[13:19:46] pig_catapult: Burns says he'll think about it and hopefully have an answer later tonight
[13:26:08] pig_catapult: Hmmmm, I've got a thought of a planet that's mostly ocean, but with a highly volcanic band around the equator that's become mostly land.
[13:27:31] pig_catapult: what kinds of aliens d'ya think would crop up there?
[13:27:48] Janus: Aquatic ones, most likely.
[13:28:39] Janus: If the planet's predominantly water and a shifting, violent band in the middle, critters would usually take to the sea, right?
[13:29:46] pig_catapult: yeah
[13:31:27] Janus: Though….
[13:31:37] Janus: If they're a higher tech race that started on the volcanic band…
[13:31:48] Janus: I could see them using floating cities.
[13:32:09] Janus: Deep sea mining for more complex and rare minerals….
[13:32:22] Janus: Or mining the more stable zones of the band.
[13:36:31] pig_catapult: I like the floating cities idea
[13:40:29] pig_catapult: What should they look like? I kinda wanna see at least one radially-symmetrical critter with, like, five legs, a central head with a ring of fifteen eyes, each leg splits at the first knee to have a pair of arms and hands on either side
[13:40:52] Janus: Jellyfish.
[13:41:02] Janus: I don't know, actually.
[13:41:06] pig_catapult: … but orange and fuzzy, yes.
[13:41:19] Janus: I'm pretty good with tech and such, but not so good with the critters themselves.
[13:41:33] pig_catapult: You handle the tech, I'll handle the critters? :3
[13:42:08] Janus: Suuure.
[13:42:12] Janus: Zemyla!
[13:42:15] Janus: GET IN HERE
[13:42:33] pig_catapult: Each leg and arm has a further knee/elbow after the first branching one
[13:43:13] Janus: Well…
[13:43:33] Janus: With a body like that… There's bound to be a decent amount of predators on the planet.
[13:43:38] pig_catapult: yeah
[13:43:39] Janus: Horrifying, big ones.
[13:43:45] Janus: Lots of eyes to see them coming.
[13:44:12] pig_catapult: Fingers/Toes are also arranged radially around the hands/feet, are all fully-opposable, and have strong grips.
[13:44:16] pig_catapult: So… climbers.
[13:44:31] Janus: Or clingers?
[13:45:00] Janus: Early symbiotic relationship with massive grazing sea creatures?
[13:45:26] Janus: Or they could've used them to climb out of the water when they're near the band?
[13:45:45] Janus: http://images.4chan.org/tg/src/1294224650745.jpg
[13:45:47] Janus: Or both.
[13:45:51] pig_catapult: Both
[13:46:15] Janus: The ones located near the band have larger, more muscular arms for locomotion and escape.
[13:46:20] pig_catapult: *nod*
[13:46:47] Janus: The ones that were further away have larger bodies, which were used for a jellyfish like locomotion.
[13:47:14] pig_catapult: There should be some matter of absurdly-huge, floating grazer that lives in the warm, relatively shallow waters by the band.
[13:48:09] pig_catapult: Living islands with tough, rough skin that survive only because nothing has big enough teeth to eat them
[13:48:22] pig_catapult: … well, once they're adults, anyway
[13:48:30] pig_catapult: The young ones are quite tasty
[13:48:51] Janus: Eating them is taboo to the Clinging race, but reasonable to the climbing.
[13:49:02] pig_catapult: *nod*
[13:49:05] Janus: Cause of some cultural differences.
[13:49:29] pig_catapult: They get that big because a lot of the plants they eat also grow readily on their rough, lumpy skin
[13:49:58] pig_catapult: So they're never far from food.
[13:50:41] Janus: They being the Clingers?
[13:50:51] pig_catapult: No, the "islands"
[13:51:02] Janus: So they eat the plants that grow on themselves?
[13:51:05] pig_catapult: yes
[13:51:11] Janus: Or they eat, like, the stuff that comes off them.
[13:51:11] pig_catapult: In addition to the ones they find
[13:51:15] Janus: Okay.
[13:51:22] Janus: So, like, seaweed and the like.
[13:51:25] pig_catapult: yeah
[13:51:31] Janus: Microscopic critters feed the plants.
[13:51:55] Janus: Clingers also eat said plants. Fairly vegetarian race. Climbers eat more meat and such.
