From: tbarnes@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (thomas wrentmore barnes)
Subject: Re: Unique Races
Organization: Indiana University
Date: Sat, 2 Jan 1993 16:35:19 GMT

I read a book called "The Remarkables" (author forgotten)

In the book, most of humanity had expanded outward into space,
encountering no other intelligent races, except for one race encountered
by a slow "generation ship" that had reached a distant planet thousands
of years before the bulk of humanity reached the world.

They found the biochemistry of the planet to be all wrong for Terran
life and were eventually forced to become symbiotic partners with the
native sentients, who were tree-like creatures that could synthesize
human-edible food.

The "Remarkables" formed "groves" as adults, which would only move very
slowly (over a period of years). They lived partially by photosynthesis,
partially by predation of small animals that passed near them, and
partially by scavenging kills brought in by their native symbiotes,
which the humans called "cretins". The remarkables could controll and
breed "cretins" for certain traits - aquatic hunting, land hunting,
attacking other groves, scavenging, attacking other cretins or humans,
etc. In return, the cretins got food and Remarkable-synethized food.
The humans acted, essentially, like a better species of cretin. Human
society on this planet evolved into seperated, but very highly-inbred,
clans of people, who lived in completely communal societies, dedicated
to serving a "grove" of Remarkables.
	Remarkable young start out as aquatic life-forms, then evolve
into a communal, mobile juvenile form, that looks like a huge
tumbleweed. This form is intelligent and is, in rare cases, capable of
speaking the human language. Remarkable communication is usually through
gesture and pheremone secretion (allowing long-distance communication
with other groves). In order to metamorphose into their adult phase, the
juveniles must undergo a stressful and hazardous journey. At this time
natural predators and the cretins of rival groves kill a lot of the
juveniles. Humans are generally good guards against these attacks,
especially when supplemented by specially bred dog-like cretins
(perfectly trained, very smart).
	The story is about a bunch of off-worlders, from the mainstream
galactic society, who are allowed to visit the Remarkable's planet and
to help with the "pilgrimage" of a bunch of the Remarkable's offspring.
It is a great idea for a series of SF adventures and is a one of the few
truly original alien races I have encountered in SF.                

	Other neat races I have read about: 

The Kefir from Megatraveller - They eat garbage and they learn when
they're subjected to pain. This means that if you want to train a Kefir
scholar, you have to slap him upside the head every so often to get him
to learn! It also means that Kefir veteran soldiers are VERY smart.

Most of the Races from David Brin's Uplift Series - The GURPS UPLIFT
worldbook has a really neat alien sentient generation system.

They beat the hell out of the "Cat-oids", "Lion-oids", "Can-oids",
Bear-oids", "Insect-oids" and Hemoroids that infest most SF.

Tom.
  
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