>Humanity is only a small part of an alien alliance. Would

Start Trek did it.

Mass effect did it.

>>51208259
Humanity is a major player in mass effect.

>>51208222
If you use the real world as your guide, then the two things that influence your answer are A) what is the humans' contribution and B) what are they allied against.

If it's a desperate alliance against insurmountable odds, I can't imagine anyone will really give a shit. If it's an alliance where we participate in freedom of navigation exercises just outside the Great Annihilator for Duke Qkdlsljla'skjlsjjjjjfuck's ten-thousand-year jubilee parade at devastating costs to Earth's people just to demonstrate our mediocre fleet-in-being, then... maybe people would have a problem?

More background might be in order.

>>51208222
Rick and Morty -sort of- did it, and they did it in a realistic way

>>51208289
ME 3, maybe two
But in Mass Effect humans are little side chicks for the real players

>>51208222
What kind of an alliance is this?

Let's say that it's a fairly standard military alliance. An attack on one is an attack on all. There's some degree of shared command and intelligence, and it likely comes with close economic ties.

This wouldn't affect the day-to-day of the average human as much, and we'd likely be proud to be a part of it.

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>>51208222
See >>51208252. Run a United Federation of Planets where humans don't make up 90% of the cast because you're not limited by a makeup/prosthetics budget.

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>>51208222
>>51208672
Also, you could run something like the Tau Empire, where the HQ planet and main race of this alliance aren't human, and humans just see themselves as part of the larger picture.

>>51208728
Demiurg brotherhood responding.

>>51208809
Something to mine there?

>>51208865
>He says, in the middle of a battle.

>>51208537
>More background might be in order.

The alliance is strongly inspired by Covenant from halo. The leaders are pretty much Eldar/Protoss.

>>51208222
How about a setting where humanity was conquered, but so long ago that it's practically water under the bridge. Humans now are side by side by their once conquerors having fully integrated as valued members of the unified culture.

>>51208222

Humans are memetically manipulated by post-biological alien super-AIs to be happy with their lot. They regard the aliens with religious awe and hope to some day ascend to their level.

>>51208580
Even in those the problem in human centric presentation.
Main character is always human, and thus human is the biggest hero of the galaxy which makes humanity seem like bigger deal it otherwise would be in the setting.

But that's kinda same problem as what OP has.
It's easy to make setting where humanity is just one of many races, but it's a lot harder to properly present it and make players feel it.

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>>51208222
>Humans are relatively new to interstellar travel and have only just met extraterrestial life
>There are two (or more) large, intergalactic empires that have set their sights on earth
>Earth flipflops between alliances with the two, trying to remain neutral by playing the two larger entities out against eachother

Alternatively
>Same scenario, but now there are multiple large empires trying to add earth to their collection
>To these planets, the concept of nation-states is unknown: all politics is tied to race or species
>The aliens all start picking sides with various countries on earth and arming their chosen champions to the teeth
>A world war starts, with at stake what alien entity will rule Earth as a puppet state and what country will represent the entire planet
>Behind the screens, secret operatives (the PCs?) work hard to cut out as much alien influence as possible, reverse engineer alien technology and ally the countries of earth into one solitary front that can weather the alien storm, and perhaps even have earth acknowledged as an independent empire within the universe

>>51210943
Just make the humans a minority. Human soldier was trained by [insert alien here], his commander is also an alien, who has another totally different alien as their superior. The human's squad-mates are also aliens. Maybe the human has an alien pet at home or an alien girl he wants to go back to after the war? perhaps he has a buddy in the squad who is in the same boat as him being a minority, but is alien himself from another low profile planet?

>>51211020
I feel that with that kind of approach a thing happens which I tend to see when I play generic fantasy, where the different races just start to look like humans on different flavor.

If that's what you are fine with, then fine, but if one tries to build a feeling of "large amount of people you interact with are different from you, really different, biologically, culturally and historically," that's hard.

