On September 21 2012 16:31 Ponera wrote: Sorry if I sounded mean there, it's just that there is method to my madness and if you take exception as passionately as you have, please show me where I am wrong in the method so I can correct my madness! I didn't mean to be a jerk, I am just letting you know the rationale behind my logic/training and was recently given "the business" on youtube by a different subscriber as interested and passionate as you. So, there it is! Thanks so much for feedback, People like you will turn "Anatomy of Starcraft" into (as planned) "Anatomy of Science Fiction" and eventually I will be the Lady Gaga of science...or at least maybe one day I can make a difference educating and using context to engage the audience!
You didn't offend, and if I might have done the same I apologize. I wasn't passionately objecting, merely pointing out the sheer variety of ways that the Zerg do things biologically that they have no rights to do so when even mechanically we cannot accomplish similar. It's the problem inherent to all biotech civilizations in scifi.
Clearly the laws of physics in the SC universe are very different from what we understand them to be, and the amount of things that biology can accomplish in the SC universe is far in excess of what can be accomplished by terrestrial biology (as the fact that their teeth and claws can damage Terran and Protoss armor that can withstand directed nuke strikes is ludicrous), so rather than limiting a discussion to only biological processes when discussing Zerg material science I would favor looking beyond substances found in nature when it becomes obvious that nothing in nature can fit the bill. Kinda like Mythbusters, you've busted the myth by showing no known fungi can come anywhere close to exhibiting the properties of FG, then it's time to go beyond and find something that would. As to the filament, issue, it's like splicing spider silk production genes into dairy cows (a think that is happening) so that you can get it produced in large quantities. it doesn't need to be inherent to the fungi, it's an added ability that takes advantage of some aspect of the fungi.
What would you propose as a reasonable starting point for "this substance can literally be anything in a universe that apparently doesn't follow physics properly"?
The new video is out. It's on the swarm itself, to help put into context the functionality of drone, overlord, overseer and queen, since there are a lot of requests to do drone and overlord.
It is a shame that we didn't have time to include this part, but it would be great if blizz added the creep maintaining organisms as neutral critters that lived only on the creep. They could maybe be squished like the bugs in diablo 2/3!
The next videos will be about fungal growth with an actual mycology phd candidate and to look at some other interests of the channel I'll be curb stomping a person who believes in ghosts in a debate. If my friend can't do the talk about fungal growth in the next few days I'll do a video on drone or overlord, as they are both heavily requested.
Great video! Thanks for making it!
As for commentary, the weird thing is that the overlord does not actually coordinate lings. If you go down to 0 overlords, you can still issue commands. Yet, you cannot produce more units. This somewhat breaks the lore, together with the fact that your units can spend an infinite time off creep and not die (overlords and other flying units provide the best example). Instead, creep sustains buildings, those die without it. Also, there's the issue of the spine crawler, it only dies when rooted. This suggests that being burrowed (all Z structures are) leads to damage, somehow, but burrowed units don't take damage. Roaches actually heal faster.
I don't have a solution to this puzzle, but there are a few hints such as the fact that units move faster on creep. Especially the queen. Also, you can do upgrades in "unpowered" zerg buildings, but cannot build units from hatcheries. At the same time, hatcheries provide some supply (and creep) themselves.
Now, overlords also make creep and supply. So, perhaps overlords are actually connected with hatcheries in some way. Extending their functionality, but replacing the actual larvae production with mobility.
Being able to issue commands after the Overlord dies doesn't break the lore.
The Overmind created Cerebrates to specialize in various tasks so he didn't have to waste his thought process attending to them. The cerbrates in turn created Queens (the ones that fly in the sky) and Cerebrates to take over tasks they can't be bothered with micromanaging.
When Kerrigan took over the swarm and had all the Cerebrates killed except for one (which ended up dying inbetween Broodwar and SC2) she still retained usage of Overlords but abondoned the old Queens for new Queens.
When you play SC1-Broodwar it is explictily clear that you play as a Cerebrate so retaining control of the swarm after Overlords dying isn't issue.
I suspected in SC2 zerg players were actually Queens acting in similar fashion as Cerebrates did for the Overmind but with far less capacity and responsibilities under Kerrigan's influence. Yet the hints of Heart of the Swarm's command structure suggest the lifeforms that Zerg players represent are Queens and something else, and both type of creatures are far more autonomous than Cerebrates were under the Overmind.
I really like this topic and have a couple of questions for the people who like examining the biology of the zerg.
1. Does the Guardien form make sense to you as presented in SC1?
If you aren't aware, the guardien was speculated to be the nesting form of the same species the mutalisk is derived from. Does the excessive alteration in looks have a bases in other creatures?
2. Is there anything else that could be learned about each creature based on the buildings used to access them? Keep in mind each of the buildings represented the natural nests the original species used.
1. Not too sure about that one, I'll look at it eventually.The different forms CAN happen, just look at lanternfish, but that one is really rather extreme.
2. I will actually look at buildings at a later time!
as far as the BW ultra, it's face is way different and it has only 2 arms, so I have no idea. I'll look at it at a later time.
1. Videos lead to potential moments of "huh, what did he say?" With written words, I don't have that problem. 2. They're much better for skimming. If I want to quickly look over the Ultralisk one, I can do so.
By popular demand I am going to do the write ups and then youtube em. I will start with the most requested, the drone.
The drone serves the same purpose as a minor worker in an ant colony- it can act like a soldier in times of dire need but for the most part, it handles the menial tasks, not including the heavy labour. It constructs the various hive structures, not by labour, but by becoming the structure in question. This suggests that they actually are given the right stimuli and enter a different form, perhaps containing multiple dormant strains of genes.
