The_Wayward_Admiral
Spacefaring
The_Real_Slim_Shady
Atrox drew this awesome image of the Keldori!
Posts: 1,011 
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Post by The_Wayward_Admiral on Apr 6, 2017 15:02:01 GMT
So there was a desire to have high level discussions that foster both a community and devloper ideation session. I was hoping we could discuss something kind of cool about insect physiology that might have implications for Thrive or maybe just make you look at insects differently.
Most (if not all) insects have brains that surround their esophagus. Let me elaobrate.
Insects with this arrangment have a brain where you'd expect it, but also have a massive collection of ganglia that lies below the esophagus and connects to the upper brain around the esophagus. Because of this, if an insect were to consume something too large and solid, it would die of a brain hemmorhage. This is hypothesized as the reason why so many insects engage in liquifying food, or consuming already liquid food. [FIXME: Cite relevant textbook when I have time to go to Easybib]
The reason that I bring this up is to have a larger discussion about "evolutionary typecasting". This one problematic piece of insects' evolutionary history prevents them from engaging in many different means of energy acquisition. They become pigeonholed in certain niches because any mutation that would change this brain position would probably also cause the insect to die of lack of brain function.
And insects are by no means alone in this regard. It's hypothesized that cephalopods never invaded land because they never made the move to fresh water, and thus never needed to develop much in the way of osmoregulation. Humans have ganglia groups that are very similar to more obviously segmented animals. Terrestrial snails were unable to exapt their gills into usable terrestrial lungs, so they now have to use their shell as a respiration chamber.
Does anyone have other examples and interesting evolutionary accidents with far reaching impacts?
Do any players think that it would be good/bad for the game to have some sort of "pigoenhole mechanic"? Any devs?
Does anyone have an idea how such a mechanic would even integrate with current plans if it seems appealing?
I certainly am of the mind that past a certain point players' decisions will do this anyway, and even though there's a delete button in the editor, there's only so much reworking one can do without completely destroying an organism's game worthiness. So perhaps it's an inevitable and organic part of Thrive's gameplay.
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Post by mitobox on Apr 6, 2017 21:51:07 GMT
You know how reptiles and birds lay eggs, while mammals carry the fetus around until it's developed? And how newborn mammals rely on milk, and can't just wander off to eat on their own?
That's part of how sauropods managed to grow so large, while the largest land animal we have is the African elephant (hardly a contender); rather than have to focus on getting a single calf to adulthood, sauropods could sustain a viable population by laying huge clutches, and having the hatchlings overcome their high mortality rate through sheer numbers alone.
It's probably a better option than trying to protect them while lugging such a huge body around, especially when it's the small, swift carnivores that would be going after the young ones. By the same token, the juveniles that make it can group up with the adult herds; by then, only the large carnivores they can actually land a hit on would risk going after them, and now they have a herd to back them up.
tl;dr life on your planet won't be that large if the dominant group of species is the sort that invests a lot in their young (although the latter is better sapience-material, as far as Earth life goes).
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crabghast
Sentient
POSADAS👽 WAS ☢ RIGHT 🚀
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Post by crabghast on Apr 7, 2017 11:51:27 GMT
tl;dr life on your planet won't be that large if the dominant group of species is the sort that invests a lot in their young (although the latter is better sapience-material, as far as Earth life goes). Care for the young could be a pretty vital component of sapience in certain cases, as knowledge is passed on that way. Otherwise, a lot of knowledge may be lost trough generations. However, as monotremes show, you can clearly have both. So eggs are just an indicator. |
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The_Wayward_Admiral
Spacefaring
The_Real_Slim_Shady
Atrox drew this awesome image of the Keldori!
Posts: 1,011
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Post by The_Wayward_Admiral on Apr 7, 2017 13:52:37 GMT
I wonder if it's possible to have an 'r' parental care model early in development, and then switch to 'k'. I'm not sure how well it would evolve, but I think it'd be very interesting to find a species that lays dozens or scores of clutches, and then has some mechanism by which the offspring can reconnect with the parental units if they survive.
I suppose the problem is that there really isn't a selective advantage to switching, and of course the "finding" mechanism seems more and more ridiculous as I think about it more. Any thought?