>>51208222
Why would you want a setting like that? I mean, you can do it setting-wise, but look at all the examples people gives. Humans are irrelevant but that's only to build a background for the human protagonists. Because, you know, your players are humans. The most obvious example is the Cal of Cthulhu were humans are literally irrelevant in the cosmic order yet the stories are all about humans. The same happens with Rick and Morty and to a degree with Star Trek (I haven't played ME). In 40k, where humans are not irrelevant at all but neither the only important species, the focus is always put on a human internal conflict of empire vs chaos with the conflict with the rest of species granting mostly background and variety for the miniatures game.

Just scrap humans completely if you want to avoid antropo-centrism. There's no other way.

>>51211095
Make all the PCs aliens.

Bam. Done. The focus is no longer on humans, because it's on the fucking aliens. Easy fix that none of those examples could use because - guess what - they all revolved around human main characters.

>>51211163
End result is that players will be playing bunch of humans with funny ears and skincolor.

>>51211209
So then what would scrapping humans entirely change, then, if aliens are just humans with a few extra features? By your logic, no matter what, players will play humans, even when they aren't playing humans.

Haven't you ever read a fantasy story or looked at a sci-fi world that tried to be revolutionary and do things from the orc's perspective or the alien's perspective, and make humans seem strange and antagonistic?

>>51211163
Why have humans if they're not playable? What's the purpose?

>>51211248
They always fail, and at best just manage to make the alien think like a non-westener human.

>>51211248
That's my point. It's really hard to make non human races seem sufficiently alien.

>>51211066
>If that's what you are fine with, then fine

Two things, one, humans with shit on their faces just to be make them different Star Trek style, is fine, lazy but acceptable, but not want I'm talking about. The universe is so vast that it is both entirely conceivable that you would encounter aliens that look nothing like humanity and others that would, the universe is large enough that the odds go both ways. If Earth were inhabited by sapient crabs and those crabs went to space to find another alien race of crabs, such a scenario would not be unheard of in a similar manner.

Number two, the easiest, most determinable way to make something or someone feel ordinary or insignificant among a larger scope is through supersaturation. Sword using heroes in fantasy fiction are ordinary, why? Because practically every hero in fantasy fiction uses one. If the OP wants to make a setting where humanity is just another cog in the greater mechanism of an alien alliance or empire, then the logical route would be to over saturate the audience with that fact. You want humans not to be special? Fine, the human is just another grunt in an alien army filled with other aliens who lives in a city with a small Chinatown-like block for humans (or not at all) in an overwhelmingly alien society. Make the fact that humans are just humans, be exactly that. The other aliens don't give a shit, they just expect of humanity what they expect of every other race in their alliance and likewise, humanity can trust that the many aliens it encounters in said alliance will expect humanity to be humans.

>>51211255
Why have monsters, alien creatures and various other races if they aren't playable? Or maybe they are playable, but like in fantasy how you can end up with no humans, in a sci fi universe the players might not pick any humans as well.

>>51211280
Which is admittedly a flaw of being human, and why I say 'try' to be revolutionary than actually really making a statement, but the point is it can be done. If you want to play all aliens, it's possible.

>>51211285
Sure, but that doesn't mean that you have to throw out aliens entirely, or throw out humans entirely just to force aliens for that matter. If you really want it, you can put your best effort in, even if it falls short.

>>51211285
>That's my point. It's really hard to make non human races seem sufficiently alien.

This is because humans view everything through our own cultural paradigms. If you saw an alien do something nice for another alien and said that alien was being humanitarian, you're doing it wrong.

>>51208252
Humans were the dominant species though

>>51211816
You could describe human dominance in Star trek as a benign tyranny. Humans were the focus of Federation but at the same time, they still had alien commanders, at least one alien president shown.

>>51208252
>>51208259
both somehow ended up at the top of their faction.

>>51211931
don't forget that everything bad in trek happened because of humans

>>51211009
What is it with SciFi and 'interstellar' empires? Is that the only political future you can imagine? At all? Moreover, your scenarios are completely against what the OP is trying to discuss. Lastly, why would fucking interstellar empires give that much of a shit about Earth? There are a shitton of resources in the solar system, putting aside greater milky way. There's no need for serious investment into conquering Earth.

