 April 6, 2012 - 12:30am | I have noted that this Frontier has an old-school sic-fi aesthetics—a style some call "rocket-punk." I have been making art that reflect these ideals. The first pic shows a man and young woman in baggy, leathery aviator/bomber suit and gear. The man has a bulky energy rifle, a large box on his chest with funnel-mic (an early poly-vox), and he is holding-up a hand-held box with a set of wind gauges. He looks middle-age, with glasses. He looks like a normal middle-age man with glasses. The girl is holding a tube-case, and looking through binoculars. She has a 1940's look about her, with curly hair and bangs sticking out of her aviator's cap. Her suit fits a man, but is tied-up and really baggy. With them, their is a Yezarian warrior in tribal gear: a feathered headdress, beaded jewelery, and a bone nose-pricing. He is holding a makeshift bone-weapon and blaster. The idea behind this, is that the Yazarians are recently discovered, and still maintain their tribe customs. I will get this scanned, once I get it finished. Another pic I'm working on address Clarion (Gollywog) and Minotaur. It has been established that Clarion has a long standing royal family, and I like the idea of having them as English Colonialists in space. I picture them as staunch, proud and proper, with fancy Victorian-styled uniforms. These guys are considered the good guys. On the other hand, the people of Minotaur are like the "Mongol Raiders" of old pulp sci-if, like Buck Rodgers, but with a Roman style. They are building their power through conquest and slavery, and they have a "might makes right" attitude. They are the unquestioned bad guys of the Frontier. I got a Minotaurian Raider nearly finished, and I'm still working on tho outline of a Clarion Expeditionary Soldier. I have also been thinking about adding a Human colony in the Liberty system, before the Ice-Age mutated the people into the Mhemne, that was made isolated by the Minotaurian raids. Well, I solved the issue of the whole "Wait, no Sathars? Then who are going to be the bad guys?" There will still be bud guys, but they are mostly going to be domestic threats, and the players should not have trouble finding them. Like in the normal game, adventures should be fairly pulp-like, but this would be less about the WWII/Cold War era Nazi/Commie-hunting you get with the Sathar, but more like the African expeditions with the Yezarian nations, and the Buck Rogers/Flash Gordon heroic action against the Minotaurian threat, as well as the usual threats of pirates, mobsters, terrorists and political depots. Well, what do you all think? Do anyone have any ideas or suggestions? |
 April 6, 2012 - 8:49am | I like the suggestions and I agree no sathar contact. There are sathar and they've left artifacts in this sector of space, but nobody has met them yet. I'm still working out the details. |
 April 6, 2012 - 9:30am | Re:sathar contact, movie makers often hide the monster from the audience till later in the picture and the first clear view of the creature is called the "big reveal". It serves to heighten the impact of the moment and build anticipation in the audience. Examples of the technique is Alien and Cloverfield and Predator. The big reveal for the sathar in the Frontier is the First Sathar War. However, this does not mean that you could not use them during the Age of Colonization, just that you'd have to be careful to not really give a clear view of them and skillfully manipulate the game so that the player is sitting there saying to himself, "I bet that has to be the sathar." Though the character has no clue as to what just happened. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 6, 2012 - 9:36am | BTW I get rocket punk but prefer '80s Retro sci-fi; there is just something about a sci-fi chick in a skin tight jumpsuit. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 6, 2012 - 10:45am | The big reveal for the sathar in the Frontier is the First Sathar War. However, this does not mean that you could not use them during the Age of Colonization, just that you'd have to be careful to not really give a clear view of them and skillfully manipulate the game so that the player is sitting there saying to himself, "I bet that has to be the sathar." Though the character has no clue as to what just happened.
That is, if you want them revealed at SWI. For those familiar with SF it would be fun to tell them, "Nope, there are not sathar in this setting." and then down the road give hints. :-) |
April 6, 2012 - 12:15pm | Thats in the background- You say before the sathar, before the mega corps, before the UPF.... then you hint at the sathar in an adventure. though not fully revealing them- perhaps the hypnotism ability comes into play in this. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 7, 2012 - 6:03am | BTW I get rocket punk but prefer '80s Retro sci-fi; there is just something about a sci-fi chick in a skin tight jumpsuit. Yeah, I hear you on that!  For sometime, I have been looking at the SF timeline through a scope of real-life sci-fi: with the history looking like retro rocket punk, the future looking like a post-modern iPod version of itself, and the default era looking like the glam sci-fi of the '70s and '80s we grew-up to. On a related note, I have been thinking about a project about a flashy future for the SF setting, but I have not figured-out a name for it, and I have been preoccupied with this project. Although, my interest in this era stems from: 110FY — A human assassin fails in his attempt to shoot Queanee
Kloonanu, chairman of the Council of Worlds. A small bioform is found attached to the human's back. Scientific studies show it to be some kind of intelligent, parasitic organism with the same genetic make-up as Sathar specimens. Authorities believe it to be a new Sathar method of controlling agents. See-through apparel becomes fashionable almost immediately. So yeah. I really want to explore the possibilities.  Although, this would have a lot of possibilities, as it would be an overall expansion: new tech, new worlds, new races, new enemies (why should the Sathar have all the fun?). As a forethought, would have a lot of elements from contemporary sci-fi — biopunk, cyberprep, nanotech, and the like — with that ubiquitous glossy CGI esthetics. But this, I can wait for... unless folks are more interested in developing this super-setting, then a retro one. |
April 7, 2012 - 7:39am | I too am interested in the latter time lime. My timeline endeavor has seen the release of what I call the Age of Colonization taking the classic setting upto SW1. The next installment in buried in an article on the CFM, Rim and their history and background basically covering their history upto the CFM discovering the core four in the Laco system after backtracking the sathar fleet there. My next big instalment is the Age of Adventure covering the period between the two sathar wars. 4th instalment will just be the second sathar war. 5th is called the Age of Corporate War due to a statement in Zebs about the corporate wars starting in earnest after SW2. That piece of the timeline covers between SW2 and year FY111 which is the last of the cannon statements concerning the timeline that I've found. I was partly inspired by Alvarez's Frontier Historian website that is no longer up on the web. He took his timeline past FY111 and eventually I'd like to do the same. I have a pile of notes back home so what I've typed here is just from memory and for some of the Age names I have two to show that historians are not always in agreement or simply have different focus and interest. Which is an understatement when applied to the real world. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
