((How much larger/more dangerous are the Eyul?))
((They're not much more dangerous, and they're actually smaller;It's that with your larger size and slower movement you are more vulnerable to being caught off-guard and separated from the rest of your species. Any similar attempts to pursue them are thwarted by their sharp hearing, although, since you've located their nest, that exposes a vulnerability.))
Yrb: The colonies, separated from the mother colony, found themselves craving connection on some instinctual level while the mother colony failed to truly recognise the change. Yearning to return to the whole the daughter colonies begin sending out thin 'feelers' of fungus in all directions, particularly heatward. On contact with another patch of Yrb, they would reconnect as a basic linkage.
You fail to reconnect with the mother colony; the Salandrians dig out any tendrils that enter their tunnels. The heat in the mother colony's chamber increases.
Travel south in a great migration. Occasionally have smaller groups split off to examine side tunnels
Put evolution point into greater agility
The trait 'agile' will take three evolution points. One is currently invested.
You manage to locate the carcasses of some large fattened quadrapeds. They are untouched excepting a massive gash running from neck to rear; likely the work of some large and dangerous creature. Should it show up again, you will have the advantage in numbers. The tunnel is otherwise featureless, and both curves left and continues forwards.[reminder for me: F-L, L-D]
Hunt the smaller creatures for now we have to sustain ourselves and try to find a weakness in the big worms body. Wait in ambush around certain points near are territory and if they see a Salandrians sneak after them. we soon must find new hunting grounds as these ones are proving difficult.
Evolution: radiation resistant
I won't be able to do it yet but this is for the future.
Please choose an evolution you can at least start now. You have one spare evolution point.
You manage to see a Salandrian when it is out hunting, but before you can catch it with your superior speed it darts into a series of tunnels too convoluted for you to follow. From what your hunters have observed, the Worm is without any natural armor, and seems to rely on an excess of flesh to negate any damage done. They have also felt an extreme instinctual directive to avoid the Worm, and a sense of fear surrounding it. Many other creatures similarly avoid the Worm's path. It seems to be slowing though, and it has been observed to stop for short periods in the past. Perhaps it sleeps?
The small invertebrates are growing more aggressive. One of your pack members returned covered in bites and chemical burns.
Destrachen: The Nests must grow. The Nests must eat to live. The Miners, those Nests who burrow and feed on the bounty of nature, and make stores, and let the magma replenish what was lost when Highflow season comes, spread. The Hunters, those of the New Nests that chose to follow the great worm and prepare for it's bounty, keep their prey in sight, though the going is hard, and feed where they may. The Eaters, those who chose the Dartlings, bring an unexpected gift of food to their fellow Destrachen, so that all might share in the feast of the worm, strengthened by meat and metal, prey and stone-plant. The Nests grow strong with this food; newborns resist toxins with greater ease than ever before. Prey cannot escape through poison. Only flight or fight can save them now.
Evolve Toxin Resistance
((Sidenote: underground, while there would be lava, rocks glowing from the heat, and presumably luminescent or phosphorescent 'plants', light would still be fairly scarce, so poisonous creatures are less likely to be brightly colored.))
((Question: I'm guessing that, since we're silicon based, you were talking about deep minerals and/or radioactive elements that would be poisonous to our metabolism?))
(sorry, was just waiting for the response of others to the Worm.)
(my bad on the coloration, poison is indicated by scent markers.)
(Poisons this deep take the form of highly toxic and reactive heavy metals. They are deadly to both carbon and silicon-based life.)
The Miners toil in the depths without incident. They have become reliant on food dragged through the tunnels by your primary hunters, and on occasion other creatures will attempt to take advantage of this by attacking the individuals transporting food. You have managed to fight them off thus far.
The Worm follows a series of looping paths through the rock, digging it's own tunnel when it cannot fit into the existing structures. It stops, presumably to rest, every week or so. It's back and front are both heavily armored, but the rest of it's body is nearly bare.
The Dartlings have proven to be fakers; their consumption has no ill effects. Regardless, the presence of deep metals in your diet has increased your tolerance of those substances inimical to life. You have revolved a basic resistance to poison.
Yes, the Borak live in the thermal belt.
Put some Yrb on rod-like stones, and wave them at predators to make them not want to eat the Borak with the stick. Put the evolutionary point received from this action into intelligence.