>>51208672
That's also got the in-universe explanation in that we breed faster than practically all the other Federation species. If the ocampa joined, they'd probably end up outnumbering us and in every role eventually.

>>51213085
>What is it with SciFi and 'interstellar' empires? Is that the only political future you can imagine? At all?
No, they're just the best, coolest, and most preferable futures.

>>51213085
because the solar system has the one thing that is unique to it

humans

it's the only resource that you can't get anywhere else in the galaxy

>>51210762
So more of a federation than an alliance? The different member species are united under one government?

>>51210814
Oh.
A bit like in Last Angel except for the "valued members" part

>>51208222
I'm not sure I see the problem. Just tell the players that humans are only one of many sentient races, and aren't especially powerful or numerous. Then have most places they go be like the cantina scene in Star Wars.

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>>51208222
Read this

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Had something similar in a Stellaris game I played, funny enough.

>Hyper religious Aliens uplifted the broken and divided governments of Earth and added it to their sphere of influence.

>Slave-owning despotic empire that are probably just humans sucked through a wormhole onto another planet see humans as at best a "subspecies" they should probably enslave anyways.

>Earth was part of a series of planets released by a psuedo-tribal militant species. Humans were conscripted but otherwise left well enough alone

>Earth was later directly annexed by a libertarian-ish corporate confederation that was in an alliance with several neighboring Empires.

It was pretty fun. Pic related, Sol was ironically enough in the center of the Alien's Empire.

>>51210814
>>51214336
This is my ideal for any space empire.

>rapid expansion
>by diplomatic or military means
>keeps conquered/subjugated populations under control, but not oppressed
>subtly engineer their societies so they can assimilate into the primary one without too much trouble
>cue cosmopolitan super empire that's diverse in species, but has a single unified cultured

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>>51213768
>implying that humans haven't been regularly seeded to other systems

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>>51213085
>Lastly, why would fucking interstellar empires give that much of a shit about Earth? There are a shitton of resources in the solar system, putting aside greater milky way. There's no need for serious investment into conquering Earth.

Maybe they see the existence of any intelligent race not under their control as a potential threat.

>>51208222
Problem? Not really. Everyone loves an underdog. Besides, climbing up is more fun when you're at rock bottom.

>>51208222
>Would we have a problem with that

Does France have a problem being part of NA...

Okay, bad example.

Does Italy have a problem being a part of NATO?

>>51215624
Who cares what Italians think?

>>51215659
Your mother.

>>51214845
and where did the humans come from?

thats right, erff

>>51215777
>medplebs
>ever

>>51208222
Most of the galaxy is part of a multicultural empire and humans have average political influence, and are common without being the most common.
A bit like Stars Wars where there is a lot of worlds with loads of different alien races on here, but there is no a human majority.
You don't have to have almost all aliens heing humans with prothestic either.

>>51215845
To be honest, I figure that the best case scenario for humanity would be to just get into as many space ships as possible and ditch Earth. It's a good planet, don't get me wrong, but I'm sure there are plenty of people here who would rather take their chances out there.

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I can see some ranking political members of a Galactic government who are some kind of activists taking a interest in getting humans off their home world. So that if something bad happens to the planet at least their be some other humans somewhere else. And I can see this alien writing a letter to another politic about this case. Like the alien expressing that it is the right of all space faring beings to have a back up population.

>Being the newest (associate) member of the Galactic Axis humanity's presents in the galaxy is quite non-existent
>Humanity did have the fortune to emerge in another member's area of control, giving the race unknown protection
>The member race who was in control of that space has no problems in giving Humanity a slice of space to call there own, seeing how they have no operation in that area.
>Humanity's United Nation's has become their number one voice which is view favorably by the GA and as Associate Members of the GA they will have many benefits showed their way.
>Their population (there are around 12 billion humans) are all in one little solar system. And on top of that most humans still live on their home world. Meaning any major lost of life on that one planet alone would put the race to near extinction.
>But because they still have an non-existent presents in the galaxy and almost nothing to offer to the GA I believe that their status as an Associate member should be converted into a Protectorate member.
>Once that is done and they can settle themselves onto other world we can bring them back to Associate status.

