Rise of the Snathi Horde

My minor-turned-major AAR

Okay, I'm still working on my other AAR but to make me try and get back to it more often I thought I'd do another one. Currently, I just started a game as my new custom race, the Snathi. Yes, the rodents.
Unfortunately, this might be a little slow-paced. I'll have to start off a long time before the game actually starts, I will also do a few chapters before and after the game as well. So this is the first chapter- the Battle of Kalis-Yu, the 'epic' conflict of the Arnor/Dread Lord war.

Chapter 1: The Battle of Kalis-Yu

The Arnorian sat back in his ship and waited calmly for the hyperspace flight to begin. The three craft were on route to Kalis-Yu, an old Arnorian outpost the Dread Lords were supposedly invading. He didn’t know why, but it was irrelevant. The Dread Lords must be beaten back, or made to thought they had won. That is the only way we can achieve victory, no matter long it takes- then, what does time matter? Mused the Arnorian.

"Sir, we have detected three Dread Lord cruisers traveling on a parallel trans-dimensional cut to ours," projected one of the other Arnor from another vessel. They didn’t actually talk, but rather, simply embraced the emotional potential of others and manipulated minds.

"Order an intercept," he allowed the others to sense. Their vessels responded well and cut off sharply, moving into the dimensional lane to engage. The Dread Lord vessels reeled, getting blasted backwards, except for the lead ship. Onboard, the Arnorian sensed a powerful mind, one greater than their own. A Dread Knight.

That ship raised shields and did a flip-maneuver, exiting the dimensional lane, in fact, exiting this dimension entirely, then reforming behind the Arnor craft and firing doom rays.

"Bank and fire!" one of the other Arnor pilots projected, just before he collided with one Dread Lord vessel. A hyperspatial explosion nearly caused the entire lane to deteriorate. As it was, the lead Arnorian sensed it twisting around. This battle must be ended.

Drawing on his inner strength, and analyzing the potential of the remaining pilot, a beam of gravitic energy emerged from his ship. It struck the other Dread Lord craft and began to draw energy from it. Curiosity probed out from that craft, and in the slight lowering of defenses, the Arnorian struck.

Twin doom rays emerged, coalescing to create a black hole. It erupted and swallowed the Dread Lord ship and collapsed the trans-dimensional lane, fortunately right on top of Kalis-Yu.



The Dread Knight was surprised at the vehemence of the assault. Few Arnorians were capable of it- but in truth, the circumstances had never been like it before. I will not allow them to have this planet, he thought.

Reaching out with his mind, he detected the potential of two of the Arnor down below. There was no way he’d allow them to contact their brethren. A field of energy expanded as he concentrated, surrounding Kalis-Yu in power not visible to the natural eye, but to the supernatural (a Precursor) it was very visible.

It was choking and shielding, protecting and strangling, the planet at the same time. Once he was satisfied, the Dread Knight withdrew his internal energy and watched the shield play about.

But wait! This was no time to ponder or muse. The Arnor craft were firing doom rays, penetrating his shields and damaging them. Cursing with fury, the Dread Knight tried to regenerate them but realized the power of his anger had just defeated his own ship. Seizing the ship’s controls and his remaining power, he teleported down to Kalis-Yu below, closing the field in around his wreck of a ship.

Once there, he found two Arnor waiting, their plasma rocket weapons raised and their minds ready for combat. Unfortunately, they were not ready for him. With a contemptuous flick of his staff, the Arnor were surrounded by a roaring, erupting volcano directly below them- but erupting with the fury of a supernova. That quickly finished them.

Now, the Dread Knight needed a way to ensure victory. Simply destroying the ships in orbit by another supernova was not enough. More Arnor could return. And this planet was centered among Dread Lord staging grounds, which could potentially be used as a bait.

Then, he realized it. The only lower-life forms on the planet were squirrels, he named them a second after he discovered them. Scanning their mind, he found they had a sadistic nature, enjoying combat and torture, but most of all hoarding their resources, building big, and then destroying.