The face is rather interesting on the drone, as it is a vertically oriented opening with a bunch of nomming little spike teeth. If course, the food items are brought to the mouth by the claws which function like mandibles on an ant- used for feeding, carrying, working...everything. They appear to have pincers, which is reminiscent of the limbs of malacostracan crustaceans (crabs and friends). The mouth itself is surrounded by two sets of pincers, which appear to have limited function other than holding prey items close to the mouth. Would inflict some painful punctures too! These are reminiscent of chelicerae in scorpions (the mouthparts) and if we consdier that the claws are actually like pedipalps on scorpions (the claws), then it seems the drone is more of a scorpion than a wasp as suggested by its lore as an origins. However, the wasp may be a misnomer so whatever. The face has 6 eyes, which is not uncommon in creatures like arachnids (in fact, it's uncommon not to have multiple sets of eyes.)
To further the comparison, the drone has lucida segmentata running on the top portion of its body; this is similar to the joined armour found on scorpions, though not as extensive. The 4 pairs of limbs are also reminiscent of arachnids, though the drone has a membrane between limbs which suggests limited mobility...perfect for keeping the bulk of your drones close to hatcheries.
I want to draw attention to the tail of the drone, for a while. The tail of the drone is, on the surface, purely cosmetic. When compared to superorganisms such as ants, however, a purpose can be forged! Ants have somewhere between 3-5 glands on the underside of their abdomen, including using their own anus and feces (just like zerg are apparently good at.) By dragging a certain gland on the ground as they move, they create pherimone trails that effectively work as recruitment highways for other workers. This would be very excellent in explaining the automated behaviours of mining and why individual orders are not required for each trip individually. They give out an alarm pherimone when attacked (our drones are under attack!) and they have a separate recruitment pherimone for gas, minerals, mass building spawns (such as spines) as well as a call to arms when the hive itself is threatened. By doing this, streamlining the orders to multiple drones is rather easy; in fact, most of these tasks would need a single order, if not fewer, as drones can take away from the micromanagement needs of the hierarchy rather than being a crippling burden.
The overlord is a creature that is as interesting as it is vestigial. The mouth on the overlord doesn't even appear to close properly, with the tongue flopping out and saliva dripping out with each movement of its interlocking, over sized caninform teeth. These teeth would be absolutely useless for anything at all, so it's likely at one point before assimilation that they were used as a sexual display. The overlord also seems to have a bit of a clefted palate, with an invagination moving up the mid-line towards the forehead. This effectively divides the head into two, with 4 sets of eyes providing a decent spread in visual field and two sets of antennae, possibly for use in determining air pressure and temperature (I will talk about the importance of this in a moment). Also on the head, and coming out of the shoulder area, are some downward facing, mobile spikes. Again, these are likely vestigial and currently are purposeless.
Once again we see the segmented armour moving down the midline of the back, with spikes on either side to make it look cool (as they would almost certainly be useless and add extra weight to a flier.) The overlord has 8 limbs: 2 hoocked frontal claws, which may be used in anchoring to a structure such as a spire or to aide in picking up units, and 3 spindly little legs on either side. These limbs, however, may not be useless! I will explain this in a moment as well. There are antennae around the limb girdles, perhaps again for sensory input.
What I have eluded to this whole time is the bulbous gas filled sacs on either side (and probably a considerable amount internally too) of the overlords bloated body. The overlord is literally like a hot air balloon, but instead of using heat it most likely uses gas ballasting like a submarine. The reason why heat isn't used is because this creature can move into space, which would make raising by heat ineffective (how to moves vertically in space is a mystery to me, by the way, as is the thrust needed to actually escape orbit.) When more gas is needed, metabolic processes can perhaps turn stored food into a gas. To be clear, this gas would be inert, likely organic and most definitely would not be vespene, as it's not in the unit cost! When descending into an atmosphere (or to the creep, to obtain nutrients "somehow") the overlord likely makes use of the celebrate zerg anus to out-gas. The ability to move vertically through the atmosphere, of course, is integral to being able to pick up and drop off units, as well as scale cliffs. It also explains why there is very little remains when an overlord "pops".
The spindly legs may help in perching or anchoring to a spire or something, in order to prevent being blown away in a severe windstorm. They also would be enough to help when the overlord comes close to ground, as its comparable mass would be low if the ballasting is done correctly.
In order to hold units, it needs a pneumatized carapace (I know, wrong upgrade right?) and ventral sacs in order to have more gas storage, to offset the extra weight and to hold units. How the overlord moves is probably through some sort of out-gassing, though I have no idea.
This creature is closely linked with the creep- so much so that a waste product of it is indeed creep! So it poops out creep onto the battlefield, making this creature have what is perhaps the most celebrated anus in all the zerg swarm. It is also a proxy for orders, used as a node to micromanage the orders and disperse tasks on a more intimate level with the various members of a swarm. I know blah blah psionic blah blah but I don't cover magic in this, so I have no idea other than vocalizations how an overlord would do this.
Anyways, I think overseer is next, but if you guys are really wanting something different let me know!
Personally, I think the overseer is kinda dumb and does not have much to look at. It's just a bunch of eyes all and antenna on an overlord. Not really that unique.
Maybe you can try the lurker! Figure out just how it attacks and everything. ^ ^
I actually have an extremely cool idea for how the lurker attacks. I will be definitely thinking outside the box on that one! Part of the fun of this for me is that, while I am bound to what I can see, what I can't see is something that I get to have fun with...and the lurker attack is as ambiguous as it gets!
EPT![[image loading]](http://www.theuen.com/images/drone.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100721022017/starcraft/images/d/d4/Drone_SC2_Head1.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://images.wikia.com/starcraft/images/e/ea/Overlord_SC2_Head1.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20090220033336/starcraft/images/3/39/Overlord_SC2_DevRend2.jpg)
