Design: Ruminant Digestive System [Effectiveness: 4+1] [Expense: 5] [Bugs: 3-1]
As it turns out, acids aren't enough. We needed to devise enzymes specifically for breaking down that troublesome cellulose. We duplicated stomachs in the standard worker design and reduced their acid outputs, instead devoting them to enzyme production and in one stomach even harbouring commensal bacteria to help break down the foodstuffs. Modification of the worker mandibles proved troublesome, but we have them down well enough to serve as grinders to macerate food.
The resulting drones are swollen due to the need to support extra stomach capacity and food storage, and they devote enough energy to digestion that their responses are fairly slow and sluggish, but they are able to pre-digest grains, legumes and plants and then vomit them up for consumption by others. These Emitic drones may never see the battlefield, but they most certainly contribute. Mostly they remain within the Hive's warrens and spend their days eating and throwing up into vessels brought to them by other workers. It isn't an exciting life, but we didn't give them a sense of boredom and they are fulfilled by serving the Hive anyway. Same as all of us.
The Emitics aren't perfect. A good proportion of the nutrition of what they consume is lost, devoted to sustaining the Emitic itself. Only a fraction of the nutritious value of the source material is preserved in the vomited slurry, so consumption of cereals and vegetables is nowhere near as efficient as direct digestion would be for our standard drones (but is still a net positive).
The biggest benefit is the Emitics' ability to digest plant matter. We can't consume wood directly, but certain softer leaves can be ground up and digested by the Emitics (many leaves are too poisonous, hardy or nutrient-low for consumption) who can then vomit it back up for standard drone types - even Queens. With the plant matter provided by a verdant forest, we could colonise it with a Queen - but such a colony would be horrendously weak and limited, needing to devote the vast majority of its production to sustaining Emitics. Emitics are not efficient at deriving calories from leaves, and most of those calories would be devoted to the Emitic's own survival before it could produce a surplus.
In short, the Emitics are far better and more efficient at digesting cereals, roots and legumes than leaves, and cannot consume wood at all.
There is also another drawback. Digestion is not a perfect process, so the finished slurry often contains significant traces of gluten and undigested cellulose. This has the effect of causing trouble for the digestion of slurry-eaters. resulting in slowed reaction times and occasional weakness.
Forest Queens: As a Strategic Action, the Hive can now spawn a Queen in a forested area, producing food and manpower based off the Timber value of the region. Since the Hive is much less efficient at gathering timber than it is food and the Hive currently digests 'timber' at 10% of its base food rate, such a Queen would be malnourished and only produce a handful of drones. It is, however, possible. Unless otherwise directed, Forest Queens will consume 50% of the Timber supply of a region.
It is now the Revision Phase. You have 2 dice remaining.
Author
Topic: Hive Race: The Hive (Read 40177 times)