#precursor

[alexriesart]

This was my very first attempts at a Subnautica Precursor.

[domineeriv]

SUBNAUTICA BELOW ZERO SPOILERS!

Finished Subnautica: Below Zero, had to draw some fanart because I think this lad is cool.

Tidbits:

I draw with keyboard and mouse.

Estimated time spent on the art is around 36 hours.

I don't know how to draw backgrounds at all.

The original size of this artwork was 7200 x 10800, but as it was too big I downsized it 50%.

This was the first artwork I've done in this style, as I usually experiment with styles. Also the largest artwork I've done in my life.

Shading is off because I don't know how to shade.

AL-AN my beloved

[architect-lumicent]

Robin connected to him via bluetooth

[knight-in-sour-armor]

[cynautica]

i remembered i can just make stuff up (stream sketches + scrapped designs)

uhhhh quick fire for the second image from left to right juvenile vessel - old world cable maintenance - artistic diplomat vessel

Headcanons below the cut:

(Im not kidding word counter marked this as a 5 minute reading time open at your own risk)

While the sentiment of the architect network as "a thousand strings in a melody, not one louder than the rest" is a poetic interpretation of the network, it is not necessarily reflective of the precursors society as a whole.

At its peak, the species span billions of planets with billions on billions of individuals, all with their own degrees of autonomy and divergence. If each architect is equal in its power, than it is equal in its power to choose. Even if the soul of an architect, its very essence and its personality, is designed so perfectly that its primary desire is the perpetuation of order and advancement (two inherently divergent concepts), faults occur. Breakages occur. Pockets, cultural subsets, faded transmissions, and any other element of lost insight be it archaic or modern, lends itself to the impossibility of an entirely homogeneous society.

Whether a hive minded society reflects the only means to perfection is debatable, but its important to remember that our main portal in to the precursor world is Al-an, a known prodigy born and raised in to a society that has done nothing but benefit him. His view of his people is intrinsically skewed. He has never had a reason to see beyond the propaganda, nor question his directives. They have never once failed him.

But what of the little guys? The constructed failures so to speak. Those destined to be cast in to the bowels of poisonous cobalt mines and those who's birth purpose is to be irradiated and isolated for the greater good of the collective. Those who's genes prompted sub-standard intelligence who will never be seen as truly important. Their needs must be cast aside by design for the greater good of the collective. By design they must be ignored, their thoughts not relevant to the forwarding of progress.

Because there is true power disparity there is a true hierarchy.

Aware of this, the precursors devised a system of checks and balances to ensure that scientific progress remains at the forefront, rather than the accumulation of power by any individual.

As with all things though, power inevitably seeks to maintain and grow like a cancer.

One such exertion of power comes in the form of a "hive master". These unique individuals require precise expensive machinery in order to be produced, and as such are very rare. The vessels they require are likewise uniquely suited to only these hive masters and their unique ability to sway the voices and personality of any individual connected to the network. They themselves are invisible, completely undetectable except in physical form. Their unique telepathic abilities only work when paired with these vessels. They have no voice nor will of their own and are said to represent architect society on its most basal level.

Given their difficult to produce nature established personalities are very often used in place of new seed combinations. Personalities most suited for repurposing as a hive master include those who are most senior, intelligent, and aligned wholly with societal goals.

They are typically only found on heavily populated planets with more than a few thousand individuals. There they go undetected, like the sound of wind lost in a sea of voices, whose squall directs its very rampage. They are also enlisted for many unique duties on populous planets, such as the refactoring of corrupted individuals and silencing cultural sub-sets.

The average architect probably isn't even aware of the existence of a hive master unless their profession lies in the refactoring and diplomatic processes.

Despite the cultural drive for a monotonous and orderly society, artistic expression is common and encouraged in some sects. All architects possess the desire to express themselves, similarly to humans. Some do this simply with their inbuilt biolights that vary naturally with the individual, while others (less commonly) modify their vessel or design new and unique ones for themselves.

A vessel after all is a costly investment you cant just change like the season, its built to last you a couple thousand years. It's only natural that some seek to don something unique.

This behavior is sometimes detested by more traditional architects, but is not universally frowned upon.

Diplomats are actually encouraged to take on more artistically designed vessels. Often with their respective species' artistic values in mind. They've found greater success with alliances when they don't look like massive sticks in the mud.

Subsets of culture also at times develop unique vessels. Such as an order-over-progress movement that developed on the fringes of the network and preferred pie-bald esque vessels. Alternatively in the past as wars waged between the architects the opposing sides often don differing forms to show their allegiances. In more recent history, a wave of white-clad vigilantes advocated for a complete reset of the old-world collective.

Aside from artistic and affiliation vessels, mainstream precursor society also used a series of varying vessels to reflect personal occupation. Some of the most notable included the warrior vessel, who by design met the largest accommodations of standard architecture for the purposes of intimidation and physical altercations. Al-an's vessel likewise is very common as a heavier-built variant meant to face harsh outer worlds such as 4546B. On base, more light and energy efficient vessels make the dominant force where defense isn't a huge priority.

Microvessels such as those seen above in grey are fairly uncommon despite their energy efficiency. They are most efficient on old world planets that have been in development for hundreds of thousands of years, where the march of time means that not all builders past and present were on the same wavelength and as such small and precise forms mean that construction can be completed with minimal risk to crowded infrastructure.