>>51211209
Why ? I wouldn't have a problem with playing only a vaguely humanoid alien (bipedal and with arms) or even one with tentacles or a non-humanoid robot.
That's not like you are limited with a prothestic or animatronic budget, just search more exotic pictures of aliens beings on Google Image or something.

>>51215897
It's not about looks. It's the culture and feel, getting those properly alien is hard.

>>51215877
Yeah, Earth is going to become a backwater world in such a scenario.

>>51215936
I really like this article
http://www.rfreitas.com/Astro/Xenopsychology.htm

>>51215977
Something like this would be a good way to do it:
>>51215883

As a setting, I could see it taking place around here. PCs just got off the space boat, now they gotta find themselves a way to prosper in the big and wild galaxy.

>>51213085
Logistics.

If you have an interstellar armada going a particular direction in space, you either subjugate what's in your way or destroy it. Because going around or turning around would cost more fuel, the one thing you need the most of. And why bother destroying what you can milk for food resources and genetic stock.

>>51215977
Being a backwater in a space empire is the best case scenario. It's like being in Hufflepuff at Hogwarts, at worse, you get a few outliers that draw attention but you mostly get left alone while the bigger parties obliterate each other.

>>51216134
>It's like being in Hufflepuff at Hogwarts
That's an awful example, Hufflepuff was the house for hard work and loyalty. Humanity would quickly drop the backwater and become a place of importance.

>>51216134
Even so, I'd reckon any empire/federation/alliance thingy would put down some buildings and satellites nearby and on it. Stuff that might seem small to the faraway group of folks and AIs, but might end up.being big things to everyone here.

>>51216134
My idea was more something like most humans living in a political entity with a lot of races.
To change a bit from all the spaces empires with only one race and all.

>>51216163
There is a difference between humans having a good immigrants potential and Earth being important.

>>51216163
>Hufflepuff was the house for hard work and loyalty

Which had no presence at all and never rocked any boats except for that one time. Besides being known for hardwork and loyalty is pretty boss for a member of a space culture, everyone would come to Earth for good service letting us do our own thing otherwise.

>>51216187
So a benign empire?

>>51216231
There is a difference between what the Houses are supposed to be and what the members are though.

>>51216257
Yeah.
A less human-centric Federation or cosmopolite parts of Stars Wars.

>>51216262
Well no shit, I'm just saying that if your culture is known to other cultures for a particular quality, loyalty and hardwork is pretty good.

If you could have humanity and Earth be known for one thing in the minds of aliens across the universe, what would it be?

I pick spiders.

>>51215877
>I'm sure there are plenty of people here who would rather take their chances out there.
Why?

>>51216353
Probably the same type would would volunteer to be part of the first civilian wave in a Mars colony.

>>51208222
I prefer
>humanity reaches the stars, no one's home
>start spreading out at first everything goes according to plan
>then the political upheaval occurs
>you thought the balkans were bad
>X amount of years latter and the human territories are all united...sort of
>the current government is an Imperium in that so long as taxes and tithes are payed, certain laws are obeyed and a fealty is sworn all the other territories go their own way
>basically nothings changed, borders still move, governments rise and fall, governing philosophies fall in and out of favor and the occasional holocaust occurs
>when things get too out of hand an Imperial fleet drops of a sternly written letter and things usually return to normal
>little attention is payed to the xeno front first contact was made with an old probe, long ago it was theorized that alien society may exist far far away into the galaxy, later it was found exactly how far and few summon the energy to make the trip
>man is content to squabble in their corner of the shard of the galaxy, the alien powers that be are content to let them, rarely do the two come together aside from the odd bobble or mercenary band
>eventually someone remembers to care enough to attend the meeting of one federation or another little is said and few agreements made aside from the occasional circumstance where an official response is demanded
>rarer still is the circumstance that requires a concerted effort to encroach on either space en masse

>>51216353
Why people immigrate ?

>>51216385
Because conditions are shitty where they currently live, but the post responded to called Earth "a good planet."

