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As a formally trained paleontologist that specializes in comparative anatomy, I have made a series (and continue to add to it) on the anatomy of starcraft 2 units. I attempt to assess the existing anatomy of the Zergling first, rather than judge it as being uncreative (ie: tetrapod with goodies, encephalized and of course apparently pseudovertebrate with a carapace that is overtly flexible in the tail.) Also know that I am lazy and don't feel like proofreading since I am doing this in my spare time. I want any and all criticisms, comments, additions or even flames! I copy and pasted my work on the first three from another forum, but will continue to post any new analysis in this thread. As you will be able to tell, I am getting more and more in depth and more accessible with my language used as it goes on. I really want to encourage participation in this, so shoot out any ideas you have!
I will start from the 'top' down. The cephalon (head) of the zergling is rather small, supported by apparently thick neck muscles and a carapace on top. The eyes are as we would expect from, well, anyone who hasn't looked at a spider: 2 eyes. Sadly, they aren't binocular, based on position. They are sub-binocular, meaning there would be a blind spot in the front. This is problematic for the Zerglings, I would imagine. This blindspot is reinforced by the seemingly pointless "face claws" that act as an outer mandible. What purpose these have is beyond me; in fact, the muscle attachments are lacking and purpose is baffling, other than to protrude further into Zergling vision. This is what I would refer to as the "Hydralisk effect," having a second "outer mandible" that really has no purpose other than to look tough.
The dentition is strongly fangling- I would suggest that this is appropriate for a creature like a Zergling. Grab the prey with whatever you can and do what you can with everything else. The piercing nature is great, however provides a troublesome dichotomy; the teeth should be recurved or even barbed if the purpose is to hold prey (though it appears as though the root isn't as strong as the crown in this case) they could be recurved or even barbed. However, if the purpose is outright damage, one needs to look no further than the dinosaurs for inspiration. They all have carinae, which are basically serrations that make them shred, much like a Great White Shark. However, these strang piercing teeth seem to be shallowly rooted and generic, without the lovely blood canals in cat canines or carnassials for tearing, as seen again on the cats.
The pectoral girdle is really of issue. The inner claws (upper in the picture) are not recurved enough to allow for climbing and devoid of purpose other than a simple bludgeon. Along with that, it really appears that the shoulder would be split on purpose. Other than some beastly tendons (like the raptors famous claw) you would be hard pressed to cause damage. As the most protruding hunting appendage, the upper claw would logically be recurved to hold prey, allowing the piercing teeth, odd cheek second jaw and lower claw to cause damage.
You can tell by looking at the lower claw that it is formidable. This is a fantastic weapon- a tendon expanding as it moves axially to sprig a deadly slash. The purpose of the shoulder 'wing' is probably design, as having that section of carapace expend like that would actually impede body extension in full spring.
The wing location should be more dorsal to be effective, not attached to the front girdle. A simple anatomy of insects shows why this is practical.
The posterior leg is fantastic or jumping, but is rather rigid which may run into issues on soft substrates in that it will dig in and transfer away the power from that fantastic pseudo-quad muscle in the upper leg. The heel claw is a nice artistic touch, but ultimately impractical and probably energetically costly to make in a race that is evolutionarily streamlining in a logical way. Kind of sour about how vertebrate the limbs look (and are), but I promised I wouldn't !@#$% about that.
The tail is merely a balance issue and a good call by designers for a saltatory critter using wings to gain extra thrust. I am a bit sour on how flexible it is; one needs only to look at animals that use their tails for balance to understand why a floppy tail isn't the best. Almost all theropods, especially those that are fast (like speedlings) have a rigid tail, reinforced by calcified tendons.
Overall, this animal looks more fierce than it is. Practically, even if its purpose is just to kill, it's getting a B- grade or so. Too many bells and whistles, too little function. Too much display in a species that isn't intimidating, it isn't having sex, it is simply killing as effectively as possible. Fun fact: recurved claws are needed for climbing, which I understand is a campaign addition in HotS for zerglings. A cluttered animal, the zergling has much to learn about lowest common denominator. I am at a loss for explaining all the random spikes etc, as honestly the only purpose other than osteoderms (dermal bone)/armor they would have to be sexual and I think we can all agree that zerglings dating is very "unzergy."
The ultralisk really strikes me as the bulldog of the Starcraft universe. Literally, the head looks like a bulldog with a spike coming out of it.
The lower jaw is really, really awkward. Having those three extra teeth really doesn't make much sense. However, as far as the anatomy of the teeth themselves, they appear to look like Crocodilian molars, which are primarily for crushing. However, there doesn't appear to be anything for them to occlude with! It really reminds me of beavis:
The lower jaw fails to occlude with his upper jaw! This would render these teeth purely for flash, sadly. Much like the 'nasal' horn, which also appears to be for flash when one considers the primary mode of attack for an Ultralisk (edit: it's actually good for ramming buildings. If you can break the seal when fighting in space then it's gg terrans/toss). The eyesight is actually much better for these than for zerglings; they need slightly offset fields of view, much like a herbivore (brontolith, anyone?) Since their scythes sweep in such a massive arc, a blind spot would be completely non-impactful whereas a wider field of view allows for placing the sweeping blades for the most impact possible. Once again we see the "Hydralisk Effect" coming into play, with an outer set of mandibles. Sigh.
As far as the cephalic shield, it serves two purposes. Not only does it take a large amount of impact from tank shells or banshee fire (or whatever), but the underside may serve a utilitarian purpose. Much like Ceratopsian frills, which are primarily for muscle attachment, the underside of this massive structure could be a shelf for the massive muscle attachments for the scythes, which may attach in a way similar to a Velociraptor (and ally) claw, by running a powerful tendon to the base of the scythe, allowing for a very powerful use of potential energy. This may work in a way similar to a crab's claw as well, with a twin set of apodemes, which are pseudo-tendons that are used to powerfully enhance muscle attachment surface area for the attack and recoil. I suspect it's the second option, given the rigidity with which the sweeping attack hits. The purpose of 4 claws versus 2 is basically mathematics: if you are serving a purpose of crushing through as much of the battlefield as possible, a damaged claw/arm would give the opposing claw/arm nothing to occlude with, rendering the Ultralisk neutered. So, by adding a second set, there is a fail-safe ensuring that damage is far more likely a result of the Ultra hitting its target.
The thick trunk of the Ultralisk is both used to support the massive weight as well as the intense musculature needed to harness such force. This is a weak area for the Ultralisk, as a underside attack/frontal attack seems to hit simple muscle and covering, rather than the massive chitinous mass that is the shield. This is also a structural weak point, and perhaps a point of fatigue for the Ultra, as the joint between the quadrupedal girdle at the base and the trunk seems to be an awkward angle for transferring muscle use efficaciously.
While on the topic of the lower girdle, I am kind of annoyed with the orientation of the limbs. They really need to be more Sauropod like, as they are the only animals large enough on land to really be analogous with the Ultra. Then need to basically be column-like legs, which would also allow for the ultra to not simply fold under the massive forces of tank shells hitting the upper shield. This would lower the walking speed, sadly, but is a necessary sacrifice if you want your Ultra to not just lay down and die. The logic is quite simple- the more angles in load bearing limbs, especially on this scale, the more weak spots you have. If you orient it like an elephant or, for example, Brachiosaurus, where the limbs are completely vertical, the load bearing potential is much, much higher, but the walking speed is less likely to be high. Just ask our own relatives: we are slow as hell, but we need to have our limbs vertical like they are for endurance (and other non-relevant reasons.)
Interesting analysis. Are you only judging the anatomy based on unit models or artwork? Lore/books? I know SC1 and SC2 Zerglings/Hydralisks/Ultras look way different too.Would you be able to sketch changes or concept art on what you think could improve these anatomies?
The Muta has 8 eyes. Yep, 8 beady little eyes. They seem to be reflective, which is useful for creatures that move through low light environments. It is reminiscent of the Tapetum Lucidum found in Cats. We see that there are two sets of mouthparts, including the controversial "hydralisk effect" jaw. However, it's not useless in this case! You can see that it actually occludes with a top part, which looks to be optimal for grasping prey. The lovely part of this is that the inside mouth parts appear to be suited for tearing, so it makes a nice dynamic of holding prey up to the face- extremely important as the only appendages are wings. Unfortunately for the eye placement, they can't look directly at what they are firing at. Not a big deal, they can probably size of an approximate target and the glaive worm will bounce around. It depends largely on the spatial awareness part of the brain for the mutalisk, which I would suggest is the primary part of the brain (along with sight center.) Using various landmarks and distance recognition as they approach a target can be used to make a fairly accurate approximation of where their shot should be aimed to land.
The segmented armor moving back on the forehead region is very reminiscent of Lorica Segmentata which was an innovative Roman armor that was great for flexibility as well as causing blows to glance off instead of penetrate. An excellent feature for a flexible and fast armoured flying menace.
The wing attachment is right at the back of the cephalic (head) region. Nothing wrong with this, just a neckless version of any flighted vertebrate. We can all agree that the wings are simply not enough to provide thrust and are clearly designed after a bat-wing orientation (fingers radiating out to support the membrane.) The difference is that the supports aren't radiating from the same origin, you can see that they actually come off of various different attachments. I am not sure how to feel about this, I suppose it depends on the strength of the attachments (which may or may not be a larger investment than a single origin point, no idea) and the stiffness of the supports, which are likely a polymer of some sort scaled up as it's cheap and easy to create biologically. It may also be something like a chitin/collagen analog.
The belly scales appear to be armoured and overlapping, which allows for mobility in this region (necessary for the abdominal muscles to be able to clench to shoot out some glaive wurms.) I don't think the back is armoured as much as the front, which makes sense for weight reduction.
Speaking of weight reduction, how the hell does a 300kg mutalisk fly? Well, I have no idea about the physics in space, but I do know that it's entirely probable that there are some Helium (lighter than air, inert and abundant all over the universe) sacs that not only work as a pseudo-bone structure for support, but help to compensate for the armour. The wings are almost certainly not a great source of thrust, so it's a mystery to me how they move so fast and accelerate so fast. I think the bum region (where the glaive wurm comes out) along with the wings may be used for manoeuvring.
Now for what is perhaps the most interesting part of the mutalisk...the glaive wurm launching. This is certainly an exaptation (a part that has been re-purposed evolutionarily) of an anus. This orifice seems to have been expanded and reinforced by claw-like things that surround it on 4 corners. This makes me strongly think that the origins of the wurm are actually an intestinal parasite which was re-purposed to cause damage, perhaps using explosive gases (which can be really cheap and easy to get, like Hydrogen) or more likely a strong acid that has had green added for effect (as most of the strong acids are clear). It is possible that along with abdominal contractions the wurm is launched with some sort of lighter-than-air gas (perhaps a small hydrogen explosion with a muscle contraction used to make a biological firing chamber.) Give it an ability to bounce around, which I have no idea about because I can't find a pic of a glaive wurm, and you have something that can cause considerable damage in a group of units.
Their wing beat frequency is an issue, as hovering flight needs some pretty high frequency beats. This is probably mitigated by the gas bladders, however, with wings being used not for lift but to prevent the muta from flying higher than needed with the lighter-than-air helium bladders. An analogy would be how a balloonist controls height by managing the temperature in his balloon. Heat moderation within the gas chambers might be used to maintain altitude as well in the muta; if they can control their metabolism and are endothermic (which I assume they are) they can control the heat, to some degree, of the Helium.
Roosting is another issue. Creatively speaking, perhaps they use the claws on their anal opening/glaive wurm launch opening to hang upside down from a spire/greater spire, or maybe a cliff.
Anyways, if someone can find a glaive wurm pic I'd love to take a crack at it more in depth.
Comments, questions, criticisms always appreciated. Let me know what I should do next!
On September 07 2012 18:51 Chicken Chaser wrote: Interesting analysis. Are you only judging the anatomy based on unit models or artwork? Lore/books? I know SC1 and SC2 Zerglings/Hydralisks/Ultras look way different too.Would you be able to sketch changes or concept art on what you think could improve these anatomies?
I am basing it on whatever I can google up. I don't want to comment on how to improve things, it's not really my place- I am simply assessing the functional elements of the creatures. It also keeps wild speculation in check and keeps things on point. I am trying to keep analysis to what we see in sc2, but I am totally open to doing new HotS content, the creep itself, buildings, protoss biological anatomy, or even SC1 stuff. Just post what you want me to talk about and I'll take the most popular (along with what they want on the bnet forums as well.)
I am shit at art, so I am going to refrain from drawing anything myself and just use my words (like a big boy.)
On September 07 2012 18:51 Chicken Chaser wrote: Interesting analysis. Are you only judging the anatomy based on unit models or artwork? Lore/books? I know SC1 and SC2 Zerglings/Hydralisks/Ultras look way different too.Would you be able to sketch changes or concept art on what you think could improve these anatomies?
I am basing it on whatever I can google up. I don't want to comment on how to improve things, it's not really my place- I am simply assessing the functional elements of the creatures. It also keeps wild speculation in check and keeps things on point. I am trying to keep analysis to what we see in sc2, but I am totally open to doing new HotS content, the creep itself, buildings, protoss biological anatomy, or even SC1 stuff. Just post what you want me to talk about and I'll take the most popular (along with what they want on the bnet forums as well.)
