How about a short-story competition for the community? I'd love to stumble upon a little more lore during gameplay and I could imagine adding some random events or new triggers for journal entries.
My thoughts: If people wrote 1 page shorts, max 3 parts long with the idea of a specific trigger (like the spire stuff) it wouldn't be too difficult for some of the best to either be included or get a little work to more accurately fit the *real* lore and become canon. But it is a lot of work for a small community and I worry about stepping on toes. Still I loved Alpha Centauri's interludes and think it's a nice way of telling a story in a sandbox game (rather than an encylopedia which seems empty if it doesn't have a piece on every single item). Since Keith mentioned ships... here's a little generic short for the Neinzul ships.
e.g.
Part 1 on unlocking a Neinzul ship at an ARS,
Part 2 On capture of a Core Neinzul fabricator, (older, bigger, better younglings)
Part 3 On capture of a planet with AI-Neinzul modules
"What do you think they'll grow into, when they're fully mature? Will they always be so..." The commander waved his hands, wishing he had the words to describe the alien nature of these ships. Even dormant on the transport they exuded an aura of lethality. Sharpness and menace, like a spring-loaded trap.
"I don't know..." The head engineer had reassuring smears of oil and grease, normally good signs with an experimental project. But this project needed someone more skilled in biology and the gap between his ability and those required for the job seemed to widen with each passing day.
"We don't fully understand their life-cycle, but what we do know is enough for this. If they reproduce on their own we'll have another enemy on our hands. We know what can happen when the military has a mind of its own. I don't like it one bit but we're desperate and these could be the answer we've been searching for. As long as we keep the younglings and the enclaves apart, neuter both and halt their development..."
"Then they're safe?" The commander asked, but the nervous reply was cut short by the telemetry.
The horde of younglings burst from the transport in a roaring stream. They tore through the target drones in record time, an unexpected but very welcome overkill. The swarm, the rippling, undulating mass of living metal turned around and headed back to base. For a moment everyone held their breath, half expecting a hail of shells, regurgitated munitions and modified mandibles only to hear the gentle thump of a hundred ships simultaneously docking with the modified, neutered hive. The regeneration chamber stood apart from the human constructions like some thorny black heart, which in some senses it was.
"They are effective... But I ask again, are they safe?"
"They aren't fully independent yet and their metabolism and energy expenditure is through the roof"
"They're fast I'll grant you that"
"Yes... but more than that they're hungry, ravenous and perpetually starving. Without a hive, or an approximation of one they will burn up on their own. I understand it will make using them for deep-strikes problematic but at least they'll be unable to break away and form a nest of their own somewhere off in deep space."
"Life finds a way..."
---
"I've seen these before" The commander spoke to the head of the research division, looking out at the wicked looking craft that streamed from the captured fabricator. They were larger than he remembered, the overlapping plates of their carapace made them look tougher and more durable but their immense speed was unforgettable.
"These are something else. They are the pinacle of the Neinzul younglings rather short life-cycle. We've never been able to control them at this stage before but the AI has found a way. I'm sorry to report that we can't reverse engineer this for our own production facilities... I'm not even sure how it works but it does. They are bigger, stronger and much more lethal."
"So this is the end of this technology?" The commander asked, nervous as to the answer.
"It's hard to say. I think the AI has reached the limit of what can be accomplished by merely modifying the different castes of Neinzul, any further and they would become something else entirely. But that may be what we can expect... something new, some fusion of various technologies. I think such a fusion may explain the unusual reports from the front-line."
"Do you mean those hives we saw weren't some rogue Neinzul group or AI-allied force but that they're some experimental... hybrids?"
"I fear so, though it may be some time before we know their intentions, capabilities and life-cycle."
"Life-cycle... so are those hybrids fully mature?"
"I wouldn't like to speculate until we capture one for our research"
"How do you expect us to capture one? They are fast, aggressive and the organic technology is immune to all standard forms of reclamation: boarding, hacking, nanites... we can't use EMPs to disable them or tractors to hold them. They regenerate when wounded and they have integrated the AI's sophisticated shielding into their structure."
"I never said it would be easy..."
---
"You've had time to examine the facility, what are your findings?"
"The Neinzul-hybrids aren't quite as independent as we had assumed. Nor are they fully mature. Each hive must visit a facility once it reaches key stages of its life-cycle to upgrade and repair the AI components to utilize its increased size and metabolic output."
"What does that mean for us?"
"If we can surgically strike the facilities we could cripple the hybrid's fighting abilities. It seems these facilities do more than merely upgrade the hives they also act as relays for controlling and coordinating their actions. If we destroy them all -no small feat- this branch of the AI's military would be effectively dead."
"That's good news, so why doesn't it sound like it?"
"There's more... from what we've been able to gather, and this is purely speculative, I believe there are plans underway for these hybrids to be given more autonomy over within our galaxy and for them to be given significantly increased capabilities. The AIs traditionally don't take and hold enemy territory, their mobile military, special forces and strategic reserve spend a significant proportion of the time far outside our sphere of operations... perhaps outside the galaxy itself."
"But these hives are different?"
"They could soon have the capacity to build a significant foothold within our territory. Retake captured worlds and infest and interfere with unique structures for their own ends. The AIs attention may be focussed elsewhere but these hives are semi-autonomous and soley interested in us."
"Then I think we better strike at them before they strike at us."