>>51216314
>High Senator Feklaar, I hear you're going on vacations soon, anywhere special?
>Yes mediator, I was considering Earth
>The home of those humans? the ones that just joined our great congress?
>The very same, I hear their particular oxygen atmosphere makes for quite peaceful sunsets, something I should like to see
>But high senator, is they not the same place as the spiders?
>...Yesss, perhaps not then

>>51211095
>Cal of Cthulhu

Probably because I'm tired but that cracked me up.

>Yes, hello, this is Cal, down in the Cosmic Abominations department, I wanted to talk to you about mind-shredding evil

>>51216398
Some immigrants immigrate for hope or improvement even when things are not really bad.

>>51208222
>Would we have a problem with that?

No.

>I'm not sure how to present it.

Human characters should answer to alien superiors and have to work around alien bureaucrats. Also, have at least some human characters explicitly look up to certain races. There was a great bit in Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda where Dylan Hunt, human hero of the series, starts talking about the Vedrans, the "elder race" which had founded the All Systems Commonwealth. He made it clear he viewed them as superior life forms, who were nobler and wiser than anyone else in the three galaxies.

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>>51216441
>tfw even ancient cosmic horrors have to rely on middle management to get sdhit done.

>>51216610
Big evil is big business.

>Hey Karen, mr. Cthulhu asked me to call a Mr. Yog ...soysauce? No, that says sothoth... and ask to reschedule their golf game. Do you have his number? It's not in my rolodex.

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>>51208222
>Would we have a problem with being surrounded by hot alien chicks to bang?
Nope.

>>51216731
>It's a "R'Lyeh Codex" sir, not a rolodex.

>>51216750
Asari tits a superior

>>51215784
Yes, but now they aren't unique to earth.

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>>51216368
Reminds me of something....
When are we rolling out the these fuckers to stop the rebels?

>>51211095
>Sometime in the late 21st century, the first fusion reactor starts producing cheap electricity for the first time.
>After a few months, Cthulhu comes out of the sea, destroys it and in the following conflict a fair bit of humanity.
>As more and more groups submit to it, someone decides to ask why.
>"I was sleeping beneath the ocean and that thing was intolerably loud."
>okayface.jpg
>But then how are we supposed to provide for our people? All other methods have failed in one way or another.
>Oh, yeah, I kinda owe you for all that mess I made. Here, have some mindwrecking tech, that should help you out! I'll even stick around for a quick century to make sure you get it right.
>Humanity slowly but surely adopts crazy mindbending tech, which is part conventional tech, part magical space-time-mind-fuckery. Society turns into a somewhat authoritarian theocracy, following the teachings of Cthulhu, such as "don't use noisy tech to annoy ancient godlike beings", and "don't be a dick, it smells bad in the astral plane".
>Using kinda-sorta magic portals, humanity can travel in space almost instantly but only in tiny, tiny bunny hops, allowing just a little more than getting into orbit.
>Half a century later, humanity becomes that weird species who uses magic in a high-tech interstellar society.

>>51216368
So basically, a setting where nothing bad really happens aside from occasional internal squabbling, and no one really cares about each other?

It's not the worst, but when you really look at it it's kind of boring. Isn't there anything man wants from the xenos, an edge in their squabbling, a resource? Isn't there anything the xenos want from humanity?

I get that the xenos aren't human, but in real world history, it's not as if countries more or less peacefully expanded, bumped into each other, and then never really had contact again. Even if oceans separated them, a shitton of people sailed to other lands.

>>51217295
I don't why you are assuming so, there can still be conflict.

>>51208222
Yes. Anyone still retarded enough to think that the only sane solution to the discovery of sapient aliens isn't immediate genocide is too stupid to be allowed to speak for any part of humanity.

>>51217444
What.
Could you at least elaborate on the reasons why ? genuinely curious.

>>51217444
That's a lot of xenophobia there, mate, you really should go for a colonoscopy because there's a lot of pent up agression stuck in your ass. And don't start with logic or reason, because those things say that in order to become a spacefaring species, you must pool your resources, tech, and manpower together, which means you must not be an absolute ass, which in turn means that a spacefaring culture will be much more likely to be at least non-hostile than genocidal. Ironically, the very thing you want to prevent is spawned by your own attitude.

