Creating our own canon, race names?

[shadowsafer]

Hey everybody,

Not sure if this has been mentioned before, but with the upcoming character creator we can make a lot of new races.
Would it be an idea to have a database somewhere that collects these new race names and possibly the templates of these new races?

My main reason for asking all this is because I want to play with a half vulcan/ half betazoid captain, meaning I'll use the character creator to create my own costum race. However it would be logical if this offspring of combined existing races get their own name.
Personally I don't care too much what this race will be called like, but it would be awesome to have some uniformity in all this.
So far the only known halflings race name that I know that exists and is generally excepted are the Kirkians. The race name may have started like a joke but it's exactly the example that I mean here.
When you're talking about the Kirkians the community here knows exactly what you're talking about! To call my new race half vulcan/ half betazoid sounds lame at best..

So what I like to know is, how do you guys deal with this 'problem'?
Are there any suggestions for such a database already?

Perhaps Cryptic themselves could allow us to upload templates, register race names and allow people to download them so we can get some uniformity in all this?

On the other hand I can also imagine that some people are completely against the idea of such uniformity and just want the freedom to call their race whatever they want. Since so many fans are real nitpicks when it comes to canon though I thought this would be an interesting discussion. :D

(Ps. I meant nitpicks in a positive way, I'm not out to offend anybody! :p)

[Arokh72]

Spockians?

Vulcanoids?

Thunder Cats?

[Rakos]

I call Klingot's.

[shadowsafer]

I was thinking of Vultazoid myself (sounds better then betacan), but the actual race is off topic and not really of much concern for now. ;)

I'm more interested in knowning if more people want something like a database for race names so other people can use that too.

[Arokh72]

Not a bad idea in theory, not sure how it'd go practically. I'm more concerned about races like ROFLcopterians or Pwnazoids or even L33toids.

[Rakos]

I was thinking of Vultazoid myself (sounds better then betacan), but the actual race is off topic and not really of much concern for now. ;)

I'm more interested in knowning if more people want something like a database for race names so other people can use that too.

What would be cool is a way to duplicate someones race easily. Either in-game program or third party.

Although, we actually have yet to know exactly how much we "see" the carbon unit controlling the ship.

[Fvillha]

A database to track the info is nice idea, but you may wish to get into Beta to see what options are really like and to discover if Cryptic will have a way to track it for you like the do our Heroes in Champions Online. The big question i see is "how do we make our custom race templates shareable with others.

For the database, if its made my some one in the community is can the template link/info be retrieved by others.

Looks like more questions for the Devs :)

[Arokh72]

Thinking of all this I wonder if we'll be able to populate planets for other players to see, similar to how in Spore you can see other players creatures on your planet.

[shadowsafer]

A database to track the info is nice idea, but you may wish to get into Beta to see what options are really like and to discover if Cryptic will have a way to track it for you like the do our Heroes in Champions Online. The big question i see is "how do we make our custom race templates shareable with others.

For the database, if its made my some one in the community is can the template link/info be retrieved by others.

Looks like more questions for the Devs :)

Oh believe me, I'd love to get into beta. It's actual my day job to test software, though beta testing a game is completely different from writing out test and automatic test scripts hehe.
I don't give myself much chance for getting in though, but I'm competing in 1 of the contest and I signed up for closed beta within the hour it came online, so I still have some small hopes.

The developers will have to give us the option to import templates easily, but from what I read so far we don't really need to be concerned about this, I'm having good faith that this will be handled well, Cryptic is aware of how much everybody wants this option so I'm sure it'll get added.
I don't know at what kind of level it'll get added though, I suspect only a simple import function and not a real time database that allows you to see all the custom races already created. As far as I know templates can be saved locally, but they aren't automatically stored online.

[shadowsafer]

Thinking of all this I wonder if we'll be able to populate planets for other players to see, similar to how in Spore you can see other players creatures on your planet.

That would be awesome yeah, but don't bet on it, at least not on release. :p
I can only imagine the poor developer pulling his hairs out at the mention of this idea and how to make it work haha.
We might see it in some expantion pack but I don't really think this will ever be added, however you never know..

[Koba]

What would be cool is a way to duplicate someones race easily. Either in-game program or third party.

Although, we actually have yet to know exactly how much we "see" the carbon unit controlling the ship.

I thought I read somewhere that you can give the race to your friends so they can create the same thing and join you. Not sure where I read that though...

[Ayradyss]

Champions Online allows you to save your hero, producing a file locally on your system (actually a .jpg pic of the character, with the game-usable data embedded). Anyone else you give a copy of this file can then load it and create the exact same character look, all the body sliders, costume pieces, etc. I see absolutely no reason they couldn't do this with the STO character editor as well. I'm betting it's the same system, just with Trek models, objects and textures rather than comic-book-hero ones.

[shadowsafer]

I thought I read somewhere that you can give the race to your friends so they can create the same thing and join you. Not sure where I read that though...

Yup that's right, you can save templates locally and then e-mail them to friends or upload them to them via msn or yahoo, as far as I know they can import them then and make their own variations.

[shadowsafer]

Champions Online allows you to save your hero, producing a file locally on your system (actually a .jpg pic of the character, with the game-usable data embedded). Anyone else you give a copy of this file can then load it and create the exact same character look, all the body sliders, costume pieces, etc. I see absolutely no reason they couldn't do this with the STO character editor as well. I'm betting it's the same system, just with Trek models, objects and textures rather than comic-book-hero ones.

