Aut'akh are coming! feedback here

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

The Aut'akh are a decentralized religious society along the lines of a cargo cult. Formed by a group of scientists and engineers after the contact war, the Aut'akh symbolically seize and control their own spiritual destiny through ritualistic augmentation. In recent days, the Aut'akh have been making overtly friendly gestures toward nearly every power in the galaxy in an attempt to be formally recognized and avoid destruction by their brothers in the Hegemony.

https://github.com/Aurorastation/Aurora.3/pull/5919

https://wiki.aurorastation.org/index.php?title=Aut'akh

Please skim their PR and wiki page before passing judgement; it's easy to tell if you haven't when you post criticism.

The Aut'akh's torso, underneath the metal skin, is still squishy organs. In them beats the heart of a Unathi, and in their head is the brain of a Unathi. If you hit them in the torso, they will bleed.

The main mechanic of the Aut'akh are modular limbs.

Aut'akh will be able to remove their limbs and adjust them to have different tools for the present situation. They will also be able to spawn with job-restricted limbs such as a security arm that acts as a weak stun baton when someone is in your grab.

FAQ
Why are these Unathi, instead of a human or skrell group?

• The flippancy of the physical body for religious Unathi makes an extreme unathi group have the same flippancy to maiming their own bodies so extremely on a scale large enough to make it mainstream. The Aut'akh are not the first group to literally make tool based augments, just like Ford was not the first person to make an automobile. It's the breakthrough in the production of these tools and the method that they make them re-usable.

OK, but why not humans?

• Are you telling me you'd find it better to have a human radical religious cult dedicated to amputating their limbs and their kids limbs and augmenting babies to tap into an AI overseer for the purpose of obliterating conventional culture and gender, and that it would mesh with the current themes playing with our current factions? I wouldn't! 

I thought Unathi were primitive?

• No

Why did you flip your views on trans-humanism?

• Vux made an argument for it with a niche that was convincing enough. The intent behind Aut'akh is a bit different from other trans-humanist suggestions. These aren't just brains inside shells that grant full immortality with mainstream appeal and bad-assery that open it up to the entire galaxy to shed their mortal bodies - they're an oppressed religious minority who are responding to an extreme situation with extreme solutions. That said, I am willing to look to proliferate an overhaul for prosthesis in general, without copy/pasting everything from the Aut'akh so that they lose their only inherently "their" mechanics.

Will Aut'akh be able to speak EAL?

• No. It is still policy that every species gets their language(s) that only they can speak and understand. The only exception is the experiment with that tajara-basic hybrid that is terrible at understanding either, and that is probably as far as we will go while im in charge.

Apart from personally modifying their bodies to such extremes, are there any particular technological things the Aut'akh find themselves trying to develop technology for? What are their short and long-term goals?

• They want to be free of dependence, to survive, and to perfect Oss, their God in the computer.

Do they wanna be friends with synths?

• They want to be friends with everybody! It helps them survive.

When do they become playable?

• Once the mechanics are done......................... Soon

Will Aut'akh be able to play in Command roles?

• They will not for a long time, if ever. They are a maligned religious minority who are doing extreme things, and they have little clout or leverage and they weird everyone out. Not command material.

Edited January 8, 2019 by Marlon Phoenix

[SeniorScore]

12 minutes ago, Senpai Jackboot said:

OK, but why not humans?

• Are you telling me you'd find it better to have a human radical religious cult dedicated to amputating their limbs and their kids limbs and augmenting babies to tap into an AI overseer for the purpose of obliterating conventional culture and gender, and that it would mesh with the current themes playing with our current factions? I wouldn't! 

Maybe not a cult but we have several political subfactions, and whole human faction, more or less, dedicated to augments and being cyberpunk as shit. How this wasn't a prime candidate before backwards desert fucks I will never know. Humanity and skrell have, in theory, technological dominance of the known galaxy and this just.. does not reflect that in any capacity.

[Butterrobber202]

How does eating work, do I charge or do I devour steak?

 

also can I have a toolbelt for an arm? Because that is an engineering dream.

[TehFlaminTaco]

3 minutes ago, SeniorScore said:

Maybe not a cult but we have several political subfactions, and whole human faction, more or less, dedicated to augments and being cyberpunk as shit. How this wasn't a prime candidate before backwards desert fucks I will never know. Humanity and skrell have, in theory, technological dominance of the known galaxy and this just.. does not reflect that in any capacity.

Jackboot is the Unathi Loredev, not the human Loredev. He's more power to change this faction than Humanity.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Just now, Butterrobber202 said:

How does eating work, do I charge or do I devour steak?

 

also can I have a toolbelt for an arm? Because that is an engineering dream.

You will still be able to eat and drink, and need to. Some abilities will require nutrition to work.

 

Just now, TehFlaminTaco said:

Jackboot is the Unathi Loredev, not the human Loredev. He's more power to change this faction than Humanity.

Oh no!!!! Don't say that. I'm the big boss - I can do anything. But it didn't fit well.

