Intelligent Dinosaurs - Droyne - Near Space

[Mithras]

I'm batting around another idea for a near space campaign, where Man is in conflict with the remnants of a civilization that evolved on Earth in the Cretaceous - the intelligent dinosaur hypothesis (all hypothetical, a number of variations):

http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2008/03/dinosauroids_2008.php

In this timeline, the dinosauroids got into space, specialised in genetic engineering, herding herbivores such as triceratops and iguanadon, colonised Mars and the Moon. Began terraforming Mars, creating large lakes and a very thin but breathable atmosphere. There were tensions and the inevitable war, and the space-faring dinosauroids used a mass-driver to smash an asteroid into Mexico, center of the dinosaurid civilization wiping out the nation and all trace of it.

The dinosaurids created an FTL hypergate in the Saturnian system and were able to colonise Barnard's Star. As a genetic virus spread by the now dead dinosaurid nation began to kill the Martian colonty and those on Luna, those in the Saturnian system got out and evacuated the Earth system for good. That was 60 My ago.

Today we meet those distant ancestors, and war begins. Maybe they realise Earth is their home after conducting recon and research - they want it back, it is their homeworld, and they were here first.

I thought, looking at the photo in the link provided, that the Droyne might slot in perfectly for these dinosaurids...

What do you think?

 

[robject]

I surfed to that page and immediately thought: Sleestak!

 

[Mithras]

Sleestak?

Not heard of that ...

EDIT: Ah, Land of the Lost, that looks like it was a great show! (Wiki is your friend!)

I surfed to that page and immediately thought: Sleestak!

 

[boomslang]

I thought, looking at the photo in the link provided, that the Droyne might slot in perfectly for these dinosaurids...

What do you think?

It could work.

As I recall, there was even a Star Trek: Voyager episode some years back exploring the trope of starfaring dinosaurs who left Earth so long ago they ended up forgetting their origins.

For added fun, you could recast the whole Yaskodray/Ancients backstory in a Terran-centric light, with less widespread seeding of Humaniti (Vland and Zhodane might never have been colonized, for example)... conflict within Droyne civilization over how best to deal with the abandoned homeworld and the monkey-people beginning to overrun it could even have been the catalyst for the Ancients' War long ago... effectively neutralizing the eons of evolutionary, economic, and technological advantage they were expecting to enjoy over the Solomani.

Extra points if you can pin the extinction event (meteroite, volcanoes, whatever) that ended dino hegemony on Terra on a civil war within Droyne space... or better yet, a conflict with an even-earlier emigrating-off-Earth race of eukaryotes who eventually became the Hivers, for example... maybe that was the true Ancients' War...

 

[G. Kashkanun Anderson]

Sleestak?

Not heard of that ...

EDIT: Ah, Land of the Lost, that looks like it was a great show! (Wiki is your friend!)

Well, if you can figure out how to stream Hulu videos from outside the United States, you can see for yourself. I think they have the entire first season available online. Or you can also dedicate a couple of hours to scouring the YouTube ... I did notice a couple of low-res episodes available for viewing there.

And was it good? Well, it was the show that first introduced me (and a jillion other Elementary School kids) to the concept of a Pocket Universe. And the number of well-known science fiction authors who supplied scripts for the show is downright jaw-dropping for a Saturday morning kid-vid show. Larry "Ringworld" Niven and David "The Trouble With Tribbles" Gerrold collaborated on an episode called "Circle" which blew my little nine-year-old mind.

 

[Madarin Dude]

I imediatly thought of the troodon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troodon They had larger brains binocular vision and opposable thumbs.

 

[G. Kashkanun Anderson]

In this timeline, the dinosauroids got into space, specialised in genetic engineering, herding herbivores such as triceratops and iguanadon, colonised Mars and the Moon. Began terraforming Mars, creating large lakes and a very thin but breathable atmosphere. There were tensions and the inevitable war, and the space-faring dinosauroids used a mass-driver to smash an asteroid into Mexico, center of the dinosaurid civilization wiping out the nation and all trace of it.

Well, ya know, there are whole websites devoted to the idea that the "this timeline" that you mention is actually this timeline ... as in, ours ... as in, everything you just wrote is basically what really happened! o:

For instance: I, for one, had no idea that Los Angeles was actually founded by a race of subterranean lizard people. Not that it's a surprising revelation about LA, mind you ... I just had no idea.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Sorry, I haven't read the whole thread, but wanted to make a quick comment. The inteli-Dinos is an old idea, as per the link to the "Smartasaurus" article. There's actually a political cartoon not shown in the article that has a collection of intelligent dino scientists ridiculing the reverse theory; i.e. a hypothesized man evolving from small warm blooded creatures.

Sentient dinos... I shrug at the idea a-la my GURPS Alien Module thread, but I guess if it's done right anything is possible.

