Irchban

Starport	B	Good: Spacecraft Construction, Overhaul, Refined fuel
Size	4	Small (6,400 km, 0.32g - 0.46g)
Atmosphere	5	Thin
Hydrographics	0	Desert World 0%
Population	8	Moderate (300 million)
Government	9	Impersonal Bureaucracy
Law	D	Extreme Law (paramilitary law)
Tech Level	7	Pre-Stellar (electronics)

Primary Star

K1 IV

Atmosphere

Thin

Off-world presence

Minimal

Zoetic individuals

Extant

Source

Reference

Canon

No

Also see

The Irchban of Eztlev/Ieprsidr (Zdiedeiant 1535) are a technologically sophisticated Minor Non-Human Race with a Non-humanoid appearance.

Description (Specifications)[edit]

The Irchban hail from subterranean communities on the desert world of Eztlev/Ieprsidr (Zdiedeiant 1535). They are associated with the Zhodani Consulate.

Physical Appearance[edit]

Physically, the Irchban are long and thin with segmented shells like a crab or arthropod, although the shells are relatively smooth and supple in children and females.

They are notably asymmetrical. They stand on five long legs, have a set of six smallish arms on one side of their body, and one large arm on the other. Each arm ends in a set of pincer-like grippers.

They possess a head with teeth, but their eyestalks are located on their torsos.

Senses[edit]

The Irchban possess only sight and touch as primary senses. They are functionally deaf, having no hearing sense. They are anosmic (no smell) but have a muted sense of taste, useful for detecting poison and chemical reinforcement from food.

Their sense of touch is hypersensitive by Human standards, allowing them to detect tremors from movement and prey, sense air currents, and even potentially diagnose problems in structures like pipes or ship hulls.

Their light vision is less acute than that of Humans and shifted slightly toward perceiving lower wavelengths in the visual spectrum compared to Human eyesight (CRG vision vs Human RGB). Their eyestalks are spaced far apart, granting them improved ability to estimate ranges, potentially over hundreds of meters.

Language[edit]

The Irchban communicate using a visual sign language involving expressive gestures from all twelve of their limbs, described by observers as akin to dancing in place.

Their written language favors tactile modes, with symbolic phonemes captured in raised surfaces or indentations and read by touch rather than by sight, similar to Braille.

Reproduction[edit]

Irchban spawn in shallow pools of temperature-controlled water. These pools are closely guarded and revered resources. Sex is entirely external, with both males and females donating genetic matter to the pools. The young are raised by the community.

The Irchban are born sexless and remain that way until they reach puberty, around 18 years of age. Upon reaching puberty, slightly more than half (55.56%) will become male and undergo further physiological changes adapted for life on the surface of their world.

The physiological changes that males experience include the following:

The chitinous shell of the newly differentiated males darkens and hardens, preparing them for exposure to the elements. This physiological transformation accompanies a reduction in grace and an increase in stamina.
Their periods of wakefulness are dramatically increased. They can remain awake for 36 hours on average, almost twice as long as females and neuters.
They gain an inborn ability to act, communicating in a way likely to evoke an emotional response in their audience.

Psychology and Society[edit]

Despite the significant dimorphism between males and females, Irchban society gravitates towards equal respect for both gender roles due to shared childhood experiences prior to sexual differentiation. Ignorance of their eventual gender means that gender as a concept is decoupled from self-identity throughout their formative years.

Like Vargr, the Irchban are considered to possess Charisma rather than Social Standing, resulting in a fluid social structure with participants regularly squabbling for dominance. Rather than actual violence, challenges take the form of ritualized acting performances, with Irchban telling tales of adventures, exploits, and feats, either their own or those of someone symbolically attached to the speaker. The Irchban value "tales well told" more than literal truth, an instinct which Zhodani view with some distress.

Irchban are considered to possess Instinct instead of Education. This grants them some inborn skills that allow them to naturally handle tasks that ordinarily require periods of learning. However, they struggle in most situations requiring formal Education.

A primary instinctual skill that all males rapidly develop upon puberty is the art of acting, which to an Irchban involves convincingly telling tales and expressing oneself through the dancing sign language of the Irchban. Males therefore have an innate advantage in challenges for dominance, though both males and females have evolved to be receptive to such tales. Historically, the male social advantage was strongly counterbalanced by female control of access to the spawning pools.

