Alien races: The Bizzarre form VS the vaguely humanoid form

[Serendipity]

Humanoid aliens just don't work for me. If it's supposed to be a fantasy that's one thing, but my suspension of disbelief just gets snapped when "aliens" are humans with some oddity of culture or (worse) the "one bizarre facial feature" aliens of Star Trek.
Does this work in a SFRPG? Not terribly - which is why I tend to think aliens should be npcs in the SF games I've run and played in.

 

[Urizen]

Ugh, I had a long post that got eaten by Enworld.. dangit.

Anyhow,

As I mentioned before, I tend to fall in the humanoid camp, for a number of reasons.

I need to be able to identify with a race on both a physical level and to a lesser extent, a psychological level.

For instance, I have no idea what a race of creatures that are essentially sentient octopi are thinking or feeling. I can't wrap my head around how to play them, if they don't have some distinct human features.

Also, the in-game mechanics of movement, tactile control (holding a gun, or manipulating other objects) ids also very important.

Communication.. eh, not so much. technology can easily take care of that. But motor skills are very important to me.

 

[Urizen]

I also think that really bizarre aliens work best as NPC's, where the GM can run wild with their cultures, bodies, psychology, etc.

That's half the fun of a scifi/space opera game, meeting strange new races...

And killing them.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I also think that really bizarre aliens work best as NPC's, where the GM can run wild with their cultures, bodies, psychology, etc.

That's half the fun of a scifi/space opera game, meeting strange new races...

And killing them.

And looting the...erm...bodies?

 

[Urizen]

And looting the...erm...bodies?

Yeah!

Can't forget the loot!

 

[Dragonbait]

For instance, I have no idea what a race of creatures that are essentially sentient octopi are thinking or feeling. I can't wrap my head around how to play them, if they don't have some distinct human features.

Would the sentient cephilopods be more understandable if they still enjoyed watching movies, eating pizza, or surfing the internet for por..er... Cookie monster singing Chocolate Rain on YouTube?

None of those are things tha specifically say "Only two-armed, two-legged, bald apes can do these things."

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

FWIW, were I to play a sentient cephalopod, I'd probably go the "cold, logical intelligence" route.

I say that because I've seen a lot of the videos of cephalopod behavior. They're wicked smart and powerful predators- I've seen videos ranging from them opening jars to get at crabs (alluded to in Deep Rising) to taking down sharks in academic reef tanks (the scientists were worried that the octopi were in danger in the tank...).

I've also had discussions with people who actually work at some of the major aquariums. One guy said that an octopus in their quarrantine area was climbing out of its tank- at night, when no humans were around- and eating fish in other quarrantine tanks. That meant it had good vision (it spotted and identified prey from a distance through distortions caused by water, glass, and air), an awareness that humans could be a threat (it waited until they were gone), and the will and determination to crawl several yards through a hostile environment in order to get a meal it preferred over what it was being fed.

Another person told of how a Giant Octopus about 6' in diameter actually grabbed one of his coworkers and tried to drag her into its tank. It used 3 tentacles to anchor itself into its tank and the other 5 to wrangle her towards the water. It took several people to fend off the attack.

 

[Mallus]

For instance, I have no idea what a race of creatures that are essentially sentient octopi are thinking or feeling.

You could just make something up. It's not like you can be wrong.

I can't wrap my head around how to play them, if they don't have some distinct human features.

All SF aliens have some distinctly human features. Actually, they tend to have mostly -- if not entirely -- human features with a patina of alien-ness, extrapolated behavior based on non-human terrestrial zoology, or just plain quirk sitting over top like oil on water.

And the SF aliens that don't aren't characters, they're usually used to demonstrate the limits of human understanding or specific philosophies/modes of knowing (like Lem's sentient ocean in Solaris).

 

[Urizen]

Would the sentient cephilopods be more understandable if they still enjoyed watching movies, eating pizza, or surfing the internet for por..er... Cookie monster singing Chocolate Rain on YouTube?

None of those are things tha specifically say "Only two-armed, two-legged, bald apes can do these things."

Good point!

The answer is probably no, because they are still too non-human in form for me to accept it.

My first question I asked myself when reading your post was "why would something like that even want to do those things?"

It just doesn't make sense to me in that context.

Of course, then I start wondering how a sentient octopus (or squid) plays a useful heroic role in the context of an average adventure.

Give it some human characteristics and I'd be more willing to accept the form, I think.

You know, it's interesting, as I read this thread I'm reminded of the star trek movie "The Undiscovered Country," where the Klingons get into a debate with Kirk and Bones and crew about Human perception of race, and racist language which permeates the human vocabulary, when applied to non-humans ("inalienable humans rights, etc..).

If, say, a klingon were reading this thread, he/she might find it very insulting!

 

[Urizen]

FWIW, were I to play a sentient cephalopod, I'd probably go the "cold, logical intelligence" route.

I say that because I've seen a lot of the videos of cephalopod behavior. They're wicked smart and powerful predators- I've seen videos ranging from them opening jars to get at crabs (alluded to in Deep Rising) to taking down sharks in academic reef tanks (the scientists were worried that the octopi were in danger in the tank...).

I've also had discussions with people who actually work at some of the major aquariums. One guy said that an octopus in their quarrantine area was climbing out of its tank- at night, when no humans were around- and eating fish in other quarrantine tanks. That meant it had good vision (it spotted and identified prey from a distance through distortions caused by water, glass, and air), an awareness that humans could be a threat (it waited until they were gone), and the will and determination to crawl several yards through a hostile environment in order to get a meal it preferred over what it was being fed.

Another person told of how a Giant Octopus about 6' in diameter actually grabbed one of his coworkers and tried to drag her into its tank. It used 3 tentacles to anchor itself into its tank and the other 5 to wrangle her towards the water. It took several people to fend off the attack.

Wow, that's pretty amazing!

See, now somehting like that would make a great "cthulhu'esque" adversary.