I am shit at art, so I am going to refrain from drawing anything myself and just use my words (like a big boy.)
how about doing the zerg buildings? would be a cool read.
I will cover the buildings one at a time, just like the units. :D Right now I'm kind of doing random things til I get a better idea of what everyone wants me to do. I'll prioritize based on popularity!
It's just a muscle placement issue for the zergling wings. They already have 2 sets of limbs coming from that part, so it would diminish the size and surface area for the muscles to pack more individual muscles into that space. By moving the wing attachment site, you allow for more room for every muscle concerned.
yeah this is pretty cool. you should go into starcraft 2's real art website though you can get more views of units there, a lot of them have them as part of armies and stuff like that.
The random spikes a zergling has all over it's body might just be to make it harder for enemy fangs to hit the more vulnerable regions like the tail, legs or the upper neck region down it's back.
The random spikes, etc, are really reminiscent of Euoplocephalus. Might just make them look scarier. I really didn't take into consideration that they also have to fight zerg from time to time. I'll have to work that into future analysis!
My girlfriend also suggested that you should take into consideration how some parts might be of display for mating (ultra theeth). If something like this does even happen in Zerg race cO, some lore nerd here? :D They could, like former elephants or animals with antlers, work as a presentation for "strength" in terms of size.
And do maybe the wings of lings work in a different fashion than normal insects wings does? I always imagine they use the wings to kinda give them a nitro-boost, considering a lot of sc plays in space it could be more logical if they use them as an forward-moving-enhachment device.
On September 07 2012 20:36 bluQ wrote: My girlfriend also suggested that you should take into consideration how some parts might be of display for mating (ultra theeth). If something like this does even happen in Zerg race cO, some lore nerd here? :D They could, like former elephants or animals with antlers, work as a presentation for "strength" in terms of size.
And do maybe the wings of lings work in a different fashion than normal insects wings does? I always imagine they use the wings to kinda give them a nitro-boost, considering a lot of sc plays in space it could be more logical if they use them as an forward-moving-enhachment device.
Edit: and of course AWESOME read :D
Even if it's not for mating for Zerg units, it may be a trait which is inherited from the original host creature, that the transformation didn't get rid of
Concerning the spikes and such, maybe they are there for scaring other enemies. Of course other zerg army won't be, but thinking about protoss and terrans, you have to consider morale and phsicology when facing them.
Maybe the Ultra's teeth serve no real purpose, but I will be really afraid of that. "Look at the size of that teeth!!" fits pretty well when looking at an Ultra.
After all, the zerg are an evolutionary race, but with rational design on the backup, so queens and cerebrates put and take away characteristics at will.
Nonetheless, great writing there, I will read the whole series.
I would think that the zerg have no need for superfluous mating structures. So I doubt that they really use them- any remaining from the original animals would be vestigial at best. The zerg wings need a muscle attachment site that is strong in order to provide any kind of assist to their leaping gait. It is just logical to move them away from the double limb girdle there in order to provide more area for a functional muscle group.
As far as the intimidation factor, yeah I can see that coming into play especially with Terrans in mind. I doubt the Ultra would need to add extra teeth in order to look fearsome, being that it's outrageously big and the nature of the kaiser blades really lends itself to be scary as hell. I am thinking that the spikes and whatnot on the carapace which don't have an immediate obvious purpose must be for zerg on zerg or zerg on wild animal (as it would no doubt happen) combat.
Glad you are all enjoying it! Remember to tell me what you want to read about next!
On September 07 2012 21:12 Ponera wrote: Glad you are all enjoying it! Remember to tell me what you want to read about next!
Roach? Or Hydra, because you already mentioned its mandibles?
Generally, how possible is it that the Zerg creatures have some features from their previous species that are not useful in their current form? I am not an expert, but maybe the human coccyx is an example for that as a remnant of a tail.
On September 07 2012 21:35 papalion wrote: Generally, how possible is it that the Zerg creatures have some features from their previous species that are not useful in their current form?
I think that, even if you make the best tuning on any car, you are still restricted to the main frame and configuration.
Honestly, as a biologist myself I don't get how you dismiss the possibility of the Zergling being a vertebrate. I would clearly say it is vertebrate, judging by the dorsal focus, the long tail and the lack of segmentation.
The carapace looks more leathery than scaly, so you could compare it to carnivore birds or mammals. I agree, that it was WAY too many limbs, but much of your criticism seems overly harsh.
The eyes are at least oriented forward and grant a good depth perception in the spot not obscured by their protruding nosebridge. They are also lense eyes and if you like you can attribute the red glow to a reflective retina similar to the cat-eye effect. Probably a dusk/dawn predator.
If you run with the vertebrate thingy, the jaw-claws must be extremely flexible, maybe even retractable/extendable, judging from the mass of skin material. So while the zergling uses his teeth to grip and hold the prey, these claws punch holes and do the damage.
The long 'inner claws' protruding from the shoulder over the head are not well designed. You could imagine they being used as a grappling hook to attach to a large prey after a jump to stay close to vital areas. But they are anchored way to fragile and probably just fracture with most stress.
The wings might have an additional joint that we cannot see (located between the hip-plates and the back in the picture) so they can unfurl above the hip plates for gliding. But that seems impractical and unlikely. They might be used as additional propulsion buffeting air directly to the back in an up and down movement. But they seem pretty worthless and they increase the limb count a ton and would come with many vulnerable joints.
The legs are fine, though the orientation of the front claw is would hinder sprinting unless nearly fully retractable ( for which there is no space in the foot). Hind leg seems fine.
Overall I'd say there are too many limbs. Remove those stupid overhead-claw-sticks and at least one pair of wings. They wings should be gliding membranes protruding from the leg area. And get rid of those ridiculous front claws and replace them with something sensible. You already have enough weapons and these jaw-claws for slashing.
Thrombo: Glad you contributed! Yeah it is overwhelmingly vertebrate, but they do go out of their way to refer to zerg as insectoid. I think the front claws are fine, assuming it's got a kangaroo-like form of saltation. The large claw on the back leg makes it less versatile than could be, as pointed out. I really like that you pointed this stuff out, I hope you continue to share your opinion on anything I write, as the discussion is more fun than the write up itself imo! The face claws I didn't think were flexible at all, but they may well be. I don't see where the musculature for a strong puncturing mechanism would be housed though, especially if the zergling has some strong masseter-like muscles at the back of the jaw, which you'd assume they would if they are biting to puncture and hold prey with those teeth of theirs.
It was brought up on the bnet forums that the outer jaw "Hydralisk Effect" is perhaps a trait that they can't 'get rid of', which is when it was debated just how adept the zerg are at genetic manipulation. You'd think if they can turn a brontolith into an ultralisk they can figure out how to turn off the alleles for specific genes, eviscerador. It's just overall inconsistent, either they are masters as blizzard claims they are or they aren't. Some traits would be easier to get rid of and some would just become vestigial, sure, but the hydralisk derp jaw is present in many zerg forms, meaning that it's more likely to be a base trait from the original zerg strain...yet that would mean that it is surely something that has been most heavily modified.
Actually, where do they go out of the way to refer to zerg as insectoid? Yes, many are and the general organization with the hive-mind structure points that way. But they clearly state that the different zerg strains in the swarm come from different animals assimilated, so they would belong to different groups.
Jaw-claw related: the skin/muscle folds only make sense if the appendage holding the claw is either pure muscle (tounge like) or supported by a spongy body instead of a bone. Then you could set muscles accordingly for flexibility. But I agree it's a problem. Maybe the perspective is just bad and what looks like a purple throat sack are actually the muscles?
Being versed in genetics I can tell you that it's not that easy as to "switch off the jaw-claw" allel. If you think about the races fusing upon assimilation, the claw may very well be a basic part of the body plan. Similar how spiders cannot switch off 2 'leg allels' if they only need 6 legs. The current for may just be an atavism.
Also I'm not sure, if the zerg evolution is really done by direct genetic manipulation and gene design but rather by a rapid breeding process.
Good points. I assume the face claw is covered by the carapace. I think their evolution is gene manipulation since they dont really breed. If they are masters of gebetic manipulation and if the face claw is controlled by hox genes the switch off could be easy. If not they could simply remove the face claw stepwise or at least make an exaptation of it.
Hox genes are for the segmentation. You would have to modify or delete quite a few hox sensitive genes that derive their positional information from the hox-group.
I always viewed zerg more as a hyper evolution race where the overmind radically selects which material to continue for breeding.
On September 08 2012 00:46 Thrombozyt wrote: Hox genes are for the segmentation. You would have to modify or delete quite a few hox sensitive genes that derive their positional information from the hox-group.
I always viewed zerg more as a hyper evolution race where the overmind radically selects which material to continue for breeding.
I think it's clear that no "breeding" as such is taking place, given that all known Zerg creatures except for the Queen are adult forms of larva produced by an unknown mechanism of the Hatchery, with all differentiation taking place after the larva's genesis. It always seemed to me that it was strongly implied that Zerg were generated by genetic modification rather than by any kind of breeding program. Their assimilation of Kerrigan would support that too, would it not, since they obviously modified her directly rather than enlisting her in a rapid breeding program (a choice that has denied the community a huge amount of fan-fiction).
Quick photoshop of a dumbed down zergling...just for fun to see how it might look with some of the suggestions you've mentioned. I removed the "stupid overhead-claw-sticks" and the wings, made the tail less flimsy, and large claw on back leg gone.
I was thinking the tail would be held more horizontally. Also the face claws suck and should go. The wings should be there still if the dumb claws are gone.
I know that there has been speculation on TL before about the Mutalisk using some sort of gas propulsion system for high speed movement rather than the wings, since they can fly through the vacuum of space, the wings would just be for stabilization and manuevering in atmospheric flight. The helium/hydrogen sack idea for spitting the glaive worms and their weight maybe needing counterbalancing lift would fit into this idea quite well.
The zergling is one of the few zergs which the original species is known from sc1 lore (the dune-runners of Zz’gash) that was adapted into the zerg swarm, so likely to be vertebrates. The zergling has always been more fierce looking than effective, relying on numbers for their true strength to show. A marine can easily gun down a zergling or two on his own, it is a when they are in a pack that they actually stand an effective chance, hence why the spawn in pairs.
On September 08 2012 00:46 Thrombozyt wrote: Hox genes are for the segmentation. You would have to modify or delete quite a few hox sensitive genes that derive their positional information from the hox-group.
I always viewed zerg more as a hyper evolution race where the overmind radically selects which material to continue for breeding.
I think it's clear that no "breeding" as such is taking place, given that all known Zerg creatures except for the Queen are adult forms of larva produced by an unknown mechanism of the Hatchery, with all differentiation taking place after the larva's genesis. It always seemed to me that it was strongly implied that Zerg were generated by genetic modification rather than by any kind of breeding program. Their assimilation of Kerrigan would support that too, would it not, since they obviously modified her directly rather than enlisting her in a rapid breeding program (a choice that has denied the community a huge amount of fan-fiction).
The infestation would be through mutated viruses directly influencing gene expression and introducing new genes. In the campaign there were massive indications of infestation through viral infection.
The breeding would only be required for upgrades. It would happen in the tech structures and enhance the available strains. Larvae - probably the remnant of the species responsible for the face claw syndrome - posses all genomic material of all strains and pheromones secreted by the hatch/creep activate the target strain and the metamorphosis into an egg. The Larvae species probably offers the rapid growth trait.
So you start the game, a larva can only form a drone, as only drone pheromone can be produced/supplied by the creep. The pool completes and starts pumping pheromones for the zergling genome into the creep -> you can hatch lings. Now you want to upgrade to speedlings and a rapid breeding program selects zerlings for speed. (If you want to be exact and explain why current lings also gain wings, the breeding program selects for viral particles that modify the zergling host to become a speedling. Once the upgrade is complete, the virus is pumped into the atmosphere.)
On September 08 2012 00:46 Thrombozyt wrote: Hox genes are for the segmentation. You would have to modify or delete quite a few hox sensitive genes that derive their positional information from the hox-group.
I always viewed zerg more as a hyper evolution race where the overmind radically selects which material to continue for breeding.
I think it's clear that no "breeding" as such is taking place, given that all known Zerg creatures except for the Queen are adult forms of larva produced by an unknown mechanism of the Hatchery, with all differentiation taking place after the larva's genesis. It always seemed to me that it was strongly implied that Zerg were generated by genetic modification rather than by any kind of breeding program. Their assimilation of Kerrigan would support that too, would it not, since they obviously modified her directly rather than enlisting her in a rapid breeding program (a choice that has denied the community a huge amount of fan-fiction).
The infestation would be through mutated viruses directly influencing gene expression and introducing new genes. In the campaign there were massive indications of infestation through viral infection.
The breeding would only be required for upgrades. It would happen in the tech structures and enhance the available strains. Larvae - probably the remnant of the species responsible for the face claw syndrome - posses all genomic material of all strains and pheromones secreted by the hatch/creep activate the target strain and the metamorphosis into an egg. The Larvae species probably offers the rapid growth trait.