[13:52:01] pig_catapult: *nod*
[13:53:20] pig_catapult: Climbers branched off from the Clingers a long time ago, and are… feathery around the top and scaled eleswhere, while the Clingers are only scaled.
[13:54:36] pig_catapult: Clingers have more webbed feet/hands to help with swimming
[13:55:03] Janus: Climbers have something resembling claws or wedges.
[13:55:18] pig_catapult: *nod*
[13:55:23] Janus: Or like, millions of microscopic suction tips.
[13:55:32] pig_catapult: Gecko feet?
[13:55:39] pig_catapult: well, gecko-foot-stuff
[13:55:46] Janus: Yeah.
[13:56:08] pig_catapult: They should both have that, I think
[13:56:33] pig_catapult: And possbily long, hairy tongues?
[13:56:38] pig_catapult: For cleaning.
[13:56:38] Janus: Hmm.
[13:56:41] Janus: Filters.
[13:56:52] Janus: Cleaning is something accomplished by others.
[13:56:57] Janus: No.
[13:56:59] Janus: Maybe.
[13:57:25] pig_catapult: A long, hairy, prehensile tongue used to assist in feeding and cleaning
[13:57:42] pig_catapult: Cleaning is a social activity, like chimps
[13:59:24] pig_catapult: Tongue is used in feeding for scraping off stubborn algae
[14:02:19] pig_catapult: When it's not out, it's coiled up in the central body
[14:02:52] Janus: Gills for the critters?
[14:03:48] pig_catapult: No, but they can hold their breath a long time.
[14:04:16] Janus: Could be problematic, if they cling to other creatures
[14:04:24] pig_catapult: … you're right
[14:04:30] Janus: unless….
[14:04:45] Janus: There could be a way for them to transfer oxygen, or whatever, to each other.
[14:04:57] Janus: So they form chains from the Leviathan to the surface.
[14:05:10] Janus: The tops take in oxygen and transfer it along.
[14:05:16] pig_catapult: oooh
[14:06:06] pig_catapult: Alright. Then they'd have a set of long breathing tendrils that they can extend, all of which go into a large, torus-shaped central lung
[14:06:46] pig_catapult: The ends can open and shut at will
[14:08:10] pig_catapult: The lung is surrounded by a set of muscles that can compress or expand different sections to pipe air into/out of different tendrils
[14:08:38] pig_catapult: So they can chain together to form a single giant pump
[14:09:04] pig_catapult: Each can take in far more air than they actually need
[14:11:50] pig_catapult: Perhaps their first huge step towards technological advancement is building air tanks.
[14:12:05] Janus: Air pockets, at least.
[14:12:09] pig_catapult: *nod*
[14:12:14] Janus: Large containers that can be stored, used, and refilled.
[14:12:25] Janus: Like, an underground bowl or something.
[14:12:59] pig_catapult: And from there, they just get gradually, steadily more advanced
[14:13:22] Janus: The clingers, at least.
[14:13:30] Janus: The climbers are still fairly primitive?
[14:13:39] Janus: That or they're working together.
[14:13:50] Janus: Basic mineral and production's handled primarily by the Climbers.
[14:14:23] pig_catapult: Climbers are less communal, but just as skilled at tool use
[14:15:44] pig_catapult: Climbers would probably develop weapons fisrt
[14:15:47] pig_catapult: *first
[14:16:12] Janus: I'd figure clingers would.
[14:16:29] Janus: They'd be more likely to encounter attacks from creatures.
[14:16:36] pig_catapult: true…
[14:17:00] pig_catapult: I was thinking "hunting implements", not "defense implements", but you're right.
[14:17:23] pig_catapult: Clingers would be developing means of defending themselves first
[14:18:14] pig_catapult: Climbers would then later adapt those toward hunting prey.
[14:18:23] pig_catapult: ?
[14:18:37] Janus: Probably.
[14:18:47] Janus: But they'd have to be fairly connected for technology exchange.
[14:20:26] pig_catapult: Since they CAN chain together — and do it in a way that doesn't leave them completely open to attack — trade routes would probably be… simple enough.
[14:20:47] Janus: The thing about chains is that it'd make them more obvious to predators.
[14:20:54] pig_catapult: *nod*
[14:20:59] Janus: I don't see the Climbers being as close to each other as the Clingers.
