Kidan
The Kidan Race Name: Kidan (Singular) Kida (Plural). Are ant-like creatures who posses an exoskeleton.
Mechanics
- They do not posses their own unique language.
- All Kida have claws, and will scratch with them instead of punching, dealing extra damage.
- Kida cannot wear glasses.
- Kida have natural armor, roughly equivalent to a riot shield.
- They can consume Diona Nymphs, alive or dead.
- 30 Karma cost to unlock
Overview
Naming
Heraldry naming scheme (used by nobles for flashy entrances and other such dramatic things): Individuals are generally named according to ancient conventions. That is, names consisting of syllables given in layers, starting first with the occuption, then the name of their family, or, 'house', then their given name, and finally their private name. Their private name was more of a nickname and only known to close working buddies or friends. The name went as follows. Occupation > House > Given > Nickname; -- in recent years, this is used as a brevity code for identifying themselves via their banner, over radio.
Peasant/everyday naming scheme: A sort of 'buggy' sounding name like 'Koz' or 'Zaz' or 'Zhar' with a corresponding pheromone signature, optionally represented by describing the smell of such in either flavor text or as a surname, for example: 'Zaz [light, fruity]' (note that not everything is one big culture over in Bugtown, so names can and will sound vastly different from eachother across planets and even in different regions of the homeworld.)
Biology
Kida DO have blood, and organs, though a slightly more distributed vascular system with several smaller hearts throughout the body, which means internal damage may be less likely to kill them, but bleeding out may be more of a danger. Most medicines work similarly on them as with other species, exempting Inaprovaline.
Inaprovaline and every drug with inaprovaline as a component have been known to produce a euphoric high, causing access to Inaprovaline while working for Human companys or in Human space to be generally restricted, to the point Nanotrasen forbids them to carry it on their person unless their job requires it. Addictions and general recreational usage of Inaprovaline has become common on the Homeworld and Colonies, due to it having no known side effects.
Physically speaking, they are about 1.5-2.5 meter-tall hard-shelled arthropods, generally with a dull-colored carapace, though bright splotches are not uncommon depending on colony. They have large, compound eyes and long, segmented antenna with which they sense things. They have two long, upper limbs which serve as arms, and two long lower limbs which serve as legs, though their third set of limbs are generally neatly tucked away against their carapce, as they've become vestigial over time. Wings are uncommon but not unheard of, and are always able to be folded away. The ability to actually fly is rare, however.
Kidan eyesight is extremely sensitive, from across the room, they will be able to count pores on a human, or see fleas in a dog's fur. As you leave the front of them, they quickly lose resolution and drop off until something standing to their side will be an indistinct blur. Kidan eyes are also highly sensitive to bright lights, preferring to keep their homes and workplaces slightly dimmer than humans prefer, and bright flashes causing great pain. Military Kida and Kidan workers tend to wear protective films over their eyes in most situations.
Kidan eyes are too large and sensitive to wear anything to the effect of glasses, goggles or HUDs.
Their native language is a series of clicks, buzzes, head, antennae movements, and pheromones, however they can mimic human speech (barely) using clicks and buzzes drawn out into words, with antenna use for emphasis and indicating emotion, this causes Human speech to appear rather blunted to them, due to the lack of olfactory and movement use. Due to them being mostly unable to use tone, their speech appears almost perpetually friendly, dispite what they may mean to say. -- this causes Z, and V noises to be slightly elongated, as well as a general buzzy tone. S sounds are difficult to seperate from Z noises, as well as C noises.
Alcohol is a little bit like drinking water; their bodies can break it down very easily and it doesn't intoxicate. Something about chocolate, however, does cause intoxication, not unlike alcohol causes it in humans. Caffeine is dangerous in large quantities, the amount of caffeine in one cup of shipboard coffee (it being super-charged as it is) is legitimately dangerous if consumed and not treated right away, but a cup of soda, or tea, or any number of other traditionally caffeinated beverages might only cause damage over the long term.
Feet are plantigrade, but with two claws coming out of the front and one on the back, giving their feet the ability to grasp like hands, though without anything comparative to thumbs. They are able to fit these into shoes, though uncomfortable. Sandals and boots are more common.
As far as temperature tolerance, very cold temperatures cause them to become sluggish, eventually just laying down to die. Very high temperatures cause them to work faster and faster until their bodies cease to function from exertion or overheating.
Language
Their native language is a series of clicks, buzzes, head, antennae movements, and pheromones, however they can mimic human speech (barely) using clicks and buzzes drawn out into words, with antenna use for emphasis and indicating emotion, this causes Human speech to appear rather blunted to them, due to the lack of olfactory and movement use. Due to them being mostly unable to use tone, their speech appears almost perpetually friendly, dispite what they may mean to say. -- this causes Z, and V noises to be slightly elongated, as well as a general buzzy tone. S sounds are difficult to seperate from Z noises, as well as C noises.The Kidan written language consists of woven strands of fabric of various colors, which come together to form words.