Excellent! he exulted mentally. Perfect! Drawing all of his remaining power- and it was great for this was one of the best Dread Knights- and his malice, he implanted a seed in each and every one of the squirrels’ minds. They would soon grow.

More and more of his power was being generated into their evolution, and they grew before him. Exulting in it, he eventually realized it was actually taking his power from him! He knew, then, that he was going to die.

As they came to being, he turned to his new minions, asking ‘what was the name for ‘spawn of evil’ in that ancient tongue?’ to himself. The answer came to him in a minute.

"You are the Snathi… descendants of evil, inherent with evil… and fathers of evil…" spoke aloud the Dread Knight. As he finished, he exploded in a bright flash of sparks, leaving no trace, but the newly named Snathi were left to consider his words.

Unfortunately for the galaxy, the Snathi understood exactly what he said.
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Reply #2 Top
Thanks! I thought some people might be confused in the Precursor battle, but in any case, here's the next chapter. Hopefully, it's the last one before the actual game starts, well, maybe not.

As the years passed, the Snathi did exactly as their creator predicted. They hoarded and stole resources, slaughtered and ate each other, and engaged in sadistic pleasures.
Finally, one Snathi chieftain attempted to unite the various Snathi by brutally killing anyone who didn’t approve of. Because Snathi reproduce very fast, this took a long time. Then, the chieftain had a better idea. Since Snathi were beginning to unite in clans, she only had to persuade the clan chiefs to join her. If, they didn’t, of course, they would also be killed, bringing the clans into line. But this was not necessary for the most part.

The Snathi joined together rapidly, creating an ever-expanding planetary empire. But they were content to engage in simple combat with each other and deplete their planet’s resources for even longer.

Until the days of the Drath probe. The hidden race sent their ships through stargates searching for aliens that could be used to help get revenge on the Altarian Republic. A probe arrived near Kalis-Yu and was brought to the new ruler, Snarky.

Snarky considered what it meant- but ultimately destroyed the probe. Unfortunately for the galaxy, he and his engineers harnessed stargate technology from it and reverse-engineered a galactic probe. They were launched en masse to find worlds to conquer and deplete.

The Drath never heard from the Snathi again. But the next race they contacted was the Yor. Ironically, the Yor considered the Snathi equals in a way, both were the children of the Precursors and both wanted death to all other life-forms.

However, N-3, field commander, ordered them slaughtered using sophisticated technology the Yor possessed, fearing a race equal to them could be a significant danger.

Hyperdrive was then conveyed to the Snathi along the hyperspace network. As Snathi scientists worked to engineer it, the Yor fleet moved in. January 1, 2225, was home to a massive battle.

A Yor battlefleet consisting of two Battleships entered orbit and targeted the planet. They only held 600 Yor soldiers, to be used to mop up the population.

“Fire one,” ordered N-3, and the plasma guns blazed, zooming closer to the planet’s main city. But to everyone’s surprise, the blasts were absorbed in a manner similar to that of the Salvation device, which would occur around a year later, in 2226.

But in any case, the blasts shook and smashed the shield, but could not penetrate it. The thing had been constructed by the Dread Knight, and it would not fall easily. “Unit G-9, deploy your units,” ordered N-3. G-9 was in charge of the Battalion on board the ships. Saluting, the Yor walked off, into a lift-transport, and down to the troop landing bay.


Down on Kalis-Yu, the Snathi waited eagerly and in anticipation for the battle to begin. Ten billion Snathi were gathered in the Capital, led by General Sralk, one of Snarky’s advisors. Sralk and his troops were armed with electric spears and axes, as well as simple ‘throwers’. These throwers contained a small charge of unstable plasma, and an igniter. When fired, the throwers lobbed a small part of plasma at the opponent, but it grew in size- and power- as it traveled.

A dangerous weapon, but it had limited ammunition. But still, ten billion was an enormously large number.


