Author Topic: The Kah-Lah (NPC Race/Corporation/GSC related lore) (WIP)  (Read 267 times)

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ApatheticExcuse

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The Kah-Lah (NPC Race/Corporation/GSC related lore) (WIP)
« on: January 18, 2017, 01:02:44 pm »
Name: Kah-Lah
Designation: Likely Sentient, but it's really tough to say
Homeworld: Unknown
Language: Documented as speaking all languages in the known universe, and some of unknown origin
Average height of adults: Consistently 5' 8'' for Kah. Lah designs vary slightly.
Skin color: Paint schemes vary
Hair color: None
Breathes: Not applicable

Strengths:

In theory, Kah-Lah, collectively, are capable of being a significant force in the galaxy, each being suspected of containing knowledge of technology and history spanning back well beyond the recorded memories of even the oldest races humanity has encountered. While they are not designed to be significantly superior to humans in strength, agility, or perception, it seems this is intentional on the part of their creator, and were they to become capable of the required self modification, they could easily be individually very powerful.

Weaknesses:

See general behavior.

Average Lifespan: Unknown, theoretically unlimited
Races: Kah, and Lah
Estimated Population: Unknown. Logically, it would seem there *could* be hundreds of billions of Kah-Lah given their apparent production rate, but is expected that there is likely a maximum of several thousand active at any time, based on known numbers and theoretical estimates of space-faring races yet to be encountered by humanity
Diet: None
Communication: Verbal, written, wireless. It is unknown how this latter method is accomplished, as the Kah-Lah appear to be able to transmit great quantities of information considerably farther than we are able to accurately measure.

Technology level: The Kah-Lah themselves could be considered to be a very high level of technology, and it's assumed that if they do indeed originate from a sentient race, that race would be very advanced. The level of technology used by the Kah-Lah themselves is something of an enigma, typically appearing to be below a human level in design, but often being capable of serving functions well beyond anything else recorded.

Culture, General Behavior, and History:

The Kah-Lah, are, for the lack of a better word, utterly confusing and contradictory to study. They have a near-omnipresent level of knowledge of the galaxy, which they make absolutely no effort to use to their particular advantage, they are functionally immortal, but don't seem concerned with the concept of mortality, and they have arguably one of the highest technological levels observed, though they don't seem to actually understand how anything is designed or functions, and are incapable of even considering alternative uses for their equipment beyond the stated purpose and intended function.

The Kah-Lah can be broken down into two subraces:

The Kah - The Kah are the more numerous, mobile component of the Kah-Lah, and are the first example of an alien species ever encountered by humanity. They are roughly humanoid, and typically sport bright paint schemes. Their method of creation is unknown, but records from other races indicate an experience similar to our own - a single Kah onboard a small merchant-style vessel will appear in orbit around a race's homeworld, seemingly from nowhere, within hours to days of a race's first faster than light flight. Should this Kah be destroyed or rendered otherwise inoperable, it will be replaced in a similar way by another one. It is totally unknown how the Kah manage to travel unnoticed and at such a great speed.

The Kah display surprisingly average levels of intelligence when compared with humanity, and seem to have several built in programming features that limit their abilities to accomplish anything beyond their main directive. Several rules known to exist include:

- The Kah are programmed to be incredibly hostile to each other. Each Kah refers to itself only as "Kah", and insists it is the only legitimate instance of itself in existence. If presented with another Kah, it will immediately begin accusing it of being responsible for every remotely negative event in the universe regardless of the Kah-Lah's presence, ranging from our own Holocaust to the effective destruction of the Duvlin atmosphere, and will encourage others to attack the other instance of Kah. While this provides us with the ability to learn more about other races simply by being present while the Kah details the "crimes" of the other Kah, the information is often incomplete, and when questioned further, the Kah will simply generate a surprisingly plausible, but utterly fictional course of events that invariably ends in the conclusion the other instance of Kah was the direct perpetrator, catalyst, or engineer of these events. Much like the apparent mechanics behind it's primary function, the Kah appears to use a complete knowledge of any recorded electronic history created by a race to build this fiction account of events, and to gain the sympathy of any listeners.

Should it fail to cause others to attack the second Kah, it will withdraw to it's ship, or assigned "living space", and refuse to engage in further conversation. Records from other species indicate that at this point, it is actively plotting to destroy the second instance through relatively subtle means which could be presented as an accident or otherwise not be identified as overt targeting, generally through any means possible. While initial investigations raised some concerns as to the potential collateral damage that could result from this attack, it would appear that the Kah are fairly inept at actually carrying out their plans - in one case, for example, one of the Kah was detected trying to breach a plasma generation plant located next to the holding facility containing the other Kah simply by requesting entry from the guards stationed at the perimeter fence, insisting it was some form of intergalactic building inspector and making only a feeble attempt at concealing it's motives. More dangerous, direct methods of assassination, such as bomb building, seem to be programmed to simply not occur to the Kah as a feasible method of accomplishing it's goals, though it is believed it would likely make use of such a device if one was presented to it, and the function explained.

