Miscellaneous Loroi question-and-answer thread

[gaerzi]

"Slanted" eyes are kind of a standard feature of elves.

That and pointy ears. Also, quite often and especially in fantasy, keen vision even in low light conditions, and a degree of dexterity and adroitness quite above the average human.

In other words, they're cats.

[Arioch]

"Slanted" eyes are kind of a standard feature of elves.

That and pointy ears. Also, quite often and especially in fantasy, keen vision even in low light conditions, and a degree of dexterity and adroitness quite above the average human.

Well, despite the "Our Elves are Better" trope, I have tried to limit the Loroi characters' inherent advantages... beyond telepathy, which is not a significant advantage against humans.

In other words, they're cats.

Maybe less impact of serving them tuna from time to time.

[Bamax]

"Slanted" eyes are kind of a standard feature of elves.

That and pointy ears. Also, quite often and especially in fantasy, keen vision even in low light conditions, and a degree of dexterity and adroitness quite above the average human.

Well, despite the "Our Elves are Better" trope, I have tried to limit the Loroi characters' inherent advantages... beyond telepathy, which is not a significant advantage against humans.

In other words, they're cats.

Maybe less impact of serving them tuna from time to time.

The only ones overpowered to humaniti are the Mizol and Teidar.

Theoretically both of them could disarm a gunman pointing a gun at them....but the Mizol has a better chance of surviving due to precision control of her PK and the many options it gives her.

Yet I think that makes the Loroi interesting, arguably more so than even their inspiration-the Elerians.

Personality-wise I find virtually all Loroi main characters quite interesting.

Tempo obviously is withholding info...for now or maybe until Alex asks.

Spiral shows that the Loroi ARE NOT all serious.

Talon is is basically the hotshot jock pilot...only it's a she.

Stillstorm is definitely interesting.

Beryl though for me seems almost like a blank slate...so little about her is actually known, beyond the obvious that she cares for Alex and is a Listel with scientists for parents.

[jterlecki]

What do Loroi military decorations look like? Modern earth military organisations (and many civilian ones) have medals, ribbons and fourragères. Do they have the same or opt for something else such as special garments that can be worn or tattoos or the likes?

[Arioch]

What do Loroi military decorations look like? Modern earth military organisations (and many civilian ones) have medals, ribbons and fourragères. Do they have the same or opt for something else such as special garments that can be worn or tattoos or the likes?

Most Loroi military awards are unit citations rather than personal ones, and they're usually displayed as some kind of badge or sigil on the ship or vehicles or combat armor of the unit (like the crescent moon sigil on Tsunami). Personal awards either take the form of a brevet rank (indicated by slightly fancier modifications to the uniform) or pins worn in the hair.

[gaerzi]

Maybe less impact of serving them tuna from time to time.

Well they haven't got the opportunity to eat Terran food yet. If they go gaga for tuna, I called it first!

[Bamax]

Aside from sex and official business, how much contact do males have with females?

Since it is obvious frequent contact, even if nonsexual can result in 'obsession' (romance as Loroi call it.

Do Loroi not spend much time around males at all?
Is THAT why Beryl is so thrilled to see Alex? Since normally she would only see a male for time a lot shorter than she will have with Alex....and she is not barred by Loroi customs with Alex either, so she could 'break' the rules and it would be....okay?

Like is it illegal for females to invite males to their house to play a game or join a picnic if it is nonsexual? Regularly?

With the same male?

I am betting the answer is no?

Meaning males must be swapped out a lot so they do not see the same lady twice. Meaning male passengers on ships or other mass transport must be common.

[Arioch]

Aside from sex and official business, how much contact do males have with females?

None, aside from family-related business.

Like is it illegal for females to invite males to their house to play a game or join a picnic if it is nonsexual? Regularly?

I'm not sure that it would be "illegal," but it's not done. It would be like calling up your favorite actress and inviting her to come over to your house to play checkers. Aside from wondering how you got her number, the politest things she'd be likely to say is "no."

Loroi males and females are not supposed to be friends, so there is no legitimate nonsexual, non-business pretense for wanting to meet with a male. Males aren't chattel, but their high social status depends on upholding a certain standard of behavior. Sort of like an upper-class European lady of the nineteenth century... if she was alone with man who was not her husband without some kind of chaperone and legitimate reason for being there, she would face very serious social backlash from members of her class. If the Loroi female was a civilian, that would be illegal, and if she was a warrior, she would probably face disciplinary action.

Meaning males must be swapped out a lot so they do not see the same lady twice. Meaning male passengers on ships or other mass transport must be common.

Ordinarily, males are not transported to meet females; it's the other way around.

But... I think you underestimate the size of populations. Even a small town has a population of several thousand. A thousand Loroi females could keep a male busy for 20 years.

[Bamax]

Aside from sex and official business, how much contact do males have with females?

