Alien or Predator?

[AlienvsPredator8]

I think Aliens are better because when they begin as a facehugger, they facehug really anything like humans, animals and even predators so they could grow up into a different knid of alien.

[A55tricky]

first post. welcome

[SamHain]

Predators for me, I just love their lifestyle.

[SpaceMarines]

So you wish you could go around killing random people and taking their spines and skulls? Get help, man. Seriously.

[keylight-di]

So you wish you could go around killing random people and taking their spines and skulls? Get help, man. Seriously.

I really doubt, he was thinking about this concrete aspect of Preds lifestyle.
BTW they never kill random humans.
Seriously.

[TJ Doc]

There is certainly a random element to it, however. For instance, from Predator:

The Predator: "Right, well, I'm in the mood for a hunt! I think I'll go... to... earth! Yes, that'll suffice. I'm sure there will be plenty of muscle-bound Austrians with comical accents who, despite having done nothing at all to piss me off, will be unlucky enough to find a place on my trophy wall. It's great being an intergalactic wanker!"

[DoomRulz]

So you wish you could go around killing random people and taking their spines and skulls? Get help, man. Seriously.

Would you prefer, in an indiscriminate manner, raping ever Tom, Dick, and Harry you came across? Coz that's what you'd be perpetuating if you were an Alien.

There is certainly a random element to it, however. For instance, from Predator:

The Predator: "Right, well, I'm in the mood for a hunt! I think I'll go... to... earth! Yes, that'll suffice. I'm sure there will be plenty of muscle-bound Austrians with comical accents who, despite having done nothing at all to piss me off, will be unlucky enough to find a place on my trophy wall. It's great being an intergalactic wanker!"

What?

There is no random element to the Predator's hunting. If there was, he would kill every human he encounters but he doesn't he selects his prey based on whatever criteria he deems necessary, much like any other hunter does.

[keylight-di]

There is certainly a random element to it, however. For instance, from Predator:

The Predator: "Right, well, I'm in the mood for a hunt! I think I'll go... to... earth! Yes, that'll suffice. I'm sure there will be plenty of muscle-bound Austrians with comical accents who, despite having done nothing at all to piss me off, will be unlucky enough to find a place on my trophy wall. It's great being an intergalactic wanker!"

You kidding, I hope?
More random human-killers walk the streets at night. You really can be killed at random, without any reason...
Preds choose their preys very carefully. By very defined, strict criteria.
DoomRulz can see it also. 

[TJ Doc]

No I'm not kidding. Whilst I understand and agree with the whole 'able opponents are their prey and Arnie and Danny are their lions etc' thing, I still find the Predator's human hunts to be very unnecessary.

Me arguing this is pointless, I know, but the whole notion of the Predator picking on unsuspecting-yet-challenging victims just so he can stroke their skulls baffles me. 

[huntin8-t0n]

Why do you think it's unnecessarry?
I'm just curios.

(I don't argue with your opinion, although  I have a different one).

[Deus Ex Machina]

Predators are your sci-fi samurai.
Aliens are your sci-fi representation of fear and death.

I'd go with the Aliens. They have an overall hivemind, which means they have one goal and are all on the same page. Their intellect is unquestionable, as it rises to meet the instinctual need to survive (It's explained in a few books, as well. I think one was called Earth Hive). Most Alien Queens have the IQ of a goat, but it will rise and evolve rapidly through each generation if not met with immediate removal of the species from the area.

Dunno, a solitary alien isn't much unless it's a third-generation or so, but it only takes one Alien to propagate an entire hive.

[keylight-di]

No I'm not kidding. Whilst I understand and agree with the whole 'able opponents are their prey and Arnie and Danny are their lions etc' thing, I still find the Predator's human hunts to be very unnecessary.

Me arguing this is pointless, I know, but the whole notion of the Predator picking on unsuspecting-yet-challenging victims just so he can stroke their skulls baffles me. 

Yea, it could be baffled. Especially, when you're looking with point of sight of the prey. But try look at this like a hunter. Change your point of view, be elastic. In human culture we can find many examples for this same behaviour, not so clearly, but it is still present. This is the reason, why we can understand them. Or even try.
We can't forget that they are aliens species, so we can't apply this same moral categories, this same logic. But if you claim, that they hunt randomly, it's not true.
In this same way we can say that Aliens are cruel. Are they? No. They are carnivores.

For Preds hunting is necessary. It's basic behaviour, essential ingredient of culture. It is more than necessary.

[DoomRulz]

No I'm not kidding. Whilst I understand and agree with the whole 'able opponents are their prey and Arnie and Danny are their lions etc' thing, I still find the Predator's human hunts to be very unnecessary.

Who said anything about necessary? Why do humans play sports? It's not because it's necessary; we just enjoy playing them. That's why the Predator hunts; it enjoys the thrill of it. It has nothing to do with necessity.

Me arguing this is pointless, I know, but the whole notion of the Predator picking on unsuspecting-yet-challenging victims just so he can stroke their skulls baffles me. 

If you play hockey and take home the Stanley Cup, or fight in the UFC and take home a championship belt, or play football and take home the Grey Cup, or any other variant you can think of, you're proud of that and you might 'stroke' that trophy because you earned it. Nothing odd or wrong with that.

[huntin8-t0n]

As I see the hunters, they are not just in for the sport, for the fun. Of course the thrill makes the hunt kind of addicting for them in a way; but I think hunt for them is something that primaryly originates from a different way of thinking  they have; I always thought of it a kind of neccessity (if you please); so TJ Doc, why not? Please tell me

Deus Ex Machina, I doesn't mean to bug you, but predators have nothing to do with samurai in my opinion.

[keylight-di]

I think the first error in trying explain Preds reasons of hunting is when we try to apply human criteria for their behavior. It's impossible. And therefore we have qualification like "samurai". They are not samurai, they are not knights. They are not human beings.
Their hunting is a profound need, it's not fun. I agree with 08yeyinde. This is something much more primeval, primary. This is the basis for existence. Perhaps the safety valve for the culture of strictly carnivorous beings. It's hard to say. Everything we know it is not even a basis for speculation.