Intro

The Ch'thda are actually not just a single species of alien. They are a co-operative multi-species system that rely on each other to expand and spread themselves throughout the universe. They are also, as it happens, the initial enemy aliens you oppose in the game. The Ch'thda are somewhat insect-like creatures with individual specialties and a micro-hive mind (small groups of individuals operate as a unit). In game, some members of the collection of species possess the ability to manipulate objects on a nano level, and even adapt themselves or evolve in tangible-time to accomplish a given task.

Any technology that the Ch'thda do posess however, does not belong to them, but rather has been pillaged from more technologically advanced races such as the Lynir. Even their thinking drones aren't very smart comparitively.

Genjix: Not so much not smart, but more the case of co-operative thinking?

Ch'thda races

• Ch'thda Proletarian (worker)
• Ch'thda Conskript (grunt)
• Ch'thda Niarb (controller)
• Ch'thda Apollyon (overlord)
• Ch'thda Arachne (spinner, creates the cocoons)
• Ch'thda Bacce-Ha-Koni (breeder)
• Ch'thda Atlas (carrier)
• Ch'thda Barghest
• Ch'thda Stalker
• Ch'thda Harpy (flying creature)
• Ch'thda Triton (a swimming creature, lives in the water)

Note: I made a list to start with, this needs a lot of editting I think. Also definitly some more later on, for both Ch'thda and E-Ch'thda, so please add more. Feel free to change names that are considered bad, if you don't get a name try google to find it. Most names are either practicle names or names.

The Cocoon

<Full description of how the cocoon works, concept art... stuff like that.>

Renaud: The cocoons are like eggs, with a protuberance at the bottom that can create a "push" ( like the reactor of a rocket) the yellow contains embrios, the white contains a liquid that both feeds the embrios and supply the reactor. A single cocoon can only fly forward, it isnt able to change it's trajectory. When a Hive is going to leave a planet cocoons are created, feeled with embrios and liquid, and attached together like an giant grape, with some kind of connection between the cocoons that creates a "collective mind". This "collective mind" allows the bunch of cocoon to direct itself by changing the amount of cocoons that generate a push on each side of the grape. So the bunch of cocoon can leave the planet and start travelling into space. When a cocoon dont have anymore liquid, it dies and separate itself from the bunch. When the collony enter the atmosphere of the target planet, all the cocoons separate from each other, it's making some king of a rain of cocoon, they scratch on the ground, it wakes up the creatures and they start a new colony.

Here is a view of an egg:

Here is an Hive going to leave a plannet:

Concept Notes/Discussion

Ch'thda are the aliens which attack the humans shortly after their arrival. Presumably, these aliens also caused the dissappearance of the Lynir and the ruin of their cities. The Ch'thda are somewhat insect-like creatures with individual specialties and a micro-hive mind (small groups of individuals operate as a unit). The Ch'thda make heavy use of nanotechnology to adapt themselves to a specific mission, creating new tools and, to a limited extent, changing their shape to accomplish a mission.

Note that all technology they can use is created by the Lynir, they aren't very smart themselves. They have instincts and became agressive (that is partly the Lynir doing, this will be added in the BackGroundInfo )

Jorrit: this part of the story needs changing. The Ch'thda are invading aliens. They don't originate from the Lynir planet. The Ch'thda are a very variable race with several different primitive and low-intelligent species. They originate from a distant planet and are not intelligent enough to have invented space travel. Instead they evolved a way to leave their planet with cocoons. Using those cocoons they spread accross the universe and they invade every planet that is suitable for them. The Lynir planet is one of them. Note that while the Ch'thda are not intelligent enough for real technology they are not stupid either. They have a lot of cunning and are able to reason (at least some of the species are).

Jorrit: one of the subspecies of the Ch'thda is a spider like creature (doesn't have to be exactly like a spider, just insect/spider like) which is the creature that is responsible for making the cocoons. In order to do that it makes a kind of natural substance which will be shaped in a cocoon form. The cocoons are very light but very strong. Inside a cocoon members of other Ch'thda species will lay eggs.

Jorrit: one other subspecies is one that is responsible for making the chemicals used to shoot the cocoons into space. Exactly how this works has to be determined yet.

Jorrit: the big idea here is that we have a very diverse race of species and they all have specialized functions. Not all the sub-species are intelligent. But a few of the sub-species are and they are the 'coordinaters'.

Jorrit: the Ch'thda only kill off creatures that are a threat to them. They are smart enough to realize that they need the other creatures for food.

Jorrit: in an attempt to stop the Ch'thda invasion the Lynir attempted to genetically modify the Ch'thda in order to create creatures that fight with the original Ch'thda. Unfortunatelly they failed. This means that we can see a lot of different Ch'thda sub-species and variants. Including a few offensive ones that originated from original non-offensive Ch'thda sub-species (like the cocoon-creating spiders). The Lynir also adapted some of the Ch'thda to work with technological weapons and some of the new Ch'thda have built-in weapons (built into their bodies) and other technology. In that sense the engineered Ch'thda are even more powerful then the originals.

Jorrit: note that the engineered Ch'thda are also aggressive towards the original Ch'thda so when the colonists arrive at the planet they actually arrive at a kind of war-zone.

Jorrit: one question is how the e-Ch'thda (the engineered ones) can produce sufficient new creatures in order to bring the fight with the Ch'thda in a good balance. There are two types of e-Ch'thda. Basically you have the 'droid'-enhanced e-Ch'thda which have some kind of electronical/mechanical extension. And then you have the 'bio'-enhanced e-Ch'thda which have genetically engineered extensions. For the bio-Ch'thda we can assume that they can breed normally and produce new enhanced offspring. For the mech-Ch'thda the situation is more complicated. They have learned how to use the original equipment that the Lynir used to create the extensions. However there is only a limited amount of new mech-Ch'thda that can be born that way (the machines can't produce new weapons that fast) so I would make the mech-Ch'thda VERY powerful but rather rare.

Hakim: Should we make a list of different species that are within the faction called Ch'thda ? Should we make seperate pages for every kind? Or different pages for the Engineered Ch'thda and Original Ch'thda? How far do we want to work out this concept? I like it myself. It enables us to come up with a lot of creativity.

Hakim: We need a big list of organic weapons that could be used by the original Ch'thda, it would also be nice to have some original bio-weapons in the game. Acid and claws are really default.

Hakim: Could some of the bioweapons be rebuild to seperate weapons that recharge themselves after a while like the hornet gun in Half-Life? I guess we shouldn't rip off their idea's too much. But that game is considered a good one.

Genjix: Could it be correct for me to say that Chthda's weapons are predominantly biological unconvential ones (with few odd alien technologies thrown in)? It would add for interesting gameplay/enemies/puzzles, to make this race slightly stranger than the lynir.

Ashims: I did a little formatting and wrote up a proper introduction...

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