Developing Sci-Fi Setting

Okay, well I've been working on a sci-fi setting, and have some rough details here. I'd just like some opinions, ideas, etc., because this is still in the early stages and I'm fairly new at this.

—

In the future, maybe 2300-2500, the human race sends 2 long distance craft, carrying roughly 125 people in stasis, to a far-off planet. The planet itself is a mystery, as long distance telescopes show a lush, green planet, but due to the length of time it takes for light to travel to Earth, it's current state is a mystery.

The people on the craft are volunteers, selected by an international council to partake on this expedition. They are not expected to respond once, or if, they survive the trip, and are all but legally dead in human's opinion.

They arrive on the planet at least 100 years after leaving even with early slip-space travel on their side. They discover that intelligent lifeforms have already evolved into a 1800's style society. They are initially feared, due to their more advance technology and the fact that, well, they're ALIENS to the locals.

— That's all I've got so far. The details, the after-effects of their arrival, and aliens physical and societal features are not really all there. Any sort of ideas would be appreciated, but I don't need anything specific, just some ideas. Thanks.

Well, what did the Travelers bring with them, and what do they need from the Locals? What sort of plot are you considering? How will this be different from Red Dwarf or The Sparrow or Turn A Gundam? In what way, and with what reason, will the Travelers and Locals not see eye to eye?

Some things to get you started, I guess.

Well, I wonder. I just can't decide whether or not the Travelers and Locals will interact. Animosity seems like the logical choice, but I think that would be a little obvious for the setting. Maybe there would be a friendly initial contact, but based on the period the locals are at, that might be difficult. Also,

A way around this may be to have the setting further in the future, maybe as the Travelers descendants try to coexist with the Locals. Also, their technology was the ship and everything on it, like supplies and solar panels or something. Maybe weapons, but probably nothing huge. And maybe a database on human history, as to educate the future generations they were meant to create.

What exactly causes this fear in the locals? In fact, what is their first impression of the humans? It could be awe. Besides the obvious space travel, do the humans bring anything else to prove they're advanced, anything else from this future you've got? The humans may bring stories of nuclear and/or solar power (or whatever power source they're using), weapons/warfare, travel via jetpacks and flying cars, etc. Do the locals react to it as less of an alien invasion, and more of something that ties to their religion - and if so, which side? Evil, good, or neutral but deadly Eldritch Abominations?

Your 250 people also need basic demographics. Are they a combination of all the basic roles like doctors,engineers, soldiers? Considering that they're volunteers, your crew may not be as balanced as it should, which could make things interesting.

Also, as said above, a basic inkling of your plot should help, too. Is your end goal about coexisting with the locals? War? An intergalactic Slice of Life maybe?

Also, since they're completely forgotten to Earth, will there be no news from it at all, and the story will just entirely focus on the crew's life there? Or will they send word back to Earth, which may cause problems? Conversely, they may live so well with the locals that they may choose to not send word back, afraid that when they do, humanity will migrate en masse there and drive out the locals to make it their new planet. It depends on whether the humans really messed up Earth, or not.

edited 1st Apr '14 12:32:11 PM by Nadir

From which perspective is this going to be told? Who's the 'alien' here?

I'm thinking it will be a sort of slice of life, what with the goal being integration of human and alien peoples. On the subject of conflict, I want to keep it at a minimum. There's only 250 humans, to maybe millions of people populating the planet. Earth itself is in okay shape; obvious problems of overpopulation and other, already projected issues. They are sending these people to populate this area for the sake of discovery, similar to the Gold Rush: All these people rushing there in hopes of a better life. They probably wouldn't be able to call back to Earth, due to radio waves and other forms of communication taking years and years to reach them. If more humans do show up, I'd have to find a decent explanation.

It's told from the perspective of both groups. I'm thinking that it will be better to tell both sides. What would the locals think of this? I'm assuming that based on their technological capabilities and the fact that the humans just sort of showed up, they'd be frightened and confused. How do the humans feel about arriving on an already populated planet? Mixed, because there would probably be some who were hoping for such a result, and those who were only wanting to colonize an EMPTY planet. They were all, after all, volunteers.