None, aside from family-related business.

Like is it illegal for females to invite males to their house to play a game or join a picnic if it is nonsexual? Regularly?

I'm not sure that it would be "illegal," but it's not done. It would be like calling up your favorite actress and inviting her to come over to your house to play checkers. Aside from wondering how you got her number, the politest things she'd be likely to say is "no."

Loroi males and females are not supposed to be friends, so there is no legitimate nonsexual, non-business pretense for wanting to meet with a male. Males aren't chattel, but their high social status depends on upholding a certain standard of behavior. Sort of like an upper-class European lady of the nineteenth century... if she was alone with man who was not her husband without some kind of chaperone and legitimate reason for being there, she would face very serious social backlash from members of her class. If the Loroi female was a civilian, that would be illegal, and if she was a warrior, she would probably face disciplinary action.

Meaning males must be swapped out a lot so they do not see the same lady twice. Meaning male passengers on ships or other mass transport must be common.

Ordinarily, males are not transported to meet females; it's the other way around.

But... I think you underestimate the size of populations. Even a small town has a population of several thousand. A thousand Loroi females could keep a male busy for 20 years.

Must be guarded off, the males, since if they were not there is norhing to stop an obsessed female from getting to her favorite male....twice.

I presume at capitols or other high security places?

Do not have to worry about who watches the watchers because Loroi are not quite as lusty as human woman are, since telepathy makes up for lack of physical intimacy. Plus if every male did pair off with a female, the Loroi as a race would face massive reduction and be more vulnerable to defeat, as there would be less replacements.

Plus it would likely cause strife and war, since both men and women, humans, have been known to fight for and kill over jealousy. Telepathic sending makes it worse, plus lack of privacy. I doubt anything intimate stays private unless a Loroi secludes themselves long enough not to be thinking about it when they meet other females.

The way Loroi manage it it is not a free for all, because a Loroi free for all would quickly go more out of control than it does even for humans.

The Loroi society is what it is because it is the way it is must function or else....chaos.


So Beryl is enjoying a rare privilege I see. No wonder she grins at him as much as she does, since she technically is getting away with with murder as it were.

I remember how disapointed she was when she saw Tempo come aboard the shuttle. Tempo outranks her and won't tolerate Beryl going too far with Alex, as much as Beryl would love to.

Tempo seems stressed, but the reasons are obvious. She probably feels she should have listened to the Historian and left earlier...then they would not be in this mess. But it may not matter, since it seems to her at least that now the Umiak have the upper hand, and all is within their reach now.

No wonder random Loroi were pointing at Alex in surprise.

Not often do males travel....if ever.

[SVlad]

A thousand Loroi females could keep a male busy for 20 years.

But wasn't the male to female ratio 1:10, not 1:1000?

[GeoModder]

A thousand Loroi females could keep a male busy for 20 years.

But wasn't the male to female ratio 1:10, not 1:1000?

Luckily for the warriors it is. If a settlement only happened to have one male available, and almost each night another female has 'visiting rights', he'd need almost 3 years to see them all.

[Arioch]

A thousand Loroi females could keep a male busy for 20 years.

But wasn't the male to female ratio 1:10, not 1:1000?

The ratio of males to females is irrelevant in this case. Whether there are 10 males or 100, each male could theoretically have sex with all 1000 females.

[SVlad]

But then every female had to have sex with 100 different males.

[Bamax]

How engaging does telepathy get?

Apparently one can engage sight, sound, smell, and touch, given what Fireblade's dream did.

Is this common or is that just Fireblade being the overpowered unstable Teidar she is?

If this is just dream effect, can other loroi simulate that by touch?

I say this because if so Loroi have virtually no nee for VR as chances are they can simulate whatever they can imagine real time through deep telepathy via touch.

Would work great for simulation training.

Or am I wrong?

[Snoofman]

How engaging does telepathy get?

Apparently one can engage sight, sound, smell, and touch, given what Fireblade's dream did.

Is this common or is that just Fireblade being the overpowered unstable Teidar she is?

If this is just dream effect, can other loroi simulate that by touch?

I say this because if so Loroi have virtually no nee for VR as chances are they can simulate whatever they can imagine real time through deep telepathy via touch.

Would work great for simulation training.

Or am I wrong?

You could be onto something there.

It might explain how the Loroi we've seen so far do not seem to panic in the face of danger as a typical human might and why they seem to accept that death is a possibility for each of them, though they fight for the sake of surviving. If that were the case, training through telepathic simulations would be the equivalent of humans experiencing interactive video games. It's just a simulation, but the experiences, the triumphs and failures, the feelings and emotional turmoils you feel help you to mature. Of course, in the end, it's not enough and, in order to truly grow and evolve as a person and warrior, one has to take the deep plunge into that dark night which is reality.

[Bamax]

How engaging does telepathy get?