So you start the game, a larva can only form a drone, as only drone pheromone can be produced/supplied by the creep. The pool completes and starts pumping pheromones for the zergling genome into the creep -> you can hatch lings. Now you want to upgrade to speedlings and a rapid breeding program selects zerlings for speed. (If you want to be exact and explain why current lings also gain wings, the breeding program selects for viral particles that modify the zergling host to become a speedling. Once the upgrade is complete, the virus is pumped into the atmosphere.)
Indeed, the original sc1 lore states that the larva's primary abilities are replicating various dna strains with very rapid growth, and that the evolutionary breeding of new traits(speedling) occurs within new buildings. To quote the lore directly: "The closest creatures to the original Zerg insectoids are the Zerg Larvae. Although their size and toughness were greatly boosted by the Xel'Naga during their experiments, they still possess the two traits that originally intrigued the ancient masters: genetic versatility and psychic sensitivity.
Maggot-like, Zerg Larvae contain within them the genetic code for all other Zerg breeds. When a new breed of Zerg is needed, an individual Larva will enter a pupal state and begin replicating the DNA of one specific Zerg breed at an astounding rate. After a short gestation period, the new mature Zerg hatches.
A young hive will only have the genetic code for the most basic of Zerg breeds, such as the Drone, but as it grows and develops new structures, its library of genetic strains is expanded."
I love your contributions so far guys, this is awesome. I definitely don't know much about virology or genetics, which is why I opt to look at morphology myself. :D
On September 08 2012 06:58 Ponera wrote: So far I have a tie between Roach and Infestor for next target, with drone in third place. Need some tie breaking!
My vote would go for Roach, they look interesting. Infestor is a little too much like Starship Troopers brain bug for me to look at an analysis seriously in a non-comical way xD.
how about doing the zerg buildings? would be a cool read.
I agree, since the buildings come from a living thing (the drone), and furthermore the thread of the underground mechanics of sc2 with regards to the zerg hatchery was pretty cool I have to say!
I really enjoyed reading this, thanks for the write up! I think continuing with Zerg is your best bet since they are all biological. Protoss is mostly mostly vehicles or robots, but perhaps just a break down of the zealot would be nice. Terran is also difficult, but perhaps a breakdown of how the suit looks impossible to fit in, or the battle hellion.
Looks like Roach is next, might do it tonight. Got one hour of sleep and had a bit of a bitchy day but I'll see how it goes. Waiting on a loyal follower on b.net forums to give me 3d model references. Any resources you want me to consider feel free to post.
I love you guys. I also refuse to proof-read still, apparently. The bar only goes up!
I plan on trying to let to you know what is what anatomically, yet I plan also on using words like "head" instead of "cephalon." Feedback would be "impeccably timed" (lol admiral Urun) here, to really help me understand what is bad about my posts, what is great about my posts and what I can post pictures of to help you guys understand how to educate you better, as this is a passion of mine.
Seriously, if you think I'm a full retard then please let me know. If I'm wrong, let me know. If I'm the best thing you've ever read, let me know. If you are a thin girl (18+ ) that is sexually available but has emotional or daddy issues, let me know. Let me know my friends, let me know.
<3
PS Roach incoming followed by Infestor and then drone, unless I get the random urge to do swarm host in there. Roach is assured to be the next though!!! Post observations/comments about the roaches in game attack, upgrades and especially dynamic anatomy here! I will use any resources I am not too lazy to use.
Edit: I assume it's not just me but are the Ultra's eyes in a sub-downward orientation??? Nope, not just me, they are angled down with lovely accentuated overhangs called eye sockets. Clearly borrowed from the eye turrets of Chameleons, but in this case with an imposed downward gaze from all kinds of fun upper eyelid tissue. Makes so much sense! Ask me if you care to know more. I am also sour about the spike coming from the neck-chin, don't worry about it. It is useless....and then they doubled it.
Some thoughts for your next topic: The roach obviously has two attacks. One with their (top ?) claws in melee and some acid spitting. For the acid I can think of two possible originations. A gland in their mouth which enriches their salvia with acidic substances when in stressfull situations (fight or flight etc) or just simply stomach acid. The stomach acid would be a one time attack just before the engagement to blind the enemy and overall decrease their combat capacity through pain etc. Spitting could be more constant, as shown in the game. Evolutionary the spitting gland could have developed from something that helped the roach to dissolve hard plant parts or bones before they reach the stomach.
the acid gland isn't in the mouth or stomach. Given the anatomy, I would think it is located in the carapace surrounding the head. If you generate acid outside of a stomach it becomes more of a volatile/last ditch defense mechanism (bombardier beetle) or a powerful offensive tool (hymenoptera.)
I am leaning towards a case of 1 to 3 acid glands that spray around the head using the carapace to direct it, etc, I have some special surprises for the elaborate roach biology coming up.
I really love youre idea, please keep me up to date on how you develop it. I will develop my idea more in the upcoming roach anatomy post! (coming soon) This is a great post, by the way. You really are thinking and putting effort into your response. While I may not use your ideas, I want you to develop them. Make your own science/anatomy concepts and then double them.
Remember, fledgling anatomists:You don't make a mistake, you just aren't perfect the first (or in my case, 600th) time!
It always makes me happy to see passionate nerds engaging in something analytical and fun instead of flaming and so on. Even for a non-biologist, this thread is a great read. Thanks for the nerdfest!
also the collectors edition book has some great pictures, some may be of use too, IDK where you'd find those online though, probably could find a scan of it though I'd imagine.
When I look at the ultralisk pictures, I would say that there are either multiple polymorphisms of this species or the two pics you posted are male (probably the one with the 3 giant teeth in the lower jaw) and female (the upper picture).
What's really bothering me with the detailed ultralisk depiction is that the way the muscles are mounted points towards an exoskeleton like it's found in crustacean with the muscles fixed to the hard outer shell. The arthropod nature is also suggested by the upgrade chitinous plating as chitin is usually the material used for arthropod shells.
Yet lore wise, the ultralisk is probably derived from vertebrates, especially as the arthropod respiratory system shouldn't support a creature of that size if it isn't in an environment with an extremely high oxygen atmosphere.
So I maybe the fusion process between the insectoid zerg origin species and the ultralisk ancestor isn't complete yet. That would account for the high variability in appearance as well as for the seemingly random sprouting of horns or horn plating, that appears more like a hyperkeratosis that properly evolved and grown protective plates.
Regarding the angle of the legs, I would liken it to turtles that have similarly mounted legs to lower their center of gravity and gain stability. At that height, with feet mounted straight down, it could be prone to being knocked on the side. I agree, that it's a nightmare to carry energy wise, but the ultralisk could be usually living partly submerged in rivers and swamps, where the distribution of weight over a larger area would also help with the softer ground.
The primary scythes actually don't make that much sense. At that size they won't be sharp nor fast enough to really cut and they aren't aligned to crush. You could only imagine that their tips would puncture. Also the second pair is aligned even worse and probably of even less use as the lower pair is in the way. As major forms of attack I would actually suggest the nasal horn (it looks nasty and functional) and - most important - trampling.
On September 08 2012 18:57 Ponera wrote: I really love youre idea, please keep me up to date on how you develop it. I will develop my idea more in the upcoming roach anatomy post! (coming soon) This is a great post, by the way. You really are thinking and putting effort into your response. While I may not use your ideas, I want you to develop them. Make your own science/anatomy concepts and then double them.
Remember, fledgling anatomists:You don't make a mistake, you just aren't perfect the first (or in my case, 600th) time!
Thanks. I'm not really schooled in biology. I just had my palaeontology lecture for some basic biological taxonomy and terms - that's it. So all I can do is basicly try to find some links to existing animals I know of. What makes your posts interesting is that they go a bit deeper than common knowledge even if it's just some nerdy food for thought
I personaly prefer objects that don't run away when you try to hit them with a hammer.
When I look at the ultralisk pictures, I would say that there are either multiple polymorphisms of this species or the two pics you posted are male (probably the one with the 3 giant teeth in the lower jaw) and female (the upper picture).
What's really bothering me with the detailed ultralisk depiction is that the way the muscles are mounted points towards an exoskeleton like it's found in crustacean with the muscles fixed to the hard outer shell. The arthropod nature is also suggested by the upgrade chitinous plating as chitin is usually the material used for arthropod shells.
Yet lore wise, the ultralisk is probably derived from vertebrates, especially as the arthropod respiratory system shouldn't support a creature of that size if it isn't in an environment with an extremely high oxygen atmosphere.
So I maybe the fusion process between the insectoid zerg origin species and the ultralisk ancestor isn't complete yet. That would account for the high variability in appearance as well as for the seemingly random sprouting of horns or horn plating, that appears more like a hyperkeratosis that properly evolved and grown protective plates.
Another hypothesis is to think that the Ultralisk (as probably any of the hyper-mutating, non-mating, short-lived zerg organisms) is very prone to cancer, and the random horns are really cancerous horns, something like keratinous skin tumors. This would explain their variance and lack of functionality.
Regarding the angle of the legs, I would liken it to turtles that have similarly mounted legs to lower their center of gravity and gain stability. At that height, with feet mounted straight down, it could be prone to being knocked on the side. I agree, that it's a nightmare to carry energy wise, but the ultralisk could be usually living partly submerged in rivers and swamps, where the distribution of weight over a larger area would also help with the softer ground.
The primary scythes actually don't make that much sense. At that size they won't be sharp nor fast enough to really cut and they aren't aligned to crush. You could only imagine that their tips would puncture. Also the second pair is aligned even worse and probably of even less use as the lower pair is in the way. As major forms of attack I would actually suggest the nasal horn (it looks nasty and functional) and - most important - trampling.
Wouldn't the scythes with that much size be able to ram? As long as the muscle structure is strong enough to withstand impact, they could be similar to an elephants tusks which do not need to be sharp as they can be used as cudgels or like a ram's horns for ramming.
@Ghanburighan Yes, the hyperkeratosis would be a form of skin tumor. I agree, that the ultralisk may be a short lived form only breed shortly before battle, while the zerglings would be a stable species as they perform patrol and sentry duty.
For the ramming - it is a possibility, thought he orientation and form is unsuited for it. Also the movement is rather bad for ramming. But the scythe might be used as a cudgel to knock them to the center path to be trampled.
Wow, such a brilliant read, I'm not surprised that they didn't try to make zerg units the most realistic way they could be though as in the end the unit models are just there to look cool.
Thinking about it though the zerg are meant to be the 'ultimate' race having rapidly evolved through examining other species they have processed so they should have perfect design! :D
I think, perhaps, there might be a different function to the Zergling "wings" than propulsion or any kind of flight. My thought process on this is based on both the name of the upgrade path (Metabolic Boost, Adrenal Glands) and the mechanics of the unit as shown in game. The short version is, zerglings don't fly or leave the ground - they just move faster. If the wings were for any kind of functional flight, even short range gliding, then zerglings would be capable of some form of cliff walk - either one way (down) in the case of gliding or full cliffwalk via powered flight. While the zerg fliers don't seem to utilize wings much for flight (corruptors and overlords come to mind, as well as your thoughts on mutalisk wing usage) it seems, the zergling "wings" could be used for another purpose, which I'll go into now.
The design of the zergling wings seems to be a large support truss with smaller trusses supporting dragonfly-like membranous material or possibly thin, translucent skin flaps. There of course are blood vessels running through the wings. This makes the wings more effective heat exchangers, allowing the dissipation of heat into the atmosphere more optimal than a mechanism like sweat. The increased speed granted to zerglings may be a result of being better able to control their core body heat - by using blood pumped through the wings as a heat transfer mechanism. This enables a higher degree of metabolic conversion in the body, allowing the zergling to more efficiently utilize energy while keeping the working muscles cooler and preventing fatigue. Additionally, the wings may allow greater oxygenation of the blood. This could help to reduce any muscle exhaustion due to anaerobic metabolic periods, reduce lactic acid build up, and generally sustained and increased muscle performance. Adrenal glands would then push this entire system into overdrive, increasing the ability of the zergling to utilize its muscles at performance levels that would otherwise rapidly tire and overheat the zergling. In that scenario, the wings do not really need to have a great degree of flexibility and the apparent stiffness of the wings is easier to accept. Also, if such is their function, the wings' placement makes more sense, radiating heat away from the core of the zergling and to the atmosphere more efficiently when moving rapidly (ie, there's more and less restricted airflow across the wings).
Of course, I am not a biologist in any sense but that strikes me as a possible explanation for an alternate function of the zergling wings.
Also, great thread. I may have to point a friend of mine at it, as he's currently doing his PhD in kinesthiology (or something similar - not sure exactly what his degree is but that's what he works on) and enjoys investigating the mechanical workings of organisms. (He has undergraduate degress in both biology and aeronautical engineering, and has published papers on the biomechanics of snake movement as well as the mechanism of how bullfrogs jump.)
Edit: Also, this could be why zerglings are really bad against hellions. They burn really easy, having a high metabolic rate and likely therefore an already very elevated body temperature. They are already "burning" up so much that just a quick application of flame causes them to combust.
Heat dissipation is really a good reason for the wings... though the running animation of the speedling shows the wings beating... but that may very well be secondary.
Good stuff, I definately recommend reading the books for some reference into Protoss anatomy. They give a lot of insight into the actual evolution of the race and ancient, pre evolved bodily structures. Did you at one point Protoss had mouths? Check it out, it's worth taking a look at if you're serious about this whole project.