 

[Mithras]

Blue Ghost, its an old idea to you. Brand new to me!

Without reading lots of off-centre websites on alternative or 'secret' evolution, I do have two simple points of my own that make me feel good about this SF campaign idea:

1) If Earth is such a great place for life to evolve, why only one intelligent species so far... why not others in the eons past?

2) I'm focussing on the stars within 12 light years, and I want technologically advanced aliens. I find it hard to believe the aliens or their ancestors have not been to Earth in the past.

Mix 1) and 2) rub in some homemade paleaontology and I have an SF alien race with some backstory rather than humans butting heads with a very very alien alien race leading to war or trade with no prior contact or themes.

Should make a good backstory.

Oh, and BTW: it is an idea for a game - not my stance on geological time!

Sorry, I haven't read the whole thread, but wanted to make a quick comment. The inteli-Dinos is an old idea, as per the link to the "Smartasaurus" article. There's actually a political cartoon not shown in the article that has a collection of intelligent dino scientists ridiculing the reverse theory; i.e. a hypothesized man evolving from small warm blooded creatures.

Sentient dinos... I shrug at the idea a-la my GURPS Alien Module thread, but I guess if it's done right anything is possible.

 

[Mithras]

Now that is a great Call of Chthulhu adventure right there, complete with government agents!

For instance: I, for one, had no idea that Los Angeles was actually founded by a race of subterranean lizard people. Not that it's a surprising revelation about LA, mind you ... I just had no idea.

 

[leo knight]

I had been looking at reptillians as Big Bads for my campaign. The conspiracy stuff is such pulpy fun: Psionic, shapeshifting, cold-blooded, baby-eating, blood-drinking, DNA-splicing, slave-master space Nazis! With an asteroid Death Star mother ship the size of Pennsylvania!

Behold:

Reptilians Heading This Way
The following information has been deemed unsuitable for the public and
there have been and will be more killings to keep such information secret.
There is a threat of an invasion by millions of reptilian aliens which have
control of the Greys. There are smaller ships heading this way, but nothing
compared in size to the small planetoid that is heading toward this planet,
which is approximately the size of the state of Pennsylvania. It does not
travel at above light speed as do other craft because it is so enormous and
holds so many aliens. It passed near the planet in the early summer of
1989, dropped off some reptilian aliens and headed out to the Draco
constellation. The timetable for the arrival back to earth is approximately
2020, depending on what may happen near Draco. The Hubble Telescopes
primary mission is to track the return of the craft. Aliens are living at
military bases at this time.
The aliens are attempting to move their entire planetary population from
their dying planet as quickly as possible, prior to the arrival of the
Draco reptilians.

From this link: http://www.fortunecity.com/roswell/prediction/51/text-files/alieninfo.txt, for those of us who love wierdness. Apparently, one way to fend off the conspiracy is to avoid making paragraphs. Another source had the population of the mother ship at 25 million lizards. David Icke will have to work overtime.

 

[Mithras]

I have now realised the web is full of weirdness.

I was making it up for fun, but there are folks out there passionately trying to convince us that it really is very real - really. All of it. Everything you've ever heard - and more.

I think it scares me. I'm not sure :0

 

[leo knight]

Too true Mithras, too true. The internet didn't start it, but it definitely kicked into overdrive. Not to de-rail, but we had a local radio personality, Zoh Hieronimus, who spent three hours every weekday talking about this stuff. I used to joke that she thought "The X-Files" was a documentary. She used the reverse of Occam's Razor: the more outlandish and outre the explanation, the better. She was a big Y2K bug, going so far as to advertise generators and reverse osmosis water filters on her show. Her station let her go after the apocalypse didn't arrive on schedule. My employer's in-laws still insist that only the valiant efforts of Zoh, and her ilk, saved civilization from ruin.

Her website, for those so inclined: http://www.zoharaonline.com/

 

[leo knight]

Sorry if I derailed there. To the original topic, I like the idea of a "familiar" alien race, and the idea of them laying claim to Earth. The reasons you laid out about five posts back seem spot on.

 

[BlackBat242]

Nicolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky is his name.

http://www.iankitching.me.uk/humour/lehrer/revisited.html#Lobachevsky

 

[Darkhstarr]

An intelligenct dino race called the Hsien was one of the first minor I created for my campaign. Located in the Vanguard Reaches they stole ships, tech (some of it Ancients), & technicians and formed a sucessful empire. It collapsed due to several factors, expansion of Imperium-based immigrants into the region; the formation of pocket empires to counter their raids; & most importantly, the revolt of their slave techs which resulted in the destruction of their homeworld. Of the surviving Hsieni, 1 group remained in the Vanguard Reaches as pirates, the second fled to the Fareven subsector under a messianic pacifist leader, the third fled to the Beyond near the borders of the Aslan Hierate. The third, the Toishani are the most important in my campaign. I had trouble finding decent 15mm minis for a dromeosaur style dino. I found one small dino that worked, but culd find any more like it. I finally discovered some Dracon minis that fit the bill from Stan Johansen a few years ago.