On the other hand, the Yor were badly outnumbered, but had several advantages. For one, each of them was a skilled tactician. Second, they had a single small hover-unit armed with a shield generator and Harpoon Driver cannons. Also, each Yor soldier’s arms contained two rapid-fire particle-beam cannons so intense they were almost as strong as lasers. They had a back-mounted sparrow launcher and also a rocket-pack.

“Graah!” roared Sralk as he stood and faced the enemy. “We may be out-gunned- but we are not out-fought!” roared the rodent again. “Troops- advance!” the Snathi commanded. Gleefully, the right line of the Snathi and the left line of the Snathi, armed with electric spears, charged forward, as plasma throwers in the center opened fire. They were demolished.

Each Yor could easily kill five Snathi at a time, the assault vehicle could demolish a whole regiment, and their armor was rather durable. They stood in formation and faced the enemy. After about ten minutes of this, nearly five million Snathi had been slain while around 50 Yor had been killed.

“Open fire. Repeat, open fire,” ordered G-9 to his troops continuously. As Yor fell, they killed many, many, more rodents. Watching the combat, Sralk felt disgusted at the fighting, but at the same time, the evil in him made him appreciate this slaughter and wanted to see more- just slaughter of the enemy.

“Send two billion of the remaining- five billion- around to attack from the rear!” ordered Sralk. Yes, the Snathi had lost half of their force in two hours. Snathi began to rapidly climb rocks and move out of the way of the Yor, climbing was another one of their talents.

As more and more Snathi ‘fled’, the two-hundred or so remaining Yor were confident of soon victory. At least, they were until two billion Snathi leaped down from the crags and rocks above and slaughtered them brutally.

In the end, neither side gained much. A Yor assault fleet and 600 troops were destroyed, while only 2 billion of the Snathi fighters survived. There were still 6 million other Snathi on the planet, but much carnage had been caused by this war. Snarky swore he would explore the stars with the newly invented hyperdrive and destroy all other who challenged him, ruler of the children of the Dread Lords.
Reply #3 Top
Thanks! I thought some people might be confused in the Precursor battle, but in any case, here's the next chapter. Hopefully, it's the last one before the actual game starts, well, maybe not.

Chapter 2: The Prehyperdrive Snathi Horde

As the years passed, the Snathi did exactly as their creator predicted. They hoarded and stole resources, slaughtered and ate each other, and engaged in sadistic pleasures.
Finally, one Snathi chieftain attempted to unite the various Snathi by brutally killing anyone who didn’t approve of. Because Snathi reproduce very fast, this took a long time. Then, the chieftain had a better idea. Since Snathi were beginning to unite in clans, she only had to persuade the clan chiefs to join her. If, they didn’t, of course, they would also be killed, bringing the clans into line. But this was not necessary for the most part.

The Snathi joined together rapidly, creating an ever-expanding planetary empire. But they were content to engage in simple combat with each other and deplete their planet’s resources for even longer.

Until the days of the Drath probe. The hidden race sent their ships through stargates searching for aliens that could be used to help get revenge on the Altarian Republic. A probe arrived near Kalis-Yu and was brought to the new ruler, Snarky.

Snarky considered what it meant- but ultimately destroyed the probe. Unfortunately for the galaxy, he and his engineers harnessed stargate technology from it and reverse-engineered a galactic probe. They were launched en masse to find worlds to conquer and deplete.

The Drath never heard from the Snathi again. But the next race they contacted was the Yor. Ironically, the Yor considered the Snathi equals in a way, both were the children of the Precursors and both wanted death to all other life-forms.

However, N-3, field commander, ordered them slaughtered using sophisticated technology the Yor possessed, fearing a race equal to them could be a significant danger.

Hyperdrive was then conveyed to the Snathi along the hyperspace network. As Snathi scientists worked to engineer it, the Yor fleet moved in. January 1, 2225, was home to a massive battle.

A Yor battlefleet consisting of two Battleships entered orbit and targeted the planet. They only held 600 Yor soldiers, to be used to mop up the population.

“Fire one,” ordered N-3, and the plasma guns blazed, zooming closer to the planet’s main city. But to everyone’s surprise, the blasts were absorbed in a manner similar to that of the Salvation device, which would occur around a year later, in 2226.

