Humans. Are. Superior.

[Shroom Man 777]

Yes. Humans are supposed to be ingenious and masters of diplomacy and while not hyper-specialized to be the best of one thing, we are the jack of all trades and our innovativeness means we can think of things that will totally catch these silly cliche'd narrow-minded aliens off guard!

[DudeGuyMan]

We're the +0 at everything no-bonus, no-penalty race. If there are alien societies out there with sci-fi stories and videogames of their own, they're probably the +0 race in those, because what else are they supposed to think of as the "basic" species?

[Ariphaos]

It's not impossible for an alien race to note its own exceptional traits with respect to the rest of their animal kingdom e.g. endurance in humans. It just doesn't happen often for us.

[Shroom Man 777]

Hell, maybe for the aliens the humans are the stupid cliche'd smooth-foreheaded warmongering aliens with stupid traditions and whatnot.

Then humans would go on about how the aliens are dishonorable for using superior tech rather than using primitive methods where technology won't be as important as individual strength and martial skill. Perhaps not because they believe in that shit, but because their own human wartech sucks and they don't want to get their ass beat by alienoids with bigger guns.

[Ahriman238]

I think I read a short story similar to this, where humanity is exploited by a more advanced civilization as a courier service. Basically, we look and smell really unappetizing to the giant centipede-people who would otherwise happily eat us and were lucky enough for first contact to be handled by a blitzed failed-zoologist who stumbled onto the right balance. Too passive/submissive, you mark yourself as prey and start a feeding response, too dominant/aggressive and you're seen as a threat and treated accordingly.

These aliens are so aggressive they can only rarely, and with great danger, deal with each other upon reaching maturity. Luckily they have long childhoods and adolescences. But we can run messages and spermatophores between them in relative safety, and take a lot of the risk out of their reproduction.