Goa'uld 'villain decay' and how to deal with it

[HamsterViking]

"Villain decay" heh, never heard that term before, but I like it! Anyway, in threads like this, I don't like suggesting ideas that would fundamentally alter the series. There's no need to do that, we can work with what we were given. For one, things that were important in the movie or at the begenning of the series, or just when they were introduced, became mundane or forgotten eventually. This had the effect of really changing just what the goa'uld were. They really needed to maintain continuity within the show it's self. Continuity with the movie would have been an added bonus. The thing that really got me aout SG-1 was the way that the kept using and reusing hte exact same villain type over and over again, just upping the power a little each time. At first that reminded me of some old arcade games, but even those have some variation. The goa'uld needed WAY more depth than 'MWAHAHA!! I'M SO EVIL!" (cue mustache twirling).

As has been said before, victories against the goa'uld needed to be few and far between. They needed to be hard won minor victories, and there needed to be nearly as many losses. I can't think of any other way to preventvilain decay in any work of fiction. SGC needed to be the underdog by several orders of magnitude, not the holy-shit-out-of-nowhere snakehead curbstompers they were.

I could not stant the asgard, they were nothing but a prolongd dues ex machina. Tau'ri need something? Asgard are there! Tau'ri fucked? Asgard save the day! How long would you watch a seris if it were any more overt and regularly ended episodes with "God did it, they lived happily ever after?"

In Stargate, status quo has been generally maintained for some ten thousand years. As such, pretty much everybody is unaccustomed to all out war. Conflict tends to be resolved by intimidation, or limited to raids and skirmishes.... So, what the Tau'ri have to offer is over 3000 years of experience in organized brutality.

A better comparison than Afghanistan at this point might be Nepal. Tiny mountainous country, out of the way, low population, few resources, not much to write home about. Yet, it provided something invaluable to the British Empire, which boasted both record size and unchallenged mastery of the seas. One word: Ghurkas. Except the Tau'ri are even better. They are like Ghurkas, spec-ops commandos, military advisers, and scientific experts all rolled into one neat package. The general idea is that the SGC does not have the resources, firepower, or manpower to take on the Goa'uld directly. That part is handled in the background by other players, whose space and ground forces can match the Goa'uld. The role of the SG teams is give advanced training to these forces, assist in developing operational plans, conduct irregular warfare against the System Lords, and (most importantly) search the Stargate network for more allies and Ancient doodads.

This is an excellent idea. I would give you food if I could

Ra's assassination in the movie seemed like a big fluke: the ruler of the known Milky Way was visting a remote resource planet onboard his pleasure ship with only a small entourage due to his relaxed attitude that is understandable because Abydos was deep in his territory far away from the borders of his significant rivals and major non-Gou'ald powers. It was stupid luck Ra was as relatively unprotected as he was on his "holiday ranch" when suddenly a small army of USAF commandos burst through a long dormant stargate and while clearly technologically inferior were still well armed enough to sweep aside Ra's bodyguards and destroy his pyramid yacht.

That gave me an image of a bunch of guys with swords suddenly appearing in Bush's ranch in Texas on one of his many, many vacations.

...why were the Ori dreamt up in the first place? Why were so much like the Gou'ald in almost evey way culturally, even their human minions were virtual carbon copies of the more iconic Jaffa!

Gods, I hated the Ori! There were SO many good alternatives to "MORE SUPER-DUPER UNSTOPPABLE BAD GUYS POSING AS GODS!!

EDIT: My keyboard sticks andII'm impatient t hit "submit," hence many typos.

[NecronLord]

Joe Mallozzi and an unfilmed SG1 Season 10 story pitch.

{FUTURE}

INT. VARIOUS CORRIDORS – SGC – DAY

The place is dead, deserted. The team discovers it’s not just the SGC. All life on Earth has been wiped out. Who or what could have done this?

{PRESENT}

INT. SGC – DAY

Carter and Mitchell stand by Landry as they receive a message from the Aschen. This is payback for the events of 2001. North America is targeted by the Aschen’s biological payloads.

INT. CONTROL ROOM – SGC – DAY

The SGC is wiped out.
[...]
INT. CONTROL ROOM – DAY

Carter sneaks in and deletes the address to an Aschen-controlled planet from the database, ensuring a future SG team not visit the unexplored world and reawaken the sleeping giant, changing the timeline and causing –

Certainly before the Asgard upgrades, at least one key writer thinks that the Aschen could handily wipe out all life on Earth, regardless of the 304s in their way.

