race image

The Networkers


The networkers are amphibius siliconoid parasites. They have a religeous drive to care for their hosts and have become symbiotic with any race which they come across. Being parasitic, they can live in any climate which has natives. Their symbiotic relationship with these natives results from the Networkers climbing onto the backs of natives and bonding to the nervous systems of those natives. Without hosts, they are must rely heavily on their machines for manual labor.

Networkers do not have hands. They have 6 short legs covered with sensor arrays which allow them to bond to the nervous system of their hosts. Their language comes from a piezo buzzer built into the back of their necks, from which they emit a carrier pitch. Modulating this pitch allows for them to communicate complete ideas amongst their own networks. Most races which contact them find their communication to be irritating although the networkers do their best to not initiate hostility. It is a Networker belief that they can rule the universe by being the brains of the empire even without being the ruling race.

There is no way to tax Networkers. Their symbiotic nature allows them to get extra income from the natives, but Networkers themselves never pay taxes. Networkers are energy specialists. They can get up to 200% shield strength from their ships and, since this overcomes most beam weapons, they use only about half the number of beams on any of their ships. If possible, Networkers will use entirely fighters and thorpedoes to defend their ships. This energy production is the equivelent of 1 aux generator per ship.

Prone to swarm behavior, and being such small entities, their ships are usually specialized resource units. The Musheid baseship, carrying the stellar syphon, has only half the beams of most race's baseships, but carries full complements of thorps and fighters even though this ship was not designed as a warship. These carriers are designed to coordinate squadrons of smaller ships, having the ability to build ships as well as breed Networkers in space.

Even their belief that beam weapons are worthless against decent shields, their point defense systems are fully powered. Their stellar syphon technology allows them to cloak planets, dropping the planet's temperature by 1 degree a turn( until it has a minimum temperature of 49 C), or provoke stellar collapse which will destroy planets. They also feel the presence of cloaked ships. When scanning, they can get the range of a cloaked ship to within 1 LY, although they can only see a cloaked ship if it interacts with them or loses its cloak. Amateur captains cannot rob Networker ships which have their full shields and these dense shields increase the cloak failure potential by 17%.

The Networkers intentionally erased most of their early history. Some forbidden talk states that the Networkers found an alien satalite which changed the basis of their technology from carbon semiconductors to silicon, yet no evidence exists to confirm this. Networker development from their legal origin passes through 3 stages, called ages.

First came the Amelkaloid age in which the Networkers, still in their original form, got tired of sitting on their brains waiting to evolve and the Amelkaloid clan secretly initiated class 5 eugenics to do something about it. In class 5 Eugenics, enhanced units are intorduced into the gene pool in an attempt to create stable hybrids with the advanced qualities of the mutaloid subject.

Unfortunately, the Amelkaloids computed only the Mars prime model and, by combining the sexes, neutralized both. Networker society was steralized. From this point, wars broke out over who was to blame and opposing views of how to survive. The Amelkaloid clan allowed Networker survival by using the "Mother 1 Mainframe" to genetically engineer children for the sterile populace. That was the end of the Amelkaloid age.

Next came the Tiyuhoweg age. A priest of the secret order, Elder Aedrec, was a dynamic botanical conservationist who had been disavowed by Networker science for his unwillingness to stop questioning their established principles of science. However, his work in computing the "Venus Prime model," required for Networker survival, brought his clan to power. Bringing an end to the wars, and almost to their planet, Elder Aedrec created the primary functions of the Mother 1's intellectual systems. Mother 1 was the female of the Networker species, handling all reproduction from genetic design to education.

Once Mother 1 was complete, the Networkers abdicated most of their physical form to their machines and modified themselves into their present form at the start of the third age: Kaetuie. Presently, Networkers are like packaged motherboards with their brains and a basic life support system. Their bodies serve only to support their organic brains while providing essential mobility.

The Mother 1 is not intellegent in herself, she relies on the combined mental power of the Networkers for her virtual intellect. It was discovered that combining the mental pathways of two male brains caused a conflict about 1/3 of the time, thus their mental networking had to pass through a passive unit--the Mother 1. She has a mind and a will separate from the Networkers, but that will and mind exists only as long as the Networkers are Networked through her.

To survive, colonization was necessary. For this means, a Mother 2 mainframe was designed. Her primary function is running the life support and agricultural systems of colonial ships. Upon colonization, a Mother 1 is built in the first factory on the new planet using a connection to the Mother 2 on the colonial ship to supply basic data and the source material. Networkers see themselves as apart from the machines thusly all new Networkers must be born from the organic material inside the Mother 1 mainframe. Mother 2 Mainframes carry this material.

