Phlegmak

Phlegmak (Aureliaparilis canticum dolor); No Image Available) *The following write-up is based on the current extant plot for the Phlegmak, and based on discussions between Deus Siddis and capi3101 on the Plot Discussion thread at ICC. This discussion page was written by capi3101 based on his understanding of everything that was supposed to take place with the Phlegmak in regards to SF3. It may not be 100% accurate; designers are advised to review all design threads before performing any work in regards to the Phlegmak. Also, be advised that significant changes to this race may occur with the next plot revisions.*

The Phlegmak are one of the most ancient races in the cosmos. An offshoot of the Delasa'Alia, the Phlegmak are devoted to the restoration of the "natural order" of the space-time continuum, which translates to them sharing the cosmos with no other forms of sapient life. Their methods for acheiving this long-term goal are exceptionally subtle, but with the recent activation of the Crystal Star, entirely within their reach. Their modus operandi is to distract the main species capable of threatening their long-term goals long enough for some major catastrophe to occur to that race, one capable of neutralizing that species as a threat. In their history, they've had dealings with the ancient Leghk, Numlox and the Old Empire. With the rise of the New Empire, the thoughts of the Phlegmak are once again turning towards how best to counter *Homo sapiens sapiens*.

## Basic Characteristics

* *Type*: Unknown
* *Durability*: 9
* *Learning Rate*: 9
* ***Science***: Excellent
* ***Navigation***: Excellent
* ***Tactical***: Excellent
* ***Engineering***: Excellent
* ***Communication***: Poor
* ***Medicine***: Average
* *Genders*: 1
* *Life Stages*: Adolescent at 189 years. Adult at 441 years. Middle age at 851 yrs. Old Age at 1,449 years. Venerable Age at 1,890 years.
* *Lifespan*: 1950+12d% years.
* *Length*: 42.42 meters; 31.82 + (2d5 x 2.12) meters.
* *Mass*: 2500 kilograms; 1875 + (2d5 x 125) kilograms.

* *Niche/Symmetry*: Exotic Radial Consumer
* *Speed/Transit*: Flyer (Atmospheric), 815 m/rd (489 kph)
* *Volume*: 1200 m^3
* *HD*: 60/56/59
* *HP*: 140
* *Unarmed Damage*: 4 NHP
* *STV*: 2,414,400 MU (2515 MU/m^3)

## Physical Description

Phlegmak are an offshoot of the Minstrel race, and share most of their basic characteristics. They are ever so slightly larger than their Minstrel cousins. They are shaped like a cylindrical teardrop, deep-violet to black in color with a bright violet dorsal region, with two long tentacles the same darkish color as the remainder of their outer surface. They have no discernable external organs, and none have stayed intact long enough after their deaths to record their internal physiology.

## Space Units

### Phlegmak Predator

#### Rivener Stream

* Type: Beam
* Recharge: 6 seconds
* Range: Unlimited
* Energy: 0.03
* Falloff: -150 Damage per range increment (minimum 100)
* Mass: 2 hT per rack / 6 hT per turret
* Effects:
	+ Collide: False (will not terminate if a collision occurs)
	+ Discriminate: True (will not damage friendly targets)

**Rivener Stream**
 Class Two
 Class Three
 Class Four
 Class Five
 Class Six
 Class Eight
 Class Nine
 Class Ten

#### Black Orb

* Type: Projectile
* Recharge: 12 seconds
* Range: 15 range increments
* Energy: 0.20
* Falloff: None
* Mass: 8 hT per rack / 8 hT per turret
* Effects:
	+ Radius: 10 range increments
	+ Wave: 5 range increments / second
	+ Discriminate: True (will not damage friendly targets)
	+ Duration: Unlimited (will remain active until it hits a valid target)
	+ Speed: 0.5 range increments per second
	+ Turn: 5 degrees per second (*could be π/48 instead, depends which math is easier*; tracks specific target)