 

[aramis]

Sorry, I haven't read the whole thread, but wanted to make a quick comment. The inteli-Dinos is an old idea, as per the link to the "Smartasaurus" article. There's actually a political cartoon not shown in the article that has a collection of intelligent dino scientists ridiculing the reverse theory; i.e. a hypothesized man evolving from small warm blooded creatures.

Sentient dinos... I shrug at the idea a-la my GURPS Alien Module thread, but I guess if it's done right anything is possible.

S:AAB spoiler:

Spoiler:

it's also the secret suprise of the origin of the Chigs in Space:Above and Beyond....

 

[Whipsnade]

Mithras,

I love this idea but you're going to have to come up with some idea to explain what the "smartosaurii" have been doing for the last 65 million years. That's absolutely mind boggling amount of time for them to remain the same culturally, technologically, and genetically.

Hogan in his sequels to the Giants Trilogy explained away lack of technological progress by Giant culture by having them become addicted to virtual reality for much of the ~300K years since leaving the Sol system. Even that won't going to account for 65 million years however.

There is one sci-fi idea that might solve your problem: Vinge's "bobbles".

How about this?

- The "smartosaurii" develop into the planet and space-based factions you suggest. War looms, so the space faction builds the stargate to Barnard as a bolthole, planning to use it if they start to lose and have to drop a rock on Earth.

- The war kicks off and, as foreseen, the space faction is losing. They evacuate most of themselves to Barnard while a small rearguard keeps the enemy at bay. The rock hits Earth as planned and, as the rearguard begins to transit the stargate, a last attack by the now-dying planet faction causes the stargate to malfunction.

- The space faction's rearguard is "bobbled" ala Vinge due to the malfunction. What's more, they don't know they've been "bobbled". The rest of their faction has made it to Barnard without incident, but they can't get the Barnard's system end of the stargate to work because of what has happened to the Sol system's end.

- What happens to the "smartosaurii" at Barnard is not important. They can die out after a long period, evolve into something else, "move on" to a "higher" plane of existence, whatever. All that matters is they are gone. They left the stargates in place because they either knew or hoped the "bobbled" rearguard will eventually emerge.

- And that's what happens after 64,999,900 years. A century or so before your present, the rearguard's bobble decays and they pop out of the Barnard stargate thinking a fraction of a second has passed. To say they're surprised is an understatement.

- They spend most of the ensuing century trying to live on Barnard with varying degrees of success. It takes a while, but they eventually manage to repair the stargate system too. That's a great relief to them because it means they can go "home" to a planet they know can support them. [Although Earth's oxygen levels are now much lower ]

- A few scouts/test probes transit the stargate to check out both the Sol system and the gate's operation. Once enough data is collected, the the smartosaurii fleet scheduled to come through next.


Hope this foolishness is of some help.


Regards,
Bill

 

[beowulf2044]

Are these lizards any relation to the ones profiled in the adventure 'Shadows'?

 

[Mithras]

Lovely ideas!

ON S:AAB, I watched and studied that show intently, I couldn't remember seeing any connection to Earth with the Chigs in that final episiode, it seemed the reverse to me, that Vesta colony had been built on their maternity/nest planet.

This is what I have sketched out for the timeline.

There are dinosaurids on Earth and some in the Solar System, during the war the space-farers build the stargate in the Saturnian system. The ground-based race are experts in genetic engineering, using bio-created lenses and sophisticated micro-organisms to do many jobs. They create a virus to wipe out the space farers. It affects those on Luna. They drop the rock. The virus continues to spread to Mars. The space-farers get out of the Solar System.

End of story. Rise of the mammals etc.

At Barnard (actually now changed to Epsilon Eridanus!) the space-farers set up a new civilization, but the virus was brought with them and it takes hold decimating the population. They survive, but devolve to a semi-sentient species.

65 MY later.

Explorers on Mars dig up a fossil of a therapod of the deinonychosaurs. Classified as a new species: Sirenosaur Buchanensis (found in the Terra Sirenum, SW of Olympus Mons). Suggestions it was intelligent.

A century later, humans make first contact with the 'feathered serpents' the gukamatz (read: Droyne) at Episilon Eridani. Limited to a single star system at TL 8. Academics believe they are of a related species to Sirenosaur and Troodont, and name the gukamatz: Eridanasaurus.

The Droyne/gukamatz with later capture an Earth ship and retro-engineer it, using the jump drive to colonize three other worlds rapidly and militarily.