Wow you nerds are really liking this! I guess I'll have to keep going, thanks for the support. I will definitely have to do the neutral critters at some point hah!
The concept of ultralisks living in swampy environments is as flawed as it was when they thought that dinosaurs had to live in swamps. It just isn't really necessary and is logically a cop-out. I still think the legs are an issue. The horn may well be a cancerous growth, who knows perhaps many of the other random horns and bumps are cancers. It would make sense!
As far as the wings of the zergling for heat exchange: dragonflies actively use their wings for heat exchange. They lay them horizontally to heat up and even do a behaviour called "Obelisking" to cool down. If you look at the zerging animation post-speed, they actually do get a little bit of hang time in the air from time to time. This is logically similar to flying fish, who leap out of water to get some speed and some air!
I don't like the concept of zerg having genders. I suspect they are all mono-gendered, like all the other superorganisms out there. It would make sense for the units to be sterile males or females, with queens being active reproducers (inject lavae) with male genes being added with additions of new buildings.
The roaches eyes are binocular and likely allow for a great assessment of acid distance shooting, which is a critical tool to have. The lower jaw doesn't properly occlude with the upper jaw...kind of awkward to be honest. Not sure what the purpose is here. Definitely can see that the elements of the lower jaw can be pulled together to form a complete jaw. This function is clearly to eat oversized prey and probably to help them power out that lovely acid spray (despite what I said before, after doing some image gawking I realize that it's likely that the acid comes from their stomach. Derpy move on my part!). Seems this has been adapted to focus largely on the acid distribution rather than functional jaws, which is fine and dandy considering they eat creep or get nourishment from creep or what the hell ever.
I am a fan of the cool carapace overhangs that are joined by some membrane of some kind. It's clear that they can pull their head in and as they do this, the carapace overhangs come together to completely cover the head. Nice feature for a burrowing animal.It's also a nice feature for an animal made to take a beating. The carapace collar which this whole aspect fits into is awesome for taking a beating, but would get hung up in the burrowing process (perhaps). The head cover is nicely pointed, so that does help mitigate any burrowing issues.
The low to the ground gait of the roach is perfect for taking hits, the orientation of the limbs is also great for taking a hit from above. Not sure why they have spikes sticking upright from their 'knee' joint and why they have so many spikes. They have six standard insecty looking limbs. With the upgrade Glial Reconstitution, they move really fast. This is because the Neuroglia alter the structure of the nerves to allow for more rapid firing, perhaps not even going to the brain to cut out the middleman. This works similar to what happens when you touch a hot stove- you actually pull the hand away before the message is fully relayed, as the message hits a proximal node and sends an immediate "get the fuck out of here" message to the hand. These could easily be coordinated at the node where these axial nervous strands meet up (probably near the front of the animal, at the top of limbs. It means the brain would send a message to move and the limbs would start doing it rapidly via the ventral nerve chord (an insect trait that would serve the roach well as having your nerves bundle on the belly is better for taking massive tank shells with your back, especially on a low to the ground animal. Would be hard to sever the chord!) If the spikes on the knees are growths, it would make a lot more sense as the cellular metabolism is clearly in overdrive when this animal goes into healing mode. Would be easy to get out of hand!
The upper claws are really, really vicious. Compact and piercing with a sharpened outer edge, they are formidable weapons. They clearly use these to help burrow through the ground, slicing up the ground in front of them similar to what the Ultralisk would do during a burrow charge. I would not want to meet one of these in a dark alley, as close combat they appear to be even worse than long range (depending on how the acid is). The acid itself is green. I think I mentioned that most strong acids are actually clear. So there must be some additive to make it sticky, which is green. The acid housing is clearly in a large stomach. Again we see the cellular metabolism taking over here- the roach is remarkable in this way. They can manufacture acid, probably hydrofluoric or hyrdochloric acid, exceedingly fast. The stomach lining, throat lining and mouth lining would all be recycled rapidly as well, probably shedding with each expulsion of acid making it even more disgusting to get hit by this acid. If you didn't die from it, you'd almost certainly get some secondary infection as a result. Their fabulous metabolism takes over yet again with the healing powers. Once they go underground, they enter some sort of dormancy that allows them to rapidly regenerate damaged areas, which would explain all the outer growths. For as durable and heal prone as a roach is, it probably is prone to a myriad of chromosomal, auto immune and cancerous diseases. This is a double edged sword.
Out of combat, the roach certainly must gorge on nutrients. They also probably have a high mortality due to the aforementioned disease. Not what you'd expect from an animal made to simply not die, but the metabolism and healing aspects come with a heavy price. This genetic code is likely rather unstable as well, given the propensity for mutation that would come with high cellular metabolism. There is likely a basic strand that is used for every roach and if this is damaged, using DNA from a roach that has been alive for a while would be a mistake. It is exactly why cloning isn't viable for humans right now, the DNA strand ages and in the case of the roach, probably starts containing more and more errors in a rapid fashion.
Questions, comments, flames, criticisms and all participation greatly appreciated!
From what I can tell, the Roach seems to be more efficently designed then the other units you have gone over. I especially like how you included the double edged sword detail in reguards to it's enhanced celluar metabolism, along with the fact that each shot most likely is diseased and full of recycled organic material--that's soo cooooooooool. Makes the Roach seem way more badass.
I love this Ponera, keep em coming I'd be especially interested in the overlord, because all of the units you have analyzed have been combat units, where as the overlord is a multipurpose non-combat unit; that, in terms of the lore, is needed to command the swarm through psychic instruction, as well as server as transport; I truly wonder how its anatomy helps/impedes this function. Reguardless, whatever you analyze, I'll be sure to read <3
You are probably right, zylog. Nice catch! Still binocular overlapping fields of vision so it doesn't impact what I said TOO much, but it really is important!
Someone over at battle.net said something awesome. I totally forgot to add this into my analysis. Turns out I am as lazy as advertised!
Arrogance said:
If you think about it, just shooting acid at your enemy over any distance especially onto an armored target, is going to be as effective as a water-gun. However, if the roach actually packages up it's volatile payload of acidic chemicals into little shells much like a shot-gun (based on it's attack animation), the acid could travel further, penetrate more heavily armored targets, and reach it's target with all the chemical components intact.
Another Idea to think of is that the roach's payload is probably not one chemical, but two or more, for instance the bombadier beetle on earth stores two chemicals in it's body, hydroquinone and hydrogen peroxide. These chemicals can mix together in a speciallized chamber, and then spray out of it's nozzle like rear-end at temperatures exceeding 210 degrees F (over 98 degrees celcius).
Video related, it actually even looks like a roach, or at least how a roach should have worked (makes more sense coming out the tail end, then out the mouth)
Therefore the roach probably has a primer Protien that initiates the reaction between the acid and several others to enable it to burn through terran and protoss warmachines with ease. If I knew what it was, I would probably make a fortune selling it to world super-powers, fortunately (or unfortunately in my case) I do not.
I completely agree with this. So you have a mixture of heat, acid and discarded biological material. Lovely.
I won't be doing any mechanical things, as I am completely clueless about that sort of stuff. I'd love it if someone would make an engineering of starcraft thread.
interesting read ponera, a few thoughts regarding what you consider to extraneous features on several zerg species such as the extra mandible. i wonder whether you have taken alternate hypothesis into account.
1) extraneous features in many species may be related to increasing the possibility of mating. aka a peacocks' feathers. considering that zerg hatcheries produce larvae (hastened by queen injections), this is not likely.
2) vestigial features are often found on a number of organisms who may have had an evolutionary function long since lost. these may be examples of that and who knows, these features may be lost over time. for instance sc3?
3) an unknown function? iirc, zerg broods are controlled by overlords/overmind/cerebrates. perhaps the extra mandible or other like feature house the receptors for said communication (whether sent by phermones or other signalling methods). housing these organs in a hardened structure would help protect them from external damage
4) the extra mandible may be used in the burrowing ability zerg units possess? would have to look at that animation more carefully.
anywho, these are the first thoughts i had reading your entries. excellent work!
On September 08 2012 00:46 Thrombozyt wrote: Hox genes are for the segmentation. You would have to modify or delete quite a few hox sensitive genes that derive their positional information from the hox-group.
I always viewed zerg more as a hyper evolution race where the overmind radically selects which material to continue for breeding.
I think it's clear that no "breeding" as such is taking place, given that all known Zerg creatures except for the Queen are adult forms of larva produced by an unknown mechanism of the Hatchery, with all differentiation taking place after the larva's genesis. It always seemed to me that it was strongly implied that Zerg were generated by genetic modification rather than by any kind of breeding program. Their assimilation of Kerrigan would support that too, would it not, since they obviously modified her directly rather than enlisting her in a rapid breeding program (a choice that has denied the community a huge amount of fan-fiction).
The infestation would be through mutated viruses directly influencing gene expression and introducing new genes. In the campaign there were massive indications of infestation through viral infection.
The breeding would only be required for upgrades. It would happen in the tech structures and enhance the available strains. Larvae - probably the remnant of the species responsible for the face claw syndrome - posses all genomic material of all strains and pheromones secreted by the hatch/creep activate the target strain and the metamorphosis into an egg. The Larvae species probably offers the rapid growth trait.
So you start the game, a larva can only form a drone, as only drone pheromone can be produced/supplied by the creep. The pool completes and starts pumping pheromones for the zergling genome into the creep -> you can hatch lings. Now you want to upgrade to speedlings and a rapid breeding program selects zerlings for speed. (If you want to be exact and explain why current lings also gain wings, the breeding program selects for viral particles that modify the zergling host to become a speedling. Once the upgrade is complete, the virus is pumped into the atmosphere.)
Indeed, the original sc1 lore states that the larva's primary abilities are replicating various dna strains with very rapid growth, and that the evolutionary breeding of new traits(speedling) occurs within new buildings. To quote the lore directly: "The closest creatures to the original Zerg insectoids are the Zerg Larvae. Although their size and toughness were greatly boosted by the Xel'Naga during their experiments, they still possess the two traits that originally intrigued the ancient masters: genetic versatility and psychic sensitivity.
Maggot-like, Zerg Larvae contain within them the genetic code for all other Zerg breeds. When a new breed of Zerg is needed, an individual Larva will enter a pupal state and begin replicating the DNA of one specific Zerg breed at an astounding rate. After a short gestation period, the new mature Zerg hatches.
A young hive will only have the genetic code for the most basic of Zerg breeds, such as the Drone, but as it grows and develops new structures, its library of genetic strains is expanded."
regarding the last statement, i would not think that there is a library of genetic strains, but rather all potential zerg units/structures are already encoded. it is a matter of gene expression/differentiation that determines which pathway the larvae may take. (assuming they replicate based on universal genetics and not some other unknown mechanism).
any other thoughts are probably terran dominion propaganda.
Nope, it hasn't been sent to anyone. I'm sure someone will take notice, sometime lol.
As far as mating structures in zerg units, it's pretty obvious that zerg units are all nonreproductives, so having said features would be rather useless.
This is super cool. A way of looking at the game I haven't seen before!
In the map editor you can enlarge the units to get a sense of their scale and movement, proportions etc, even slow everything down and really see some of the connectivity of specific joints.
Examining the anatomy of the zerg from a practical perspective (on traditional predator/prey, occlusion of jaws, and field of vision based on eye-sight) is a little strange. They are not adapted to typical examples of natural selection but were selected by the Hivemind based on traits which would be optimal for warfare against zerg enemies. (I won't go into the "Hivemind is an intelligent being/inKerrigant design" argument).
Probably most of the combat units in SC2 have transcended the need for basic survival adaptations and instead rely on a hunter species to feed the entire swarm while they hold the front lines. Maybe zerglings act as worker ants whereas the roach, ultralisk, hydralisk, etc act as the soldiers. Hence, the Hivemind is free to select fearsome looking creatures with bizarre adaptations which somehow seem suited to simply ripping apart men in metal suits or opening a can of siege tank since even basic adaptations like a working mouth are obsolete (assume the zerg have a way of feeding the swarm through creep? zerglings hunt and then feed the rest of the swarm? overseers/overmind/overlords give vision to their poorly eye-sight adapted bretheren?).
tl;dr zerg swarm is more like an ant colony (and not evolved for individual survival) except where the soldier ants defend against space marines and aliens.
Could the features present in every single one of the units (hydralisk jaws) might actually be derived from the base zerg strain that would assimilate the other species?
That has been brought up, though I don't see why they wouldn't be present in every unit. If they can be removed, why wouldn't they remove them when they are just extra?
I love the support you guys are giving me for this. If you have any suggestions let me know! I think next up is the infestor, followed by drone and then overlord, but that can change depending on what everyone wants.
The drones serve the purpose of the minor workers and the various strains have different purposes in combat. I wouldn't be shocked to find that here is a whole ton of other non combatants that help maintain creep and buildings.
It was pointed out to me that HF is a weak acid, so scratch that. Someone on Bnet wanted me to tackle why they would have 3 eyes. The best suggestion I have is that the larger middle eye may see in a different spectrum of light than the two outer eyes.