Lastly, the Mother 3 mainframes were built into the largest baseships. Mother 3 Mainframes are used to coordinate large strikes. None of the Mother mainframes are used for military purposes, but the Mother 3 units carry an enhanced data storage matrix so that the collective Networks can store and analyze the data which would easily overload the organic brains of the pilots involved in the conflicts.

Presently, networkers are subdevided into 3 classes. Class 3, the largest class, is the Effectors. Effectors directly interface with machinery and native races to carry out the projects required by the network. There is no physical difference between the Networkers of any class, except in the tasks each class is permitted to perform for the network. If an Effector shows a demonstrable skill in any specialty, he is raised into the Cors class.

Cors are the leasons between the levels of the Naisp planners and the Effector laborors. Forming the heart of the network, Cors are the only class which directly interfaces with the Mother mainframes. Being a Cors, these units have the weakest independant will in any of the classes. Should a Cors demonstrate a unique skill in a non-physical trade, as a planner, dreamer or psychic, he will be raised to the Naisp class. If he cannot perform the tasks required of the Cors, or commits a serious offense as a Cors, he will be dropped back to the effector class.

Naisp class units are forbidden any physical labor. Performance of a physical trade will require that the Naisp be dropped back to the Cors class. Being in the Naisp class requires that this network ring perform the end processing of all data provided by the lower classes. Pilots are all Naisp as are the technicians who maintain the power plants and syphons.


I've designed the Networkers to use large ships to keep the number of Networker ships to a minimum. Their disadvantages make it hard to build ships that use large amounts of resources. Thusly, these ships have to be powerful to keep the 'entrenched' feel that I aimed for with the Networkers. Some people have commented that I gave the Networker ships too much fuel which allows them to go on the offensive far too easily. That may be the case. My intent was that the Networkers colonize planets with smaller ships, then build base ships to defend their colonies. Fuel was to prevent these ships from being taken by pirates because, if these ships fall into the hands of a race that can build them easily, they might endanger game balance.

Either I need a way of keeping these ships from getting to races which are resource rich or I need to make these ships unclonable. My earliest thinking is that the ships blow up when there are no Networkers to hold them together since the Networkers are integrated into their ships. Maybe that would work. I want the Networkers to be the race that gets about a dozen planets during a game and needs a large alliance of oppenents to remove at great expense. The Networkers whould rarely win, but their toughness should determine the winner based on skill. Networkers should be around until the end of the game.

It has been some time since I have had the chance to do any playing and I am kind of rusty. I'll take any suggestions that you have to offer.

After the recent vote concerning the Networkers, I had a difficult choice to make. This race came in third from the bottom in the list and the explanations were destructive rather than constructive. Why was my format taken as more important than the race itself? Somebody mentioned that I had not updated the page in a long time. That was odd since I made updates the same date that I changed the page to include the vote link.

I did not use the 'standard' format because I do not like it. I've avoided races that use it because they are too hard for me to read. My vision is not what it once was. The truth is that I cannot read the 'standard' layout. These linear pages are easier for me to read.

When it came to the reasons people did not want Networkers in the game, I did take note of the criticism. Players do not like defensive races. That was constructive. I did not expect Tim to have to rewrite the program for every race added, so I kept the race itself simple. Maybe there is no space for Networkers in the game. I'll put them on ice and wait to see what happens. If you have to comply with the standards by which I was graded, aside from playability factors, then there is no point to my working on the other ideas that I have. The alternative was to shut the page down completly.

****************************************************************************** ***** Dave's Contribution **** ****************************************************************************** I have added new ship designs which I thought of for the Networkers. By no means are these finished or implimented, they are only ideas done by someone who has read up on the Networkers.

Perhaps some of these ships could be upgraded when coinciding natives are found. For example: Amphibian Class Gunner (no Amphibian planets owned) 4 Beams, 1 Torp (Beams do 2X damage) Amphibian Class Gunner (Amphibian planet owned) 4 or 5 Beams, 1 Torp (Beams do 2X damage & 1.5X kill rate) get what I am saying?

VOTE for the Networkers in the New Races Survey.





Timo's new races page.
My warp technology paper.
Look over CornerNET.
Comments for the author.



(C)2005 Control Group Alliance --- All Rights Reserved.