But in any case, the blasts shook and smashed the shield, but could not penetrate it. The thing had been constructed by the Dread Knight, and it would not fall easily. “Unit G-9, deploy your units,” ordered N-3. G-9 was in charge of the Battalion on board the ships. Saluting, the Yor walked off, into a lift-transport, and down to the troop landing bay.


Down on Kalis-Yu, the Snathi waited eagerly and in anticipation for the battle to begin. Ten billion Snathi were gathered in the Capital, led by General Sralk, one of Snarky’s advisors. Sralk and his troops were armed with electric spears and axes, as well as simple ‘throwers’. These throwers contained a small charge of unstable plasma, and an igniter. When fired, the throwers lobbed a small part of plasma at the opponent, but it grew in size- and power- as it traveled.

A dangerous weapon, but it had limited ammunition. But still, ten billion was an enormously large number.


On the other hand, the Yor were badly outnumbered, but had several advantages. For one, each of them was a skilled tactician. Second, they had a single small hover-unit armed with a shield generator and Harpoon Driver cannons. Also, each Yor soldier’s arms contained two rapid-fire particle-beam cannons so intense they were almost as strong as lasers. They had a back-mounted sparrow launcher and also a rocket-pack.

“Graah!” roared Sralk as he stood and faced the enemy. “We may be out-gunned- but we are not out-fought!” roared the rodent again. “Troops- advance!” the Snathi commanded. Gleefully, the right line of the Snathi and the left line of the Snathi, armed with electric spears, charged forward, as plasma throwers in the center opened fire. They were demolished.

Each Yor could easily kill five Snathi at a time, the assault vehicle could demolish a whole regiment, and their armor was rather durable. They stood in formation and faced the enemy. After about ten minutes of this, nearly five million Snathi had been slain while around 50 Yor had been killed.

“Open fire. Repeat, open fire,” ordered G-9 to his troops continuously. As Yor fell, they killed many, many, more rodents. Watching the combat, Sralk felt disgusted at the fighting, but at the same time, the evil in him made him appreciate this slaughter and wanted to see more- just slaughter of the enemy.

“Send two billion of the remaining- five billion- around to attack from the rear!” ordered Sralk. Yes, the Snathi had lost half of their force in two hours. Snathi began to rapidly climb rocks and move out of the way of the Yor, climbing was another one of their talents.

As more and more Snathi ‘fled’, the two-hundred or so remaining Yor were confident of soon victory. At least, they were until two billion Snathi leaped down from the crags and rocks above and slaughtered them brutally.

In the end, neither side gained much. A Yor assault fleet and 600 troops were destroyed, while only 2 billion of the Snathi fighters survived. There were still 6 million other Snathi on the planet, but much carnage had been caused by this war.

Snarky swore he would explore the stars with the newly invented hyperdrive and destroy all other who challenged him, ruler of the children of the Dread Lords. And he was going to.
Reply #4 Top
Woah, something went wrong. I tried to edit my second chapter to add a title and change some other things, and it created a brand new post.

Can the post that has a chapter without a title be deleted please?
Reply #6 Top
Cool story. Very nice.
Reply #7 Top
I like the origin you came up with for the Snathi, and I'm interested to see if they spread across the rest of the galaxy like an evil furry plague.

Sentient species taste better... Sentient species taste better...

Reply #8 Top
Darn Squirrels, E-V-I-L!
Reply #9 Top
Awwwwwwwww!!!! Squirrels with Plasma rifles!! How cuuuuuuuuuuuuuute!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Reply #10 Top
^
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Did somebody mention squirrels?
Reply #11 Top
Thanks! If you like squirrels with plasma rifles... wait until you see what they get when they do some 'ordinary' medical research.
Yep, plague is definately the right word for the Snathi...

I should add that the Snathi species is called the Snathi Horde, if you didn't get it yet from the title and references below.

Chapter 3: The Game's Start

January 1st, 2226
Snarky, dictator and ruler of eight billion mindless, totally evil rodentoid beings, stood at the front of the Planning Room, gazing at charts and a group of other Snathi, who were similarly posed.