On September 09 2012 18:18 Ponera wrote: It was pointed out to me that HF is a weak acid, so scratch that. Someone on Bnet wanted me to tackle why they would have 3 eyes. The best suggestion I have is that the larger middle eye may see in a different spectrum of light than the two outer eyes.
Strong/weak acid doesn't refer to how corrosive it is. HF is a weak acid but still highly corrosive. Strong/weak is based on conductivity. The strong acids are the ions that dissociate in aqueous solution the most making them good conductors. Many weak acids are still extremely corrosive. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrofluoric_acid ( i know it's wikipedia but I'm too lazy to look up a better source atm. I can get one if you want)
Hydrofluoric acid is a highly corrosive acid, capable of dissolving many materials, especially oxides. Its ability to dissolve glass has been known since the 17th century, even before hydrofluoric acid had been prepared in large quantities by Carl Wilhelm Scheele in 1771.[2] Because of its high reactivity toward glass and moderate reactivity toward many metals, hydrofluoric acid is usually stored in plastic containers (although PTFE is slightly permeable to it).[3]
So, your idea of HF being a potential acid source is still valid, there would just have to be some adaptation so it didn't dissolve the insides of the roach.
Oh dear... hopefully I can make some time later to go through the article... though from reading the initial comments I'd say that the roach acid cannot be HF because where would the fluoride come from? It's most likely a multi-compound organic acid most likely loaded with corrosive enzymes. I'll be back later with more..
Anyways, if someone can find a glaive wurm pic I'd love to take a crack at it more in depth.
I found a picture of it
Also you can look at BW muta gif: As I understand it is the lower part of muta and that "creature" which pokes out and has it's own tongue is a Glaive wurm
On September 08 2012 01:29 NibbloniaN wrote: Quick photoshop of a dumbed down zergling...just for fun to see how it might look with some of the suggestions you've mentioned. I removed the "stupid overhead-claw-sticks" and the wings, made the tail less flimsy, and large claw on back leg gone.
I just want to mention that this looks a lot better than the real zergling. I only like the longer tail better. They could use it for whacking as well, so it wasn't entirely pointless.
An excellent read Ponera! Thanks for taking time to write this. I really love your "scientific" approach to the Zerg anatomy and metabolism. It's always great to see other people interested in exploring the idea of living weapons and how they might work.
I also wanted to present my idea about the possible function of the extra spikes on the bodies of Roaches, Zerglings and other Zerg. I think they may simply function as protection against projectiles. The hard structure of a spike could easily stop a bullet or a slug. Furthermore, against explosive munitions, those spikes could trigger detonation of the shell before it comes in contact with (or penetrates) the creature's body, giving a significantly higher chance of surviving the explosion. Same thing applies to the "Hydralisk effect" jaws - they may simply protect the face from being blown off and losing important sensory organs.
Just a fun fact on Zerg cells in case you don't know yet: apparently zerg have two cell types: a regular, mutating cell type and a killer cell type. Survival of the fittest on the cellular level, or at least that's how it is described. No zerg will ever get sick or old or anything like that.
On September 10 2012 12:16 Ponera wrote: So in other words they have an auto immune system? Way to be in depth, blizzard. :/
No, not auto immune. The killer cells kill the mutating cells, so that only the strong ones survive. Supposedly it makes them strong because natural selection on the cellular level.
On September 09 2012 08:30 Ponera wrote: As far as the wings of the zergling for heat exchange: dragonflies actively use their wings for heat exchange. They lay them horizontally to heat up and even do a behaviour called "Obelisking" to cool down. If you look at the zerging animation post-speed, they actually do get a little bit of hang time in the air from time to time. This is logically similar to flying fish, who leap out of water to get some speed and some air!
Couldn't the wings be dual use then? I would favor the wings as heat exchangers as the primary role and the boost as a secondary function. Wings as heat exchangers would give the Zerglings improved endurance, but since in-game all units have infinite endurance that upgrade translates as increased speed instead. The boost function of the wings is just a happy benefit. Seeing as how the design of the Lings is not streamlined for aerodynamics to better support gliding through the air as a means of improving distance covered per movement cycle I would not favor that as a primary role.
As to the hydralisk-effect jaws not being eliminated, well in the lore for the evolution of the Zerg, it is said that even though the proto-Zerg assimilated all manner of organisms, they never lost their "Zerginess," rather they changed the assimilated organisms into something that looks like it belongs with the Zerg. So, the basic coloration of the Zerg and the weirdo jaws are likely just examples of common Zerg physiology from the base Zerg worm creature that gets applied to everything else to show how it is part of the Swarm.
BTW this is an awesome read Ponera.
On September 09 2012 04:15 fire_brand wrote: Good stuff, I definately recommend reading the books for some reference into Protoss anatomy. They give a lot of insight into the actual evolution of the race and ancient, pre evolved bodily structures. Did you at one point Protoss had mouths? Check it out, it's worth taking a look at if you're serious about this whole project.
Well they would have too. It isn't feasible for organisms as large as a Protoss to consume all its necessary nutrients through osmosis. Yes, you can get large trees that do infact absorb nutrients passively through their root system, but they also take a long time to reach that size and they aren't exactly known for their active lifestyles. That fact that Protoss no longer have mouths is weird. Since we've never seen young Protoss I've always had the idea in the back of my head that Protoss go through a metamorphosis like butterflies. They would have a young form that has a voracious appetite, spending its entire time eating to store up the nutrients it will need to undergo the process of maturation and then survives the rest of the its life on psychic energy and the nutrients it would absorb naturally.
Protoss anatomy will be a fun one, it will probably be my longest one as there will be no overlap in concepts.
As for the Hydralisk-effect...it makes no sense to just make things look zergy. If they lose functionality or gain extras that really aren't needed then it actually hinders them. What I find odd especially is that they pick organisms based on traits they have already. For example, infestor was a super organism and roach already had amazing regenerative powers. To make them "more zergy" as a rationale is absolutely retarded; why not just evolved their own strains further instead of take on new ones? Not to mention that zerg strains are meant to be utilitarian. They don't have sexual selection, they don't need to intimidate. They do a job as effectively as possible for as cheaply as possible. At least that would be MY goal if I were to make an interstellar force of biological attack units. Then again, Kerrigan did have biological heels and retained her nice boobs...so...perhaps she put a bit of flare into things? I wonder why she didn't stop conquering and just make a line of biological purses for women to buy? She could take over the universe one hand-bag at a time.
That reminds me, I should do zerg-kerrigan and infested terran stuff sometime.
Thanks everyone! You are all so awesome. I am glad that several of you have decided to probe further or even contribute yourselves. I hope that we can flesh out all of these ideas more and then add them to the database on this site or even send them to blizzard to make our game more interesting!
On September 10 2012 15:01 Ponera wrote: Protoss anatomy will be a fun one, it will probably be my longest one as there will be no overlap in concepts.
As for the Hydralisk-effect...it makes no sense to just make things look zergy. If they lose functionality or gain extras that really aren't needed then it actually hinders them. What I find odd especially is that they pick organisms based on traits they have already. For example, infestor was a super organism and roach already had amazing regenerative powers. To make them "more zergy" as a rationale is absolutely retarded; why not just evolved their own strains further instead of take on new ones? Not to mention that zerg strains are meant to be utilitarian. They don't have sexual selection, they don't need to intimidate. They do a job as effectively as possible for as cheaply as possible. At least that would be MY goal if I were to make an interstellar force of biological attack units. Then again, Kerrigan did have biological heels and retained her nice boobs...so...perhaps she put a bit of flare into things? I wonder why she didn't stop conquering and just make a line of biological purses for women to buy? She could take over the universe one hand-bag at a time.
That reminds me, I should do zerg-kerrigan and infested terran stuff sometime.
Thanks everyone! You are all so awesome.
Yes please... Kerrigan... the medic... Banshee... Dropship... Nova... all good candidates for anatomy analysis.
On September 10 2012 15:01 Ponera wrote: Protoss anatomy will be a fun one, it will probably be my longest one as there will be no overlap in concepts.
As for the Hydralisk-effect...it makes no sense to just make things look zergy. If they lose functionality or gain extras that really aren't needed then it actually hinders them. What I find odd especially is that they pick organisms based on traits they have already. For example, infestor was a super organism and roach already had amazing regenerative powers. To make them "more zergy" as a rationale is absolutely retarded; why not just evolved their own strains further instead of take on new ones? Not to mention that zerg strains are meant to be utilitarian. They don't have sexual selection, they don't need to intimidate. They do a job as effectively as possible for as cheaply as possible.
At first, I am neither a biologist or a paleontogist. I am just a nerd who grew up with a lot of science books. So everything I write here has to be seen under that premise.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I think all Zerg creatures in WoL that can fight in some way got those claws in some fashion. Some are smaller, like the Baneling's, some are bigger, like the corruptor's, some are separated jaws, like the Hyrda's or Roache's. That means to me that they might have a purpose, because so many creatures have them.
One can say the designers just wanted to make the Zerg look more insectuous/fierce, but as we have infinite interpretation powers, I want to propose two suggestions for those mandibles. Those may have flaws, if someone sees some mistakes I make, do not hesitate to point them out.
#1: Even if the Zerg communicate via telepathy (the Overlords), and pheromones, I do not see any reason why the lower creatures do not have a kind of some primitive sign language, maybe for battle, maybe paired with an acoustic communication form for the ground units (I also propose harvesting coordination between drones). There is an ant species named Camponotus ligniperdus whose workers warn each other by knocking and drumming on hard ground with their mandibles or their gaster. For the zerg ground units, the creep may help to spread signals. Also there are ants that produce sounds through stridulating with their mandibles and their gaster.
The benefits could be pace and energy efficiency. Pheromones have to spread, and thus are slow, and "telepathy" might cost more energy than some claw movements. Summarized they could be used as some low-level communication between the lowest Zerg creatures.
#2: They are for nutrition. If Zerg eat in some way, those claws would help. They could feed with creep. I remember a picture of a wasp using its mandibles to eat bee honey. Creep may be of similar viscosity. But even if creep can be used as food, they could have the possibility to get other kinds of food, to be sure to be able to fight even if there is no or few creep available.
I want to add that to me the Zergling mouth claws look segmented, making them perhaps a tool for holding something, plus they could be moved in all directions.
As stated at the beginning, these are just some proposals, I am not an expert. Just someone with a ton of sciolism in my head, and maybe some bad use of English grammar, so do not be too harsh, perhaps I can at least point into the right direction.
Also while researching, I, as so often, am astonished of how various and brilliant nature is.
They could be used in some form of communication, but it would need to be something ubiquitous throughout the swarm and not all of the creatures actually have the extra set of mandibles. I don't doubt that there is secondary communication to coordinate zergling packs and whatnot, but to say it's related to mandibles like that...I am just unsure. Really, I don't see how flexible a system like that could be! It would almost certainly have to be audible or perhaps pherimonal to be most efficient.
I don't doubt many claws have been added to the swarm, it's just the hydralisk derp jaw I am not a fan of.
Infestor (cause I do what I want like a teenager on Maury)
Good morning children! I am just listening to some Pat Benatar and thought "I have 30 mins, why the hell not."
So the infestor is derived from a superorganism. For those that don't know, the unit itself is actually a mobile colony of a bunch of different organisms all functioning as one. Think of it like an ant colony combined with a slug. They appear to have horridly bad frontal sight, which is just fine and dandy as having peripheral vision is important for such a defenseless blob. Presumably it will be behind the front line, so it doesn't exactly need to see in front of itself. The front of the head has an armoured plated which has a bunch of Zoidberg-like tentacles hanging down from it. These presumably mask some sort of orifice and would be used in feeding, but how knows. Perhaps this creature has no specific mouth as the original animal could very well have subsided on food brought in by its smaller counterparts that live inside (and out) of it.
Moving back up the body, it looks like it has that same segmented armour we saw on a mutalisk, overlapping like Roman standard. Each segment apparently has a set of eyes as well for a total of 8. You can see some tubes, 6 in total, that stick out just under the eyes. These are actually very similar to insect spiracles, which is how they would breath. It's a passive breathing method whereby there is limited amount of intake of gases for respiration.
The limbs are armoured in the front as well and there are 6 of them. The reasoning as to why there are bits that stick up from the lime itself makes sense- they protect the limbs behind, allowing for one shot to not completely destroy all the limbs at once (unless it's a really lucky/good one.) To ease their movement, they do make a nice slime trail like a slug. What a charming adaptation.
Under the armoured plates is where the symbionts/other aspects of the super organism would be held. Presumably we don't know everything all that is in there, but we do know that it has a neural parasite that comes from it's rather muscular anus. I don't know what it is about a nice, muscular anus that the zerg favour, but it's definitely seeming to be a trend. Use what you have to work with, I guess! This is also where the fungal spores in the insidious fungal growth are launched from. Along with that, they have infester terrans they can shoot out with abdominal contractions. What's even more charming is that when they are burrowed the only thing that sticks out of the ground is the anal opening along with the three anus claw things. Imagine stepping on one of those. They seem to be lacking in armour behind the frontal plates, which makes a lot of sense for something not made to take a beating that also needs to expand its abdomen for infested terrans. So that makes three separate creatures that live within the infestor, which suggests to me that there are others that help maintain these and the infestor as a whole.