I'm thinking that at first, they are captured by the military of the planet, and the rest of the story would be dealing with the aftereffects of their arrival. Both groups would be reeling from the discovery of other intelligent life, and both would have varied opinions of the other. I've still been trying to come up with details on the aliens planet, appearance, and society. I'm trying to avoid to human of aliens, but I don't want to have them be brain-sucking tentacle monsters either.

Tell me if this is to complicated or convoluted. I wouldn't want to over-do the details.

edited 2nd Apr '14 8:45:26 AM by IgnisFuturus

This sounds like it could be an interesting opportunity to explore human and alien nature. I think what you need to do it identify one specific major difference between human and alien psychology, which leads to endless hijinks between different characters. Not necessarily dangerous hijinks, although they could be, but also funny, outrageous, even heartwarming ones. You could have some fun exploring all the different variations you think up.

There's nothing that's too complicated or convoluted, if you reveal it slowly and pace it right. It's more important to have characters who can explore those details in a way that's interesting to a reader.

...depending on what kind of colonization the Travelers were planing on, they may have brought equipment that're no different from Weapons of Mass Destruction. Nuclear weapons are tested on/in uninhabited areas, after all, and the Travelers weren't expecting to bulldoze anyone's home or displace a population.

I wouldn't do the military capture thing. It'll be abundantly clear from orbit that the planet is inhabited, and they had telescopes and astronomy advanced enough to pick out the International Space Station in the 19th century - the Travelers shouldn't be a surprise to the Locals, or at least, that's probably not worth using past some minor initial conflict.

The trick is going to be in answering how these two completely different cultures are going to communicate with each other.

What kind of planet is it? The local climate decides what the Locals look like and are adapted to, and I'd come up with them in that order.

I'd also recommend reading/watching The Sparrow and Turn A Gundam, as they deal with this sort of first contact conflict.

I agree about the military capture. Colonising a planet is going to take a lot of powerful technology, it is certainly feasible that whatever they have taken with them could easily be used against the natives. Even having just a spacecraft is a huge advantage. It would really be against both sides interests to have serious conflict. I'd imagine both sides would be very nervous to make contact for fear of a misunderstanding. Certainly if advanced aliens turn up on your planet going straight for military action is a bad idea.

edited 2nd Apr '14 3:08:03 PM by aoide12

Yeah, the military capture is nixed for now. I can see why that wouldn't be an appealing choice.The climate of the planet will be something along the lines of a taiga, with intermittent mountains and lakes. There's one big city, but otherwise the peoples population is relatively scattered. Of note is the fact that there are multiple countries, and the one the Humans land in is a monarchy similar to that of Old England. I think the political part of an alien society would be interesting to explore. As for the aliens themselves, many details about their appearance and culture are as of yet unknown. I'll have to spend some time thinking on that subject.

Also, I'm starting to think about who the humans are made up of. Diehard Sci-Fi fans, exploration minded folks, people looking to get out of trouble, maybe even religious zealots. I don't really think the world's governments will sanction some sort of interplanetary vacation, so there would maybe be some doctors and engineers on board, but otherwise, they are volunteers.

Anyways, this advice is really helping. Feel free to make more suggestions, I enjoy them.

Those are some good ideas about volunteers, I think it could be good to play up that aspect. If the human governments don't want to have much involvement The colonists could end up containing a lot of volunteers who are completely unprepared for the reality of meeting aliens. I can imagine a mix of crazy survivalist types, political and religious outcasts, and space nerds. As far as skilled roles, I'd imagine at least one government would be interested enough in the potential of colonisation to provide the bare minimum needed for survival, perhaps a handful of military doctors/engineers. I imagine there would be as much conflict within the human group as between the two species.

Assuming the humans manage to create some kind of settlement I can see there being problems further down the line. Once the pressure to simply survive is off and they need to develop a society they should be a lot of disagreement on exactly what the rules for this society should be. It might be very confusing for the aliens- a species which appears to be incredibly advanced lands on their planet but rather than do anything meaningful they just argue amongst themselves.

