 January 12, 2013 - 6:04am | This time last year I was on the level of drawing that was a little bit
above stick figures and stymied that I could not beg borrow or steal
enough art for my needs in fan magazine publishing. Over 2012 I threw
myself into drawing and ressurrected 25 year old skills that had been
lost hopefully 2013 will be a year of even better improvement. This discussion is not just for me as there is a handful of artist in the community producing stuff- Malcadon has a very nice gallery of sketchs (admittedly geared toward gama world) at deviantart.com , AZ_gamer is the resident cgi artist here producing so much in that mediu, and others. I thought that it would be nice to talk about what we'd like to see come out in 2013 of Star Frontiers art or Star Frontiers-ish art. 1.) I recently saw a post (I dont think it was on this site) criticizing the fact that a lot of sci-fi art these days shows people in tactical gear carrying modern looking assault rifles. I'm not surprised that this would be a trend as a drawing reference helps and its not hard to find these subjects to work from. How does the community feel about this? Do we prefer stuff with a more golden age of sci fi look or is it ok if it has a more Gritty modernist look? 2.) In another thread someone asked a question that caused an image to pop into my head and I had to draw it.  This one is equal parts sexy, creepy, and disturbing IMO and I drew it! So how do we feel about art with a sexy subject? Yay, Nay or dont care? I suppose this question should be actually be separated into three questions- Sexy, creepy and disturbing should all be answered separately. 3. New avatar pics? would we like new avatar pics for this site? I suppose most of us have settled on an avatar pic and are not likely to change it so this is about new members, of which a large portion dont bother with getting an avatar (though many that actually post do). Would a host of new pictures of the core four be a good thing to add to the available avatars? 4. This question is separate from #3; character portraits? would a library of character portraits be a valued addition to game play? To be able to add a character portrait to your character sheet? Pose a question if you think of one. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
December 8, 2013 - 4:00pm | I was looking for a thread to post this picture http://www.deviantart.com/art/T-cha-Lok-Lok-413309493 A slightly different take on a vrusk if you like:  I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 December 8, 2013 - 6:43pm | Nice "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
 December 9, 2013 - 5:03am | Having some new Avatar pics would be nice. Characters pics are always useful as long as match the characters. Could be a Vrusk from a minority group. Most of it matches the description pretty well. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
December 9, 2013 - 6:37am | Having some new Avatar pics would be nice.
Thats what I thought and if I was rolling up a vrusk right now I might consider using this as the character portrait. My original idea i floated by Terl Obar was to set up a rogues gallery of character portraits on the Frontier Explorer site where any registered user could upload a charwcter pic and anyone could grab the image to use. I've produced a handful of non player character portraits forU the magazine and will continue to do so and when I attend sketch group I can usually produce at least one sketch that I feal is useable as a character sketch thus this would be a growing resource. The problem is that he'd needs to have time to do this and and he's been time poor lately. I still think that we could use a rogues gallery and perhaps it could be done in a project on this site. The problem with that is that while you can upload you cand organize by race. Characters pics are always useful as long as match the characters. Could be a Vrusk from a minority group. Most of it matches the description pretty well. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 December 10, 2013 - 9:35am | Here's a quick sketch of a Sathar I created a few months back. I'm currently doodling out some ideas for a bigger picture featuring a Sathar, and this sketch was part of that process. I'm also working on some sketches of their weapons, as their shoulderless physiology and preference for recoiless weapons conjures up some interesting ideas... |
 December 10, 2013 - 10:42am | That is awesome! Can't wait to see more. And feel free to submit art to the Frontier Explorer (http://frontierexplorer.org) for publication in the magazine if you'd like to. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
December 10, 2013 - 11:06am | Thanks! I don't have anything ready yet in terms of artwork. Everything is too rough - and I need to show the Sathar's lower arms doing something else rather than being 'legs'. Drawing Sathar time and time again has given me various ideas about their physiology that I should write up at some point... |
 December 10, 2013 - 9:49pm | Your rough sketch is better than most finished work. I really like your sathar. I'd love to see more. -iggy |
 December 10, 2013 - 11:46pm | Great work, but I hate to say it as it probably detracts from the main point of the pic --- I'm digging the ship in the background. |