(You can't evolve intelligence yet, or attempt toolmaking. Patience, patience. These things will come in time.)
The Yrb you have managed to gather don't stick to stone once peeled from their rocks, and seem to die rather quickly, losing their effect. In yet worse news, you are being stalked by an enormous sinewy predator. All you can see of it is it's maw, as that feature fills an entire tunnel. Fortunately, it seems uninterested in killing beyond it's need for food.
Kuyeth: Continue trying to force our way Coldword, totally ok with cannibalization of the dead or dying to survive there.
Your worms have evolved significant fat stores and larger bodies, enabling them to move further Coldward for periods of time. You have not located any new sources of food there; all that is present are small Yrb colonies. Your worms are safe so far away from predators, however, and Coldward acts as a safe place to build nests.This has balanced out the increased nutrition requirements of this new form, and your population growth rate remains constant.
The Heatward colony is more or less stagnant, as predators prey on your excess numbers.
Call out to the Dirigids, letting them know of our current limitations. Return to our nest and breed some more, leaving scouts around the massive hole, but far enough back to be undamaged.
Evolution direction: heightened senses. Focus: echolocation.
Primitive echolocation is achieved. You no longer have to be concerned about plummeting from unseen cliffs, but detail is still beyond your grasp. Your scouts manage to transfer the pheromone {incapable, impossible} and take up exploration of the pit. They quickly return to the nest, however; it turns out that the ash clogs up your filter-feeding apparatus, an extremely painful affliction.
((so, it takes twelve Dirigid to float one Ixid?))
Dirigids: We need some food, so float around a bit, perhaps Northwards, in search of little flying critters to catch and eat. Move in a large cloud.
Evolution: a pheromone-based connection with the Ixids. Basically, figure out how to release chemicals that influence the Ixid behaviours. Good behavioural triggers to find would be "come here", "go away", and "help". ((Hope you don't mind, Ozarck.))
((I don't mind. I started thinking symbiotic relationship anyway, so yay!))
((
Awesome.))
Dirigids: turn back from the scary hole. Send a small group to investigate the sides of the hole for food, but move the main cloud back with the Ixid towards their nests. Move in a large, spread out formation, to maximize surface area for catching airborne creatures.
Evolution: toughened epidermis.
((note: how large is my population, approximately? Because preferably, I'd like the "small group" to be large enough to float at least one Ixid, but if I only have 50 Dirigids, a dozen is way too many to leave behind in an extremely dangerous location.))
(Your population numbers roughly 200-300; a number this high is due to the relatively non-complex nature of your organics.)
Your main population spreads out and begins to float back towards the center of the chamber. You are halfway when you are suddenly attacked by a flock of vicious predators. They take the form of thin needles, propelled with an unknown force, spearing your central organ then descending with their feast. Perhaps the weapon of a larger creature? The losses are small though, and encourage the evolution of a toughened hide able to resist the attacker. This will take two points; one is currently invested.
The Ixid seem to be incapable of moving near the shaft, according to their pheromone signals. A few Drixid venture downwards to try and get a sense of the depth of the shaft. Most return, with the report of a massive climbing creature with a sticky tongue chasing them upwards. Thankfully, it seemed to be slow, and would often get stuck on the rocky walls.
Most creatures also can't project that psychically into other being's minds. And you're projecting it with a mere fist-sized clump...it's not so much the fact itself, so much as it is that it's this early in your development. I would think more like a stretch the size of a bedroom wall would be necessary for it. It's difficult to really use fear as a comparison, since it's really interconnected with the entire brain, like everything else is. Plus, being able to not only create the impulse, but override other creature's mental impulses, and more than that, different species of creatures, each of which will have different patterns of neural networks, and being able to find the part of their neural network that controls aversion...
This is a fair criticism. My counter, development-wise, is that the Yrb lack any form of independent locomotion or environment beyond simply multiplying in a direction and mind control. (Right now, said mind control is a bit blunt.) Instead of developing into complex animals, Yrb pre-game evolution was developing mind-fuckery.
((Mind control is definitely overstating the Yrb's current influence. Right now, it acts like an instinctual signal or desire; it is able to be overriden without great difficulty, but it will be obeyed without outside motivation. It seems to me to be a fair capability, even if it has no real biological counterpart.))
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Topic: Dawn of Evolution [Multiplayer] (Read 18844 times)