Guys... seriously, I need HELP on this. And more than help, it's about sci-fi world-building, which as sci-fi fans, we should all love, right?
I made this so as not to clutter the rest of this section with threads like "How would the Psi Corps and the New Jedi Order interact?" or "How similar are a Base Delta Zero and an Exterminatus?" or "Is it possible Talia Winters could be restored?" or a dozen other threads. Now, if you don't wanna show any interest in this, I'll do just that.
This is far past a story about fanfiction. I'd hoped to get a discussion going on basically these eight universes, at a time when the forum could desperately use it. And no one cares...?! How is it possible for SCI-FI fans to feel this... detached from the possibilities here?
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
No need to worry. I think it's just . . . well, 8 different franchises (and 13 pages of notes) is a bit overwhelming. That's probably why there hasn't been as many responses. Of the franchises, I'd consider myself well verses in Star Wars, pretty well versed in Star Trek and 40 K, ok in B5, Stargate, and Halo, and I know nothing about Star Craft. I'd consider maybe starting off smaller with some of those franchises, and then slowly integrating other franchises later as you progress.
Or maybe do the "Crisis on infinite earths" method of integrating characters and such. For example, DC Comics had a group called "Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters" that fought an alternate earth where Nazis won WWII. When they deciced to make sure there was only one earth, they were ingegrated into the timeline as simply heroes who fought during regular WWII. I have never written any fan fiction, but sometimes when bored I've thought of "What if the Covenant fought the Empire" type scenarios in my head. And sometimes, I'd take that Freedom Fighters approach. Daleks have a good aesthetic, and them fighting along side Liberty Prime as part of a robot army would be cool, but I don't want the backstory of the Daleks dragging things down. Solution? Re-imagine them as another robot cooked up by the old world in Fallout.
For some of your specific questions:
* Valen meeting Kahless is a cool idea
* Psi Corp meets the New Jedi Order could have enough material to be it's own series. On the surface both are groups of law enforcement with mental powers, but the Jedi's spiritual views on the Force, and their opposition to the Orwellian methods of Psi Corp would lead to conflict. Maybe a Psi Corp member starts wondering if they're the result of genetic manipulation or if they too have a spiritual destiny, or a Jedi who experienced anti Jedi sentiment sympathizes with the Corps "regular humans will always hate and fear us" stance".
*I think exterminatus and BDZ are basically the same, but exterminatus sometimes involves virus bombs
Yeah, Daleks are too OPed as hell to be part of this crossover anyway, lol.
Hell, I've toyed with the idea of Valen popping up in the present via Stargate time-travel shenanigans.
As to Psi Corps meeting the Jedi, in this story, the Force is superior to telepathy as I have written it, given that obviously, the Jedi and other Force users are like "minuscule avatars of the Q." Other sci-fi races simply "uplifted" beings to have telepathy, and during the time of the Belkan Empire, following the disastrous incident that spawned off the Chaos Gods, it was decided to carefully regulate it. Getting back to the topic, though, my feeling is the Psi Corps would wanna get their hands on a Jedi, and experiment. See what makes them tick. It's all about midi-chlorians, which seem to take on a life of their own, while psi power is relegated all to your mental functions. Obviously Luke's Jedi Order would disapprove of drafting people into public service, which might be something of an irony when he is confronted with how the Jedi Order of the Old Republic had conducted itself, lol. The big problem I could see is the Psi Corps underestimating the Jedi. Treating them as just more "psykers" instead of legit beings operating upon a higher plane. And of course, in the Shadow War, in which this is set, Jedi and Sith would be able to stop whole fleets of Shadow vessels with EASE, given their susceptibility to "telepathy." And a Jedi or Sith, even a low-tier one, would just HAVE to be stronger than even the toughest Psi Cop. Bester would be so jealous, lol.
Here's an idea I'd had. The C'tan being in their primordial state across many universes is deliberate. I WANT other First Ones like perhaps the Shadows to build them organic shells similarly to what the Necrons had done eons ago. Now obviously, during the time of the Council of the First Ones in the Belkan Empire, that would not be done, but the Shadows and Vorlons are Younger First Ones, not Ancient First Ones, and with the dissolution of the Belkan Empire, naturally, a lot of its policies can't be enforced anymore. And of course, if Vorlons and Shadows EVER crossed into the Delta Quadrant, it would mean hell to pay from the Undine.
Thoughts so far?
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
-Long ago, the Vorlons, through the Belkan Empire, had visited the Yuuzhan Vong galaxy and left some of their organic technology, which allowed the Yuuzhan Vong to reverse-engineer it.
-Given how computers by the time of these advanced spacefaring races use 3-D data storage, my feeling would be that for downloading into a computer network made out of something like isolinear circuitry or the HoloNet would be akin to ascending into a higher dimension for any Sprites or Binomes or even viruses, perhaps even driving them mad simply from even the briefest of exposure over a prolonged period of time through total systematic decay, like a human being glimpsing Cthulhu's true form.
