Life on Mars interested scientists for decades. Yet nobody would've guessed we get our answer so soon. 1894, the heart of Britain is attacked by Martian invaders. Their trail of destruction then mysterious demise left Britain weakened yet secrecy and the greed of empires made it a minor note to history. Until now. 1914, the Central Powers and the Entente are embroiled in a Great War. Yet while the major powers are busy with conflict Humanity is being watched by an intelligence greater than them yet just as mortal. 1914 December, the night before Christmas brought numerous cylinders to Earth heralding a newer and greater Martian invasion. Yet hostilities remained and the news spread slow. Can the warring factions forget their differences and unite against the alien menace or try to use the invaders to further their own goals? Can this divided mankind stand a chance against the Martian forces? Only time can tell.
Basically this is an alternate World War I with Martians thrown into the mix. Choose nations that can be part of the Central Powers, Entente or even neutral. Alternative you can command one of the Martian invasion forces to make this planet yours.
HUMANS
Humanity is mostly the same as in OTL. Britain and those better informed are aware of the previous Martian invasion from 1894 and while struggling to understand any of the alien technology they made some advancements as well as precautions (ie.: earlier development of gas masks).MARTIANS
They are squid-like creatures with the size of a bear. They adopted to Mars's lower gravity thus they can barely crawl on Earth. On the other hand they have strong dexterous tentacles and extremely huge brains which gives them intelligence and even mild telepathic abilities. Martians don't talk aside from making signal noises and rather communicate via telepathy. Their regressed digestive tracts cannot process normal food and instead they drain the blood of other creatures. Martians don't have a spoken language and they also lack compassion and other higher emotions the humans have. By our standards they are cold, evil and highly logical beings.Martian technology is weird to us. They are sure more advanced than humans but they also developed very differently. Martians never developed the wheel and instead their machines walk on multiple legs. They lack gunpowder weapons. In addition Martians lack numbers and their armies absolutely lack infantry. They fight with large automatons and giant machines. These machines are technologically superior to human vehicles but aren't unbeatable. They are bigger, stronger, faster, tougher and more complex than what humans build but that's about it. They don't have energy shields or anything which would render attacks outright ineffective. They are just better machines with weirder design. They don't even have advanced sensors or anything similar, they detect enemies by sight like anyone else. Lastly the platform where they have the most difficulties is water. They are entirely unfamiliar with naval warfare and initially don't have any units to exploit this. So yeah, while strong (especially in the beginning) the Martians won't be unbeatable at all.
What do you want to be?
A major power vying for dominance?
A minor power struggling to survive?
An alien warlord plotting for global conquest?
You choose!
