This question came to mind after reading the first issue of Iron Gods and the Technology Guide. The amount of militarily material which could be find (as plasmathrowers or graviton guns)and came out of the spaceship crash (the annihilator robots) plus the lack of restrain concerning contact with other sentient lifeforms (the kasatha tribe kidnap sure would be seen as an absolute violation of the so called "Prime Directive" find in a certain sci-fi franchise) hints Androffans aren't really nice guys.
In fact, this modus operandi: charging an exploration vessel with weaponry capable of level an entire city from a civilization which cultural and technological level is that of the iron ages and aggressively extracting whole communities for its study instead of having a direct contact or research in situ, points androffans are most likely a Lawful Evil civilization or Lawful Neutral with evil tendencies.
If its so, then this could be exploited for a "continue the campaign" plot, about Androffans finding about what happened to Divinity mission and perhaps getting ready a full invasion force not on Golarion but on the whole Solar system.
Well, the Reign of Stars was over 8,000 years ago. All the technology in Technology Guide is vastly outdated. Just think of all the advancements real life human society made from -6,000 B.C. to the modern day.
The odds that Androffa still exists at all are pretty slim. And if they do exist, the odds of them being anything like they were 8,000 years ago is even more slim. Of course the developers could just hand-wave realism in this case and say "meh, they entire society has been static for the past eight millenia."
So were they lawful neutral/lawful evil/militaristic? It's hard to say. But would they care about a ship that went missing 8,000 years ago? I'd say not so much.
I doubt they did any advance since the Divinity invaded the Dominion of the Black space. Most likely both powers struggled and that perhaps halted the development of Androffa, maybe there was an Asimov's Foundation scenario. If that is the case, perhaps the new restored Androffa is trying to contact any lost colonies during the whatever dark times they had to endure after being attacked by lovecrafnian horrors. Perhaps someone has found in ancient records about the Divnity.
Ummm... You do know that (bad Sci-Fi notwithstanding) there is no greater impetus for technological (or magical... or psychic... depending on the cosmology) advances than conflict/war? Unless both sides manage to wipe each other out/destroy their societies in the process (which is extremely uncommon).
I'd say the historical Androffans aren't "Star Trek Federation," by any means. They definitely don't seem to have had a pacifistic/non-interference mindset and were probably expansionist. However, they did seem fairly inclusive and accepting of other "alien" races as crew members on Divinity.
I don't have my book yet so i have to ask, are we sure that the spaceship that crashed in Numeria is an exploration vessel and not a generation/migration vessel?
Are we sure that only one spaceship crashed in Numeria during the time of the falling stars?
Creative Director
|
I'll have a little bit more to talk about Androffa in the last Iron Gods, but until then, these questions will need to remain unanswered.
I can say this though...
There's no reason that the actions of the crew of the divinity took was necessarily indicative of how the rest of their society functions. The people in charge of Divinity might have been a bunch of dicks, or could have had competing factions.
also...wasn't there a huge mutiny? which occurred after a major attack by The Dominion of the Black? Presumably if the ship had any sort of nano-fabrication systems, the crew could very quickly manufacture advanced weaponry en mass. Remember, The Destiny had technological capabilities far above that of anything we have today: There is no reason they had to bring all that weaponry with them.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'll have a little bit more to talk about Androffa in the last Iron Gods, but until then, these questions will need to remain unanswered.
I can say this though... ** spoiler omitted **
*cough*DominionoftheBlackcolony*cough*
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ummm... You do know that (bad Sci-Fi notwithstanding) there is no greater impetus for technological (or magical... or psychic... depending on the cosmology) advances than conflict/war? Unless both sides manage to wipe each other out/destroy their societies in the process (which is extremely uncommon).
I'd say the historical Androffans aren't "Star Trek Federation," by any means. They definitely don't seem to have had a pacifistic/non-interference mindset and were probably expansionist. However, they did seem fairly inclusive and accepting of other "alien" races as crew members on Divinity.
In a conflict between standard sentient humanoids, yes, war effort would had bring a Big Science leap. But we are talking about a civilization of humanoids unfamiliar with magic and facing a "confederation" of beings which are the embodiment of cosmic horror. Just imagine what a spell like glyph of madness could do to a society which is almost all the time on-line being download into the net. In no time the whole Androffan civilization would had end Event Horizon.
The Destiny had technological capabilities far above that of anything we have todayOf course it does, but when did this become a discussion about Stargate?
Whoops...meant Divinity! I actually never have even seen a single episode of that spin-off
The Destiny had technological capabilities far above that of anything we have todayOf course it does, but when did this become a discussion about Stargate?
Who said anything about stargate? According to page 82 in Fires of Creation the ship is clearly called Destiny.
That instance is an error that snuck in. The ship's name is Divinity.
Someone watched a lot of Stargate?
its for the best that you stopped there:)
awesome movie tho!
