Why are there no human settlements?

Why are there no human villages/settlements in Starbound, only prisons. Hylotl settlements will be added, but will human settlements be added as well?

 

Earth was the only settlement humans needed, but then the giant tentacle monster took that from them, now they must seek shelter among the settlements of the other races. There they rest, they prepare, biding their time for the opportune moment to strike back and reclaim what is theirs! <Insert Independence Day quote here>

 

I think you meant "Tentacle" there
(I'm just gonna assume auto-correct acted up as auto-correct is wont to do).

This said, playing nightly, I -THINK- humans settlement might be a thing that might be in the work.

Though it seemed rough around the edges... I think I recently fell upon my very first human refugee camps recently while playing nightly as said.
The thing was very basic, but basically had the essentials of a town; namely borders and actual armed guards.

Basically the "settlement" limit were very specifically marked by (implied, though damage could have been more evident if you asks me)broken RVs at the edges and humans(at the time that I found it) wearing what seemed to be titanium gear toting assault rifles and I think broadswords for melee.

In between was the "town", basically a "tents villages" with a bunch of humans going about daily business.
Sadly I didn't find much merchants but like said, the guards were a very clear presence. Unlike microdungeons that also feature armed NPCs guards(like the wilderness villages), those guys clearly wore racial human armor.

What make me think even more so that this was basically meant to be an human refugee camp though was one NPC whose dialogue was literally "Space is too big! I want Earth back!".
The fact he went "I want Earth back!" rather than "I want to return to Earth" is notable what specifically make me think this might have indeed been an human refugee camp(and thus "settlement", of a sort) rather than just something like a space commercial camping ground. That, and you know, the guards. Plus the fact that it had very clear limits determining where the camp started and where it ended also helps me further feel this may indeed have been a rough form of "human settlement".

It was a most interesting find if anything! I do hope they expand upon this if that was indeed what they were going for.

 

Perhaps we could see a human civilization built with another civilizations technology. Due to the destruction of Earth, it's reasonable for the humans to have very few remnants of technology. With no new technology and human desperation taking over, how long until we see a Glitch castle captured by humans? Or a floran village razed and humanized? It would add a level of realism and desperation to the human race.

 

There was a few things shown in the nightly like human bunkers found on wasteland planets as well as full-fledged buildings.
However as with the many deteriorated homes found on other planets, they are barren and without an NPC in sight.
(Except the few that contain raiders).

I do hope they include NPCs that reside in these massive fallout'like shelters with merchants and quests alike, as the fate of humanity after the destruction of Earth doesn't seem that grand.
Just looks like they escaped and either crawled into abandoned homes or turned to raiding to survive.

 

Itsss ssstill likely that sssome would have jussst moved on and created coloniesss. Humansss lovesss colonizing.

 

I saw a group of humans on Nightly. Not sure if you could call their place a settlement though.

 

Was it a bunch of tent grouped together, with guards around it and broken campers vehicles at the "limits" of it where guard posts/towers would be in the settlement of other species?

 

Yes. That one. Maybe it is a settlement, but a sorry one.

I didn't visit many planets on nightly, if there aren't other types of human settlements then they must be keeping it for 1.0.

 

Considering the protectorate and stuff (I haven't checked much to avoid spoilers so I don't know much), it would seem that humans are among the big players, on the level of the other races at least. As such I find it strange that there are apparently no human colonies around the universe like those of other races.

I hope we simply haven't found them, I don't want humans to get the short end.

 

To be honest, part of it might just be that until recently humans were not a priority because unlike the other races they didn't have a need assets tying into the new exploration mechanic to unlock the new story missions since technically the intro mission and erchius mining facility ARE the human missions already.

Ergo, we might start seeing human stuff start to appear only as part of the current round of nightly now that they have finally finished everything that was required for story progression and can finally focus on, well... everything else.

So I'm taking a wait and see approach. On one end, we may very much start seeing more human specific stuff as part of ongoing development.

On the other, the fact that the Protectorate itself was always described as a "young" organization itself means that in lore Earth may indeed have been the core of human civlizaion to the point that human colonies may indeed have been still such a recent development that we might only indeed see them added after the game official release. To not mention the possibility that they may indeed have existed but were still, again, such a recent development that the current occasional independent homestead and the like or even folks like the humans living in igloos alone on ice planets MAY have indeed been all that humans had in terms of colonial effort for a lack of such programs having existed long enough for full fledged colonies to have taken form to the same level than other races.

There's multiple ways this could be pulled off really so even if I hope for more human settlements/polished/updated content... I also don't mind if what gets added prove to be a different reality than my original hopes.

 

I was under the impression that the Protectorate was actually not that young, which would mean the Humans have been out in space for much longer. I can't really confirm this though as I forgot where I saw it. If what little I've seen of the starter quest is taking place on Earth, it would seem Humanity is very advanced so I wouldn't understand why they lack colonies.