Ah cool, I didn't know exactly how this works in CO since I'm not playing that game, but yeah as far as I know it works exactly the same for STO. All the info I read about it so far matches 100% with what you just wrote, except you give a bit more details hehe. :D

[ozzy1975]

the only thing i remember was someone from Cryptic (i believe it was Zinc) stating that we will be able to save our newly built race as a template and 'share' it with others so they can use it for their own characters

edit: damn i'm to slow *hehe*

btw, Vultazoid or Vulcazoid sound like evil robots :D

[rabidchocobo]

Melthusians. Since nobody's ever seen one, except maybe Patrick Steward, I have no idea what kind of physical differences or our newly discovered race traits I'll use. Anxiety!

http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/library/aliens/article/71584.html

[mistharm]

I actually had a thread that looked at some of the ways to incorporate player made races into the game a bit better:

Here's the link (http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=28865).

I think that a database would be a fantastic step in the right direction >.< for obvious reasons.

[Blademaven]

.

So far the only known halflings race name that I know that exists and is generally excepted are the Kirkians. The race name may have started like a joke but it's exactly the example that I mean here.
When you're talking about the Kirkians the community here knows exactly what you're talking about! To call my new race half vulcan/ half betazoid sounds lame at best..

(Ps. I meant nitpicks in a positive way, I'm not out to offend anybody! :p)

Okay Ill be the one to admit to monumental ignorance and suffer the consequence:p What the hell is a Kirkian lol

[shadowsafer]

Okay Ill be the one to admit to monumental ignorance and suffer the consequence:p What the hell is a Kirkian lol

Captain Kirk is rather famous in TOS for getting it on with all female alien babes. His offspring is called Kirkians. Basicly a Kirkian is any half Kirk/ half alien creature walking around in the universe.
Supposedly Kirkians are far superiour to most known races in the galaxy and have all kinds of kick ass racial traits hehe.

To clarify further, it's actually a fictional non canon race created by the community, I have no idea who originally came up with it. I'm sure others can tell you more about the origins of the Kirkians though. :D

[Arokh72]

Captain Kirk is rather famous in TOS for getting it on with all female alien babes. His offspring is called Kirkians. Basicly a Kirkian is any half Kirk/ half alien creature walking around in the universe.
Supposedly Kirkians are far superiour to most known races in the galaxy and have all kinds of kick ass racial traits hehe.

To clarify further, it's actually a fictional non canon race created by the community, I have no idea who originally came up with it. I'm sure others can tell you more about the origins of the Kirkians though. :D

I wonder what would have happened if Kirk met an alternate universe or cloned female version of himself?

[shadowsafer]

I wonder what would have happened if Kirk met an alternate universe or cloned female version of himself?

The universe might implode at the awesomeness of that.

Infact, I feel my brains starting to boil by just thinking over the idea..:eek:

[Peregrine_Falcon]

I wonder what would have happened if Kirk met an alternate universe or cloned female version of himself?
Do you really have to ask?

C'mon! You know exactly what would happen.


* bow chicka wow wow *

[zanderj]

It would _not_ be logical for a hybrid race to have a new name.

A Klingon/human mix with obvious klingon features is *still* a Klingon.

A Belgian/American living in Belgium, is *still* Belgian!

[shadowsafer]

It would _not_ be logical for a hybrid race to have a new name.

A Klingon/human mix with obvious klingon features is *still* a Klingon.

A Belgian/American living in Belgium, is *still* Belgian!

Well they sort of evolve into a new species after the cross breed. Take one of our famous dutch export products, tullips; there are many cross breeds there and whenever they succesful create a new crossbreed it gets a new name as well.

I'd say it's more common for a new race that is the combination of 2 other races to receive a name new name then it's not.

The belgium/ american argument doesn't really count here since in both cases you're talking about the same race from 2 different continents. If I mix a horse from south america with a horse from the middle east it's still a horse.
But if I mix a horse with a donkey then you get a mule, a completely new species alltogether.
Another example, the offspring of an european and an asian is called a eurasian, which is basicly a new race as well.

So I'd argue that it's very logical for a hybrid to get a new name, it happens all the time in real life as well.

[scorpiovaeden]

Whenever two differnt species cross breed, the resulting child is of the race of the more dominant genetics... human is always submissive to this (Kirk being the exception to this, lol). So a human/ betazoid is called Half-Betazoid. The same is true when looking at other genres like fantasy and dungeons and dragons where we have half-elves and half-orgres.

So in the original posters case where you have a half-vulcan and half-betazoid character, you simply have to choose which one has the more dominant genetics.... maybe its vulcan, so your race would be Half-Vulcan. That one is up to you.

Or you could simply create your own race name, nothing wrong with that. Thats the beauty of the customization that this game will offer, it leaves that up to you. Gotta love freedom of customization.

[JPJappic]

Personally - though I know it won't be possible - I think that species names should be moderated so that people don't start making Kardasshians or Klingots or even Romulens.

[rabidchocobo]

I agree. Use the character creator to create, not clone a quadrant full of Pherengi.

[Faerlzress]

Don't worry Shadowsafer. We are all basically Kirkians at this point anyway.