The Acid that rains down on Cybertron is damaging to Cybertronians, yes? It bites away at their paint or paint nanites, and when it gets under the armour it can de-grease the important greasy bits and damage any silicone or rubber wires. It destroys tires, damages fragile sensory components, eliminates nanites, and it probably does unspeakable things to the energon in a mech’s frame.
What does this mean for the Cybertronian buildings?
Obviously, they are built to resist these acid rains. Windows and wall materials are capable of withstanding acid. But it would mean that any and all decoration would peel or slough off.
Imagine looking at a Cybertronian city on the horizon, when acid rain begins falling. And slowly but surely, all the colours of the buildings drain away, leaving only a gleaming grey surface. After an acid storm the cities are quiet, as everyone waits for the acid to drain and for the disposables to get rid of any lingering pools.
I imagine that there are nooks and crannies built into every structure. Small sheltered places were nanites can bunch together and survive the onslaught of rain. After it has been dry and unclouded for long enough, the colour spreads back out over the city and all of its buildings. And in the Dead End, where the buildings do not have nanite shelters, or even any nanites to speak of – the acid rain washes away the graffiti. Creating a new blank slate for streetmecha to paint.
Thanks to @harutemu for the excellent idea that I couldn’t help but add to a little bit.
Between the six major polities–those being Iacon, Praxus, Kaon, Vos, Tarn, and Crystal City–there exist several dialects native to the mecha who inhabit them. Each one is uniquely devised to reflect the culture, history, and social structure of the polity it represents.
Iacon
As the political hub and capital of Cybertron, the language is based on governmental patois.
Conversation revolves around the verbal structure of an open debate, treatise graphing, or Senate hearings.
Quick, clipped, and unerringly polite, even when it’s not meant to be.
Body mods, paint details, and personal decor imply rank, faction, caste, and political lean–it is an important abstract to the language as a whole; rarely will you find an Iaconian without one or more mods.
Body language is reserved almost to the point on nonexistence; likewise, EMF has no place in public spaces.
The language has few contractions and is always short and to-the-point among the middle- and lower-class.
Praxus
A lilting language, expressing exuberance and joy.
Colorful and overly descriptive, it is a mixing of many cultures, including its own, and thus will fluctuate from sector to sector.
Unlike Iaconian dialect, Praxian involves excessive movement and EMF patterns, and many citizens are Chirolingual; physical touch is highly important and used to convey deep emotion.
Facial expressions and motor noises–chirring, chirping, purrs, growls, and chuffing–are used intermittently with the spoken word.
Singing, though not essential, is also considered part of the local dialect.
Kaon
Brash and loud, the Kaonite dialect is less refined than the others and is considered ‘barbaric’.
Graphic use of glyphs to illustrate ideas and desires, as opposed to lengthy descriptions.
A deep, guttural language originating from vocal synthesizers attached to the engines, as opposed to vocoders, which filter air.
Excessive use of violent or wild gestures, as well as body language–flaring and tightening plating, shifting kibble, etc.
Tone is often grating, or rough, due to constant abuse of vocoders, but always passionate and exceptionally proud.
Similar to Praxus, motor noises are also common markers of the language.
Vos
As the City of the Seekers, Vosnian vernacular is heavily dependent on having a certain frametype.
Gestures play an enormous role as an integral part of the spoken language; without wings, or the knowledge of how to interpret their movements, one cannot ever properly converse in the language.
A political language, though not necessarily to the degree of Iaconian; it draws more heavily from Primal Vernacular than Basic.
Verbose, and yet articulate, the language is woven together with soft tones and a cultured, rich accent that belies a simmering passion below the surface.
A sly, secretive language preferred for making deals and negotiating contracts.
Tarn
As a militaristic polity, the language reflects the rigid social structure of Tarn in its harsh, orderly composition.
Posture alone is worth half the language; plating is always pulled tight, and facial expressions are very neutral.
Binary and code intersperse the spoken language, but EMF pulses are rarely utilized in day-to-day conversation.
Relies heavily on data emissions.
Flat and cold tones with few contractions.
The language is heavily dependent on status and military rank, which regulate how members of the different castes are to speak to one another; each caste holds a different ‘rank’, and the lower the caste, the less mecha permitted to speak to you.
Only the lowest castes rejected the strict and ordered speech, thus interring themselves in the slums where they would oft go ignored.
Crystal City
As the foremost scientific community on Cybertron, the language of Crystal City revolves heavily around binary, code, equations, and glyphs.
The language is complex, but entirely factual; some might say insufferable.
The tone is cultured, but very matter-of-fact and sometimes even described as cold or harsh.
Enunciation is key to everything, and few words have less than four syllables.
As always, there are differences between the castes themselves. The higher the caste, the more strictly one adhered to the chosen vernacular; lower castes often had their own languages, which were bastardized versions of the ‘higher’ language.
Some bits and bobs of information I gathered from comics and such, hopefully they might aid with writing or reference.
MARBS– Mobile Autobot Repair Bays.
The Regenisis Progam- Created by Shockwave with the intent of seeding many planets with energon so that, in the distant future, he could harvest them.
Soundwave also organized a number of Anti-Neutral Programs
NAIL– Non Alligned Indigenioud Lifeform. I.E, A Cybertronian who is neither an Autobot or a Decepticon
I/D Chip- Inhibitor/Deterrence chips that freezes the transformation cog- among other things. (Created by Wheeljack)
Both sides hoarded sparks during the war
Ambulatory System– Self explanatory
Inhibitor Claw- Form of restraint used by security and law enforcement on pre-war Cybertron. More effective than handcuffs or leg restraints.