**Black Orb**
 Class Two
 Class Three
 Class Four
 Class Six
 Class Seven
 Class Eight
 Class Nine
 Class Ten

## Ground Units

*Due to their physiology, the Phlegmak cannot stay near a planet's surface for extended periods of time. They therefore have no ground units.*

## Territory

*From the Plot Discussion thread, in regards to Phlegmak "territory": I do not know how you feel about possible SF4 spoilers, but I can partly answer this with 'everywhere'. The Phlegmak as they are in this draft, have no need for planets or fuel or mechanical technology. They know about every system, flux, nebula, race, and major event that has taken place in the galaxy, because they have been there to see it. This knowledge, combined with their very unique technology, makes it less than difficult to remain mostly unseen by the various local races of the galaxy, unless they want for their presence to be noticed (which is rare.)*

* **Patrol**:
	+ *Alpha Sector*: Sparse, but Present
	+ *Delta Sector*: Sparse, but Present
	+ *Beta Sector*: Sparse, but Present
* **Space**:
	+ *Alpha Sector*: No Sphere of Influence
	+ *Delta Sector*: No Sphere of Influence
	+ *Beta Sector*: No Sphere of Influence
* **Star**:
	+ *Alpha Sector*: None
	+ *Delta Sector*: None
	+ *Beta Sector*: None
* **Worlds**:
	+ *Alpha Sector*: None
	+ *Delta Sector*: None
	+ *Beta Sector*: None

## Status

* **Ally**:
	+ *Initial*: Numlox
	+ *Final*: None
* **Enemy**:
	+ *Initial*: All Others
	+ *Final*: All

## Economy

* **Economic Status Levels**:
	+ *Not Applicable; Species is Nomadic*
* **Specialty Trade Goods Purchased**:
	+ None
* **Specialty Trade Goods Sold**:
	+ None

## Supplemental Information

*The following information has been pulled directly from the SF3 Plot Discussion thread. Note that the information contained herein may also provide spoilers to the Phlegmak and the roll they will play in SF4.*

The Phlegmak have very powerful, but also very specialized technology and tactics. From a strategic scale, the main limitation of the Phlegmak is their inability to fight planetside, since they and their tech are adapted for the vacuum of space, not the harsh gravity, pressure, and heat of a world's surface. The best they could do was send a small payload down to the surface, which required that their ships approach into an orbit, which leaves them very vulnerable since they are only meant for deep space. Fortunately, the Black Egg device helped make up for their otherwise lack of planetside offensive strength, but they only had a few of these and they each took roughly a million years to fabricate.

**Phlegmak and the Ancients**: The telepathic Delasa'Alia evolved in deep space well after the initial seeing of the Ancients throughout the entire universe, generally along with the remaining sapient races. The physiology of the Delasa'Alia was such, however, that they couldn't visit planets directly, and so they remained unaware of any other forms of life in the universe, right up until the first sapient races started building starships. The knowledge of the existence of other forms of life was a shock to the Delasa'Alia; while most were happy and welcomed this surprise of the universe (right up until they started hunting the Delasa'Alia en masse), there was a faction within the race that was nonplussed, annoyed at the very presence of these upstart races. The annoyance only grew when the other members of their race refused to defend themselves from the growing threat. Taking matters into their own hands, a group from this faction ambushed and managed to destroy an upstart starship. While sifting through the wreckage to learn the technical secrets of how to build such a vessel themselves (not that they needed it for travel through space, but rather as a means to better protect themselves), they made a shocking discovery through their natural telepathy: the fuel the craft employed was in fact itself a sapient race.