[Big Orange]

The Tollan and Aschen could have their own space navies as well, if they're so advanced and have certain technologies that were well ahead of what the Gou'ald often had. And going back on the Gou'ald, one of the primary reasons they were cardboard cutout evil was that they were mentally damaged by their continous use of their life extending sarcophagus, the Tok'Ra were more mentally balanced due to them mostly shunning the use of the sarcophagus. What if the Gou'ald, making them less cartoonishly villainous, would pour tons and tons of resources into making their sarcophaguses safer? That could explain why old skool Gou'ald rulers like Ra would seem more eccentric than more recent "streetwise" Gou'ald rulers like Ba'al.

[Darth Nostril]

They could have tied that in with Nirrtis genetic experimantation and Ba'als cloning experiments.
Both of them knew that prolonged use of the sarcophogus sent the elder System Lords loopy, they knew it would inevitably do the same to them so they started looking for a way out, Nirrti by way of creating a superhost that wouldn't need the sarcophogus, Ba'al by way of cloning himself.

[NecronLord]

The Tollan and Aschen could have their own space navies as well, if they're so advanced and have certain technologies that were well ahead of what the Gou'ald often had. And going back on the Gou'ald, one of the primary reasons they were cardboard cutout evil was that they were mentally damaged by their continous use of their life extending sarcophagus,

That's a factor. But not a primary one. Setesh had gone five or ten thousand years without one, and he wasn't exactly a good guy. Same with Apophis (well, in fairness, his goal of 'bust everyone out of here and kill Sokar actually was good) after his banishment to Netu, where I don't think he could get his hit.

If you can get it, the SG1 RPG 'System Lords' book has an excellent assessment on what makes them behave the way they do. The first and biggest is inertia - every generation of snakes has the knowledge of the previous. While they are theoretically capable of resisting that (as with Egeria, and the snake in that Kewlonan scientist) most aren't. The next is insecurity - without a host, they're absolutely pathetic snakes. They're compensating on a grand scale by demanding worship.

That could explain why old skool Gou'ald rulers like Ra would seem more eccentric than more recent "streetwise" Gou'ald rulers like Ba'al.

Ba'al wiped out sixty million people rather than lose their systems to Sokar. He's in no way nicer than Ra. He's just more genial (and to be honest, Ra was pretty genial, too, his conversations with Daniel in the film are rather better than Ba'al's interrogation techniques) than other snakes.

[Juubi Karakuchi]

If you can get it, the SG1 RPG 'System Lords' book has an excellent assessment on what makes them behave the way they do. The first and biggest is inertia - every generation of snakes has the knowledge of the previous. While they are theoretically capable of resisting that (as with Egeria, and the snake in that Kewlonan scientist) most aren't. The next is insecurity - without a host, they're absolutely pathetic snakes. They're compensating on a grand scale by demanding worship.

That was my biggest single beef with the 'parasitic snake' concept. It made the Goa'uld essentially pathetic, and forced the writers to come up with something more threatening (the Ori) which did not suffer from this problem. The Ori nonetheless got removed from the equation fairly quickly, by having an Ancient device (because humans are genetically destined to rule the universe) wipe out the Ori, having SG-1 neutralize the Priors with ultrasonic brain-scramblers, then convert their followers by force care of the Ark (another Ancient device). I know I should probably support the Ancients, since they represent the scientific method over religious obscurantism, but the whole ending felt incredibly unsatisfying.

Incidentally, the term 'Villain Decay' comes from http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/VillainDecay.

An issue I've encountered in wondering how to arm a fictional enemy is 'character'. The Staff-Weapon and Zat gun, for example, are characterful weapons for the Jaffa. If they want to be credible as a military force, however, they need something more. They cannot rely on static Staff-Cannons and Death Gliders for fire support, so what can they be given? Would it detract from their 'character' to give them mortars or tanks? What would a Jaffa tank look like?

[Yuri2356]

Some sort of enclosed, armoured hover-chariot?

[Samuel]

Something that spreads fear and respect. I'm thinking big, hovering, point defense to shoot down missiles and fry anyone insolent enough to approach and a main gun that can simply burn through anything.

[Big Orange]

Something that spreads fear and respect. I'm thinking big, hovering, point defense to shoot down missiles and fry anyone insolent enough to approach and a main gun that can simply burn through anything.

Wouldn't want that rumbling into the SGC complex.