Culture
Important ships and structures are generally named after large historical events that have happened to the people as a whole. Slightly less important ships and structures may be named after more local events. For example: Exploration ship named, "First Contact", or an infrastructure project named, "That Party; Last Tuesday"
Planets are generally named after the first noble that has arrived upon it. Unnamed planets are marked with a letter, and star systems are named by a compound name of every settled planet, as well as the number of planets total. Unnamed planets are named with a lowercase letter, similar to how unnamed moons are handled in certain settings. EX: "Qraz III a" would be the gas giant on the edge of the Kidan home-system.
Their history is maintained not only through normal methods (books, written accounts, electronic storage) but also culturally through songs and tapestries, as with humans. Families are responsible for their own records, generally, and will make their own tapestries and keep their songs written either on hard copies or electronically someplace in the home. It's considered a pretty huge blow to lose your house histories, and the oldest ones have items dating back hundreds of years. Generally, tapestries will be imprinted with perfumes or pheromones as an olfactory component.
Kidan art generally consists of either drawn, painted, or woven art pieces with an olfactory and sound component, or large performance pieces somewhere between an opera and a play, with loud music, strong smells, lots of movement and many, many performers involved at once in an intricate display.
Religion varies wildly between colonies, due to long periods of seperation, however they can all be traced down to the original myths on the homeworld, in which a group of spirits embodying various elements came together and pooled their power, building the world from nothing and creating everything in it. The names of these spirits vary wildly, between cities, planets, and systems. The names are almost never constant, but generally similar. Some myths even have the parts of the spirits filled by historical figures, or great leaders. This shows best the very healthy respect that the populace has for their ancestry.
Home Planet
The main government is largely controlled by a restricted cabal of nobles. Early in their history, the Kida have utilized observation of primitive insect hives with clearly defined hierarchies to build their own system of government with the nobles at the top. As a result of this, only the offspring directly produced by the nobility are considered worthy of any redeeming social value. Through the many years this system has been in place, it has strengthened and become the core, causing for non-noble larvae to generally be shunned by the nobility.
Under this government, the population of the home world is mostly subjugated. The organized leadership and strong loyalty has caused a sort of willing serfdom, though relating more so to a form with cities, where the non-nobility work upon the land and pay the land-owners, who are usually nobles, for the privilege. The majority of the race is controlled by this fashion.
Asteroid mining is widespread within the homeworld system, with the previous colonial ships mostly being refitted for the purpose. As for the homeworld planets, the luxury goods and industrialism is what fuels the majority of the output, processing these raw goods into fine ones.
Technology
The technology of the Kida race is slightly behind that of the human one, barring specific advancements in space-faring technology. Most notable among these is cheap Faster Than Light travel, which warp gates are capable of replicating but not perfecting. Bluespace is an exciting, unheard of new field to Kida researchers.
Kida robotics and cybernetic technology has become especially advanced within the last fifteen years, due mostly to the Faezh IX colony's advancements in automation, and sentient machines imported from this colony oversee and perform most production and labor work outside of the homeworld and loyalist colonies.
The kida, lacking a proper system of simple Faster Than Light travel, use mostly propulsion engines or a few sets of warp gates that have been constructed in order to travel between the worlds.
Ten colonies have been formed so far, but there is a current ongoing program to form more. Sleeper ships, preceded by long-range sensor ships, have been sent out from the home system and a few of the auxiliary systems. The goals of expanding are mostly for monetary gain for the home worlds and the governing body, so that they may get even more lavish treatment. r Most of their transportation of peoples and goods is done through an extremely inefficient system. Mass drivers shoot materials and cargo into orbital stations around the planets, and then are transported between planets and gates with carefully measured solid fuel rockets. While it is precise, it isn't quite precise enough, and so as a result quite a few of the planetary bodies are in danger of Kessler Syndrome from the spent stages. This is where the debris in space is too thick to properly pass into it. There are ongoing discussions within the homeworlds on how this may be rectified.
Ship to ship combat tends to be long and tedious, performed at long and close ranges with heavy rail cannons and swarms of unguided rockets, timed or proximity. Boarding is entirely impractical, due to Kidan shipwrights not being skilled enough to design hulls capable of withstanding the force of crashing into another ship. As a result of this, the preferred result of any combat within space is complete and utter destruction to the enemy.
Defensive tech tends to be overlooked, not going much more advanced than simple point defense cannons to counteract the long range missiles, as well as inert chaff fired off to intercept via kinetic force any missiles coming in.
EVA tech has been developed, but is not fairly advanced. The Kida are capable, however, of wearing human soft-suits so long as they are of the proper size. Hard-suits, on the other hand, tend to be very uncomfortable. The race's own native suits are essentially body-gloves, insulating them from pressure and heat while managing to allow for excellent maneuverability. Said suits, however, are completely lacking in armor.
Ground combat is performed in a similar method to the humans WWI, trench warfare, artillery, and mass infantry charges, though this seems rather primitive at first, it has been proven to work for the Kida. Orbital strikes are unheard of, as their current weapons are unable to perform accurate Space to Ground strikes.
