OK, so, remember that any means of reproduction that *doesn't* combine DNA/an equivalent is going to naturally be less diverse, more prone to speciation (may or may not be a terrible problem, but still), and slower to evolve.
So far, "construction" is interesting but is a little too...tailored for exploitation? I think it'd make more sense if "animals" on our planet tend to be made of a core "alive" and squishy component and a surrounding harder shell that is not necessary "dead" but not as "alive" as the core, if that makes sense. Manipulative bits and all would be various bits of the "shell"; basically the core would be the most basic possible unit of life for any of these species. Loss of the various organs and manipulators and armor that builds up in the outer shell would hurt the creature, but wouldn't be capable of killing it because the core can always sustain itself. Less-intelligent species are made of almost completely identical individuals since they are only capable of replicating an external body plan in their instructions, as life gets more intelligent individuals start to be able to alter their external body plan (quite literally a body plan, as in "blueprints", encoded in our equivalent of genetics) to suit themselves. The more intelligent, the more alterations they can conceive of and build.
Individuals would start with just a core and thus be vulnerable when young, but capable of rapidly beginning to build the shell around themselves. Plant equivalents would perhaps just be immobile forms that often prefer a more defense-oriented shell layer rather than one capable of movement and whatnot?
This core either needs to be produced by more than two individuals, inherit the memories of the individual that produced it (thus technically making our entire biosphere basically immortal by most considerations, I think?), or be capable of doing the thing proposed previously where young individuals group up to make larger more capable ones with more diversity.