 

Personally I think the theme of that one,but I could be wrong and some of its assets may also be placeholders, is that it's basically a refugee camp for humans who lost their home on Earth.

At least I think this is what it was supposed to be based on some npc quotes but yeah.

This said, Just replacing those broken down campers vehicles by actual guard posts or watchtowers of sort(to ward off whatever lives in the wilderness) may improve it's visual a ton in my opinion. A couple of stuff like piles of crates on rough platforms to imply they may have been stockpiling whatever supplies they retained or got their hands on may help a lot reinforcing this image. So may one or two more semi-permanent structures in the middle of the tents.

 

That was my impression too. It's just a group of survivors.

I didn't mean it was a bad design for a human settlement, just that the poor guys improvised the place. There must be a city somewhere right?

 

Could be.
Though it also depends on how "old" the human species is compared to the others. For example... even if they had somehow had superb level of technological advancement they might have simply lacked the critical numbers to produces or build more than the occasional science outpost we sometimes find on snow planets or in ice caverns underground. The rest being semi-independent homesteaders and/or explorers.

"Older" races may have had time to produces more population overall for it to be worth it.... which ironically might also helps to explain the sometime "lower" perceived level of tech in many settlements, thanks to isolation from each others limiting the spread of more advanced tech.

That is, if one really wishes to try and figure out reasons for that beyond just aesthetic choices

 

Which reminds me of an explanation to the relative low tech in Firefly's outer worlds. Without many people there, it could be cheaper to breed horses than maintain all the infrastructure necessary for cars, for example.

But I believe there will be more human settlements. Especially for the USCM. Wait, is it still a thing in the game? There is the protectorate now...

 

I remember talking about this to someone before he said that if there where human settlements he wanted them to be made out of space ships parts or something like that

 

I think the protectorate and the USCM might be different and perhaps opposing factions. The USCM might be isolationist and seeking to bring about human dominance in the universe. They'd be the Cerberus of Starbound. Given the reaction they have had toward players, even human ones so far, this seem likely. As a human who seek to join with the other races, we are the "enemy".

 

Actually, I fear the USCM might just be an artefact from the early phases of starbound development.

Back then the Protectorate didn't exists in the lore at all and every race was implied to be truly independent from each others. In fact, it was basically implied that it was the humans who were the "new kids on the block" who were -just- starting their expansion throughout the starts with most of the civilization still centered on Earth when it exploded. Every races were meant to have their own intro such as the Apex player originally meant to be an unsurgent against the miniknog, the avian meant to be a grounded fleeing persecution(which is still implied in current known lore but possibly more subdued since Kluex-following Avians speak of the Grounded with pity rather than hatred in current quotes and the grounded sky-pirates just seem happy and enjoying their freedoms rather than seeking war against kluex-religious like the apex insurgents actively fight the miniknog). Glitches were implied to be an outright simulation where most glitches were not only stuck in the middle age but didn't even actually feature any self-awareness while it was only a token few glitches who would have broken free of their limitations but thus be cast as "witches/warlocks/heretics" to be dismantled by those glitches who weren't capable of self-awareness and still running under the impetus of the flawed civilization simulation program they were created to follow... the player was thus implied to be one of the glitches self-aware enough to cobble together a working spaceship to escape their non-sentient kind.

As you can imagine a lot of that lore seems like it was revamped somewhat and rolled back all into a revamped version of the Human intro by making Earth the home of a multi-racial "Terrene Protectorate" of which all the major races seems to have not been just allies by direct members of... even Big Ape's Apex judging by the presence of Apex labs-style chairs and table in one of the room one of the Apex npc is found into during the intro mission... which, with dialogue with insurgents insisting they were not "traitors but freedom fighters" or something seem to imply to me that the Protectorate might never have been fully aware of the full nature of the Apex regime proper. Thus it even leaves open the possibility for apex players to be as much supporters of the insurgents than regular apex from Big Apes' regime enrolling into the protectorate thanks to diplomatic links between Humans and all the other races.

As a result of the addition of the Protectorate into the lore through a reworked intro mission featuring the destruction of Earth for all playable races, I wonder if we'll even continue to see USCM bases in the same form at all in future versions of the game because the USCM only existed as an entity in the known lore during a period of time that predated the creation of the Terrene Protectorate. With the TP firmly based on Earth as the implied leading faction there(and for humans), the old USCM might very much cease to be in the future(especially with human armor sets not even corresponding anymore to those seen on the USCM), especially since original lore for them once implied to be the leading military of Earth(a role that may now have long seen taken by the Protectors in the lore, especially since the Broken Sword item whose handle is visible patterned after the emblematic Matter Manipulator of the Protectorate may very much implies it has experience of combat itself... which makes one wonder what the "peak conditions" state of such a "protectorate sword" might have been like).

 

That is true, however, there is still a point to consider. The USCM has a LOT of unique themed blocks and furniture. I doubt all this would be trashed, same as the USCM dungeons. It's resources to not waste, especially when it can be solved with just a few additions to lore.