-Exploring WHO created the hyperspace disturbance at the edge of the galaxy, and perhaps having this Compact Alliance working on a solution to overcome it. That in effect, it's similar to the Great Barrier, around the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy.
-Making Yosemite God a Cytherian who had been cast out beyond the Great Barrier.
-That the Ancient Humanoids left the DNA seed-fragment message before they discovered and became part of the Ancient Belkan Empire, and left a second message out there once they had discovered it, perhaps in preparation to a great threat. Maybe the Warp?
-That perhaps the Changelings were uplifted by another great race, maybe even the First Ones, and they forgot it. Possibly the Xel'naga? If so they would have purity of essence.
-That perhaps the Guardian of Forever had been built by the Belkan Empire. Maybe the Ancients. And in the past, an ancient scavenger race had laid claim to the Guardian of Forever long after they built it, not just a gateway across time, but other worlds, and so was possibly active during many ancient events in the time of the Belkan Empire, though they never treated it as a sentient being, and as a result, they never asked it any questions, simply hooked it up to their organic technology of the time period. An idea I'd had with this is that perhaps the Guardian can hack into Stargates and Hypergates and Infinity Gates. I'm also considering in the present if some unscrupulous race or group lays claim to the Guardian of Forever and has it hack into all the connected wormhole networks in order to cause chaos, like use an Infinity Gate to send out an Infinity Wave and destroy a planet or solar system. This could help in taking out some Zerg Overworlds behind the scenes. Perhaps by the Shadowfleet guys?
-The Great Machine can be used similarly to the Guardian of Forever and the Bajoran Wormhole to reach into other realitystreams, but this requires even more power than to open a rift across time.
-That the Iconians of Star Trek were really the Gree, lol.
-That possibly Sargon's species were members of the Belkan Empire.
-The civilizations that employ hyperspace technology to travel between worlds, like those in Stargate, Babylon 5, and Star Wars can sometimes use different methods in doing so. Example, the way the civilizations in Babylon 5 use hyperspace is much more primitive than those from Stargate and Star Wars, because a lot of times they are dependent on gates, and is still much slower than those other civilizations, though not entirely by much.
-Making the Tkon Empire similar to the Culture in a massive shout-out, and the Federation is what another "Portal" sees as their natural successor state.
-The subspace network the Hirogen claimed was created by some ancient race from another reality through the Belkan Empire.
-That perhaps the Ancients had built the Dyson Shell in TNG. That said, it became unstable over time because a C'tan had drifted through to begin feeding on its solar energy! The way the episode was written seems to imply it had destabilized over time, and they wouldn't have been dumb enough to build a Dyson Shell around an unstable star.
-Having Tam Elbrun and Gomtuu return. Gomtuu's race had gone beyond the rim and into worlds and across time. So perhaps show more of Gomtuu's race. Gomtuu himself seemed pretty OP in "Tin Man."
-Having the Furlings as part of the "Alliance of Four Great Races" appear as another race from another franchise.
-Luke restores Talia Winters to herself.
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
In general, combining a lot of the similar tropes across different franchises is a good idea, all the different "precursor" races, especially some of the ill defined ones in Star Trek, the various first ones of B5, the Rakatans in SW, etc. However, it is a bit confusing, especially for ones I haven't heard of before.
No kidding. This is pure sci-fi world-building and it ain't easy. Hell, in many ways, it feels like what George Lucas had talked about when he was mishmashing stuff together into the first Star Wars.
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
OH HELL! This would be a cool idea to explore! Contrasting a Vorlon's ability to leave a piece of themselves in another and how it relates to the Vulcan katra transfer process. I'd figure since the Vorlons or other First Ones had uplifted every psychic species in the history of the universe, then it's natural.
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
HOLY SHIT I FORGOT SOMETHING! CORTANA! Is it possible she could... like... download into the world of ReBoot, a computer network given physical form, and... have form there? She's a digital being!
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
Hey. I've further fleshed out ideas here, but I need more help. While in the past Vader agrees to a partnership with the Shadows to loosen the reins on the Galactic Empire so to let the various moffs and admirals battle among one another to strengthen the galaxy through conflict, I'm thinking Palpatine is restored in a clone body on Byss with his essence transferred to it, where he begins attempting to transition the Dark Empire into a pure dark sider empire. It was his plan all along. It will also set up nicely when Kerrigan's Overworlds begin flooding creation, since only dark energy can permanently kill them, but... how do I do this? Make the Dark Empire mostly dark siders? Hell, would Palpatine continue research into Plagueis's midi-chlorian manipulation? He had decades, though... ideas?
"A culture's teachings - and more importantly, the nature of its people - achieve definition in conflict. They find themselves, or find themselves lacking."
— Kreia, Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
I mean, if you look at Legends there were lots of dark side acolytes, cultists, Emperor's hands, etc. even before Clone!Palpatine's Dark Empire. (Really stretching that whole "Rule of Two" thing for the sake of video game bosses and the like). So I don't you'd need to change much. (Though you could always say Palps was using cloning or other experiments to make more force users if you want).
