The Qularr don’t have personal names. Instead, they’re referred to simply as what they are or what they do. For example, the commander of the current Qularr force on Monster Island is named “Qularr Invasion Leader.” His second-in- command is named “Leader’s Chief Assistant,” and every single one of his shock troopers is named “Qularr Shock Trooper.” Ordinarily this would cause constant confusion when a group of Qularr tries to work together, but the Qularr have a sort of “instinctual telepathy” that eliminates the problem. They cannot communicate mentally any more than Humans can, but if Qularr Invasion Leader says to a group of Shock Troopers, “Shock Trooper, go patrol that perimeter,” all the Qularr involved know exactly which Shock Trooper he’s talking to. This leads to a preciseness of commu- nication and discipline that many Human military commanders would envy.
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The Qularr language not only relies on this instinctual telepathy, but also on infra- and ultra- sonic sounds. Thus, Humans simply cannot learn to speak it without the aid of super-tech devices that can produce the right sounds and mental impulses; learning to read their written language would be next to impossible. (If the GM permits it at all, learning Language: Qularr costs triple the normal cost for an ordinary Language and requires special speaking devices. Qularr words in this chapter, including the species’s name, are approximations.)
Despite their (to Human eyes) “monstrous” appearance, the Qularr have a rich culture and can create and appreciate many forms of art.
ArT AnD LITErATurE
Since Qularr aural and tactile senses are far better developed than their vision, they favor art they can touch and hear over what has to be seen. For example, sculpture is far better developed as an art form than painting. While the Qularr do produce fine literature, many of them prefer to absorb it by listening to recordings of a book being read, or even listening to storytellers. Storytelling has a long and ancient tradition on Reqqat. In modern times many storytellers still make a good living through a combination of traditional tale- telling and the memorizing of entire novels which
they recount at events that run for several hours a day over the course of roughly a week.
PErForMInG ArTS
Qularr drama, whether live theater or recorded “movies,” is very “operatic,” relying far more on songs and flashy “dance numbers” than on sophisticated, emotional acting or subtle dramatic cues. A Human watching it would probably be impressed by the spectacle despite his inability to follow the story.
Qularr music sounds flat and dull to Human ears, because Humans cannot hear the ultra- and infra-sonic sound that make up a significant part of it. Qularr music is actually elaborate and sophisticated, with songs to please everyone from the simplest working-class Qularr to the most snobbish aesthete.
SPorTS AnD GAMES
The Qularr enjoy participating in and watching sporting events; in fact, entire castes are devoted to athletic pursuits for profit. Most Qularr sports involve some level of physical contact. One of the most popular is qerg, which to Human sensibilities seems something like a cross between wrestling and basketball. On the other hand, games tend to be an amateur pursuit, played for fun or as a hobby. Two of the most common are geldaro (a chess-like game in which each player controls 40 pieces with varying “powers”) and ruqo (an elec- tronic game that pits one or more players against a like number of opponents in a race to move their “pieces” through a trap-filled maze).
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One of the factors that made unification of Reqqat fairly easy once the Qularr set their mind to it is that about four-fifths of all Qularr follow the same religion, a goddess-worshipping faith they call Qeqlub Arlavo Dhren, roughly meaning “Church of the Holy Mother.” Dhrenists worship a being they simply call “Goddess” who resembles one of their great brood mothers (see above) in even more monstrous form: larger, with six arms and an insecto-crustaceoid lower half instead of legs. They consider her the mother of all Qularr, who laid the first clutch of eggs (thousands of them, according to the holy texts) which were fertilized by an obscure sky-god figure. While some regional differences and ritual preferences still remain, the core of Dhrenism is the same across the planet, thanks to intrafaith councils that harmonized various aspects of the religion during the unification period.
The remaining twenty percent of Qularr mostly follow a sort of animistic faith that emphasizes the spirit world, personal harmony with nature, and astrological practices. Most followers of this faith belong to certain upper lower class and lower middle class castes.
Qularr technology is quasi-organic (sometimes consisting of up to 83% biological components) and significantly more advanced than Human devices. It includes:
n starships with FTL drives capable of achieving
speeds of one light-year per hour in the most advanced military models (though one light- year per day is more common for most vessels);
n various types of blasters and other energy
weapons (they regard projectile firearms and similar technology as primitive);
n force-field systems that can maintain a high-
strength field over large areas, or even project force-fields offensively instead of just defen- sively; and
n communications systems able to broadcast and
receive clearly over hundreds of light-years. The Qularr biological sciences are particularly sophisticated. Bio-materials are one of their major trade items with other galactic civilizations. As Humanity has seen, one aspect of Qularr skill with biology is their ability to breed giant monsters for various purposes (for example, to carry burdens, assist with agriculture, or fight in wars).
In HERO System terms, Qularr technology is “Barely Compatible” with Human tech, meaning that a Human who works with Qularr tech or tries to combine Human and Qularr components in a single device may suffer up to a -8 Skill Roll penalty and other restrictions; see HSS 40.