Another unique and uncommon vessel is that of a juvenile grow-out vessel. These are seldom customized beyond survival needs, and are designed to acclimate a freshly generated architect to the physical world. Like a living vessel, they grow with the individual starting from broodling all the way until young adulthood. They tend to be a bit clumsy and lack the ability to interface with most technology. Always running a blue biolight, these vessels to not require a lot of energy to function physically. A juvenile architect must prove its maturity before it is allowed to graduate in to an adult vessel. This change-out phase is a diplomatic process and one can sometimes wait many years before being approved in to maturity.

The treatment of a new architect varies quite significantly depending on their birthplace and genotype. High performing juveniles are singled out very quickly for better education. Despite the rarity of children in architect society they are not given much importance. A single broodmother may be the ward of up to fifty broodlings, each of which given little attention in favor of allowing them to develop social skills among themselves. Despite architect's seeming infinite power to control resources, broodling mortality is surprisingly high.

[cyliph]

Was trying to test my skills at designing with a pre-ascendant architect. It didn’t look right until I gave him clothes, now look at him. Look at this absolute microorganism of a scientist

[welele]

[zgasly]

Horse oc time

[searsage]

What would your thoughts be on a role reverse AU, where humans are the ascendant species and Robin’s the one stuck in the containment cube? I feel like you’d have some thoughts :3c

(sorry my dumbass clicked unfollow instead of ask)

I think I've seen some neat reverse au ideas floating around and i think there is a actually a fic or two about it being the other way around one ao3!

Id definitly check em out!

As for me i have considered it before tho id still have Al-an an architect and Robin a human lol hear me out.

Like the precursors were successful in curing khaara but not before the bacteria managed to make it to sol's solar system, that being the case it was discovered by Alterra and brought back to earth in hopes of weaponized.

This of course was a complete mistake, as they could not control it and the bacteria predictably goes apeshit, infecting everything on earth.

Over the years many attempts to combat the bacterium fails and pretty much all is doomed when the last attempt at a vaccine fails.

Amidst this Sam a scientist once attempted to make a cure but her efforts were in vain, then turned her sights to another frontier, instead turning her talents to creating a way for man to outlive the virus by attempting to flee into stasis, new and a unstable technology but inarguably their last hope.

Yet due to the unauthorized use of materials and lack of time and general lack of support from her peers past her sibling, her creation mostly successful efforts goe unappreaciated and noticed by the wrong person.

Sam contracts khaara, infected by a jealous scientist who planned on stealing credit for her work. Buuuut before dying she managed to trick Robin into a stasis machine hidden in the lab.

Freezing her mind and body in a unstable but lucid like sleep within a cryopod

After it is implied Sam's work was stolen and the fualty prototype rebranded but as a cheap faulty series as they never fully understood Sams backwards blueprints and never discovered the self sufficient staisis machine.

This of course leads to humanity's extinction, the stasis machine failing.

Loooong time later precursors are asigned to Sol to clean up the pieces left behind by the bacteria, when Al-an comes to earth he finds a barren and alien planet, stuggling to recover, khaara has died out mostly but decontamination efforts were still required which is what lands a curious Al-an to explore the ruins of the long extinct species.

Noticing a odd energy pulse he diverges from his intended duties and tracks the tether until he ends up discovering the faulty stasis cryopad in a long destroyed laboratory.

And Robin still dreaming in the pod, but like her bodies heavily damaged from khaara and time breaching the tank.

Of course his reckless curiosity leads him to accidentally disrupting the power/breaking the tank by accident, and realizes the human's body starts rapidly deteriorating.

Without though shrimp boy ends up using alien technology to yank her mind into the his vessel with him.

Unaware that the disgruntled researcher was very much awake and very displeased, as for her one moment she was watching her dying sister scramble to hide blueprints, alterra agents tearing apart her lab, then a alien abducting her!.

In general i like to think Robin would be the one with the pessimistic outlook and internalized trauma, Al-an would likely be vary unprepared to deal with the boarderline suicidal and cynical head voice..

I like to think it would be a nice hurt comfort fic, with alot of inner healing and not only coming to terms with how ugly the world could be event at the end of it! But also learning to retrust people after the betrayal that murdered her sister!

I also want to note while the option to give Robin a body is plausible Al-An outright refuses until long later to offer her one as she has shown signs that she may be a danger to he's self.

Lots of slow steps and self indulgent fluff and validation because i live on that shit…but yeah that was it lol xD

[splitfoxe]

at long last, my subnautica precursor/architect oc has a ref (yes they are tall, yes they are awkward to move around, yes they are just a twinkified spider crab with cannibalistic desires)

[intomore]

‘Arthur Rimbaud,’ Paris Charleville-Mézières, 1978,

Ernest Pignon-Ernest

[sturon2841]

silly masks designs inspired by jak and daxter and its concept art

[architect-lumicent]

Hey uhm, quick question

AL-AN who the fuck allowed your kind to shape the horns like this. Why are they so difficult to figure out and draw?

[wodeworm]

151 Mew

Mｙｔｈｉｃａｌ

１７９　ｐｏｃｋｅｔ　ｍｏｎｓｔｅrｓ　ｃｏｍｐｌｅｔｅｄ

[postcard-from-the-past]

Lejeune precursor aircraft on a vintage postcard

[cyliph]

WIP

how we feelin robin enjoyers