December 11, 2013 - 3:21am | Thanks chaps! The ship in the background was my brain trying to recall the design of a Sathar fighter ;-) I'm in the process of writing up a bunch of stuff about Sathar physiology and weapon design. I guess I should start a new forum topic for that (?) |
December 11, 2013 - 9:22pm | OK look I love the picture. It is a classic Sathar right from the game. Which is the problem. As I have mentioned before he should be holding the weapon in his lower limbs and saving his upper limbs for surgery or painting miniatures. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
December 12, 2013 - 5:08am | OK look I love the picture. It is a classic Sathar right from the game. Which is the problem. As I have mentioned before he should be holding the weapon in his lower limbs and saving his upper limbs for surgery or painting miniatures. Well, I'm not sure. The description of the Sathar states that their lower limbs are for carrying heavier loads, and doesn't say anything about the upper pair not being able to carry weapons. I've assumed that the upper pair are at least strong enough to carry rifles and pistols. One of the reasons I put the rifle on a sling was that it was there to bear some of the load. If instead the lower limbs carry and operate all weapons, it's not clear how this is done, nor does it explain how the Sathar have rifles, pistols, etc. I could see the lower limbs being used to carry the mortar-like and large laser-type things shown in the minis, but it seem from those that the lower limbs are used in concert with the upper limbs. Maybe we need a seperate thread on Sathar physiology...? |
December 12, 2013 - 6:12am | I meant that the lower limbs are used for heavy work like carrying weapons and upper limbs for delicate work. Having been a soldier for 20 years I can tell you slings are useful for carrying a weapon, I used it that way many a time on a foot march. But once the shooting starts the sling gets in the way since you need to move alot and usually very low to the ground. For me one of the attractions of SF is that the core four races are so different physically unlike most Sci-Fi games. Take Traveller for example, most of the play is by humans and while some aliens are included most are the basic Star Trek humaniods. I have tried to think through the various races and how they would actually work. This is why I am pretty hard on the Sathar lower limb use and Yazirians staying in proper character. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
December 12, 2013 - 6:34am | But maybe you're applying the rules of human physiology onto the Sathar, who are (of course) completely different. The sling I mentioned isn't a sling in the sense that it is for humans. Also, ordinarily Sathar are closer to the ground than humans in terms of stance, given that they slither. Even if they 'stand', they're still shorter. How would the lower limbs be able to help at all with weapons in this sort of situation? Also, given their paddle-like shape, how would they be able to manipulate weapons in terms of firing, loading/reloading, etc? As far as we know, Sathar weapons aren't any heavier than those of the Frontier races, and they include pistols. How would all this match up with the shape and position of the lower limbs? |
December 12, 2013 - 7:24am | I think rat t makes some good points but in the picture under discussion you could justify it as the worm is using his lower limbs to leverage himself higher for a better view. That said I do believe since this topic came up that I have a miniature of a sathar holding and operating a mortar with the upper arm holding the shell but a lower limb steadying the tube. or my memory is faulty and it was a worm with a heavy rifle supporting its weight with a lower limb, have to dig out the minis latter and check. You could make the case that trigger pulling requires the upper limb's fine motor control as well as embracing rat t's position on heavy work with the lower limbs. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
December 12, 2013 - 7:59am | Yes, I have the same minis but in both cases they seem to be using heavy weapons. The back of the box says one of these is a rifle but, if so, it's very large. I guess there may be discrepancies between the minis and what we're shown in the various illustrations of the Sathar. I say this as the upper arms of the Sathar mini are very long. It the stuff I'm writing up, the idea is that the Sathar hold their weapons with their upper arms and can brace them on their chests (i.e. the area between their upper arms). They brace them as part of the way that they aim, and not because of recoil - although the grenade rifle is an exception to this. Maybe I should just post all of that stuff I've written... although it is nearly 2000 words and I don't have any pictures ready just yet  |
December 12, 2013 - 10:24am | Yes, I have the same minis but in both cases they seem to be using heavy weapons. The back of the box says one of these is a rifle but, if so, it's very large. I guess there may be discrepancies between the minis and what we're shown in the various illustrations of the Sathar. I say this as the upper arms of the Sathar mini are very long.