Diet[edit]

The Irchban evolved from hunter omnivores, and while they can and do eat plants, meat forms an important portion of their diet. They prefer to eat meat either raw or else cooked/preserved in such a way that minimal liquid is lost.

Traditionally, females (with their increased grace due to their unhardened shells) formed hunting parties and took down large prey with ranged weaponry. Males, being better adapted for long periods in the desert environment, would use more varied solo hunting methods, such as ambushing small, vulnerable prey or tracking larger prey to exhaustion.

History & Background (Dossier)[edit]

Homeworld[edit]

The Irchban originated from Eztlev/Ieprsidr (Zdiedeiant 1535), a low-gravity desert world with a thin but breathable atmosphere. Eztlev has a very slow rotation resulting in days that last approximately 80 hours.

The system hosts a Zhodani Base and is secluded from the Third Imperium.

The homeworld of this race is:

Eztlev/Ieprsidr (Zdiedeiant 1535)

Evolutionary History[edit]

Life evolved in shallow seas that once blanketed Eztlev. As the surface liquid receded, life forms either adapted to the unforgiving surface or retreated to subterranean refuges. The Irchban evolved from scattered tribes of omnivore hunters centered upon underground water sources.

Their gender differentiation at puberty reflects the pressures of their evolutionary history, in which females remained at permanent communities based around underground water sources, while males traditionally left their communities to wander the wilds, overcoming dangers and proving themselves before (ideally) integrating into a foreign community.

Their solo journeys through the overland wilderness gave wandering males the opportunity to discover new resources and both identify and overcome dangers. The information gathered during these adventures had potential importance to the survival and prosperity of remote communities, so that a wandering male who could convincingly tell epic tales of his many feats would be welcomed as an asset and be more likely to produce progeny.

Relationship with Zhodani[edit]

The Irchban were discovered by the Zhodani during the establishment of a base on Eztlev/Ieprsidr (Zdiedeiant 1535). As the Irchban settlements were scattered, secluded, and subterranean, the base had already been established for a number of years before Irchban sapience was recognized. A famous incident involving an adventure-seeking male Irchban on his solo "walkabout" negatively colored Irchban-Zhodani relations for some time. It took a concerted effort in the wake of that incident to develop a means of translating between Irchban and Zdetl.

With their inclination toward embellishment and a seemingly perverse desire to be deceived, the Irchban psychology is mildly abhorrent to most sane Zhodani. After many years of trial and error, an intendant made an interspecies breakthrough by successfully conveying the essential teachings of Morality's Path to a local chieftain by couching it in terms of an epic allegorical narrative.

Irchban are now considered potentially compatible (though essentially remedial) with Zhodani society. Nevertheless, to reduce the potential for psychological cross-contamination and the need for re-education, a high degree of law and preventive observation is maintained on Eztlev, including extensive thought-monitoring throughout settlements where Zhodani and Irchban might cross paths. The only Irchban who are permitted to leave Eztlev are those who have successfully embraced Zhodani teaching and been deemed sane by Consulate auditors.

Calendar and Timekeeping[edit]

The long day cycles of Eztlev (Zdiedeiant Ieprsidr) and variant sleep patterns of the two sexes has resulted in each literal day being differentiated into five component periods of 16 hours each, which are treated as separate days for scheduling purposes.

These "days" are:

Nightrest: A period of darkness during which both males and females sleep.
Wakeday: A productive period of sunrise during which both males and females are awake.
Maleday: Females sleep the entirety of this period, while males remain awake.
Femday: Males sleep most (12 hours) of this period, while females remain awake throughout.
Duskwatch: A sleepy period after sunset, during half of which (8 hours) females nap, while males remain awake throughout.

This cycle can be confusing for outsiders, but reflects the needs of their society, enabling periods of synchronicity, alternating watches throughout the daylight hours, and accommodating the need for surface-wandering males to shelter during the unforgiving midafternoon sun.

When Irchban are not on their homeworld, these daycycles are quickly abandoned in favor of Zhodani hour cycles. In a 24-hour cycle, Irchban females will usually sleep for 16 hours and remain awake for 8. Males have trouble adapting to a 24-hour cycle and often opt to sleep for 12 hours and remain awake for 24.

References & Contributors (Sources)[edit]

This list of sources was used by the Traveller Wiki Editorial Team and individual contributors to compose this article. Copyrighted material is used under license from Mongoose Publishing or by permission of the author. The page history lists all of the contributions.

Author & Contributor: User:Thriggle
Author & Contributor: User:Korok