser, over the relatively minute section of space in the SC universe (maybe 1,000 light years wide) its is quite plausible for there to be dense clusters further out from the core.
Remember - the galaxy has spiral arms. it is not an even distribution of stars getting denser and denser
And I'd like to point out that, while this is not a canon extinension, it's aim is fit in seamlessly with the canon that does exist.
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SuddenDeath
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I assumed that, since both Ur-Quan subraces did a semi-circle of the galaxy in opposite directions and this was on the other side from where they started, that this area of space would be on the galaxy's edge. Good point about the spiral arms though.
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Cronos
*Many bubbles*
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Shofixti Scoutmaster
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/delurks
I love what I'm seeing and I'd love to help. I can write dialogue if you need it and do some voice acting too if that's what you require. 
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