Ooh! An official answer!

... Although we still don't know how they throw up.

How is that little mass of nutrients gained through inhalation supposed to sustain a human sized lifeform, unless they submerge themselves in there meal and eat like fish breath or something. It would definitely give a whole new meaning to don't inhale your food, well the inhale part anyways, of course how would such a species evolve. Now on to more pressing and more fascinating questions... what is hunting them down, whatever it is I was kinda hoping to figure out in a campaign.

Lets put this out there. Take Pollen or Fungus/Mold that is in the air. What if our body was made up in a way that it could digest it? We could breathe it in in small amounts like 200 parts per million add in the oxygen blah blah you get the idea lol.

You might be able to sustain energy through various things in the air, but what about nutrients? Some things such as minerals and metals aren't so easily vaporized. At least, not by any of our common natural processes.

Plants in Space!

They are more like whales in space. Filter feeders. Then why are they aggressive? Filter feeders are usually quite benign. Think sponges and baleen whales

I think maybe we should take stuff with a pinch of salt. I don't think the mouth will have to do anything with backstory, expect if, :gasp:, it does.

LoL.

I just like to have as much information as possible... I like to make stories concerning the factions I play with, and I like them to be as detailed and personal as possible.

Advent and TEC are both essentially Human in nature... even if the Advent are far flung mutant psionicists who can tap into a societal consciousness... It's still easy enough to understand them, their hopes, dreams, and motivations. It's easy to create a society on the fly for them (Human conflict can be a lovely thing), or fall into the ones IC has provided for us. I for one like to pretend my factions are splinter factions probably 95% of the time, because it makes them mine   

The Vasari are so different though, that I need more information on them to make a more involved, personal story about them. Which is why I love to get my hands on every little tidbit out there that's about them (and not just their exodus) that I can!

The ability to give one's imagination a proper exercise is one of the best things about this genre of game (MOO, GalCiv, SoaSE, etc)... it's almost like a "choose your own adventure" book, but way more open ended and complex. It gets a bit of role-playing involved in it; if you want it.

no, the official lore for the Protoss is that they do photosynthesize. They get energy from the sun and smell through their skin. i have no idea about the independance day aliens though.