Apparently one can engage sight, sound, smell, and touch, given what Fireblade's dream did.

Is this common or is that just Fireblade being the overpowered unstable Teidar she is?

If this is just dream effect, can other loroi simulate that by touch?

I say this because if so Loroi have virtually no nee for VR as chances are they can simulate whatever they can imagine real time through deep telepathy via touch.

Would work great for simulation training.

Or am I wrong?

You could be onto something there.

It might explain how the Loroi we've seen so far do not seem to panic in the face of danger as a typical human might and why they seem to accept that death is a possibility for each of them, though they fight for the sake of surviving. If that were the case, training through telepathic simulations would be the equivalent of humans experiencing interactive video games. It's just a simulation, but the experiences, the triumphs and failures, the feelings and emotional turmoils you feel help you to mature. Of course, in the end, it's not enough and, in order to truly grow and evolve as a person and warrior, one has to take the deep plunge into that dark night which is reality.

If we are right, that in of itself would explain the lack of rampant commercialism.

Since you may not need to try a product when you can simulate it.

When simulation is free and easy...many things are possible while making many others virtually obsolete.


And that is so true, games are not real, but the feelings are.

Much the same for stories. Which again explains why Loroi don't do fiction, since they have such a direct route to feelings that they hardly need a 'story' or 'VR' middleman.

In fact, if they want adventure, just let a brave Loroi do it, and the cowardly Loroi can experience adventure telepathically through them.

It also goes without saying sex can easily be the simulated same way.

[Snoofman]

...It also goes without saying sex can easily be the simulated same way.

Bow-chicka-honk-honk!

[Krulle]

Bow-chicka-think-think!

[Bamax]

Found out we were right based on past comments from discussions where Arioch answered about this, at least so long Loroi touch each other, which is why they avoid it. That's like their personal space to them. Virtual privacy is about all Loroi can get unless they stay 100 meters away from other Loroi (telepathy range I think was 100 meters):

Jericho wrote:
Telepathic communication is considered deeper then regular right? Is this a just a loroi opinion or is it widely accepted? If a telepath is eager and excited to tell a story will that eagerness and excitment be apparent in the story and make it more interesting for the listener?

When an alien and loroi mind-meld they don't recieve that intimate connection from the loroi to loroi mind-meld because the alien is not a telepath. Ok so what difference does it make when the loroi is already poking around the mind of another creature?
Telepathy between Loroi does have more bandwidth than spoken communication. The Insider page on Telepathy definitely needs a revamp, but there's a lot on it in the forums and the compilations. Here's a previous conversation on the subject:


Arioch wrote:
Loroi telepathy is not normally the sharing of literal "thoughts" or "emotions"; telepathic messages are similar to a spoken message, but there is a lot of extra bandwidth (which varies with the quality of the connection) that can contain subtext information, including emotional or sensory information. If there is enough telepathic bandwidth (especially if the two conversants are touching), then there may be so much information in the message that it almost seems like sharing thoughts or emotions or viewing through someone else's senses, but that's not the "normal" mode of operation for telepathy.

A Loroi who stubs her toe might "cry out" telepathically, and the subtext of this telepathic message would probably contain information that the crier was in pain, but this would not be literally be a transmission of pain.

It's difficult to knowingly transmit false information via an ordinary telepathic connection, because much of the "subtext" information is semi-conscious or unconscious. The higher the bandwidth, the greater the detail and depth of the subtext, and the harder it is to consciously control. It's possible to intentionally omit this subtext, but then the receiver definitely knows something's up; it's a bit like when someone refuses to look you in the eye when talking to you.

However, just because it's difficult to knowingly lie doesn't mean that the message must be impartial or strictly factual; it can contain opinion or judgment. Every Loroi has her own point of view, so information that she believes to be true is always colored to some extent by personal biases. Two people can watch the same event and form different interpretations of it.
fredgiblet wrote:

[Bamax]

Also I also learned that Teidar can be more precise in their PK than I have given Fireblade credit for.

Arioch said in an old post that Fireblade could crush Alex' brain at any time, Alex is only still breathing because she allows him to.

So Fireblade has more precision than I thought. And if she can do that, Tempo could probably peel an apple into orgami and steam it too LOL. Since Tempo is all about more precision with less power.


I would think the only possible counter the Umiak would have would be to shapd every cyborg umiak brain diferently so that Teidar have a difficult time visualizing them.

Since what they can visualize they can attack even without line of sight accordimg to the codex, so long they are within 100 meters.

And IF Umiak have not bothered to do even that, then I imagine Umiak cyborgs to have as high a fatality rate as they do a kill rate.

Since there would be nothing stopping Teidar from crushing brain after brain till hundreds of Umiak keep going down....with mere thoughts and some exertion, but not nearly as much as Loroi Teidar can bring to bear at max.