Should the Kah fail to destroy it's nemesis, it will finally resort to attacking it outright, generally without weapons. If it succeeds, it will revert to it's normal behavior, and refuse to speak any further about the event beyond re-stating that it is the only legitimate Kah, and insisting it has done it's "hosts" a great service by removing the imposter. Reports from other species indicate that simply transporting one of the two instances of Kah outside the boundaries of the system (regardless to how those boundaries are delineated) will also cause the hostile behavior to cease, regardless of whether or not the Kah has been informed of this action.

- The Kah exhibit what can only be described as immense cowardice in other life threatening situations. Though threatening it with direct violence is not sufficient to activate what has been deemed the "flight program", actually taking steps to realize a threat is. At this point, the Kah will attempt to escape, conceal itself, or otherwise separate itself from the threat at all costs. Unlike it's hostile behavior, the Kah are actually very skilled at escape, and appear to be able to use some form of teleportation to remove themselves from danger, though, much like the bomb-building example above, they seem unable to comprehend that this same ability would be very useful in destroying other Kah.

It is somewhat interesting to note that the "flight program" seems to be an addition to their programming that was not present during their initial creation - there is no way to confirm this, but anecdotal evidence based around Kah vocalizations while attempt to escape seems to indicate this may be the case. While the program is active, the Kah will repeat a set of phrases relating to the activation of combat mode, and detailing various weapons systems it will use to destroy whoever threatens it, though it will not engage in any behavior that could be described as remotely threatening and will attempt to flee during the vocalizations. Upon reverting to it's original behavior after a "cooldown" period in which no further danger has been detected, the Kah will express confusion when presented with audio or video recordings of these vocalizations, claiming to know nothing about any of the devices mentioned or even acknowledging the recording is of itself.

Thus far, the most "hostile" action testing has been able to extract from a Kah is a stream of very detailed, absurd profanities directed at the tester. It will generally present this behavior if interacting with someone who intentionally insults it or treats it poorly without physically threatening it, much like most sentient lifeforms, and will generally cease instantly should the "provocation" be stopped. Though Kah are clearly capable of recalling an offense, they do not seem to bear any dislike for the offender after the fact.

- The Kah, as has been indicated, are completely unable to think in what can loosely be termed a "creative" sense, and don't seem to understand that certain technology and abilities can have multiple uses, such as in the teleportation example above. This also applies to devices such as the power supply found on all Kah ships, which uses an unknown energy source to generate a form of power which, given their level of technology, could likely be used as a weapon of immense power. Even when presented with this opinion, the Kah will simply state that it is "pretty sure" that the speaker is experiencing a programming error, and insist that the power source "is just to let the ship fly around".

There are suspected limitations to Kah behavior, and it has been argued that the Kah do not actually represent sentient machines, but are, rather, just very well programmed with limited adaptability.

The purpose of the Kah in Kah-Lah society is relatively straightforward - upon contacting a new race, the Kah will explain that it is present to help the race integrate with the galactic market system, and evaluate it for unique products or services so that it may be rated in terms of gross domestic product measured via Galactic Standard Credits. The Kah will also request a direct link to any computer capable of accessing the internet, or internet equivalent in order to facilitate this. Though it will continually insist it be allowed access if this request is denied, records from many species, including our own, indicate that it is fully capable of processing every piece of electronic data created by a race through an unknown, remote means. When questioned in regards to this ability, the Kah will readily admit to this ability, but generally state that it prefers a direct link for a variety of reasons.

Once data collection is completed, the Kah will begin transmitting vast quantities of information to several Lah repositories. This appears to function similarly to their wireless intrusion abilities, but at a greatly accelerated rate - in the case of humanity, the entire sum of created human knowledge was sent in under a week. The Kah seems only vaguely aware of this ability, and does not appear to understand where the information is going.

Though a Kah presence is undetectable until FTL travel has been accomplished, it is theorized that they actually initially begin monitoring of a race when concrete evidence of radio transmission or STL spaceflight is identified by whoever dispatches them. Though there is no hard proof of this, the Kah initially encountered by humanity had a fairly expansive knowledge of TV and radio programming beginning roughly in the 1950s, and appeared to be capable of speaking versions of all human languages in widespread use from that era. It is unknown if this theory is correct, and the Kah will simply change the topic or elucidate on plotlines from the time period suggested if it is asked whether or not it was directly observing humanity at a specific point in time.

Notable Player-Characters:

Intent:


((You can kinda see where i'm going with this. It's horribly absurd in a lot of ways, but I dare you to call this race OP just because they're robots :P. I also couldn't think of any other way to force people to use GSC or have it as a standard beyond having someone show up and simply say it's the way things are done. It's stupid, but it's also the basis for most modern monetary systems and is maybe a bit more legit from my understanding than it seems on the surface.

This is obviously an NPC race unless you want to play a character who literally can't do anything but act as a stock ticker and wireless router than can talk. I guess that might be fun for someone. The Lah will be a little more capable, but also not PC suitable for reasons which will become obvious.

I'll write some more in a bit once I finish coming up with Lah stuff. I'll also write up a transcript of a conversation between a Kah and early human space travellers, cause it would be fun.))
« Last Edit: January 25, 2017, 06:10:01 am by Discord »
Gone. Cheers guys.

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RedVulnus

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approved

I apparently forgot to approve a few things.

ApatheticExcuse

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This is still mostly WIP anyway. No worries.
Gone. Cheers guys.

guest48

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approved

 

NOCTIFER IS A FAGGOT