The Delasa'Alia faction swapped information with this new race, who called themselves the Xysythyx. Both had a common enemy, though the Xysythyx had not yet realized what was plaguing their race was other forms of sapient life; they lived on a geologic time scale, where billions of generations of other forms of sapient life could be born and die in a single one of their lifetimes. The Delasa'Alia faction realized that the Xysythyx could in fact be a powerful ally in their quest to rid the cosmos of the upstart sapient races, and so suggested a course of total annihilation of all other forms of life to the Xysythyx. It took some time, but ultimately the Xysythyx were forced to agree to that course of action, for no other reason than to preserve their race. It would take the Xysythyx some time to implement any long-term plan, however, so they asked the Delasa'Alia faction to act on their behalf in the meantime, a course to which they readily agreed. The two species maintained contact, with the Xysythyx sharing any information they had on the worlds in which they inhabited and the technologies of the races that hunted them whenever possible. They also provided the Delasa'Alia faction, who had by this time broken away from those "stupid, hippie bastards" that composed the rest of their race and had restyled themselves "Phlegmak", with a non-sapient, renewable energy source for their craft (which would later be known as Luminium; this substance was so close to the structure and internal chemistry of Endurium as to be totally indistinguishable, and every race that managed to destroy a Phlegmak ship in the future thought that they too used Endurium for fuel). In time, the Phlegmak had sufficient technical know-how to build their own craft, and began launching their first campaigns against sapient races.

**Phlegmak, the Leghk, the Mysterions, and the Uhl**: There was a great war between the Phlegmak and Leghk over a million years ago. The Leghk were slowly losing, and desperately needed an edge to turn the tides of the conflict. During this quest, they contacted the plasmoid 'Mysterion', on their home sun in the far upspin reaches of the sector. These exotic lifeforms possessed strange and powerful technologies, but lacked the ability to build long distance vessels from stable solid materials. The two races shared their know-how with with each other, but neither fully understood the fundamentals of the alien technology they had received. The Mysterion warned the Leghk that there could be dangers to misuse of their science, but the Leghk did not have time to be as thorough with their research as they normally would be. They used this influx of knowledge to rapidly develop and contruct new systems to use in the war, though one in particular proved to be effective at leveling the field with the Phlegmak- the Plasma Bolt. But for all of the benefits of the new weapon, it had one flaw. While the weapon functioned optimally a strong majority of the time, every so often it would produce an anomaly. The first were the living ionized storms, that would eventually be known as "Dark Lightning." As dangerous as these were, they were only a warning of the threat the Mysterion had warned about. But pressed by the continued offensives by the Phlegmak, the Leghk could not afford to terminate their usage of these devices, and they felt it would eventually bring an end to the war. It did, by creating the Uhl. As the creature grew in strength, it was able to use its telepathy to control greater numbers and more intelligent Leghk, forging them into the Uhlek. As the new war between the Uhlek and Leghk escalated, the Phlegmak broke off their attacks and dispersed their forces from the Sector.

The Empire is currently using Plasma Bolt technologies in their war with the Gazurtoid...whether that will factor into SF3 or not has not been determined (perhaps as a side-quest).

**Phlegmak and the Numlox**: Once the Crystal Planet was completed and functional, the Phlegmak took on the goal of identifying any race that might be capable of posing a threat to its operation and doing their utmost to eliminate that threat, either through direct intervention (though they preferred not to do this, if at all possible) or through some circuitous route. The Uhl was alarmed when every Uhlek ship it sent to destroy the Crystal Planet was fried in the attempt (as they did not possess any Crystal Orbs), and thus packed up and ran, taking the Uhlek with it. The Phlegmak allowed this course of events to occur; the Uhlek would be very effective at wiping out any race the Crystal Planet missed. When it came to the Beta Sector, the Uhlek met up with the Numlox, a race powerful enough to pose a serious threat to them. Fortunately, the Phlegmak were able to learn through their Xysythyx contacts about the Numlox belief in the "Keepers", a powerful race that would one day put them on the path towards true enlightenment. The Phlegmak decided to take the novel approach of impersonating these Keepers; it worked, and the Numlox were neutralized as a threat when the bulk of their space fleet departed with the Phlegmak fleet for parts unknown (toward the Alpha Sector, eventually), allowing the Uhlek to mow through the Sector and cause chaos. The Gauzurtoid eventually came along for the ride, having long before left the Beta Sector. Though the Numlox remembered the fanatical Gazurtoid from long ago in their history, the Phlegmak recognized the benefits of having yet another race bent on wiping out other species (albeit in a very specialized form), and instructed the Numlox to leave them be. Thus was set the configuration of the first wave; the Numlox led, with the Phlegmak largely in a support role to watch the progress of the Crystal Planet. Gazurtoid followed, with the Uhlek at their heels.