[14:21:07] pig_catapult: true. More space.
[14:21:13] Janus: The climbers are more independent and the Clingers more codependent.
[14:21:21] Janus: Also the air. Climbers don't need to link up.
[14:23:10] pig_catapult: Alright, so, I guess our question then is: Both races (species?) develop weapons. Do they do so before the split and thus their weapons have similar roots, independently and thuss their weapons are completely different, or do we have there be some sort of exchange?
[14:24:11] pig_catapult: … and what happens when a leviathan gets beached?
[14:24:33] Janus: I assume a conflict.
[14:24:54] Janus: The climbers want to eat it. The Clingers venerate it as the closest thing to a living god.
[14:24:57] Janus: Or their home or something.
[14:25:08] pig_catapult: Both their home AND a god.
[14:25:14] Janus: yep.
[14:26:43] pig_catapult: So if the clingers win, that would constitute them helping their leviathan back into the water before the climbers kill it. But what happens to the clingers if the climbers win?
[14:27:38] pig_catapult: ((And how do they reproduce? are males and females spearate, or do all individuals have both sexes?))
[14:28:03] Janus: Uh…
[14:29:23] pig_catapult: … I ask mainly because one scenario would allow for a "kill the men and plunder their women" approach, while the other would be… more complicated, at least?
[14:29:32] Janus: Hmm.
[14:29:45] Janus: Well, I assume they try to kill each other.
[14:29:52] Janus: I'd figure both sexes are more appropriate.
[14:30:09] Janus: And why couldn't it be 'kill the women and plunder their men'?
[14:30:15] pig_catapult: true
[14:30:52] Janus: Damn.
[14:30:57] Janus: Where's Abe when I need him?
[14:30:57] Janus: http://www.turdfergusonblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/39025-33d96e-550-309.jpg
[14:31:32] pig_catapult: Wait, did you mena "both sexes" as in "there's both men and women", or "both sexes" as in "they are all hermaphrodites"?
[14:31:34] pig_catapult: *mean
[14:31:41] Janus: Herms all around.
[14:32:01] pig_catapult: k
[14:32:26] Janus: Reproduce by… Budding?
[14:32:40] pig_catapult: Sounds good to me.
[14:33:45] pig_catapult: Well, except that sexual reprodcution facilitates faster evolution/adaption
[14:34:02] Janus: Then give them both sexes, but make them require a mate.
[14:35:57] pig_catapult: Alright, so, sexual reproduction, yes, and the babby/babbies form on the top of the parent's central body, kinda like how some frogs develop the eggs/tadpoles in the skin of their backs?
[14:36:10] Janus: Sure.
[14:36:18] Janus: The time in the womb is competitive.
[14:36:22] Janus: Only one child survives.
[14:37:04] pig_catapult: Well, two. One on each parent.
[14:37:24] pig_catapult: but yeah
[14:37:44] pig_catapult: one per womb/egg-sac structure
[14:38:48] pig_catapult: Whoever kills and eats all of their siblings gets to grow into a large enough babby to have a chance at survival
[14:38:59] Janus: A chance.
[14:39:02] Janus: Once released…
[14:39:10] Janus: Well, plenty of predators like to eat the youngins
[14:39:14] pig_catapult: yup
[14:40:48] Janus: Hmmm…
[14:40:59] Janus: I figure Clingers would develop heavier, emplaced weapons.
[14:41:06] Janus: Ones more focused on defense.
[14:41:29] Janus: While the Climbers develop more mobile, lighter weapons
[14:42:11] pig_catapult: yeah
[14:42:44] Janus: Currently…
[14:43:05] Janus: Clingers have what amounts to underwater artillery emplacements.
[14:43:15] Janus: Lots of torpedos.
[14:43:18] pig_catapult: *nod*
[14:43:25] Janus: Climbers, however….
[14:43:27] Janus: Uh…
[14:43:28] Janus: Hm.
[14:43:58] Janus: Mountainous terrain, high mobility, and low need for penetration?
[14:45:13] pig_catapult: yeah
[14:45:24] Janus: Shotguns.
[14:45:38] Janus: Hold on.
[14:45:44] Janus: Lets see what we've got so far.
[14:45:52] Janus: Fifteen legs, or something.