>>51208222
Earth is now the alien's Afghanistan. Take that and run with it.

>>51211255
Someone give him the screen of an alien party discovering something about their FTL gate network.

>>51211816
Wasn't that the Borg?
Humans were protagonist, so the most focus was on them, obviously.

>>51217845
>Afghanistan
>not The Balkans

>>51208222
Not having every player character and major npc is a good start. No matter how you present it, if the majority of charaters is human it wil still result a humans in space story rather than an alien alliance which also has humans.

>>51218152
>*every player character and major npc BE A HUMAN

>>51214548
>Abaddon's Demesne

Where he broods while searching for his arms.

>>51218152
You could mix it.

You mainly see humans in our solar system. Once you leave it, humans will become extremely rare.

>>51217845
I think the spirit is more like a small second world country.

>>51216134
Worst House
Huffers need to go and stay go

>>51216289
>Space Mexicans

>>51208222
>>Humanity is only a small part of an alien alliance.
>Would we have a problem with that? I'm not sure how to present it.

Easy.

You center the game around a few humans tasked with a mission deep in the cosmpolitan center of the alien alliance. And then put them in a campaign millions of lightyears from home, and not meet a single human, except over maybe a few videocalls that has a 30 minute delay.

Bonus points for making the players feel less human as the campaign goes on.

>player character human urban warfare veterans along with many other alien veterans are brought to an rebellious planet for advisory work and training the local military forces
>rebel forces commit an atrocity and manage to beat back local military forces so bad, the player characters have to get their hands dirty
>the war is brutal, but the players manage to turn the tide, and despite the horrible rebel attack, the war is won
>players however are fucked up, and require severe cyborgification and/or biomechanical engineering to survive
>their commanding officer back on earth coldly states that the population of their nation is vehemently against bringing strange half-alien killing machines back, and the politicians don't want to go against public opinion
>the alien commander of the local military forces gives them a card
>it's an multi-species mercenary company mainly composed out of young species that have had similar experiences - wounded in battle, given standard military "healthcare", suddenly seen as monsters on their home planet

I dunno man.

>>51216385
To find tasty white women

>>51213085
>What is it with SciFi and 'interstellar' empires?
Because we know that the direct surroundings of our planet are both uninhabited and uninhabitable. For us humans to deal with aliens, we already need to introduce an interstellar dimension, which implies FTL travel. Interstellar empires being formed by beings who have already passed this threshold is not beyond reason.

For most sci-fi it's either that or martians living under the surface of Mars.

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>>51214845

Old, but effective trope.

I prefer the GCIII models personally.

>>51218650
Yay for the cosmopolitan aliens.

>>51217959
They meant dominant species within the Federation. It's not like aliens are second class citizens or anything, but Earth is the capital of the Federation, and Starfleet seems to have far more humans than any other race. So humans aren't just one small unremarkable part of the whole.

>>51217845
There are several TV shows with that theme, and both Marvel and DC comics use it.

If you think about it, it does sort of make sense right now. As much as we want the surveillance state, we've got plenty of gaps for super advanced aliens to hide away from the intergalactic IRS and the panplanetary Mafia. Not only that, you could have enemy empires trying to.muck with the advisors of other empires.

>>51217444
Even putting aside any ethical objections to that, you seem to be taking it for granted to we could win a war with them. Which is a pretty big assumption. Unless we were the very first to get out into the galaxy, we would be at a severe disadvantage in both tech level and resources.

>>51216089
If you pick your direction even remotely carefully you're not going to hit other civilizations. Space is absolutely massive and almost entirely empty.

>>51218650
I'd play this.

>>51218650
>>51221481
Yeah sounds rad as fuck.

>>51208222
>I'm not sure how to present it.
"humanity is only a small part of an alien alliance"

>>51217295
The idea is that's just the current state of things, then something happens that makes the galaxy feel a lot smaller, that's where the fun starts, seeing what happens when you can't ignore each other anymore.

In my setting earth was bought by a weeaboo space dragon that practically froze all technological and cultural advancement so that the planet would stay exactly how he likes it.
He eventually let any humans who wanted to leave earth and explore the galaxy do so, and the humans who left still respect the dragon as the owner of earth.

