Populate a planet with critters

Love_Rhombus · February 5, 2014, 2:32pm

We’ve been given a “clone” of the current planet Earth sans humans or any evidence of human habitation or development, and no animals. You can put on one type of any living creature, so one person could put on robins for example, one hawks, ect, with any species you like. However, you cannot repeat what someone else has placed. And as an arbitrary rule because I do not like them, you cannot put slugs on Doper’s World, and assume that if whales are added plankton are as well as a package deal.
(Edit: I only thought of this last night, so I’m not totally sure it’s a game, per se. if it fits somewhere else, feel free to move it.)

Der_Trihs · February 5, 2014, 2:48pm

Real world creature only, or can we make things up?

Love_Rhombus · February 5, 2014, 2:53pm

Ooo, now I’m torn between seeing what people make or keeping it real. Sorry, I should have added that as well. I was thinking of all of the other rules and I forgot that one. :smack:

I’d say you can make 'em up as long as they seem reasonably believable and well-explained. Oh, and it can be any critter from history as well, so dinos and such are allowed.

Der_Trihs · February 5, 2014, 3:12pm

In that case I’d like to toss in my non-magical version of trolls I created some time ago elsewhere. I was trying to think up a non-magical equivalent of a Dungeons and Dragons troll at the time.

Trolls are colonial organisms, like a Portuguese man o’ war. They are a walking colony of specialized creatures that imitates a humanoid, but isn’t one. Their muscles are formed of worm-like creatures, their bones are made of interlocking beetle-like critters, their “skins” are made from a different beetle-like creature that interlock their shells to present a scaly-looking “skin”, their eyes are a swarm of eye-creatures etc. Their bodies are further strengthened by a network of silk fibers and tubes, which doubles as a substitute for a circulatory & nervous system thanks to yet another breed of critter that moves along inside them bringing nutrition and chemical messages. Their “teeth” and “claws” are made of an extruded material; the only thing about them besides their silk infrastructure that isn’t made of smaller creatures. Trolls can range from tiny, mouse-sized things to lumbering ten foot tall monsters, but start to lose their structural ability to hold together if they get much larger. On land at least; sea-trolls can be enormous with the water to support their weight.

Their nature as composite entities is the source of their ability to regenerate. Stab them and while you’ll kill some of their individual components, the living ones will just move over to take their place. Hack them to pieces and the pieces will assemble themselves into a new troll - or perhaps into multiple smaller ones. Crushing weapons work better, but trying to crush every last component of a walking swarm that out-masses a human with a mace is going to take a long time, and it isn’t going to just sit there and let you pound on it. Fire for obvious reasons is a favored weapon against trolls. Also due to their composite nature keeping them constrained or caged is nearly impossible, since if necessary they can break up into their components and reassemble themselves outside of any chains or cage.

Trolls have a collective decision making ability like an insect hive can have, but are not truly intelligent or aware. They have a pretty sophisticated set of instincts however; they can (clumsily) use simple weapons like bludgeons & blades and can use fire if a pre-existing fire is available for them to take a burning brand from. On the other hand they can’t open a door except by breaking it down, since they don’t have any instinct for doors.

In terms of senses they have an excellent sense of smell, good vision, and one of their components is a tiny, nearly invisible flier that scouts for the troll giving them an excellent ability to detect what is happening around them for a great distance. They require neither sleep nor rest, and are basically walking appetites. Cold makes them sluggish or puts them into hibernation, but doesn’t kill them - they are a lot easier to destroy if they are hibernating though. Several of their sub-components can like bees create warmth by rapidly flexing muscles however, so they are not totally “cold blooded” (not that they have blood); if not fully hibernating they can in a short time warm themselves up enough for a fight if they are in danger.

Love_Rhombus · February 5, 2014, 3:58pm

Interesting-diet? Reproduction? Without humans these things won’t run wild, will they?

Yllaria · February 5, 2014, 6:58pm

I’ll add blue-green algae aka cyanobacteria, just because they make a nice foundation and are useful in many ways. Are you going to make me pick one? Or can I scatter around a variety and let them all decide where they’d like to be?

Der_Trihs · February 5, 2014, 10:27pm

Diet is pretty much anything. Reproduction is by some of the troll-colony dropping or being ripped off and reforming into a smaller troll. The small creatures that make up the troll reproduce inside the troll.

It depends on what else there is to compete with them. Also, in colder regions a lot of them probably get eaten during winter by critters that aren’t as disabled by the cold.

Ethilrist · February 5, 2014, 10:48pm

Interesting thread titles for the win:

I’m Looking For A Good Coleslaw Recipe
Populate a planet with critters

and for some reason, my brain saw “fritters” rather than “critters,” and I thought, “what an odd game…”

Love_Rhombus · February 6, 2014, 12:21am

I don’t know enough about them to differentiate the the types. Scatter as you like. Just say where.

Ken001 · February 6, 2014, 12:47am

Dang! I thought of it first. :smack:

Ok so felix domesticus. Gotta have cats.

Yllaria · February 6, 2014, 1:53am

They go nearly everywhere. Very versatile. Anabaena is my favorite. They can fix atmospheric nitrogen and pump oxygen into vacuoles to float themselves high enough in the water to get the good sunbeams.

Ken001, if a lot of people want to do blue-greens, we can just pick species.

Suburban_Plankton · February 6, 2014, 2:15am

I feel somehow compelled to add whales…

Oakminster · February 6, 2014, 5:43am

I’m adding dragons. All of the original AD&D Monster Manual types.

dracoi · February 6, 2014, 6:53am

I’ve always thought that trilobites deserve another go at it.

Malacandra · February 6, 2014, 7:16am

Cockroaches, obviously. They’re Mother Nature’s fulfilment of the “meek shall inherit the earth” beatitude, and they’ll be around when all the dinosaurs and dragons have gone.

Sterling_Archer · February 6, 2014, 5:09pm

What is the point of this game? At any given point do we check our world for survivability of existing species? For example those cats all die off pretty quick with nothing to eat but algae.

I add grizzly bears.

Chronos · February 6, 2014, 5:16pm

I’ll go with thermophile archae, such as are found in Yellowstone’s hotsprings and in ocean vents. Even more foundational than the blue-greens.

Kobal2 · February 7, 2014, 10:36am

Judging by Spore, if the population is done by semi-anonymous committee there’s going to be a lot of penis creatures. Flying dicks, burrowing dicks, giant hairy dicks, perambulating sentient scrotums…

Anyway, I’ll add giant ants ('bout St. Bernard size). Ants are cool, big ants are cooler. And don’t you bring your inverse square laws into this ! Mine work without crushing themselves with their own exoskeleton because something something intelligent design.

Try2B_Comprehensive · February 7, 2014, 3:14pm

Slugs are banned, but how about worms? Annelids are one of those “don’t know what you got 'till it’s gone” [del]species[/del] phyla (?) (help me out here). Trust me, the herbivores will thank me!

SCAdian · February 7, 2014, 3:53pm

I’ll bring back marine sloths.