 

Just now, SeniorScore said:

Maybe not a cult but we have several political subfactions, and whole human faction, more or less, dedicated to augments and being cyberpunk as shit. How this wasn't a prime candidate before backwards desert fucks I will never know. Humanity and skrell have, in theory, technological dominance of the known galaxy and this just.. does not reflect that in any capacity.

The closest faction is Eridani, but even they have the limit here. That said, as said, this opens the door to pushing the overton window deeper into cyberpunk territory. Since Skull said early on in this project that the modular limbs of Aut'akh opens the door to updating prosthetics in general.

I need to stress again that previously trans-humanist proposals were to make the group mainstream or generally bad-ass. The Aut'akh are an oppressed religious minority with extreme views. They're replacing the organs of kids dude come you need to have that cultural 'meh' attitude about the body.

Edited January 8, 2019 by Marlon Phoenix

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Quote

Humanity and skrell have, in theory, technological dominance of the known galaxy and this just.. does not reflect that in any capacity.

Automobiles existed and were very well done before Ford. This is the equivalent of the first Ford factory. Other people than Ford were able to make factories and cars that ended up better than Fords.

[Scheveningen]

ultimately, the issues I had(have? idk anymore) with Aut'akh were of the 'the promises changed' variety and in all honesty, I was of the 'tentatively pro-transhumanist' crowd roughly a year ago. It was sad to see it go (except for the xeno shells with MMI brains and psuedo immortality, screw that, it sucked), but it was for the better given the severity of shells at the time.

I'm all for it, at the end of the day. Some concerns I held were already addressed in a brief discussion with JB and one could consider me utterly convinced that this is fine for the most part.

[CommanderXor]

Out of curiosity will there be any restrictions on them? Certain jobs/departments locked, unable to play command/certain command, and so on?

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Just now, CommanderXor said:

Out of curiosity will there be any restrictions on them? Certain jobs/departments locked, unable to play command/certain command, and so on?

Great question! This one slipped the list. No, Aut'akh will not be able to take any command jobs for quite some time, if ever. Aut'akh have only existed for about 10 years and they don't have a lot of leverage - they're also needing to be portrayed as a really weird and unpopular religious minority. Regardless of how trans-humanism goes we are still early in this era OOC and IC, so it's still super squicky and not command material.

[TehFlaminTaco]

Will they have their own whitelist? And or will it require the Unathi Whitelist?

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

As with all subspecies it will only require a whitelist for the primary (Unathi) race.  It's easier for both players and also whitelist managers. We had an internal discussion about requiring a synthetic whitelist as well, or making it a synth whitelist only thing, but neither are appropriate or really wanted and it doesn't have a precedent.

[SilverTalismen]

So how much of them internally will be Cybernetic, will all of their organs either be cybernetic or assisted and will their lifespan be longer, towards skrell age, as a result of their cybernetic mods, even if the group itself is only 10 years old or so?

Edit: Will they also fall prey to changelings and other such mimics or will they be unable to be absorbed due to outter metal core being unable to be reproduced?

Edited January 8, 2019 by SilverTalismen

[CommanderXor]

Another question, how will vampires work? Given teeth can't easily pierce metal. Will vampires have to resort to tricks to get them to open their cases to get blood?

[Guest Menown]

28 minutes ago, Senpai Jackboot said:

As with all subspecies it will only require a whitelist for the primary (Unathi) race.  It's easier for both players and also whitelist managers. We had an internal discussion about requiring a synthetic whitelist as well, or making it a synth whitelist only thing, but neither are appropriate or really wanted and it doesn't have a precedent.

One of the main complaints with species shells was people were using the shells to bypass the whitelist restrictions to play the species they appear as. How is this different?

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Just now, CommanderXor said:

Another question, how will vampires work? Given teeth can't easily pierce metal. Will vampires have to resort to tricks to get them to open their cases to get blood?

Joints and bits of the body that need to stretch and turn are made of a material that can be punctured. You can still shlurp out their blood.

Just now, SilverTalismen said:

So how much of them internally will be Cybernetic, will all of their organs either be cybernetic or assisted and will their lifespan be longer, towards skrell age, as a result of their cybernetic mods, even if the group itself is only 10 years old or so?

Edit: Will they also fall prey to changelings and other such mimics or will they be unable to be absorbed due to outter metal core being unable to be reproduced?

They claim to be immortal, but it's only been 10 years, so all bets are off on that one. We have no idea what their lifespan is. There might be unforseen complications that kill them off 20 years after their augmentation - or even 4.

There are lists of what organs are being replaced with cybernetics, or what cybernetics are added as is, on the PR and in the documents provided.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Just now, Menown said:

One of the main complaints with species shells was people were using the shells to bypass the whitelist restrictions to play the species they appear as. How is this different?

They are a unathi subspecies. You need a unathi whitelist to play the unathi subspecies. You cannot bypass the whitelist for the unathi subspecies if you have a whitelist for unathi.

[Guest Menown]

And shells were an IPC subspecies. You didn't need a separate whitelist to play the various types of shells, which was the main complaint at the time.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

These are not various types of shells. These are unathi. You need a Unathi whitelist to play this Unathi subspecies. They are not IPC's.