You could upload the file to the downloads area of the Sathar project. In fact you could even start a thread there for just discussing your documant. The projects are a good place for discussions on narrow topics to not get lost whereas the open firums continuously scroll down as new topics get started. It the stuff I'm writing up, the idea is that the Sathar hold their weapons with their upper arms and can brace them on their chests (i.e. the area between their upper arms). They brace them as part of the way that they aim, and not because of recoil - although the grenade rifle is an exception to this. Maybe I should just post all of that stuff I've written... although it is nearly 2000 words and I don't have any pictures ready just yet I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
December 12, 2013 - 10:57am | I started a thread in 'Game Talk'. |
 December 19, 2013 - 1:16pm | I was poking around SF art... and is it canon that Yazirian woman have four breasts? Not sure where that comes from? My players are not inclined to make female characters for some reason. I played a female character once and they gave me a hard time about it. But on thier UPF frigate their will possibly be female yazirians. ----------------------------------------------- |
 December 19, 2013 - 2:47pm | Interesting question. The idea of multiple breasts is from one drawing by Jim Holloway, who is known to take wild license with source material. Yazirians are based on the Tran from Alan Dean Foster's science fiction universe, and they have 2 breasts. So, I have always ruled that Yazirians only have 2 breasts. Along the same lines, Jim Holloway's drawing of a Yazirian that is beside the original description shows the Yazirian with huge gaps in its patagia. If you look carefully, you will notice that the patagia is not even attached at the same places on each side! Now, as I said Yazirians are based on the Tran, and their patagia has no gaps. Also, these aliens are all based on real-life creatures such as the flying squirrel and the sugar glider. The real-life animals do NOT have any gaps in their patagia, because if they did, they would fall to the ground like a stone. Yazirians should not have any gaps in their patagia, because they would not be able to glide.  |
December 19, 2013 - 3:40pm | I was poking around SF art... and is it canon that Yazirian woman have four breasts? Not sure where that comes from?
That stems from two places in the AD/original purple boxed set: the pic of Eusyl on p.4 of the Basic Game book and the two female yazirian chits. |
December 19, 2013 - 6:41pm | I have always been happy with yazirians having four breasts becuase that makes them more alien. I hate copying earth biology into alien worlds. I do not compare yazirians to apes, monkeys, squirrels, or anything else on earth. There biology is different. Now the physics of all the worlds needs to be the same. Thus I have always wondered a bit about the gaps in the yazirian wing membranes. My theory is that the attachment points are filled with muscles so that they can pull the membranes tight against their bodies and not have to rely on just their arms and legs to do so. -iggy |
December 20, 2013 - 12:13am | iggy, I like the idea of them pulling the muscles tight. For me, I always thought of it like a parachute or wingsuit. If you had holes in it, you'd be dead. Shadow Shack - regarding the female Yazirian chits, I looked, and I'm not sure which ones you mean.  This was the only female Yazirian chit I could find. The other ones were obviously male. Are there others? |
December 20, 2013 - 2:50am | Yep, those holes in the wings are tricky. Back in the day, it was also a bit of a pain to try and figure out how they'd work when I was drawing up some player-character portaits (my group had two Yazirians). I have the 1980 AD box and that has female yazirian chits which show them with four breasts. |
December 20, 2013 - 8:40am | That wasn't in the original purple box, unless TSR changed them for the pink AD box. The female yaz chit had her in a raised pistol (pointing upwards) profile pose. Shadow Shack - regarding the female Yazirian chits, I looked, and I'm not sure which ones you mean. This was the only female Yazirian chit I could find. The other ones were obviously male. Are there others? |
December 20, 2013 - 10:04am | That image is from the KH counters. You can see the full set of AD counters here: http://starfrontiers.info/data/scans/AD_Counters.jpg . The one Shadow Shack is refering to is in the bottom right of the left column. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