[14:46:21] pig_catapult: Five legs, ten arms
[14:48:26] Janus: Five legs, ten arms. Fingers are radial around the hands, have a gecko like covering on the fingers, enabling them to cling or climb easily.
[14:49:01] pig_catapult: yes
[14:49:47] pig_catapult: Ditto deal for the feet/toes, although the feet are probably bigger and more for supporting weight than maniuplating things
[14:52:32] Janus: They're capable of exuding tentacles from their bodies, which are connected to their lungs. The lungs are subject to a fair amout of manipulation and can be used to pump air to others further along in the chain of connected tentacles.
[14:53:09] pig_catapult: yes
[14:53:23] Janus: The bodies themselves, what were the shapes?
[14:55:54] pig_catapult: ummmm, I was picturing kinda… fat disc-shaped.
[14:56:30] Janus: Arms and legs on the edge of the disc?
[14:56:33] pig_catapult: yeah
[14:57:00] pig_catapult: Each fifth of the circle is identical to the other fifths
[14:57:34] Janus: Pentagonal Symmetry?
[14:57:39] pig_catapult: yeah
[14:58:08] Janus: Groovy.
[14:59:32] Janus: So, it's a flattened sphere, with a set of manipulators extending from the edge. The manipulators split shortly after extending. Branches down into thicker, more sturdy legs and up into two arms, which are thinner and more dextrous.
[14:59:48] pig_catapult: yesh
[15:00:06] Janus: Reminds me of this guy: http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20060424003502/starwars/images/thumb/0/05/VuffiRaa-EGD.jpg/311px-VuffiRaa-EGD.jpg
[15:02:25] pig_catapult: That 's the basic shape, yeah
[15:06:26] Janus: Oh, boy.
[15:06:29] Janus: Abe and Hayley.
[15:06:35] Janus: This should be hilariously fun.
[15:06:50] Janus: The alien, though.
[15:06:51] Janus: It needs a name.
[15:07:10] pig_catapult: I was about to say, actually
[15:07:21] pig_catapult: What do we call these things? XD
[15:07:37] Janus: Uh
[15:07:38] Janus: uhhhh
[15:07:42] pig_catapult: errrrr
[15:09:22] Janus: uhhhh
[15:12:14] pig_catapult: I'm tempted to say "Starfies", because it's not like any humans could pronounce whatever they call themselves?
[15:12:26] Janus: Communication is color based?
[15:12:40] pig_catapult: Sure.
[15:12:46] Janus: Their skin is chameleonlike, so they can shift colors.
[15:13:05] pig_catapult: That works both over and under water, so yeah.
[15:13:33] pig_catapult: And… more squidlike, I'd say, but yeah, same idea. :3
[15:17:37] Janus: Hmm.
[15:17:47] Janus: Could be a manner of sound, as well.
[15:17:52] Janus: For the communication.
[15:18:01] Janus: But not speaking like humans.
[15:18:08] Janus: More like whales.
[15:18:17] pig_catapult: yeah
[15:18:29] pig_catapult: I'm thinking, if they "speak", it's… not like we do
[15:19:26] Janus: Conveying general emotions and feelings, but not complex thoughts?
[15:21:43] pig_catapult: yeah
[15:22:05] pig_catapult: Colour is for that? Or sign-language, considering how many hands they've got
[15:23:51] Janus: Uh.
[15:25:34] pig_catapult: Or they just don't have complex language?
[15:27:08] Janus: The colors are the language, maybe?
[15:27:23] pig_catapult: alrighty
[15:28:00] pig_catapult: They should see (and do some colours in) a wider spectrum than humans
[15:29:11] pig_catapult: UVA and near-IR
[15:29:28] Janus: Or just colors that aren't something humans perceive too well.
[15:29:37] Janus: Like octarine.
[15:33:54] Janus: Something that causes headaches in humans.
[15:34:07] pig_catapult: Not necessarily head-aches.
[15:34:09] pig_catapult: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opponent_process
[15:34:29] Janus: oh man
[15:34:30] Janus: wikipedia
[15:34:36] Janus: can't you just summarize it?
[15:34:39] Janus: I'm laaazyz
[15:35:02] pig_catapult: Well, "Octarine" is a greenish yellow-purple.