"Master, we have developed three hyper-capable ships in the Docks," reported the Horde's Spacemaster. Others had advisors, but Snarky had hordemasters, who answered to him, the Hordemaster

"Excellent!" exulted Snarky, slashing his tail against one of the tables. "What are they?"

"Our first three hordeships. H1 is a mining vehicle, 933 meters long by 921 meters long. Our Researchmaster, going over artifacts from the Invaders, discovered a way to mine asteroids. I'll let him explain," reported the Spacemaster, grumbling at deferring to his comrade.

"It allows a vehicle to deploy an energy beam, made of Dreadstuff-" the Snathi term for mystical energy or Precursor artifacts- "That can gather minerals from the asteroid and hoard it to us. Establishing a mining facility on the asteroid allows the ship to journey elsewhere," explained the Researchmaster with pride.

Continuing, the Spacemaster said, "The second craft, H2, is a 933 meters by 880 meters long transport. Not a military transport," he hastily added after seeing the grin of the Warmaster. "A colony transport, for 100 million colonists and 1,400 crewmen. It is being sent to the nearest world, a Class 4."

"Send it into space instead, heading 652.15," Snarky commanded. The Spacemaster nodded, gave orders, and contiuned the briefing.


Onboard the command center of the third ship, H3, a survey craft, the vessel's master, a Snathi by the name of Sorka, laughed as one of his security guards flogged an engineer who had failed to correctly chart engine speeds.

"Use the Mark 4 sensor package and find some Dreadstuff!" demanded Sorka of his crew. "We must find more... hoard it all..." he trailed off. All Snathi felt a natural effinity for the strange remains of the Precursors.

"Master! We've identified dreadstuff approximately three light-years away!" shouted the communications specialist. Sorka nodded.

"Activate the It'In Ion Drive at once. Set course for this Dreadstuff. Full ion speed." The ship rose to obey his command, bringing the Snathi Horde into the galaxy.


Back at the planet of Kalis-Yu, the Buildmaster, in charge of production, sat in a command pod, observing the Ersnak district. She was in charge of all the planet's resources, a very important position in the material hoard-based Snathi society.

This district has a great amount of natural nutrients, enough to boost food production by %100,, she thought, idly gazing at the studies.

"This is the Buildmaster. I want a farming district established in Ersnak at once. Build farming facilities over better nutrient regions," she barked into the communications system.

Now, there was another odd case to observe. In the Vrisk district, people were reporting feeling very happy. Putting it on her screen, she noted an Entertainment Center could be constructed.

This involved constructing a building which featured sports matches of wrestling, jabbing (a sport involving teeth-to-teeth confrontation), and flepping (a sport involving flicking thorns out of a tail). Also, several hundred virtual channels allowed Snathi to play hoarding games where the goal is to accumulate as much as possible. But the main attraction of the Snathi was combat sports.

"This is the Buildmaster. Start construction of an Entertainment Center at once in the Vrisk district," she ordered.


In the research center, the Researchmaster was working on a secret project. The theory was, if the Horde could speak the language of the alien races, they would be able to sway them or better declare war.

He was nearly finished installing one of the units into a headset, powered by Dreadstuff. In this case, the Dreadstuff was a fine, orange powder found in a secret vault deep below Kalis-Yu.

Just as it was about to activate, the thing exploded in a shower of sparks. Screaming in pain, the Researchmaster ran from the laboratory as it biodegraded. Glancing about ruefully, he noticed the Dreadstuff was polluting the soil.

"It will take almost a year to repair this soil," chittered the Snathi, marking it as 'Yellow' on his map. "But I can get the Translators finished in three weeks."


Yes, all I've written so far is the first turn. I want to get into the Snathi culture and ideas as I go along the turns. Not everything will be as slow as this (if nothing happens it'll be pretty fast), but some will.

Reply #15 Top

Shit you're right.

I'll respond in detail later.

I'm too lazy to read it at the moment.