Rejected Submission [Faction] Sargon Nation

I added an article about the Sargonide language Kasatro.

Thanks for your patience with this. I hope to find time to sit down and look at this this weekend.

I invite anyone in the SARP who has feedback to give it.

I restructured the Sargon Nation's site and expanded the articles about the Sargonides and Sargonide history. The latter is still to be continued after "The Great War", however, but right now I'm to tired to continue.

I intend to expand the rest of the articles, too, and to add more.

I'm actually not sure about the Khasidel brothers story in the Sargonide history. Although I like the story and would like to tell it in more detail in the future, I fear it might not fit in, as it might be to supernatural/messias-like. I'd need you feedback on this.

You might want to rename the Khasidel brothers, even if they stay in, seeing as that's the username of one of our members. That, or at least check with him.

Now, outside of that, a couple things. Some fairly big stumbling blocks, at least right now. First, and most obvious, "The staff is only willing to accept submissions for major setting additions if you have been on SARP for at least 3 months, and shown you are consistently active as well as a competent roleplayer." This applies to species, and to most major factions as well, meaning that thus far, at least, you haven't been active on the site for long enough yet.

Secondly, "2. Start with art! Concept art is required." All races require art before they can be approved, especially so if they're going to be an entirely separate, new faction.

Last, and least important, but still worth mentioning, "Avoid being pseudohuman." Right now, this race is literally human+1. We have plenty of human or nearly human races already. If you want to make this faction one of the existing races, that's fine, but human+1 is just a bit silly, when we already have what, 8-9 semi-human races? Several of whom can completely customize appearance.

Things are looking pretty good so far.

One thing that needs some attention is wiki styling. Basically, I'd like to see text between all the headers. For example, on the species page there's no text after the title header. You could probably just delete the General Information header to fix this. A general spellcheck could also help.

@Aendri

Aendri said:

You might want to rename the Khasidel brothers, even if they stay in, seeing as that's the username of one of our members. That, or at least check with him.

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Ooops... That name came to my mind and seemed to fit. I guess thats a case of having a name saved unconsciously. I'll change it of cause.

Edit: Name changed in Hozarion.

Concerning your other points:

They are not meant to be a major faction in any foreseeable time. The Sargon Nation is meant to be a minor faction in the frontier space, Floodwaters is working on.

The Sargonides are specifically not a new species but part of the human species. Due to their long isolation and adaption to their homeworld they are however a subspecies of menkind. If they create offspring with other humans their special traits may as well get lost within a few generations.
Their 'mind sibling' ability is, however, a core concept of the Sargonides in my eyes and I can only explain it when they are a subspecies.

Art... well, as I said I'm still working on the faction especially with the art I would be glad, if anyone could help me. I have a head full of ideas but I'm not good with art.

@Wes I'll look into it. Unfortunately mispellings in English don't catch my I as easyly as they would in German.

If they have new, unheard of abilities, they're a new race. Either they're human or not. Saying they're different because they've been separated is like saying a tiger and leopard are the same species. That's called evolution. Regardless, the psuedohuman guidance still stands. Why do we want to add these psuedohumans to the setting, when we've specifically stated in the submission guidelines this isn't what we're looking for? You really need to justify this for the setting, not just because it's the race you're interested in.

Past there, EVERY species, especially combined with a new faction is considered a major setting addition, whether it's a "major" faction or not. The 3 month rule isn't there because we don't think you can write. It's there because flat out, you don't know the setting yet. There is a LOT to learn about the setting, and it's possible you'll end up finding out something already exists that works for you. That's a learning curve time period, nothing more.

And again, the art is a requirement, but it's a pretty flexible one. Heck, if nothing else, why not go make a commission with an artist? If you don't need anything incredibly high end, you can commission people for $20-$30 and get good art, especially for a race that is so similar in appearance to humans. I don't recommend doing something like that until you're a bit further in the process, just remember it's a requirement before the race can be approved at all.

In terms of the spellings, if you don't have Microsoft Word, you can always download Apache OpenOffice for free, and use that to spell/grammar check your writing. A lot of our members have done that in the past, especially one like you who aren't native speakers.