**Phlegmak in the First Wave**: The Phlegmak often used fleets of Numlox vessels to try and clear out any potent defenses around or on a planet, before a lone Predator would move in and make the final kill with a single Black Egg. However, it did not take many lost colonies before the Humans started massing huge defensive efforts around their worlds. They continued to lose many of the outer colonies, but they made the First Wave pay greatly for everything that it took. After a bloody war, the Numlox forces were extinct, leaving the Phlegmak alone and on the retreat. When the Empire's Veloxi allies narrowly defeated a large cluster of the Phlegmak fleet at the Handle of the Axe, the Phlegmak hastily dispersed from the Sector. Sadly, the Old Empire never fully recovered from the loss of so many colonies, and its relationship with the Veloxi that had proven so valuable eventually broke during the time leading up to and then into the Second Wave, leading to the demise of the Old Empire and throwing the Sector into chaos. In essense, the Phlegmak did defeat the Empire, just in their characteristic, indirect sort of way.

**The Phlegmak destroyed the Crystal Planet**: They destroyed it for two reasons. The first was to deal a potent economic blow to the powerful spacefaring races of those Sectors surrounding the new (Beta) Sector. They already have things under control in the new Sector itself, and they have learned to respect Humans and their ally races, who have just discovered a nexus to the new Sector and who now depend on Shyneum. The second reason was to increase the consumption of Endurium, since its use would be more and more essential once Shyneum started to become scarce. The Phlegmak know that with the Ancient's quicker minds, the possibility of contact between them and carbon-based sentients becomes a greater possibility. That then increases the possibility that there could be some sort of truce between the two, which would prevent the reaching of their goal of restoring the galaxy to the state in which they prospered and safely roamed space (a galaxy where they have the void, and the Ancients have the worlds below.) Increasing the consumption of 'Endurium' by carbon-based planetary life, pushes the Ancients to finish their reclamation for the sake of their survival. The plan works only if the Ancient's means of reclamation is not destroyed; if it is, a truce with the carbon plague will be their best option; while the Ancients are not even remotely as cold a race as the Phlegmak, their own survival is all they can any longer afford to consider.

In other words, the Phlegmak and the Ancients still have the same goal, but if the Crystal Star fails, the Ancients will have no choice but to broker a truce for the sake of their own survival. Their long alliance notwithstanding, the Phlegmak would be left to finish carrying out the goal of the universal extermination of all other forms of sapience all by themselves. And their longest standing, most powerful ally would now be counted amongst their enemies. So clearly the Phlegmak have a lot at stake in current events.

## Importance

The Phlegmak are the main villains in the game; the game's main quest is to foil the plot of the Phlegmak to use the Ancients to cleanse the universe of all other forms of sapient life, thus making it safe for them to travel openly through space once more. Like the Ancients, they have very powerful ships. Phlegmak are only encountered at specific points in the game, usually right after the player has obtained a mission-critical artifact or a related artifact (i.e. one that will lead to the player finally obtaining such artifacts). Their role in the in-game events will slowly be revealed to the player as they make progress towards the game ending, culmunating in an encounter with two dozen of their powerful warships at the game's end. The player wins the game by neutralizing the Crystal Star; the planned ending will leave the Phlegmak available to act as a villain in future Starflight installments.

## Communication Text

This final "stat" is a listing of phrases a species will use in communications with the player. For more details on this system, see the discussion on the Communication Mechanics, Interface and Engine. In addition to communications phrases, this section should include the species reactions to various communications postures, as well as their "threshhold values" (again, see the Communication Engine discussion for details).

*As a new species, there is (obviously) no old text to analyze. Communications messages for this species will need to be generated at a later date.*

### Communications Messages Notes

*None at this time.*

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