>>51221648
Weeaboo space dragon ? so Earth is like anime now ?

>>51213085
Well what would you call an interstellar government?

>>51215883
Another way to do the first part of your post is to say that they are removing humans from earth in order to preserve the earth, not the other way around?

>>51214572
USA, USA, USA !!

>>51221750Nah, it sounds to environmentally hippie that way. You'd get stories about people mad they are being relocated.

The way the other person put it would be better. What happens when entire towns just up and ditch the planet, leaving 'that guy' who would be the hero of some HFY story all by his lonesome? What if his only 'human' contact ends up being some alien undergrad studying the Earth reparation effort?

>>51221697
That depends on what king of government it is. Empire implies a collection of formally sovereign states that have been conquered or otherwise coerced into accepting the rule of a central government.

>>51221687
Long story short, the dragon came here to buy the planet but wanted to spend about a hundred years getting to know the place first. While he was living among the people, he fell in love with earth's culture with a heavy bias towards Japanese culture (despite never at any point visiting the island).
When he bought the planet he did everything possible to preserve the culture, but Japan was pretty much molded into a parody of its original self.
That's why the strongest space faring human faction is a Japanese Corporation with a Feudal Japan aesthetic. They took advantage of the dragon's bias to get support from him, but then as generations passed and the corporation left earth for space the fact that it was all a trick was lost to history.

I know it doesn't make a lot of sense, but I needed a way to justify the players fighting space samurai.

>>51221975
Were there other Dragons buying up planets? What about aliumz?

>>51222115
Dragons are insanely long lived, so they have practically infinite resources. As a result, they are all engaged in an everlasting battle against boredom.
In order to combat that, they do all sorts of shit.
Some go around buying up planets, some compile massive hordes, and some just go on killing sprees. They say that no dragon has ever lived to the end of their natural life because they always end up either killing themselves or getting killed by people who are sick of their shit.

There's a whole wealth of alien empires and kingdoms and such. Humans are technically the most powerful, but they are fragmented into dozens of different factions that aren't even in the top three individually.

>>51221975
I am loving the fundamental idea here - come up with a dumb idea (or take a dumb idea from somewhere else) and coming up with an Insane Troll Logic reason for it to work.

>>51222277
Thanks. That's pretty much my whole design philosophy on this setting honestly.

>>51215998
Thank you for linking that anon. I found it interesting.

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>>51208222
It's not like this hasn't happened plenty of times throughout human history (a culture being dominated by a larger empire/union of different cultures).

Just read anything Indians circa 1900 wrote about the British Empire. Or is finding original sources is too much trouble, just read the George Orwell novel 'Burmese Days'. The characters of Dr Veraswami and U Po Kyin should give you a well balanced perspective on how to play that sort of situation.

>>51208567
underrated post

>>51222624
Fasxinating.

>>51211009
>Earth flipflops between alliances with the two, trying to remain neutral by playing the two larger entities out against eachother

Imagine if Somalia wanted to play the Russian Federation and NATO against each other. How would they do it?

Now put this in a planetary scale.

>>51210762
Well if you go the Covenant route you've got religious zealotry to unify the people. You've got a good dynamic there by fleshing out their religion - maybe the people on top say humanity is welcome in heaven's light, but what if the average joe Martian thinks humans are blasphemous because we eat fish or have pairs of most of our parts?

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>>51208222
>>Humanity is only a small part of an alien alliance.
I recommend reading this book for that. It's a great read and I bet you'd get a lot a great ideas from it.

>>51213085
To be fair you see interstellar republics and federations just as much as you see empires. Interstellar theocracy's and military juntas/dictatorships are less common but not unheard of. I think the only form of government that isn't really represented in sci-fi is feudalism (and communism if you want to count that), the only example I can think of is the Imperium.

What I'd really like to see is an interstellar government based on the HRE. Between the politicking in the capital, the large amount of different cultures and species mixing together, and the relatively loose central authority there would be room for all kinds of interesting stuff to happen.

>>51226152
Replace "Somalia" with "Ukraine", "Baltics" or "Syria".