In a conflict between standard sentient humanoids, yes, war effort would had bring a Big Science leap. But we are talking about a civilization of humanoids unfamiliar with magic and facing a "confederation" of beings which are the embodiment of cosmic horror. Just imagine what a spell like glyph of madness could do to a society which is almost all the time on-line being download into the net. In no time the whole Androffan civilization would had end Event Horizon.Ummm... You do know that (bad Sci-Fi notwithstanding) there is no greater impetus for technological (or magical... or psychic... depending on the cosmology) advances than conflict/war? Unless both sides manage to wipe each other out/destroy their societies in the process (which is extremely uncommon).
I'd say the historical Androffans aren't "Star Trek Federation," by any means. They definitely don't seem to have had a pacifistic/non-interference mindset and were probably expansionist. However, they did seem fairly inclusive and accepting of other "alien" races as crew members on Divinity.
Pulling the "they're aliens, they don't have to make sense" card is a cop out. Either they learn from/coopt the "good stuff" from other races they encounter or (eventually), they'll be pushed aside by a race that does.
In a conflict: (1) it's over quickly and the winners appropriate the losers' "good stuff" (tech has a lot of "good stuff" for magic types, and vice versa) before the losing side can make adjustments and start learning, (2) the conflict brings changes on both sides while it lasts as each side starts figuring out/coopting the other's "good stuff" (through various methods, including spies and traitors, interrogation/torture of captured opponents, study of captured equipment, etc.), or (3) they decide to delay/end the conflict and get distracted by something else/want to avoid the secondary consequences of continuing (think the Korean War, which is still technically in a "temporary" cease-fire after more than 60 years).
If I had to make a guess, since high-tech (on the level of Androffa) doesn't seem to be that widespread among what we've seen of the Dominion of the Black (even after all the time that has passed since the initial conflict with the Divinity), something along the lines of the third option is what happened.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
In a conflict between standard sentient humanoids, yes, war effort would had bring a Big Science leap. But we are talking about a civilization of humanoids unfamiliar with magic and facing a "confederation" of beings which are the embodiment of cosmic horror. Just imagine what a spell like glyph of madness could do to a society which is almost all the time on-line being download into the net. In no time the whole Androffan civilization would had end Event Horizon.Ummm... You do know that (bad Sci-Fi notwithstanding) there is no greater impetus for technological (or magical... or psychic... depending on the cosmology) advances than conflict/war? Unless both sides manage to wipe each other out/destroy their societies in the process (which is extremely uncommon).
I'd say the historical Androffans aren't "Star Trek Federation," by any means. They definitely don't seem to have had a pacifistic/non-interference mindset and were probably expansionist. However, they did seem fairly inclusive and accepting of other "alien" races as crew members on Divinity.
Pulling the "they're aliens, they don't have to make sense" card is a cop out. Either they learn from/coopt the "good stuff" from other races they encounter or (eventually), they'll be pushed aside by a race that does.
In a conflict: (1) it's over quickly and the winners appropriate the losers' "good stuff" (tech has a lot of "good stuff" for magic types, and vice versa) before the losing side can make adjustments and start learning, (2) the conflict brings changes on both sides while it lasts as each side starts figuring out/coopting the other's "good stuff" (through various methods, including spies and traitors, interrogation/torture of captured opponents, study of captured equipment, etc.), or (3) they decide to delay/end the conflict and get distracted by something else/want to avoid the secondary consequences of continuing (think the Korean...
According to Lovecraft one of the key elements of cosmic horror is the idea of the alien being as a pure expression of The Other. They make sense, but their own sense, in the meaning its actions can't fit into the moral and ethical scope of mankind. The Dominion of the Black is a more space opera interpretation of the concept exposed by Lovecraft in his essay Supernatural Horror in Literature .
If the Dominion of the Black invaded the space of the Androffans, they did not because they need resources nor because of manifest destiny, they are above those elements, they may just did because they are pure Dada and perhaps their sole purpose is bring madness and chaos were logic and reason rule. If you start to introduce elements which rationalize their actions you eradicate their ethos as cosmic horror.The fall of Androffa (if such thing happened) sure would be a tale of true horror as their most brilliant minds, from xenologists to militar strategist, tried to crack the modus operandi of these incredible ancient beings (perhaps the first ones to achieve sentience) which actions doesn't make sense at all according to what they expect the universe to be!
Just visualize it in your mind, being an Androffan soldier, wearing the most advance/state of the art power armor and equipped with the latest plasma weapon, traveling faster than light in a mighty battle spaceship which suddenly is swarmed by Mi-Go, who doesn't need no spacesuit, which are equipped with weaponry which seem to mess with the laws of physics and which physiology is so out of the norm the expected points to be fatal in a normal living being. Now imagine yourself as a general of said forces, trying to predict which is going to be the next attack of these forces, finding the strategy of the Dominion of the Black doesn't make any sense: One time, they attack the civilians directly instead the places of military importance, the other they just let their forces be slaughtered without offering any resistance. You can't find a chain of command nor seems to be any limit to their resources, there is no clear leader, no political body. And it will no too late you end hearing your own troops chanting names as Nyarlathotep or Shub-Niggurath and behaving "erratically".