And don't forget the other boy in the band:
Infested terrans pretty much just have the armour cracked open to reveal the soft nougat terran inside and have all kinds of lovely growths.It looks like it's somewhat random, with the exception that the face gets zerged up and the claws are added on the back. What's neat is that it seems to use the powered suit as a platform for expansion biologically rather than using the frail human form. Certainly these growths feed and help keep the infested terran alive, but as we know they don't last too long outside of the infestor. This is probably because they are very volatile and are basically a patchwork retrograde infestation, making their biology very unstable (as supported by how explosive they were back in BW)
Actually the marines just get control back. It's not that they don't last, it's that they shoot themselves in the head when they manage to take control.
Hydrofluoric is unlikely; while it is a highly reactive species (it etches glass!), it's actual acidity is quite low compared to many other "strong acids." Hydrochloric acid is appropriately strong, but you'd need a lot more chlorine than is reasonable to get to manufacture enough HCl to then throw at enemies during battle.
Sulfuric acid is an option, but again, sulfur can be hard to come by. So, my guess is nitric acid! High concentrations are pretty strong (not to the level of sulfuric acid, which is effectively a superacid [technically it's the acid by which superacids are defined], but definitely strong enough to cause damage), and nitrogen is often plentiful. Our atmosphere is ~70% nitrogen, so there would be more raw material than for HCl or H2SO4.
edit: Having thought about it some more, they COULD generate sulfuric acid via advanced proteolysis. Some amino acids (e.g. cysteine) contain a sulfur, so with the right diet/enzymes they might be able to harvest enough sulfur from protein intake to generate sulfuric acid.
(I am a molecular biologist grad student with an undergrad background in organic chemistry and biochemistry, for reference)
This thread is so cool, I love how people with different angles, and different knowledge bases like chemistry, and genetics, can comment and expand upon Ponera.
What about carbonic acid or perhaps another sort of carbon rich acid? (Lol acetic)
On September 11 2012 06:31 CrazyF1r3f0x wrote: This thread is so cool, I love how people with different angles, and different knowledge bases like chemistry, and genetics, can comment and expand upon Ponera.
This was the goal when I started this, to get others involved so everyone could have some fun with it.
On September 10 2012 15:01 Ponera wrote: As for the Hydralisk-effect...it makes no sense to just make things look zergy. If they lose functionality or gain extras that really aren't needed then it actually hinders them. What I find odd especially is that they pick organisms based on traits they have already. For example, infestor was a super organism and roach already had amazing regenerative powers. To make them "more zergy" as a rationale is absolutely retarded; why not just evolved their own strains further instead of take on new ones? Not to mention that zerg strains are meant to be utilitarian. They don't have sexual selection, they don't need to intimidate. They do a job as effectively as possible for as cheaply as possible. At least that would be MY goal if I were to make an interstellar force of biological attack units.
You need to keep in mind the lore though, when the Xel'Naga were creating the Zerg, they were striving to ensure that they had a "purity of essence" in contrast to the "purity of form" that the Protoss possessed. That purity of essence is why the assimilated creatures adopt a "Zergy" appearance, they are suppoesd to in order to show how the original host species has been fully assimilated into the Swarm. As to the fact that Zerg assimilate organisms for what they already bring to the table, that's also established in the lore as their modus operandi. The Zerg can enhance and modify what is already there, but they can't create new and interesting gene sequences ex nihilo so they grow by looking for the most "evolutionary advanced" (however that is supposed to be defined) organisms to assimilate and eat everything else.
If anyone is interested and doesn't have or can't find their SC1 manual, here's a link to a pdf from Blizzard. If you look at the picture of the larva there, the mandibles it sports is likely what ends up becoming the Hydralisk-like jaw that everything seems to end up with.
I am thinking queen might be next, but the queen presents some unique challenges to the zerg which makes me want to think about their morphology a bit more. On the roster for "next" now that I've had my selfish fix are: Drone, Overlord, Larvae. Thanks for indulging my selfish fix this morning, I know I said I'd do what you guys request most and then talked about swarm host...but yeah. Got the urge!
Nice work again Ponera. I bit of a feedback: compared to the other units, you didn't take a critical view of the interstor. I missed that. I really enjoyed reading about what was plausible/unplausible, and why. Please re-incorporate that into your next dissection?
I feel the same way about the infestor. It really doesn't have much morphology to work with, sadly! I walked away from it feeling bad about it. The infestor is hard to be critical of because, to be quite frank, it's really modest. REALLY modest. All that is infester is housed in that bloated abdomen. While speculation is fun, I am trying my best to look at what is there and then (at most) make one assumption based on each aspect. I could go on and on, as could anyone, about the internal structures of the infestor and how each and every bit works. Ultimately, I realized it would be fruitless as people would assume I am right (which I am not) or fight me to the bitter end (which they would be right to) and so I talked a bit more about ecology of the infestor (ecology as it fits within the zerg structure, that is.)
My apologies! I have actually been working for about an hour on queen, creep, hive structure and a few other things just to understand them as best as I can, which is the most significant single investment I've made to this project as far as time goes. The queen is going to be a hard beast to tackle, as is the creep, and giving details on a blob of purple goo really is hard if you are trying to stay canon or at least dance with canon as best you can.
I also feel that the infestor is actually rather smartly designed and as such, with what I was given to work with, I couldn't find much in the way of "this makes me annoyed" as I try to rationalize or explain things. I was bothered a bit by how it can move underground or even burrow. The limbs are TERRIBLE for digging even if the abdomen can contract. Moving forward while underground is baffling...it's hard enough to fathom with a roach, nevermind something like an infestor.
I'll do my best to work harder on the next one and be the biggest jerk I possibly can to the organism in question! Nah, I'll try to pick something that has meat on the bone, so to speak, so that means larvae is kind of a terrible choice. Thanks for the feedback though. I do appreciate it very much.
I made a really subtle joke there about meat on a bone, yet infestor and larva are all meat with clearly no endoskeleton. The irony is palpable. Just ruining it for everyone.
On September 11 2012 17:46 Ponera wrote: I made a really subtle joke there about meat on a bone, yet infestor and larva are all meat with clearly no endoskeleton. The irony is palpable. Just ruining it for everyone.
The queen is really a unique Zerg unit, one that shows the new frontiers they are starting with gene incorporation into the swarm itself. Other than that volatile infested terrans and Kerrigan, the most intelligent creatures incorporated into the swarm are the Gargantis proximae which became the Overlord, so this is a rather significant step forward in the intelligence department. The queen seems to set a dangerous precedent of a tiered hierarchy within the hive with specific roles to play.
Anatomically speaking, we see the controversial "hydralisk effect" again, but these seemingly useless jaws have been expanded with a nasty looking set of caniniform teeth. They seem to only move laterally, making them useless for any kind of prey capture. Their function is rather mysterious and in my opinion, useless yet again.
You can clearly see that there is some hominiform (human/protoss) genetics incorporated. The face looks really protoss-like, with two small eyes and that elongation in the lower part of the face where the mouth would be in a human, but isn't. Makes nutrient intake a mystery, perhaps there is a semi permeable membrane somewhere for ingestion. Yes, I know that zerg are supported by creep, but exactly how is rather ambiguous so nutrient intake consideration is important. You can see the brow ridge and up features some armoured plates, to help protect that large brainlike structure the queen has heading out the back of the skull. The spikes on each plate seem like simple design yet again with not form/function. Nobody can say it's vestigial, as this queen is a direct descendant of the brood war queen but with hominiform DNA tossed in. I have no idea what the purpose of the large posterior extension from the head; it surely can't all be brain! I would suggest that perhaps this structure houses hormonal/pherimonal assembly structures, which are then somehow injected into the hive to stimulate larvae production. How this is transferred is a mystery, perhaps there is some kind of semi permeable membrane on the face. No wonder there is protection in the form of armour for this structure. This structure also almost certainly contains the anti-air attack, working like a biological spike thrower. How this works is probably with muscle contractions and this structure likely stores and produces the spikes. How they leave the head is a mystery as I don't see any openings.
Hanging off the posterior head are a few interesting aspects. Firstly we can see structures that look similar to Kerrigans zerg dreadlocks. Looks kerratinous to me, which suggests mammalian origins, or at least vertebrate. Probably from the human. Doesn't seem to have purpose, but it is a clue into the origins of the modern queen. The armoured plates on the head expand laterally, making a shield-like structure to protect the claws below, as well as the abdomen.
Continuing on with the hominiform appearance, there is a graceful neck heading down from that large posterior head. The femininity continues with a female-like pectoral girdle (the collarbone area isn't very broad, nor are the shoulders.) Coming off from the shoulders are unnecessary spike things. This would add a weight burden to the slender upper arm and would perhaps hinder the 2 fingered hand from tending to larvae and creep. The fingers are like little pincers but they move more like fingers. So what these do is a little bit baffling, as there is no ability to grasp. Perhaps they are used for scooping larvae and eggs. They are really delicate and remind me of the fingers from the aye-aye.
The long, skinny finger of the aye-aye is used to tap trees and find hollows where larvae can be found. Perhaps there is a similar purpose for the queens long fingers, tapping eggs to check for viability/readiness to get a sense of when things will hatch? Would be a useful tool to have in order to manage larvae and egg production.
Coming from the shoulder girdle is a wicked set of claws used in close combat attacking. These claws really don't seem that effective to me, as their location is awkward and their form is rather fragile with several mechanical weak spots, like the peak at the top. One half decent shot from a marine would end this claws usefulness. Since marines are decidedly more accurate that stormtroopers, this would potentially be an issue with queens seeing their close combat spayed mid-battle. Not sure how the musculature would work here, again we see the design of this creature trying to do too much with a single limb girdle. While the location is actually lower on the back for the attachment, it would absolutely affect the shoulder girdle as that is likely the platform that supports the upper muscles for the claws.
The hominid pelvis has been completely re-purposed in this case and is apparently the platform for the frontal claws to attach to. These are likely powered by some very tensile and thick tendons which allow for them to smack a marine vertically, piercing their suit and ruining their day.
The queens lower body is clearly a manufacturing facility for creep tumors, which exit from her celebrated anal sphincter. The zerg really do love to use spinctors and support them with clawlike structures. Unarmoured and expansive, this re-purposed gut allows the queen to function further in he defensive support role. This is good, because the queen can't walk for shit off the creep. How the creep speeds up her locomotion is really a mystery to me. She has six insect-like limbs that end as a spike. They are joined together by some sort of membrane which likely limits the stride length of the queen. Perhaps they had issues with the likely intelligent (and perhaps independently minded) queens exploring and moving off from their duties, so needed to find a way to keep them on the creep. Silly rebellious queens, filled with angst.
I am not sure how the transfuse ability would work. Don't even get me started on how lame the animation is for it. Perhaps she somehow transmits creep to the zerg/building in question?
Overall, I really don't like the queens design. I find more flaw with it than I do with many others, as it really seems to be trying to do too much. I know it's getting a change in HotS (at least it might be, it's not present in the beta.)
Perhaps your genius minds can help explain some of the mysteries of the queen!
You need to remember that a Queen has Psionic powers, there doesn't need to be a transfusion of a biological nature when you can use the wishy-washy answer that it's magiiiiic.
It could be that she is able to psychically repair tissue damage in a similar fashion to the medics ray.
On September 13 2012 01:18 2011 wrote: This is far and away my favorite thread on TeamLiquid, after 4 years of lurking.
Edit: I wanted to say this before my upcoming ban. I have some trolling cooked up for the "U.S. Ambassador to Libya" thread!
User was temp banned for this post.
Well, that didn't quite go as intended, did it? Or maybe it did. Intentional martyring is not unheard of, and I have too much faith in the human race to believe that a 4-year lurker would actually think he could get away with this. On topic, the Queen does have psychic abilities, and the elongated head and head tendrils are heavily reminiscent of the Hybrid and Protoss psionic appendages. It is very likely that the elongated head and tendrils are almost entirely dedicated to boosting that brain power so that the queen has more psionic power with which to command her hive with. She is, after all, in the command tier above the overlords, so she does have more information that is also more advanced than what the overlords have to deal with.
So what is your opinion on the changeling? It seems to be limited to changing morphologically into marine, zergling, and zealot, and not gain any of the actual bone-structure required for combat. Your thoughts?
I am not about to comment on psychosis, psychic tendrils or things I can't observe. Sorry, I am trying to find function beyond magic for an elongated head (my logic still stands.) Psionic abilities, to me, are like voodoo or tarot readings. If I can observe something it has a purpose. Saying the elongated head is for magic is really not the purpose of this thread. I understand we are bound by the lore of blizz, but holy hell I think we are all doing a good job on giving them the benefit of the doubt before we dive head first into full retard.
A 4 year lurker is called a swarm host, as an addition to that.
My friend suggested the changeling is made of creep as an observation to overseers no longer being able to poop creep, Desarrisc. I am no prepared to answer that other than: maybe. If I think that's the case, you can expect my planned tomes on "the hive" and "the creep" to give a decent baseline! I really think she is on to something, as creep may be more dynamic than any of us realized...til she (stepped forward on queue) and made her case a lot more public!
