...Okay, but why, though? [G5]

[Affable]

Playing G5 again after a few months, looking out for quests or events I missed my last playthrough. One thing I was certain I missed was the true staple of the Geneforge series: the Ornk Boss. Surprisingly, I found out that it was the basis of an actual quest in Haria-Kel, to recover a modified Ornk so it can be evaluated at the Foundry. ALSO surprisingly, this Ornk was modified by its Shaper to be-- I'm sorry, can you run that by me again? More... intelligent? An Ornk? The food animal? Okay, how intelligent is it? ...Smart enough to get a sense of its ultimate fate (getting cut up at the Foundry), decide that its story didn't end there, and undo its bonds and escape when its handler was asleep? Okay then, just one question:

What is the benefit to that?

So I go out to the Okavano, and what do I find? A bunch of Ornks... rather strong, feral Ornks. They seem friendly enough, though. I look through the herd, checking for the white patch to identify my quarry. Finally I come across an Ornk that seems... Ornkier than the others. I check for the patch, but THIS Ornk is unusually filthy... I dive for it, but it's too fast for me (what)! It's definitely my target. I make for it, but then it starts screaming. Not mooing, not squealing. Screaming. Words. "Help me! Help me!" The Ornk can think. Now, I ask everyone here today: why this? Why would someone Create this?

[Randomizer]

Shapers are strange and not in a good way. Making an intelligent Ornk shows that being powerful doesn't mean also intelligent. It might not have been a rational reason why it was made. It might have been to settle a drunken bar bet.

[alhoon]

17 hours ago, Affable said:

Playing G5 again after a few months, looking out for quests or events I missed my last playthrough. One thing I was certain I missed was the true staple of the Geneforge series: the Ornk Boss. Surprisingly, I found out that it was the basis of an actual quest in Haria-Kel, to recover a modified Ornk so it can be evaluated at the Foundry. ALSO surprisingly, this Ornk was modified by its Shaper to be-- I'm sorry, can you run that by me again? More... intelligent? An Ornk? The food animal? Okay, how intelligent is it? ...Smart enough to get a sense of its ultimate fate (getting cut up at the Foundry), decide that its story didn't end there, and undo its bonds and escape when its handler was asleep? Okay then, just one question:

What is the benefit to that?

So I go out to the Okavano, and what do I find? A bunch of Ornks... rather strong, feral Ornks. They seem friendly enough, though. I look through the herd, checking for the white patch to identify my quarry. Finally I come across an Ornk that seems... Ornkier than the others. I check for the patch, but THIS Ornk is unusually filthy... I dive for it, but it's too fast for me (what)! It's definitely my target. I make for it, but then it starts screaming. Not mooing, not squealing. Screaming. Words. "Help me! Help me!" The Ornk can think. Now, I ask everyone here today: why this? Why would someone Create this?

 

 

That's a very Trakovite-like question... *squints eyes suspiciously*

 

16 hours ago, Randomizer said:

Shapers are strange and not in a good way. Making an intelligent Ornk shows that being powerful doesn't mean also intelligent. It might not have been a rational reason why it was made. It might have been to settle a drunken bar bet.

 

Well, it potentially took months of work, perhaps years. I doubt a Shaper just boosted the Ornk's "intelligence" to the max.

And then, it would have been sent to the foundry to be evaluated.

 

 

Regardless I would agree that the Shapers are strange and not in a good way and take it a step further:

Shapers are EVIL and need to be replaced.

A suffering sentient Ornk is by far not the only thing. New servile variants the ones supposedly built with loyalty boosts probably had a couple of ancestors cut up in the Foundry. Battle Alphas and Thands can occasionally talk and may decide to rebel. There was one rebellious sentient Thahd you send to the Rebellion in GF4 or GF5 I think. (You know, to the non-auto-enslaving creations side).

I never sent that Ornk away to die.

 

@Affable: There's only one thing you can do for the poor creature and only one answer to your questions:

 

 

 

 

 

(That's my take on the Takers' flag)

 

 

 

Edited June 1, 2018 by alhoon

[Minion]

Perhaps whoever created it wanted to know if it would, by the application of logic, accept its fate as food for its keepers or whether it would rebel and attempt to escape.

[alhoon]

I think it's a big taboo for Shapes to create wannabe rogues. Of course, it's not impossible that they would do something like that.

But if someone created this to see how loyal sentient ornks would be in the face of death he was asking for trouble.

 

I also remember the Shapers that make Drayks to study them in GF4 and GF5... they are creating sentient things with the very purpose to kill them shortly, often in a violent way. Or the Shapers that made a disease by accident in GF3.

[TheKian]

If I recall correctly, the soldier who gives you the quest says that the Shaper was experimenting with different types of brains and found the Ornk to simply be a useful creation to use to test them. It makes sense, in a way - why would you want an extremely intelligent creation that can burn your face or crush your spine or (very practically) run away?

 

Also, if you let the Ornk escape (I usually just murder it), you can find it again in the next zone and convince it to return to its handler. So there's that, I guess.

 

 

On 6/1/2018 at 6:31 AM, Minion said:

Perhaps whoever created it wanted to know if it would, by the application of logic, accept its fate as food for its keepers or whether it would rebel and attempt to escape.

Also, Hitchhiker's Guide to Terrestia, anyone?

Edited June 3, 2018 by TheKian

[alhoon]

2 hours ago, TheKian said:

If I recall correctly, the soldier who gives you the quest says that the Shaper was experimenting with different types of brains and found the Ornk to simply be a useful creation to use to test them. It makes sense, in a way - why would you want an extremely intelligent creation that can burn your face or crush your spine or (very practically) run away?