[15:35:46] pig_catapult: Humans can't percieve a yellow-purple because they cancel each other out to our eyes. We'd just see grey
[15:36:14] pig_catapult: But these guys can see reddish-green, orange-purple, etc.
[15:36:28] Janus: Yeah.
[15:36:35] Janus: So, we'd just see gray for them, sometimes.
[15:37:23] pig_catapult: And so there's lots of cases where there's two hues that look identical to us, but compleetely different to them
[15:37:49] Janus: The concept of camoflauge is pretty foreign to them
[15:38:00] Janus: Or they're just way, way better at it than we are.
[15:38:20] pig_catapult: "Oh, that's grey with a little green added" looks the same to us as "Oh, that's green with a lot of red in it"
[15:40:29] pig_catapult: But yeah. Camoflauge? Nah, they just see enemies coming regardless of direction and are well-equiped enough to defend themselves
[15:40:57] Janus: Equipped with what, though.
[15:41:03] pig_catapult: hmm
[15:41:20] Janus: They're fairly big and bound to be ungainly, so most weapons I can think of might not work.
[15:41:29] Janus: Emplacements shouldn't be too hard.
[15:41:33] Janus: Hmmm.
[15:41:44] Janus: Maybe the weapons are built into them?
[15:41:47] Janus: Grown into them?
[15:42:18] pig_catapult: Perhaps they have poisonous spines of some sort?
[15:42:42] Janus: Heeat rays?
[15:43:00] pig_catapult: Biotech sounds best, tbh.
[15:43:05] Janus: Yeah.
[15:43:14] pig_catapult: Weapons that are grafted on
[15:43:17] Janus: Projectors, built into their back.
[15:43:23] Janus: Flings various types of projectiles.
[15:43:38] Janus: Or other critters.
[15:43:50] Janus: Ones that swim in a straight line, then burrow into whatever they hit?
[15:44:04] pig_catapult: They would not be above breeding and weaponising other animals
[15:44:16] pig_catapult: so yeah
[15:46:46] Janus: So, their weapons vary, but are primarily organic, engineered ones.
[15:46:50] Janus: Clingers are symbiotic critters.
[15:47:05] Janus: Climbers are more like tools and more engineered.
[15:47:12] pig_catapult: *nod*
[15:48:35] pig_catapult: And when humans make first contact, they're gonna make the mistake of thinking that the climbers are the mor advanced ones, "Maybe even on level with chimps", and that the clingers are primitive and ridden with parasites.
[15:50:31] Janus: Well…
[15:50:42] Janus: The Climbers aren't necessarily less advanced.
[15:50:46] pig_catapult: true
[15:50:54] Janus: They're just using technology in a different way.
[15:51:00] Janus: More violentally.
[15:51:10] pig_catapult: trueee
[15:53:27] pig_catapult: So… which one of them makes the floating cities first?
[15:53:39] Janus: The clingers.
[15:53:58] Janus: Climbers tend to dig their cities into more stable areas of the belt.
[15:55:08] pig_catapult: Should the first floating city result from a clinger colonies' attempts to save the life of their aging homegod?
[15:55:19] pig_catapult: *colony's
[15:55:28] Janus: Maybe an attempt to imitate it?
[15:55:33] Janus: Ooh.
[15:55:52] Janus: Maybe it's the corpse of a dead homegod?
[15:56:04] Janus: Was living, but they added more stuff onto it to make it last longer.
[15:56:14] Janus: It was still able to float after it died, with minor changes.
[15:56:40] pig_catapult: *nod* They couldn't save it in the end, but they could preserve it.
[15:56:51] Janus: Exactly.
[15:57:02] Janus: It's how they get all their floating cities now.
[15:57:12] Janus: The corpses of homegods, with lots of things attached.
[15:57:21] Janus: They don't kill them, but they use the bodies.
[15:57:28] pig_catapult: *nod*
[15:58:17] Janus: The Climbers use engineered critters to burrow and bore holes into the volcanic band.
[15:58:28] Janus: Cities tend to be descending and vertical.
[16:07:28] pig_catapult: How's "Eizzenerms" for a name?
[16:07:44] Janus: Sure.
[16:08:39] pig_catapult: If you're wondering how I got that, I was trying to think of a descriptive name, and thought "Well, they're all eyes and arms."
[16:08:58] Janus: Oh wow