Oolite Bulletins

There's been a fair bit of discussion about what the various species in Elite/Oolite actually look like based on the vague in-game descriptions.
How about a look from the other angle - how would you describe the aliens in different franchises using the Elite categorisations?

Only the descriptors and categories existing in Elite should be used, and ideally the description should fit the limits of the original algorithm (e.g. no "fierce" and "large" on the same species.)

Here's some examples:

Alien
Engineers: large blue humanoids. Xenomorphs: fierce black insects. (Xenomorphs aren't sapient so they probably wouldn't get a classification in Elite but included for completeness.)

Ringworld
Kzin: large furry felines.

Star Trek
Andorians: blue humanoids. Gorn: green bug-eyed lizards. Klingons: fierce humanoids. Pakleds: harmless fat humanoids (Yes, I know they aren't actually harmless, but they actively present this image.)

Star Wars
Ewoks: small furry rodents. Hutts: large frogs. Rodians: green insects. Wookiees: large furry humanoids. Yoda's species: small green... hmm, frogs maybe?

Bicorn wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 5:04 pm

Hutts: large frogs.

Cholmondely wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 7:50 pm

Bicorn wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 5:04 pm

Hutts: large frogs.

What would you classify them as, then?

Bicorn wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 7:51 pm

Cholmondely wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 7:50 pm

Bicorn wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 5:04 pm

Hutts: large frogs.

What would you classify them as, then?

All of the elite 'species' have legs, prominently so in the case of frogs. Hutts don't, so it's a tricky one.

Molluscs (slugs etc.) aren't really represented. Molluscs are invertebrates, more like 'insects' and 'lobsters' than frogs in ancestral terms if not appearance.

The 'xenomorph' often gets called insectoid, even though in many ways it isn't (four limb, bibedal, no wings etc.) but using the elite categories, you're probably right: probably black and definitely fierce

Redspear wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 8:50 pm

Bicorn wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 7:51 pm

Cholmondely wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 7:50 pm

What would you classify them as, then?

All of the elite 'species' have legs, prominently so in the case of frogs. Hutts don't, so it's a tricky one.

How do we know they all have legs? Hutts' upper half looks pretty froglike, it might be enough for whoever in GalCop is in charge of classifying new species.

Bicorn wrote: ↑Fri Jun 27, 2025 10:07 pm

How do we know they all have legs?

We don't and you're quite right to point out the assumption.

However, the idea of a human comparable intelligence evolving with a slug-like locomotory system (I'm not a star wars expert) is rather unlikely for reasons I'd rather not take the time to spell out here (nutshell version: slug's main 'defence' is sheer numbers, once that's working there's little selection pressure to favour intelligence).

Octopus, by comparison, are also molluscs but they're intelligent partially on acount of being highly mobile. Without the mobility they would be less effective predators and less likely to develop intelligence. Although some slugs are predators those that are prey on other slugs or similarly slow invertebrates requiring little in the way of tactics. AFAIK they're all hermaphroditic and generally non-social, again suggesting less cranial real estate be required.

So as strange as an intelligent insectoid might be, taking away its legs and giving it the movement of a slug isn't likely to help at all in evolutionary terms. Sure: different enviornments, different outcomes so I can't call 'impossible' but I'm going to say that the assumption that they all have legs given the descriptors is highly probable. The only Hutt I know is Jabba and even without the eye stalks, I still don't see a frog, sorry.