I guess I missunderstood the rules concerning species submissions then. Although I totally understand your point, it would have been nice if I had been more specifically told so, when I introduced my concept before, especially to avoid such a problem. If I had been, I probably wouldn't even have started to put any effort into it, for I consider the Sargonides 'mind sibling' ability a core point of the faction.

I need to sleep on the matter, before I can decide what to do about it now, because right now I'm just pissed. Really pissed. I've no grudge against you though, Aendri. Just have to digest this.

Like I said. Sell us on it. A lot of the "rules" are treated pretty much as guidelines. Give us a reason to want to work around the idea, rather than just saying you want something a particular way, and it's easier for us to help you out. Right now, all I've got is that you want a human, but you want some cool abilities too. What makes those abilities so important? What makes this race truly UNIQUE, not just a human+1? Remember, this isn't just a submit something and have it approved or rejected forum, this is for discussion about it. The rules are there to guide, not to wall things off.

At first: I'm sorry if I overreacted yesterday and hope I haven't affronted you or anyone else.

Concerning the Sargonides:

The 'mind sibling' ability is the only thing that really distinguishes the Sargonides from humans as far as I see it. The phenotype and the cold resistance are minor alterations, adaptions to the world their live on. For the setting itself I consider the 'mind sibling' ability a pretty minor addition, because very few individuals even have it - there are only about 40,000 Sargonides with an active 'mind sibling' at any time, which is few even compared to only the Sargonide population. They are, however, of cause in most cases the top scientists/leaders/agents/etc. of the Sargon Nation, for they are in general more intelligent then the average and have an eidetic memory. For once because the selection process favors more intelligent people in the first place and second because two mind can think of more than one can (especially as one of them is barely influenced by emotion). But as I said, there are few. Most Sargonides are basically nothing else as humans with white hair and red eyes, which is why I considered them to be humans as a species and didn't think the species submission rules to apply. That was an error on my side, I guess.

For the RP, however, I think the 'mind sibling' can be great and sometimes humorous to play, when he comment's on various actions, decisions or even just thoughts of his host, although these would only be NPCs (mainly for Floodwaters' Frontier Space) in any foreseeable future, as I don't intend to go for anything bigger than a minor faction until I'm more experienced and 'home' in SARP myself. That is basically why I've given it to them. All in all I actually don't intend them to be anything else than humans and after I now slept on it I could even live with writing the mind sibling out of the concept. I would really prefer not to, though, because I really think it can be an interesting instrument for storytelling.

Concerning your other points:

I think you misunderstood my intentions when I started this thread.

Rattenkind said:

Notes: I'm still working on this faction and have yet to write down many things I have in my head right now and other things that are already written might still change slightly. Still I wanted to open it for review for one thing to eliminate every unnecessary mistake for another thing to get some general feedback to keep me motivated and for a third thing to maybe find someone who would help me out with some art for I'm not good with art.

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I actually don't want the Sargon Nation approved right now. I don't consider them ready for approval yet myself. What I meant to do with this thread is getting feedback and opinions on the Sargon Nation, so that I know what to work on and what to better change. I guess, maybe I should have done so somewhere else in another form.
I actually absolutely agree with the 3-month-rule, for I totally see the reason behind it. I also plan on adding concept art to the sides, though I admit that I hoped to get help with that here. But if I don't then I guess I got to work really hard to create something presentable myself, for I unfortunately have no money att all to spend on this.

The Sargon Nation is meant to be part of Floodwaters' Frontier Space and not to be introduced to the actual RP until her project is, which is yet another reason I actually don't want it to be approved right now.

I hope I haven't caused you to much trouble, although I certainly did it to myself.

Okay, so, looking at the "Mind Sibling" ability. I'm still not getting a really unique feel to it, to be honest. We live in a setting of androids and cybernetics, where anyone can plug a computer into their head (if their brains aren't already digital), and promptly have a perfect memory. About the only part of it (to me, at least) that would really set it apart and make it unique is that it's almost like having a second character in their head, and that causes issues of its own. Namely, in consistent presentation, and actual utility. Once this race is approved, unless it's specifically marked otherwise, ANYONE can make a character from this race, and their presentation of how that system works might not even be close to what you had in mind. Past there, it just seems like the kind of thing that if they're not really comfortable with, they would ignore completely, meaning we're back to this race being nothing more than a different appearance of a human.