Underbase– a collection of knowledge that underlies all databases; the combined knowledge of the Transformer race.
Solar Pool– What is does is unknown, only that it contains destructive energies within.
Energon Lake– A reservoir of energon located in the Sea Of Rust. Possibly the only major source of energon left on Cybertron.
Pious Pools– Rung was from the Pious Pools, living near the Vinvissius Canals during his youth. The Pious Pools we’re wiped off the planet in the rebirth initiated by Vector Sigma.
Vinvissius Canals– Landmark
Other places wiped off planet by Vector Sigma: Mesmerica, Warriors Gate (also a saying, ‘What in the Warriors Gate), Fragmented Whole, The Vaulted Heights Of K’th Kinsere (also a saying, ‘By the Vaulted Heights Of-‘), Pess Pess, The First City, The Transeptum of Infinte Reach and Subterrania.
Hydrax Plateau– An island in the center of the Rust Sea. It holds Cybertron’s primary spaceport, where planetary visitors must check in first.
Sonic Canyons– Located on the southern side of Cybertron, the deafening sound of underground machinary wells up from their depths and echoes up from the surface. The noise causes the constant falling of scrap metal to come tumbling down, making the canyons direct environment inhabitable.
densely populated settlements do, however, live there, including the Autobot Siren. (People who live their often have loud voices)
The Canyons function as Primus’s sensory organs, their resonating structures allowing him to collect data from across the galaxy, which is then proscessed into a more meaningful format by the Vecta Sigma supercomputer.
Moon Alpha– The main spacesport of Cybertron’s moon Alpha.
Deterrence Chips– Usually used by Autobots with their prisoners. Administered to the head, and, when activated, blow up, killing the prisoner.
Electronic Jammer- composed of crystal rod wound with copper wire. Capable of interfering with Transformers circuits and incapting them.
Ion- Neautralisers– Autobots who wander into an ion-neautraliser will be disabled in a flash of green light.
Anti-Grav manicales–
Detention Sphere– when activated, creates a force field around the beings nearest.
Ultra Prison– A Decepticon invention for holding and killing Autobots. Creates an impenetrable domb of ultra-refined energon, which slowly wipes the mind of any Mech imprisoned in it.
Noisemaze– Mesothulas created the Noisemaze, a portal doorway that leads the prisoner with a ‘small pocket dimension assembled from harvested matter-gaps in the fabric of our universe’
Ethics Committee– any new weapon created by the Autobots must past a Protocal of the non conventional weapons act before it can be used in battle. Brainstorm liked to terrorise the committee with weapons so awful that ‘nothing short of the moment destruction of Cybertron and the universe would justify their use.’ He coined them ‘the unmentionables’.
Cerebro-sensitive-bullets– bullets that lock onto the targts neural processor when the bullet is fired. Anyone using them is gaurented a headshot.
The Clampdown– A time in Cybertron history when the planet was essentially put under martial law. Heightening security measures to protect its citizens and weed out potential terroists.
Milant Monofrom Movement- Monoformers who made a symbolic rejection of Adaptis by removing their t-cog
Solar Barge– either towed by a smaller ship or solar sails to move with its own power. Used to transport prisoners.
MAABs– Mobile Anti-Assault Battlesuit.
Grand Cybertronian Taxonomy– All Cybertronian life is classified in one great system, the Grand Cybertronian Taxonomy, determining the placement of transformers in its heirachy based on Alternate modes.
Rust Sea– Crystalline growths grow along the bayous edge from the Rust Sea’s energon particles
Five Dark Epochs– five significant periods of the Great War that almost brought the Transformers race to extinction. Includes: The Uprising, The Exodus, The Remote Age, The Cataclys and The Surge.
Omniglobe– Sphere shaped cells which can feed massive amounts of data to their occupants.
Cluster Bomb– Explosive Weapon
Data Slug– Small, rectangular object that stores significant amounts of information
Death Cloak– a medical scanning device that monitors the rate in which a Cybertronians spark is shrinking, allowing it to calculate time remaining before death. People like Drift aren’t fond of them.
Axis Cradle– Technology that allows Cybertronians to imprint their will onto another being.
I really like the idea of the outer planets, regardless of what continuity, have really diverse and strange cultures too. We know the Autobot Commonwealth exists in some fashion in most universes as a fact (Unicron Tril, TFA, TFP) and like, just the ideas of what they bring to the table when the planets come together. Velocitronians loving physical prowess as a show of both strength and intelligence, coming from a desert planet and getting used to living in wetter and lusher worlds, being surprised at how separated the city states of Cybertron are because they are used to one planet wide ruler. Animatron natives coming from their largely organic world and separate tribes and learning about the intellectual sides of the power balance, being rough and rowdy on a whole and having a predisposition for big parties. Gigantion mechs towering over everyone else, a huge inventor culture with a somewhat anarchistic form of community learning to integrate with the smaller and more wild bots from the other worlds, wondering why they update their old buildings instead of simply building up, creating massive structures in mere days. GIVE ME MORE.
YES THIS.
I headcanon cultural diversity in the outer colonies SO HARD.
I sometimes feel bad whenever I think about how Cybertron looks in my universe b/c in the official canon you have all of these spires and smooth shapes and it basically looks like fuckn’ El Dorado in space and it’s just glorious and magnificent y’know? Truly the kind of amazing you would expect from a race of technological beings that have lived for millions of years.
Cybertronian Database 