Also do they plan on taking information from earth, like a database of human knowledge? If so the aliens would be keen to get it and the humans would probably be very reluctant to hand it over.

edited 3rd Apr '14 9:12:28 AM by aoide12

I'd limit the activity to a single continent, where that landscape and climate and culture applies generally. (Single-Biome Planet being something to avoid like a sniffly toddler on a bus - "look, I'll just take the next bus".)

...you could probably get a lot of mileage out of Diehard SF Fans and their Wrong Genre Savvy hijinks, but I'd suggest a mix of people who one day said to themselves "I don't want to live on this planet anymore" and got on a spaceship to nowhere. At least some of them have the training and education to make a colony work, of course.

I'd go further into who sponsored the flight. I like the idea of a crowdsourced interplanetary expedition, both to remove the possibility of any single government being able to pull rank over the Travelers (which could be a nice source of future strife a generation or two down the line)... and because it sounds more idealistic/humanistic that way.

Food, growing it, and how it affects the local fauna/ecosystem. (Which can be largely circumvented by having them set up a mass irrigation system in the middle of the Local version's Australia and being very careful, but that's kinda cheating.)

Disposing of the old spaceship. Or using it as a superweapon to threaten the planet. Or continuing to man it with a mix of Locals and Travelers, to give the Locals some idea of what the world outside their world is like. Or not disposing of it and keeping it in orbit as a reminder. Etc. "What happened to the Ark?" is a question you get to answer here.

I disagree somewhat on the cultural trade bit. Stories told from a wildly different, even alien perspective (in any sense of that word), are always interesting to someone somewhere. In our world, it's usually the people who are hungry for new mental stimuli and restrictive governments who would rather that not be the case. The refusal should be from the Locals' side, not the Travelers', as "We'll give you access to large swaths of our technologically superior culture in exchange for a place to live" would be decent terms for negotiation - you could set the whole story during the following relocation, and still get some good drama out of it.

(The 'why do those advanced alien idiots spend all their time arguing' thing is a potential goldmine of funny. I second it enthusiastically.)

A Tiaga like Biome sounds cool, and it would most likely be inhabited by mammal-like life forms much like humans maybe you should go for Ursine Aliens

Okay, been spending some time working on this. All the suggestions as of so far have been very helpful. To address some points:

• Yeah, there would be a wide variety of people going there for a wide variety of reasons. Plus, nobody was expecting aliens (but some may have hoped for it), and I think that would provoke a wide variety of reactions. Something to think about, definitely.
• Alright, a good question on the Human history database, I like the idea, so it may act as a throwaway device. I think that the Locals would be interested, but only from an academic standpoint.
• Who sponsored the flight? Well, I imagine it was a sort of a joint-governmental effort, like the G8 or UN coming together to do it. However, if something better comes along, I may change it. I really enjoy the idea of crowdsourced interplanetary exploration, so that's not changing.
• The ship was meant to get them there, but that's it. It has all the necessary supplies to sustain them for a certain amount of time, but then it becomes next useless. Where would they get extra fuel, anyways? So the ship will be dismantled, to serve needs as they arise.
• Also, no full-planet thing. I dunno what I said earlier, but I meant that where they land is a Taiga biome, and that area is just a single country out of many.

More details to follow, later.

Just a small issue, no telescope would be able to tell you the condition of the planet, the size maybe, the temperature, and even the atmosphere, but not whether or not it's life-bearing. Of course this doesn't matter overmuch, since a planet with an ambient temperature of 0°-40°C, a gravity about 9.5-10.5m/s² and a nitrox mix atmosphere will be pretty inviting regardless.

As for what's on the ship, I'd expect frozen sperm and eggs and lots of them so that when the colony finally is established reasonably well you're not going to be stuck with a mere 250 bloodlines. Also, 3D printers, some kind of resource-refining capabilites, etc.

Also, don't be afraid to take some ideas from here, it would be a relief every once in a while where, say some alien plant causes a reaction between severe indigestion and instant, rather than just tasting bitter.

edited 2nd Jun '14 4:19:13 PM by MattII

How about a few, scientific-type humans doing some anal-probing of the locals? Or tagging them, inadvertently causing some revolutionary shifts in technology as well? *wink *wink