[Guest Menown]

1 minute ago, Senpai Jackboot said:

These are not various types of shells. These are unathi. You need a Unathi whitelist to play this Unathi subspecies. They are not IPC's.

They're otherwise augmented Unathi that possess large synthetic augmentations to their bodies that make them more synthetic than Unathi. If I wanted to play an IPC, but decided against it and just played an Auto'akh like a shell IPC, that'd be iffy, wouldn't it?

[Snakebittenn]

27 minutes ago, Menown said:

They're otherwise augmented Unathi that possess large synthetic augmentations to their bodies that make them more synthetic than Unathi. If I wanted to play an IPC, but decided against it and just played an Auto'akh like a shell IPC, that'd be iffy, wouldn't it?

Your Unathi whitelist would be stripped. 

[ShameOnTurtles]

How will other Unathi (not Aut'akh) be expected to react to them?

How centralized is the cult? Do they have a clear leadership?

Sort of leading on from the last questions, what kind of official status do they have on Moghes/Ouerea? If they have no official status, how open is the persecution of their cult, if any?

Are Aut'akh generally reserved or, as I would presume, the complete opposite of an orthodox and 'family values' Unathi?

 

EDIT: Can their limbs be removed by people other than themselves? This is something I would really like to see, and I think it would help even out their strengths.

[VUX]

1. Other unathi will react to them as they feel appropriate. The hegemony hates the Aut'akh completely and I assume Dominian unathi are the same.

2. The cult is completely decentralized. They have no leadership.

3. They are exterminated on sight on Moghes and presumably Ouerea.

4. That's a good question. I think effectively they eliminate a lot of the old social ideas but the general religious ones are still in place.

5. Ideally yes though I didn't really think of that and I dunno how easy that is to code. I don't like the idea of them popping off easily but you should be able to pry one off given a neckgrab and 30 seconds. When their arms are broken, it takes a circular saw to get them off.

[ShameOnTurtles]

Alright, thank you. One last question, how will the Hegemony react to NanoTrasen and the general galactic community accepting Aut'akh? If you would rather save this to develop in news articles and/or events that's cool, let me know.

[Huenererschrecker]

You want feedback and my feedback for the Aut'akh is that I hate them for multiple reasons. My main reason for that is that you take a traditional cyberpunk concept (Transhumanism) and apply it to a faction/race that has not a lot to do with it along with a religion that, depending on who you ask, says that any kind of prosthetic hurts their souls.

6 hours ago, Senpai Jackboot said:

Are you telling me you'd find it better to have a human radical religious cult dedicated to amputating their limbs and their kids limbs and augmenting babies to tap into an AI overseer for the purpose of obliterating conventional culture and gender, and that it would mesh with the current themes playing with our current factions? I wouldn't! 

Yes it would. Eridani for example has the social stigma of dreg and suits. A religious sect of transhumanists that tries to obliterate both of those classes to try and unify them into one sounds like the cyberpunk thing that they would do. Most of them already come pre-equipt with cybereyes and a neural implant (even if that is just in lore). Hell, some dreg would even jump at the opportunity to get their head chopped off, slapped on a synthetic body and ride it around in the most disgusting way possible.

Don't like the Eridani flavor? How about the techno-conglomerate from the frontier alliance. They don't have alot of lore but they are high-tech ships, pro-augmentation, see synthetics as equal life. It is very believable that one of the ships decides to grow a transhumanism cult that augments their babys right after birth.

5 hours ago, Senpai Jackboot said:

I need to stress again that previously trans-humanist proposals were to make the group mainstream or generally bad-ass. The Aut'akh are an oppressed religious minority with extreme views. They're replacing the organs of kids dude come you need to have that cultural 'meh' attitude about the body.

The only reason your robot lizards aren't seen as badass is because you stress that you want them edgy. You can just as easily create the same atmosphere with any other faction (Example, a dreg that joins transhumanism cult XY to get rid of his drugaddict body to get back any kind of quality of life or a child growing up in a cult on the conglomerate that is suffering from severe depression because it's seen as a freak by anyone not part of the cult it was born into).

My stance on this minority is that it does not fit unathi and should rather be given to any of the more cyberpunk/pro-synthetic factions first.

[Diona Gestalt (654)]

Surprisingly, subrace itself looks balanced enough that discomfort about "we can add X only if it's edgy, being badass/human is forbidden" will be diminished, in the end, and it indeed opens a way to add augments to other races.

Will implant section be expanded? Half of sub-fractions don't have their mechanics, it seems (camo systems, wireless connection). Will there be uplink-only unathi implants, in future? Traitors need their nodrop lasers/diamond-tipped bullets

"I am "interested" to see how the lore justifies Unathi outcasts somehow having access to the technology, resources, and industrial capacity, to invent, design, and mass produce what are pretty fucking advanced augmentations"-le lord fowl, discord salt. Plz explain

What's the public reaction of Skrells to a cargo cult of self-modifying AI? I don't think they would be happy at all.

Edited January 8, 2019 by Diona Gestalt (654)
Why is Overseer a loredev? Hence the mystery