 

 

Ahem... let's take a moment to recall that Drayks, the exact definition of what you said, have been created centuries before the sentient ornk and they were far smarter from what I see of them. It indeed makes sense to start with Ornks.

But... when you want to impress your superiors, you go for the smart deathmachine and laugh at the guys over the other side working on smart ornks, rubbing your hands in glee that you will get the promotion and the funding. Well, we all saw how that turned out for the wiped-from-history guys that created the Drayks.

 

And then we had the Barzites that said "You know what? Let's go for EVEN MORE intelligence and power for our creations and make Drakons! We will totally make it if we have a stick that keeps them in pain." 

Edited June 3, 2018 by alhoon

[TheKian]

23 minutes ago, alhoon said:

 

Ahem... let's take a moment to recall that Drayks, the exact definition of what you said, have been created centuries before the sentient ornk and they were far smarter from what I see of them. It indeed makes sense to start with Ornks.

But... when you want to impress your superiors, you go for the smart deathmachine and laugh at the guys over the other side working on smart ornks, rubbing your hands in glee that you will get the promotion and the funding. Well, we all saw how that turned out for the wiped-from-history guys that created the Drayks.

 

And then we had the Barzites that said "You know what? Let's go for EVEN MORE intelligence and power for our creations and make Drakons! We will totally make it if we have a stick that keeps them in pain." 

I mean, I figure they probably learned their lesson after the second (third?) uncontrollable, flame-breathing lizard.

[alhoon]

Well, the Ornk escaped. The ornk. So I guess not.

[Alberich]

Quote

Perhaps whoever created it wanted to know if it would, by the application of logic, accept its fate as food

 

If you've ever read The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Arthur Dent and the boys meet a cow-like creature bred (or genetically engineered) for exactly this purpose...it wants to be eaten, and it walks up to your table and tells  you so.   (That, I guess, is TheKian's reference.):

 

On ‎6‎/‎2‎/‎2018 at 10:24 PM, TheKian said:

Also, Hitchhiker's Guide to Terrestria, anyone?

 

(And I suppose the "Help me" might be a reference to the original Vincent Price The Fly.)

 

Another possibility is that they weren't making the smarter Ornk for food, but for some kind of work that it would do better if it had some brains.  (If anyone read Robert Don Hughes' "Pelmen the Powershaper" trilogy back in the day...the giant beasts of burden were called Tugoliths, and they'd been gifted with speech and human-child-level intelligence...which made them both useful and extremely dangerous.)

 

Doubly so if the smart ornk you meet isn't itself a shaped creature, but a descendant of one...or didn't come out exactly as intended.  

[alhoon]

If it was not intentional, or at the very least, desirable by the Shaper that made it, they would have absorbed the Ornk immediately, not sent it to the foundry for evaluation.

[TheKian]

Allow me to settle this. Direct from the game scripts:

"I was traveling to the Foundry. The Shaper I served under had developed a new sort of ornk. A smart ornk. I know. Why would we need that? But, somehow, he made it. He gave it to me."

"Then I lost it."
"Now I'm waiting for it to come back. I hope it does. I'm in real trouble if it doesn't."

"It was smart. It tricked me. It acted all dumb and normal. Then, one night, I went to sleep and left it tied up. It undid the knots somehow. It ran off. I tracked it until it got close to the swamps southeast of here, and then I lost it."
"I won't survive out in that swamp by myself. It's rebel lands. That is why I need help. I need someone to track down the ornk for me. I can pay. Honestly, I can."

 

"What good is a smart ornk?"
"I don't know," she wails. "The Shaper said it was just experimenting on different sorts of brains. He said that the ornk just provided a good template. I don't know what any of that means!";
"He wanted it taken to the Foundry. So that's what I was doing."
        
"What would have happened to the ornk at the Foundry?"
"I think they were going to kill and dissect it. I felt bad about it at first. Now? I feel pretty good about it."

 

This explains A. How the Ornk escaped and B. Why (in general) the Shapers made it. As to how it could speak? Well, I'm just saying that there was a literal FREAKING ORNK GOD in Geneforge 1, so there is probably something about Ornks the Shapers don't realize.

[alhoon]

 

35 minutes ago, TheKian said:

 I'm just saying that there was a literal FREAKING ORNK GOD in Geneforge 1, so there is probably something about Ornks the Shapers don't realize.

 

 

There was what?! Damn... that remake can't come fast enough!

[Triumph]

Your persistent unwillingness to play original Geneforge never ceases to amuse, Alhoon. Your dedication is impressive.  😂

[alhoon]

3 hours ago, Triumph said:

Your persistent unwillingness to play original Geneforge never ceases to amuse, Alhoon. Your dedication is impressive.  😂

 

The remake is on the plans. I have resisted for 3+ years, I can resist for 1 1/2 more. I had trouble reconciling with GF2 bizarre inventory and mechanics despite the nice story. I don't want to spoil GF1.

Edited June 8, 2018 by alhoon

[Randomizer]

It might not be the exact same story. After all these years Jeff is likely to add new content that will make some changes. He did that with the Avernum: Escape from the Pit remake where he added a new town and some other changes with more Empire bases. 

 

Besides you really appreciate the newer games after putting up with the older game engines.

[TheKian]

5 hours ago, Randomizer said:

Besides you really appreciate the newer games after putting up with the older game engines.

I personally rather liked a lot about the Geneforge 1 engine. Well, with an exception to the way living tools worked. Although I must admit the infinite tool glitch was great fun.

[Alberich]

On ‎6‎/‎7‎/‎2018 at 12:36 AM, TheKian said:

Allow me to settle this. Direct from the game scripts:

 

Thanks!  It was an old memory and I had utterly forgotten this.