@Wes, is there any way he could integrate his mind sibling idea as it is now into an existing race somehow? That way he gets the effect, without having to really set them out as a distinct group?

I'm so sorry Rattenkind, I really hate to hear that you're upset. This isn't the experience I want you to be having here.

The sticking point seems to be the mind-siblings. I don't think there's an issue with the mind-siblings themselves, more that they're said to have been evolved, which sort of creates a new human+1 species.

I've been thinking about this and since cultures can evolve faster than physiology...what if it's a cultural practice where, instead of, say, getting circumcised or baptized, when they're babies they get injected with whatever mojo makes the mind-siblings manifest. So they'd technically be baseline humans, at least at birth. Then they'd get genetic/nanoprobe modifications that makes them into your current species variant concept. Let me know if you think this is an elegant or feasible solution to Aendri's objections.

That might be a good solution Wes, it could also allow for some preselection of traits for the mind-sib

Sorry for not replying in quite some time. I've been preoccupied with RL issues a lot. But I'm back now and somewhat eager to continue with my Sargon Nation project.

Concerning the solution of @Wes : I'd like to keep the negative side of that ability, the increased chance of schizophrenia, too. But if the Sargonides caused their ability voluntarily that would be stupid if you cause that terrible disease to so much of your own people than ever get an activated mind-sib. So either I'd have to take schizophrenia out or they'd have to get the ability involuntarily.

Maybe one could explain it with some environmental condition of Sargon that enables someone who was exposed to it for something like two decades (which would just happen to be every adult Sargonide) to activate the mind sibling but also might cause schizophrenia.

Would that be a workable solution, @Aendri ?

I actually think Wes's idea works, even if the negative effects are included. After all, many drugs in modern day society have a HUGE list of potential negative side effects, and I can't name one that has as major a potential upside as this benefit. I'd think it would be one of those things where people consider it worth the risk. I know personally, I'd go for it in a heartbeat if I could basically have a computer in my head with a 1 in 100 chance of going nuts (assuming I'm not already there). You could also include little side things like the fact that there is testing people can undergo to see if they're likely to have mental breaks from the process, or required psych tests to be allowed to receive the drug at all.

What it comes down to is really that you need to go one of two ways with this. They should either be baseline humans with a bit different coloration, and the strange abilities are something added culturally, like Wes suggested, or you need to take them a few steps further off of the mainline human template, so they're not just humans+1. Personally, I think that the best way to keep them close to what you're looking for is Wes's idea.

I actually thought my last solution would do just that, for Sargonides are baseline humans with a different phenotype that way. The drug is basically the planet itself (or something in the air...) and every other human exposed to it would get the same ability but with the same risk.
I just can't see the Sargonides taking that risk voluntarily. Just to give it some numbers: There are under 50,000 Sargonides with an active mind sibling at any given time but about 70 million Sargonides suffering from schizophrenia.

People will do some pretty risky things if their culture dictates it. Some cultures mutilate their kids' sex organs because it's the "norm." Even in real life, some people will go fight hopeless wars or explode themselves, scar themselves, or purposely expose themselves to hazards like diseases or poisonous snakes for their culture. Particularly if it's part of their faith.

What if the mind siblings were considered a sort of angel, and this was the Sargonides' way to getting closer to God?

You're right about that. But the all-Sargon culture is only about 200 years (100 Sargon years) old, while I thought the mind sibling ability as something considerably older that was a binding similarity of all Sargonides, regardless of their culture or nationality. But I can't see all the former Sargonide cultures practicing the same whatever activates their ability but does harm them, too.

And it's certainly nothing to them that gets them closer to some god, because after the disaster with the Krax Order they have become pretty atheistic. I haven't mentioned that yet thought. *making a mental note to catch up on it*

What is so wrong with the planet causing the condition? I actually like that version because this way Sargonide colonists, which there are some but not very many, wouldn't even have it.

Because that opens up the question of what prevents this from going into effect on ANY person who stays on the planet for any length of time? If this is basically the one and only thing that makes them unique, it should stay unique to them, not just a random side effect that kicks in just by being around on the planet.