Naratha
An ancient four-armed race from a distant star system, Naratha are staunch traditionalists with customs that make them seem wise and mysterious to other races.
Naratha maintain a reputation as a noble and mysterious people. They are famous for their anachronistic warriors, ancient wisdom, and strange traditions.
Playing a Naratha
You likely
- Seek wisdom in history and find dignity in customs and tradition.
- Strive to maintain balance and stability in yourself and your comrades.
- Think quick and act quick, but never without thought.
- See other species as slow and sluggish.
Other Species probably
- Resent your aloofness and assume you think you’re superior to them.
- Fear you want to invade and colonize their home.
- Respect your cultural knowledge but find you stodgy and inflexible.
- Underestimate your physical abilities, as they only see your mental ones.
Basic Information
Biological Traits
Naratha have four arms, which allows them to wield and hold up to four hands’ worth of weapons and equipment. It also makes them very adapt medics and scientists, when combined with their superior intellect.
Naratha possess a hyperactive metabolism; they think fast, talk fast, and move fast. To Naratha, other species seem sluggish and dull-witted, especially the Korrug. Unfortunately, their metabolic speed leaves them with a relatively short lifespan; Naratha over the age of 40 are a rarity.
The Naratha are a bipedal race of amphibians, with tall, elongated bodies well-suited for their high metabolism, and skeletons composed of more cartilage than those of other races such as humans. Naratha heads are long and thin. Skin varies in color, from bright reds and greens to the more common shades of blue or grey. Their blood is a greenish color.
Naratha eyes are large and oval and have thin membranes in place of eyelids. The pupils are a wide slit, oriented horizontally, and the irises can be dark green, purple, red, blue, or brown. Naratha blink upwards, rather than downwards as humans do. When Naratha roll their eyes, it is not a sign of disdain as with humans, but rather a response to situations where the thin protective membranes require extra help in defending against dryness or irritants.
Naratha are noted for their high-speed metabolism, which allows them to function on just two hours of sleep a day. Their minds and bodies work faster than most sapient races, making them seem restless or hyperactive.
Genetics and Reproduction
The Naratha are amphibian haplo-diploid egg-layers; unfertilized eggs produce males and fertilized eggs produce females. Once a year, a Naratha female will lay a clutch of dozens of eggs. Social rules prevent all but a fraction from being fertilized. As a result, 80% of the species is male.
Additional Information
Social Structure
Naratha society is generally matriarchal and organized into myriad “great families,” clans, and subclans. Their conviction that most other species don’t truly understand the importance of personal dignity means Naratha rarely bother to teach their customs to outside races, which leads to their reputation as being mysterious, standoffish, wise, or all three.
Average Intelligence
Naratha have photographic memories and rarely forget a fact.
Civilization and Culture
Naming Traditions
Naratha go by their first names, though their full names always encompass additional names denoting parentage, clan or subclan, relation to a corporations, and connection to historical heroes—it’s not uncommon for a Naratha's full name to include half a dozen such elements. For instance, a Naratha who introduces himself as Isu might properly be named “Isu var Renraku of Clan Tarma, House Hadulan, soul-splinter of the line of Ru.”
Some examples of Naratha first names are Altronus, Esar, Gorsen, Hadif, Jehir, Kala, Maedar, Metweska, Ninura, Remu, Senesel, Tolar, Umana, Voloteo, and Zye.
Relationship Ideals
Due to their method of reproduction, Naratha have no concept of romantic love, sexual attraction, or the biological impulses and social rituals that complicate other species' lives. Male-female relationships are rare (due to the scarcity of females) and more akin to human friendship.
Naratha sex drive and reproduction differ from that of humans. Reproduction is more of a necessity and Naratha do not seem to desire sex for pleasure. They are, however, attracted to the Nymphea, as even the Naratha find them irresistible.
Average Technological Level
Naratha were technologically advanced when humanity was still huddling in caves, yet they long ago plateaued socially and technologically, learning the importance of stability and balance after a series of near-apocalyptic disasters.
Culture and Cultural Heritage
Naratha excel at invention, preferring to use cutting-edge and state of the art technology rather than settle for anything less.
The Naratha see information gathering and even spying as a matter of course when dealing with other Species, but to them this is not underhanded: they simply embrace the dictum of "knowledge is power". Corporate counterintelligence agencies are constantly uncovering Naratha agents and cyber-warfare incursions, but there is little they can do to stop them.
Normally, the rare Naratha females are treated with respect and often hold high positions within Naratha culture. Though male Naratha rise to positions of great authority in business, academia, or the military, they rarely have any input on politics.
Interspecies Relations and Assumptions
Naratha strive to maintain open trade with all races, yet they find some more amicable than others. They see Yurian as brutish and shameful in their focus on conquest by any means, and Vermir as loud and undignified. They are intrigued by both Synths and Siczik - races they see as young enough to be led down proper paths. Humans often confuse them; just when they’re ready to write all humans off as capricious, they meet one whose sense of honor almost matches their own.
Scientific Name
Avito Narathis
Lifespan
~ 40 years
Average Height
~ 1,9 - 2,2 meters
Average Weight
~ 80 - 100 kg
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