On September 13 2012 16:22 Ponera wrote: I am not about to comment on psychosis, psychic tendrils or things I can't observe. Sorry, I am trying to find function beyond magic for an elongated head (my logic still stands.) Psionic abilities, to me, are like voodoo or tarot readings. If I can observe something it has a purpose. Saying the elongated head is for magic is really not the purpose of this thread. I understand we are bound by the lore of blizz, but holy hell I think we are all doing a good job on giving them the benefit of the doubt before we dive head first into full retard.
A 4 year lurker is called a swarm host, as an addition to that.
My friend suggested the changeling is made of creep as an observation to overseers no longer being able to poop creep, Desarrisc. I am no prepared to answer that other than: maybe. If I think that's the case, you can expect my planned tomes on "the hive" and "the creep" to give a decent baseline! I really think she is on to something, as creep may be more dynamic than any of us realized...til she (stepped forward on queue) and made her case a lot more public!
Hmmm I'll have to disagree. Magic and psionic powers are fundamentally different forms of reality manipulation in many many fictional universes.
Magic is usually linked to tomes and knowledge, which forms the source of which it gains its power. It is essentially like learning physics or chemistry in real life. It is powered by knowledge, and enhanced by those with a sharp mind. The raw power of Magic comes not from the caster, but instead the environment. Magic is the manipulation of elemental forces or in certain cases, raw arcane energy, which can be understood as the most basic form of energy which other elements are derived from. Simply speaking, Magic is the art of manipulating energy forms.
Psionic abilities are more based in the organic fundamentals of the creature. One cannot simply "learn" psionics. One must be born and physically attuned to using Psionic abilities. Psionic abilities also tend to work more strongly on organics rather than synthetics, although telekinesis of non-living materials is a common manifestation. Psionic abilities usually have their strength tied to resolve rather than understanding. It is an irrational, raw, burst of mental energy. The way psionic powers propagate is also directly from the brain, and little to do with the environment. In a nutshell, psionic energy is the raw power of one's mental strength, resolve, and complexity rolled into a energy projection onto the physical plane.
As such, the queen's protoss-style elongated head makes sense according to the Psionic part of my above description. A larger brain mass would literally mean much stronger mental power generated from more brain cells.
That said, this is one of the most awesome threads I've ever read. Please don't stop here. Shoutouts to Hydralisk analysis.
ponera, while doing rigorous research with my cutting edge devolution parser i came upon a startling readout:
do you think infestors could be... infested reavers? infesters? spherical medium range projectiles and the lorica segmentata. we know from your most recent publications that armor on marines can be used as platform for zerg life, and also that infestors are composed of multiple life forms.
your female colleague has also pioneered our current understanding on the dynamic nature of what we term "creep". we don't have much data on its effect on psionic lifeforms.
finally, i want to bring to your attention the webbing on the bottom of the queen. it looks a lot like that of the drone: perhaps queens use it to float and glide, like some sort of inister alien mary poppins?
I am considering starting a youtube channel for this, but also for topics like paleontology and ghosts (lol I am not kind to stuff like ghosts)
What do you guys think? I have a friend pushing me like crazy to start educating about all kinds of things like this but I am ultra noob at video making.
On September 14 2012 10:04 Ponera wrote: I am considering starting a youtube channel for this, but also for topics like paleontology and ghosts (lol I am not kind to stuff like ghosts)
What do you guys think? I have a friend pushing me like crazy to start educating about all kinds of things like this but I am ultra noob at video making.
Do it please. Seeing this in video form would be a bit easier that constantly switching windows/schrolling to look at what you are talking about . Also if you do the video please highlight area of the creature that you are focusing on.
perhaps reading too much into it, but i think that the queen probably needs a relatively more massive amounts of nutrients to deal with it's multiple structures, especially the creep tumor producing mechanism. Perhaps the reason it moves so slowly off of creep is simply because that is the limit of its metabolism when not in direct contact with the nutrient brothy thing (whatever creep itself is)
and, according to lore, drones float (dont get killed by spider mine)
Regarding the zergling: i think it is entirely possible that there are, in fact, relatively few muscles connected to the back claws of the zergling, and that the zergling propels it's back forward, ramming it's target by proxy, with maybe a few muscles to contract slightly in the upper back claw, but the appendage connecting to the body being mostly just rigid. this would be a slightly more plausible reason for the back claws i think
On September 11 2012 09:15 Ponera wrote: Do you think that Kerrigan kept canon to that philosophy though?
It's not philosophy though, it's something that is inherent to their DNA, that is how they were genetically manipulated by the Xel'Naga and we have no evidence suggesting that Kerrigan can somehow fight against the purity of essence that is at the core of the Zerg. To say another way, the Zerg assimilated Kerrigan, Kerrigan didn't infest the Zerg (she just took control of and then replaced the Hivemind).
Another thing, something I have never liked about the Infested Terrans as implemented in SC2, where the heck is the armor and gauss rifle supposed to be coming from? The Infestor is a biological unit, but the power armor and rifle are clearly mechanical constructs. If you want to say that because of all the humans that the Swarm would have eaten since the beginning of the war, they should be able to produce ITs on demand, but the armor and weaponry makes no sense.
Well I think the weaponry is being held by the power suit arm. Think of it like an overlay of zerg on a marine powersuit.
Also: I am done the voice recording for the next instalment, sent it off to my friend who is currently making a video for you guys. Should be up tonight, I will post the link when it's ready. :D
On September 14 2012 01:23 intrigue wrote: ponera, while doing rigorous research with my cutting edge devolution parser i came upon a startling readout:
do you think infestors could be... infested reavers? infesters? spherical medium range projectiles and the lorica segmentata. we know from your most recent publications that armor on marines can be used as platform for zerg life, and also that infestors are composed of multiple life forms.
Actually, the original role of the infestor was supposed to be a sort of "zerg artillery", vaguely similar to the reaver. It was supposed to fire a powerful, long-range, slow-moving projectile that could be targeted and shot down by ranged units. That proved very confusing, but blizzard liked the model, so it was repurposed in to a spellcaster.
Another thing, something I have never liked about the Infested Terrans as implemented in SC2, where the heck is the armor and gauss rifle supposed to be coming from? The Infestor is a biological unit, but the power armor and rifle are clearly mechanical constructs. If you want to say that because of all the humans that the Swarm would have eaten since the beginning of the war, they should be able to produce ITs on demand, but the armor and weaponry makes no sense.
I've always been under the impression that the infested Terran were captured and "infested", thus explaining the power armour and rifle. I assume that the Infestor has some way of consuming injured Terran marines before beginning process.
Sorry about the delay everyone! My channel is live with the first video. Turns out it takes a lot longer to make a video than it does to record the audio. River should step forward with her account on TL and take credit! Let me know what you think here or in the comment, I don't care where just let me know so I can improve. I really do hope you guys give feedback and don't just say "man series is shit now" or whatever, I plan on using this channel for all manner of nerding and the next anatomy of starcraft video, coming in hopefully one week, will be one that none of you will predict but completely engaging and hopefully convert some of you non zergs to the cause (for those that mass roach hasn't already)
Sorry about the delay everyone! My channel is live with the first video. Turns out it takes a lot longer to make a video than it does to record the audio. River should step forward with her account on TL and take credit! Let me know what you think here or in the comment, I don't care where just let me know so I can improve.
Love the video format! It was hard to follow as the audio and video tell two different aspects of the story all the time, but that only made it more fun. GJ!
So, the message I took from this was that the corruptor is a hot-air balloon with some kind of jet stream propulsion (which explains why the tentacles wiggle when it moves, as there's air going through them. Yet... I think they wiggle also when it's still. So may-be it is sick and in pain instead).
Images flipping too fast, I actually had to concentrate on watching it rather then sit back and enjoy. Also trying to be funny too much, I'd rather have the picture zoomed in on part of unit that's being discussed pointing out what you're mentioning.
River will see this guys, so I do appreciate the comments. We actually toned down the image flipping rate a lot, but it can go more if you want (will make video making a lot faster as a nice bonus, as there will be fewer images.)
The upcoming videos will take several different formats, but for this series I will still use river to make the videos, so your feedback is really important!
Thanks so much, I fret about how my voice isn't as nice as various casters etc. I guess everyone hates their own voice when played back but whatever. :p
Edit: Ovie is probably the next unit I am going to tackle, but after doing the queen I feel I really need to look at zerg structure as a superorganism as a whole first.
On September 16 2012 16:53 Ponera wrote: River will see this guys, so I do appreciate the comments. We actually toned down the image flipping rate a lot, but it can go more if you want (will make video making a lot faster as a nice bonus, as there will be fewer images.)
The upcoming videos will take several different formats, but for this series I will still use river to make the videos, so your feedback is really important!
Thanks so much, I fret about how my voice isn't as nice as various casters etc. I guess everyone hates their own voice when played back but whatever. :p
Edit: Ovie is probably the next unit I am going to tackle, but after doing the queen I feel I really need to look at zerg structure as a superorganism as a whole first.
Don't worry, you have a nice low radio-voice. Your enunciation and emphasis could use a bit of attention, although for the most part it was good. Might help to have another person sit opposite you while you speak. Then you will feel like in a natural conversation with that person and the text will have a more natural sounding reading.
After rewatching the video it was easier to follow. Maybe it was just too early in the morning to watch. The length is great and there's nothing wrong with your voice, don't make it shorter, I love hearing the details.
As for corruptor, the tentacle design reminds me of a giant squid, although they're at the wrong end in that case. That could explain the movement, atleast how they'd do it in the water, doesn't seem like a plausible way to move in the air though, but I guess it's still what the designers at blizz were going for.
I'll admit I had a few problems making the video... (like losing half the video at some point and then got too lazy to redo it as good as before)
BUT it was a good experience as I'm less likely to make mistakes on the next video! :p The next vid will also feature a proper opening and ending credits toooo yay
I should have boosted the audio gain in ponera's voice now that I think about it... lol hindsight
[B]As for corruptor, the tentacle design reminds me of a giant squid, although they're at the wrong end in that case. That could explain the movement, atleast how they'd do it in the water, doesn't seem like a plausible way to move in the air though, but I guess it's still what the designers at blizz were going for.
The original corruptor was actually a ground unit, and it used the tentacles to move sort of like a hydra. When it turned into an air unit they just kept the same base design, even though it doesn't really make sense for an air unit.
[B]As for corruptor, the tentacle design reminds me of a giant squid, although they're at the wrong end in that case. That could explain the movement, atleast how they'd do it in the water, doesn't seem like a plausible way to move in the air though, but I guess it's still what the designers at blizz were going for.
The original corruptor was actually a ground unit, and it used the tentacles to move sort of like a hydra. When it turned into an air unit they just kept the same base design, even though it doesn't really make sense for an air unit.
Actually I remember way back Blizz said they originally planned for the Corruptor able to switch between land and air but then gave it to the Viking because they have a hard on for Terran and transformers. :\
FYI we have the audio done for the next episode and about 50% of the video. River took your advice and is putting in less distracting clips but insisted that I once again draw a detailed schematic like I did with the corrupter. This next episode lays the groundwork for doing the overlord and overseer, as well as drone and all the buildings, while putting the queen into context a bit. So it's not about a specific unit but is still all about zerg biology.
On September 14 2012 11:50 Ponera wrote: Well I think the weaponry is being held by the power suit arm. Think of it like an overlay of zerg on a marine powersuit.
No, I get that, it's just if the Infestor is supposed to be producing the Infested Terran right then and there, (cause where would it be storing them?) it should be a much larger unit.
Another thing, something I have never liked about the Infested Terrans as implemented in SC2, where the heck is the armor and gauss rifle supposed to be coming from? The Infestor is a biological unit, but the power armor and rifle are clearly mechanical constructs. If you want to say that because of all the humans that the Swarm would have eaten since the beginning of the war, they should be able to produce ITs on demand, but the armor and weaponry makes no sense.
I've always been under the impression that the infested Terran were captured and "infested", thus explaining the power armour and rifle. I assume that the Infestor has some way of consuming injured Terran marines before beginning process.
Yeah, that's the only thing I can really figure, but the mechanic as it is just doesn't make any logical sense. It would be cooler if the Infestor had a Viper like abduct ability that let it "eat" Terran infantry and produce ITs. Of course, against Zerg or Protoss then it becomes an issue since there are no Terrans to eat. In a case like that I'd say have the ability work like consume on Zerg units (but only useable on enemy Zerg) and against Protoss it, I don't know, just kills them or something since you can't infest Protoss, or maybe makes unstable Infested Protoss that detonate like the ITs of old.
On September 14 2012 13:05 SeeN_CiRcUs wrote: Furthermore, this thread is just awesome.
There is a massive scale issue with units in the game. Just look at battlecruiser versus zergling. So that scale issue we are kind of not counting, as that's more for balance/practicality than it is for being canon to lore. The infestor doesn't "make" the marines- it actually snags them in battle or injuries post battle (or who knows, perhaps newly deceased) and infests them.
Presumably, the infestor which is a superorganism, has fungus farmers that perhaps use dead terrans to cultivate the fungus. The marines and the fungus farm are stored in the swollen abdomen.
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.
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.
Interesting. Yeah, I don't know it's rather inconsistent. I really think that the faster movement speed may be related to metabolism. Like I've mentioned in the past, there are certain balance issues like size that need to be considered as that is kind of more important than sticking true to any lore.