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crabghast
Sentient
POSADAS👽 WAS ☢ RIGHT 🚀
Posts: 68
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Post by crabghast on Apr 7, 2017 18:22:15 GMT
I wonder if it's possible to have an 'r' parental care model early in development, and then switch to 'k'. I'm not sure how well it would evolve, but I think it'd be very interesting to find a species that lays dozens or scores of clutches, and then has some mechanism by which the offspring can reconnect with the parental units if they survive. I suppose the problem is that there really isn't a selective advantage to switching, and of course the "finding" mechanism seems more and more ridiculous as I think about it more. Any thought? Such a system would allow for a lot more freedom when building societies. In fact, humans we're closer to this not that long ago, when women gave birth to 7 children on average but almost all of them died. However, this was still fundamentally different from, let's say octopi or turtles who really don't care about their kids. Letting the player switch systems in such a way would allow for those, let's from now on call them "baby wave" reproducers to pass on knowledge from generation to generation without sacrificing the brutal-savage-alpha-negligent parent RP. |
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Post by tjwhale on Apr 7, 2017 18:22:27 GMT
I wonder if it's possible to have an 'r' parental care model early in development, and then switch to 'k'. I'm not sure how well it would evolve, but I think it'd be very interesting to find a species that lays dozens or scores of clutches, and then has some mechanism by which the offspring can reconnect with the parental units if they survive. I suppose the problem is that there really isn't a selective advantage to switching, and of course the "finding" mechanism seems more and more ridiculous as I think about it more. Any thought? I think it's reasonable to imagine a species in which cultural inheritance wasn't from parent to child. So maybe a bunch of turtles lay eggs on a beach and then swim off to the feeding grounds. Any offspring that manage to migrate to the feeding grounds are then welcomed into the community and taught lessons. Of course turtles that teach would be called tortoises because they tortoise the lessons! This kind of happens in schools, universities and apprenticeships. The old medieval model of an apprentice was to have the master as a kind of parent who taught the apprentice skills but also looked after them in a parental way. -- In gameplay terms one thing that could be offered is a "tree of life" where you can see all the species that branch out from your ancestor cell (vs those that branch out from other ancestor cells). Maybe you can choose to move to a different species higher up the tree (so for example if you make a plant and then realise it's a dead end you can revert to an ancestor (assuming they are not extinct) and play as them and go a different route). Maybe (though this would reduce the challenge quite a lot) you coulds switch to a cousin species (same level of development but having gone down a different path). Maybe if there is a disaster (such as asteroid strike or nuclear war) you get booted back a few levels and have to go back to being a microbe or something (though this is pretty harsh and should definitely be optional). Overall I think a tree of life would be educational and awesome. It would also make a cool strategy mode, trying to kill off all other species which weren't descended from your ancestor cell. Of course that would be really hard (you'd have to migrate to different biomes and mutate a lot of different species to push everyone else out). It would mean that we could let people go down an evolutionary dead end without it totally ending their game (also reduces the need for save scumming). -- Also cool insect and sauropods facts  |
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crabghast
Sentient
POSADAS👽 WAS ☢ RIGHT 🚀
Posts: 68
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Post by crabghast on Apr 7, 2017 18:27:17 GMT
Maybe (though this would reduce the challenge quite a lot) you coulds switch to a cousin species (same level of development but having gone down a different path). Maybe if there is a disaster (such as asteroid strike or nuclear war) you get booted back a few levels and have to go back to being a microbe or something (though this is pretty harsh and should definitely be optional). Tbh this sounds essential to me. A big problem I had with earlier Paradox games was that there was no way to continue after losing, in some different form at least. If the players species goes entirely extinct they should either auto-switch to the closest cousin species or be allowed to pick any other in existence. |
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Post by blackink on Sept 13, 2017 15:43:12 GMT
Sorry for necroposting tjwhale, but since you mentioned the disasters I ought to ask, what about the players that decide to stick to the microbe stage instead of evolving? Given the time simulation (which is faster in microbe stage because of evolution complexities), it may come a point where the star which the homeworld planet orbits starts to die for example or an asteroid comes crashing, is it really game over?
I would propose that if such a situation arose, then maybe you could create spawn points for small rocks (with a low set probability), the player could swim to them before a counter runs out and if they arrive they get sent to another world inside the asteroid (panspermia). This would allow for the player to start in anew but bringing his upgrades with him (a kind of newgame+).
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Post by Omicron on Sept 13, 2017 19:24:32 GMT
Sorry for necroposting tjwhale, but since you mentioned the disasters I ought to ask, what about the players that decide to stick to the microbe stage instead of evolving? Given the time simulation (which is faster in microbe stage because of evolution complexities), it may come a point where the star which the homeworld planet orbits starts to die for example or an asteroid comes crashing, is it really game over? I would propose that if such a situation arose, then maybe you could create spawn points for small rocks (with a low set probability), the player could swim to them before a counter runs out and if they arrive they get sent to another world inside the asteroid (panspermia). This would allow for the player to start in anew but bringing his upgrades with him (a kind of newgame+). Well, in this thread, it was decided (mostly) that it'll most likely just be an option you can toggle on, for a kind of speedrun challenge. (Also, I think it would've been better if you made a different thread about this instead of using this old thread, as this isn't what this thread is about) |
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