So they are chaotic bat-s@%# crazy?
I meant how they would seem to us.
That instance is an error that snuck in. The ship's name is Divinity.
Destiny sneaked in again in the newest book.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Somewhat unrelated but the androffan letters in page 33 seem familiar to me (A LOT), so i started digging and i think that they look very similar to thassilonian runes, both languages seem to have curvy letters and both of them use dots, sure the thassilonian letters are more "curvy" but still i think that the resemblance is uncanny. Does anyone else sees the resemblance or is it just my mind seeing a relation where there is none?
Maybe the Androffans were controlled by a psychically powerful Sith Lord at one time, which explains the militarism, but are free of such pesky evil occultic influences eight thousand years later :)
How long has the Star Wars galactic civilization had hypertravel?
Maybe the Androffans were controlled by a psychically powerful Sith Lord at one time, which explains the militarism, but are free of such pesky evil occultic influences eight thousand years later :)
How long has the Star Wars galactic civilization had hypertravel?
It wasn't widespread until about 25,000 BBY, give or take.
While Androffa was technologically advanced, how developed was it at a magical level? Arcane or divine.
.... In a Galaxy far, far away.....
unrelated I now wanna remake Isuma as a Kensei monk/fighter with a Null Blade ;-)
At the time Divinity launched? Not at all. About as magically developed as Earth.
That may have changed significantly in the past 9,000 years, of course!
Will the fate of Androffa be revealed in the last book of the AP?
|
Androffa is as distant from Earth oas it is from Golarion....
Is Androffa Earth?
Ok. I thought for a moment there that you were enigmatically hinting at that with your response.
@ADaigle: Yep, I know about that one - Hell, Rasputin Must Die! was the reason I subscribed to the AP line! I thought that maybe Paizo's Earth was Androffa in the distant past, and then something happened to wipe them and their advanced tech from the planet. Sorta like the Assassin's Creed games or something.
I look forward to discovering the truth! Bring on The Divinity Drive!!!
So there are humans in at least 3 galaxies.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
What if we're the Cockroaches of the Universe!
|
Creative Director
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
At the time Divinity launched? Not at all. About as magically developed as Earth.
That may have changed significantly in the past 9,000 years, of course!
Will the fate of Androffa be revealed in the last book of the AP?
Somewhat, but not in detail. That said, once the last book's out, I'll be willing to talk a bit more about Androffa here.
Androffa is as distant from Earth as it is from Golarion....
Is Androffa Earth?
And how far is that, measured to the nearest galaxy of distance? Should I be looking in the Large Magellanic cloud for Golarion, or farther afield? Or maybe just the other side of our own galaxy?
|
Creative Director
|
And how far is that, measured to the nearest galaxy of distance? Should I be looking in the Large Magellanic cloud for Golarion, or farther afield? Or maybe just the other side of our own galaxy?Androffa is as distant from Earth as it is from Golarion....
Is Androffa Earth?
All three are in different galaxies. That's all that we're willing to reveal at this point.
All three are in different galaxies. That's all that we're willing to reveal at this point.And how far is that, measured to the nearest galaxy of distance? Should I be looking in the Large Magellanic cloud for Golarion, or farther afield? Or maybe just the other side of our own galaxy?Androffa is as distant from Earth as it is from Golarion....
Is Androffa Earth?
Awesome!
All three are in different galaxies. That's all that we're willing to reveal at this point.And how far is that, measured to the nearest galaxy of distance? Should I be looking in the Large Magellanic cloud for Golarion, or farther afield? Or maybe just the other side of our own galaxy?Androffa is as distant from Earth as it is from Golarion....
Is Androffa Earth?
Man that's so weird. It would take light from Earth two million years to reach the Andromeda Galaxy, much more even further out. Makes me super curious where humans even came from and why we're so spread out over cosmic distances that is incomprehensible for many people.
Like I know distances in the Material Plane probably don't matter for deities but DANG.
|
Light doesnt matter in this case. My hypothesis is that humans simply got lost in the great hallways of doors that connects every place and ended up traveling to them in the blink of an eye. cultures then developed similarly based on human nature.
You should remember the old old tales. There was a restronte at one end of the hallway, it opened into a back door. Pug's even been there a time or two. Anyway this hallway has doors of all types, that lead to various worlds and planes and times and basicaly everywhere and when. But only a handful ever open to the same world. Some are open to all travelers, some are sealed to all. There is a strange peace in the hallway. Mortal enemies will not attack each other, ever within the hallway.
So a simple tribe or group or military unit could have been exploring and wandered into one of the doors.. nothing would have attacked them, but they would have seen many strange sights. and it would be very easy to try and return and go through the wrong door. Even if it was clearly labeled, for none of them may have known the tongue.
Actually there's hints (in Distant Worlds, and other sources) of a progenitor race that seeded humanoid life throughout the universe. (Yeah not very original) They probably had some from of advanced space drive or ability use wormholes to travel like the Androffans.