Maybe the broodlings start feeding on the building when its no longer supported by creep? I dunno its kinda random idea, doesnt explain the whole spines/spores survive off of creep either.
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.
This is gameplay/lore segregation, not a "puzzle". This is in the same department as the fact that marines can shoot down a battlecruiser, or that nobody ever runs out of ammo, or that siege tanks & immortals can't hit air targets.
Yeah I like this broodling thing coming out. I'm going to have to give them special consideration given Their interaction with buildings and broodlords as well as volatile nature flying in the face of the concept of zerg living potentially forever (though roaches would be more disease prone and would need to invest way more into disease eradication as a result).
Brodlings are sadly low on the priority list but I will get to them. The more stuff I do on the zerg it seems the more there is to do. I love your enthusiasm, posting ideas about any unit is always good because I am not without fault.
Audio completely done for Fungal Growth. I basically ask my friend some questions about Fungus, she is a phd candidate in mycology. Just getting the video throw together with zero visuals (just our handsome faces). Should be up tonight!
On September 12 2012 23:15 Skytt wrote: You need to remember that a Queen has Psionic powers, there doesn't need to be a transfusion of a biological nature when you can use the wishy-washy answer that it's magiiiiic.
It could be that she is able to psychically repair tissue damage in a similar fashion to the medics ray.
queen "energy" could be a indication of phernmone levels produced by an unknown zergy gland. this would explain the three functions. transfuse is phermones directed at other zerg units/buildings to activate a healing process. or the phermones could be used to activate larvae production or thirdly, the production of a creep tumour.
I am pleased to say that Fungal Growth is now done!
If you guys like Az, she is more than willing to help me with future endeavours. If you don't like her, that's really sad cause she is probably going to help me with future endeavours. As for me, it's back to units!
Thanks so much guys. Des, no reason why you can't try to set up a community effort to analyze terran and toss tech. I mean hell, if any of you want to volunteer to help me out I can certainly use the help!
What if fungi itself can't survive in the atmosphere (or out of infestor) for longer then 4 seconds? Whether it's susceptible to light or something lacking in the atmosphere (wether there is one or not) to maintain itself. Kind of like broodlings are on a timer once out on their own. I've never really thought of fungal growth as an actual fungal spread on units, great idea to look closer into this.
If it died in the atmosphere that fast, it wouldn't be able to propagate from a spore and ultimately do the 'growth' part of things, causing all that damage.
Another PhD student has stepped up and claimed the Xenomorphs from Alien as his first topic. I am in the process of working on the Drone with River. :D
On September 18 2012 13:18 Ponera wrote: There is a massive scale issue with units in the game. Just look at battlecruiser versus zergling. So that scale issue we are kind of not counting, as that's more for balance/practicality than it is for being canon to lore. The infestor doesn't "make" the marines- it actually snags them in battle or injuries post battle (or who knows, perhaps newly deceased) and infests them.
Presumably, the infestor which is a superorganism, has fungus farmers that perhaps use dead terrans to cultivate the fungus. The marines and the fungus farm are stored in the swollen abdomen.
Yeah I know, it's the issue between game mechanics/implementation vs. lore, like what Gradius wrote earlier. Infestors likely grab Marines from prior battles, but then they should be more like Spider Mines, with each Infestor having a limited supply rather than infinite (so long as you have the energy or the time to wait for it to regenerate) like they currently do. It's a bad implementation when better options are available. Also, you have consider the issue of the power armor, Marine power armor can only be folded into so tight a space, acting as an unavoidable limitation to the amount of Marines an Infestor can possibly store internally.
Directly addressing the size issue though, Infestors are cargo space 2 units, that puts them in the size category of a Zealot, Marauder, Hydralisk, Roach, etc., which means they are bigger than a Marine, but not as big as a Seige Tank, so based on the sizes of the units under the cargo size 2 umbrella (and I'm going based on art assets, and not their in-game size) that means the Infestor can only be a couple of times the size of a Marine, likely between 2-3 times the size of a Marine.
On September 20 2012 15:05 zcki wrote: What if fungi itself can't survive in the atmosphere (or out of infestor) for longer then 4 seconds? Whether it's susceptible to light or something lacking in the atmosphere (wether there is one or not) to maintain itself. Kind of like broodlings are on a timer once out on their own. I've never really thought of fungal growth as an actual fungal spread on units, great idea to look closer into this.
Actually, looking at the effect for FG, I'm thinking it acts like an expanding foam sealant. These sealants expand on contact with moisture in the atmosphere, sealing in a space. The Infestor could fire a tight ball of fungi that release a chemical that functions like the sealant foam, the foam expands and then hardens, sealing the affected units in place. As to the quick dying nature of the fungi, that could be related to how they do damage, maybe the fungi release a chemical that deals damage, but also wrecks the sealant, giving it a finite lifetime. Either the Zerg focus more on damage and lose the hold, or focus more on holding units in place and lose the damage. The current sweet spot is what we see in-game.
There are also no organisms that exist in the universe as far as we know that are capable of achieving escape velocity unaided by mechanical means, that doesn't stop the Zerg from doing the same (in fact in the lore its stated there were none on the Zerg's home planet either, they just got lucky that some happened to "fly" nearby). There are no known organisms that are capable of reincarnating other organisms, but that's an established canon ability of the Zerg. There are no known non-microscopic organisms that can survive the vacuum of space (and even the Water Bear goes inactive when in vacuum). I could keep going for some time. The point is when its obvious that no natural (and sometimes even man-made) thing has the exact properties necessary you try to think of things that fit the bill in terms of ability to try and understand it, at that point you're left with saying the Zerg must be capable of producing this odd thing through biological means, somehow.
I will now copy and paste something I said in my youtube channel, in reply to someone:
Uniformitarianism is a limiting factor, to be sure, but it's also a logical leash to stop us from bullshit creeping in. If I give liberalities out, it really means that anything can be anything. So within the confines of what we know, rather than what we don't, it's reasonable to assess things based on life as we know it...especially since every single thing in Starcraft is based on life on Earth.
Add this with lore + gameplay and we are sufficiently handcuffed for your argument to be troublesome. If we say "oh well this thing doesn't make sense so this other thing, which can be rationalized, doesn't have to make sense" then we would literally get nowhere.
The very simple truth is that we can't necessarily explain every inch of a creature that we can't actually look very in-depth for. It's quite limiting; from what we can see and what we do know, it's a FUNGAL growth. That said, any additives are speculation; to speculate past "well maybe there is some protists or something" is really scientifically irresponsible.
Yes you could make the argument that SC2 is made by artists, not scientists, and that there are a lot of gaps, but I am trying my very best to explain things or write them off; Fungal bothered me, I consulted a mycologist. :it's all part of the process! Turns out fungal is controversial for more than just balance!
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!
Yeah, the atmosphere theory falls in the initiation phase. But if fungal growth requires sugar for rapid development, it could be that the infestor shoots out nutrients together with the spores (and this where the celebrated... comes into the picture again.)
While the nutrients are digested, the spores have rapid growth. Once they run out, the growths just die.
Are you perhaps able to provide an explanation why infestation gave Kerrigan high-heel things as part of her body (seen in the cinematic where she battles Zeratul)? It seems a little... Uh. Impractical.
Also the Fungal Growth video was absolutely disgusting. I like it! :D
Now for what is perhaps the most interesting part of the mutalisk...the glaive wurm launching. This is certainly an exaptation (a part that has been re-purposed evolutionarily) of an anus. This orifice seems to have been expanded and reinforced by claw-like things that surround it on 4 corners. This makes me strongly think that the origins of the wurm are actually an intestinal parasite which was re-purposed to cause damage, perhaps using explosive gases (which can be really cheap and easy to get, like Hydrogen) or more likely a strong acid that has had green added for effect (as most of the strong acids are clear). It is possible that along with abdominal contractions the wurm is launched with some sort of lighter-than-air gas (perhaps a small hydrogen explosion with a muscle contraction used to make a biological firing chamber.) Give it an ability to bounce around, which I have no idea about because I can't find a pic of a glaive wurm, and you have something that can cause considerable damage in a group of units.
You know, I think it is probably vaspene gas. That stuff is green, and you need a hell of a lot of it to spawn a mutalisk, so it seems quite plausible that this is what all that gas is used for.
You all heard the expert, the alternative to a fungus is a protist, but I am not convinced on this either. It's just like the siphon ability, it doesn't make sense. If the fungus is eating nutrients provided by the infestor, then dies when they are done, how exactly is it damaging units at all? It would be kinda like giving the suits some athletes foot...annoying, inconvenient and probably stinky, but ultimately not really all that effective at eating through neosteel or shields, for example.
Vespene would have to be lighter than air, which it appears to be, and it does look like they use a green gas to fire out the glaive wurm. Neat!
Kerrigan has heels because developers sometimes have autism.
On September 22 2012 08:05 Ponera wrote: You all heard the expert, the alternative to a fungus is a protist, but I am not convinced on this either. It's just like the siphon ability, it doesn't make sense. If the fungus is eating nutrients provided by the infestor, then dies when they are done, how exactly is it damaging units at all? It would be kinda like giving the suits some athletes foot...annoying, inconvenient and probably stinky, but ultimately not really all that effective at eating through neosteel or shields, for example.
Vespene would have to be lighter than air, which it appears to be, and it does look like they use a green gas to fire out the glaive wurm. Neat!
Kerrigan has heels because developers sometimes have autism.
I thought it was pretty clear that Kerrigan having boobs and high heels was the Zerg starting to branch out their brand and attract some new talent through sex appeal.
Also, this thread is awesome and I thank you for making it and brightening up my day.
Thanks! Yeah there is more to come from Az, I'm sure, but I haven't talked to her as there is a conference going on and I am going out to the field tomorrow! Hooray for making money while basically road tripping with a friend and helicoptering around the back country.
Alch, what are you writing in your mom's basement?
amazing work. I can understand a lot of it, currently studying biomedical science and I had the idea of doing something similar but I don't have enough knowledge/experience to actually do one of these analyses myself. Therefor I really appreciate these!! It's incredibly interesting.
I couldn't find anything about burrow charge; is it possible for a creatue of that enormous size?
And why did you mock the eye placement of the ultralisks?
I mock a lot of things about these creatures. The ultras line of site would be bad for locating its victims.
Its potentially possible depending on substrate and how they use their claws. I may do a separate episode about it as I have some good insight into burrowing. I'll upload something from my hotel tonight if their net isn't total crap.
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!
On September 24 2012 11:11 Ponera wrote: 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"?
I never said it could be anything, I said that once you've eliminated any obvious biological materials you can think of, then try and find a material that does fit, which is what I was doing by suggesting the foam.
Anyway, I was doing some independent research and came across something that was quite interesting. So fungi can form things called appressorium, which they use to push against and eventually penetrate plant tissues. These things are capable of generating forces upwards of 8 megapascals [MPa] (for reference, the Earth's atmosphere is 0.101325 MPa). This force is more than enough to penetrate the ceramic plates used in bulletproof vests. Seeing as how Zerg biology is capable of handling stresses that would reduce normal biology to a bloody mess, it's not a stretch to imagine a Zerg equivalent capable of many times this. That would explain FG's ability to damage targets and even an apparent "growth" capability based on how the appressorium forums. Then after watching your video on Animals sci-fi can learn from I learned about the velvet worm, that the slime they spray, which you described as expanding in the atmosphere due to moisture, would certainly fit in well too as the component that holds the units in place to give the fungi time to deal damage. Also, it fits in with the limited time of effect for FG since the slime eventually dries out too much and becomes brittle, making it self-limited in terms of its ability to hold a target in place. Of course, all of the above need to be enhanced to Zerg levels of impossible biology.
That is actually a really, really awesome suggestion. I will have to ask Az as to the specifics of that. Are you honestly telling me that I have spurred someone to do (GASP!) Independent learning?
:D You just made my night a lot better, you did a great job synthesizing that data. You are completely on to something with that- a little more research and I think you will have unlocked the secret of how fungal works! I stole that word for word and put it up on the thread on the bnet forum. I gave you full credit, of course, but feel free to step forward and claim your awesome idea:
On September 26 2012 12:23 Ponera wrote: 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!
I thought it was canon that they extended tentacles with spikes on them under the ground and "snapped" them like whips, forcing the wave attack motion?
On September 26 2012 12:23 Ponera wrote: 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!
I thought it was canon that they extended tentacles with spikes on them under the ground and "snapped" them like whips, forcing the wave attack motion?
Source? I would love to see it and how that might actually work!
On September 26 2012 12:23 Ponera wrote: 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!
I thought it was canon that they extended tentacles with spikes on them under the ground and "snapped" them like whips, forcing the wave attack motion?
Source? I would love to see it and how that might actually work!
I don't think that would make sense though. Considering how large the spikes are (almost as large as a marine), the lurker's proposed tentacles would have to be quite large and muscular to perform a wave motion for those spines. Underground it becomes even more complicated to do this motion because of all the soil/rock/metal the tentacles would have to displace to perform the action. The lurker's body also doesn't look to have the kind of tentacles suggested (they'd be huge and obvious and I don't see any).
Edit: There are 6 spikes, each about 6 feet high and perhaps 2 feet in diameter. Assuming they are all perfect cones that's about 6.28 cubic feet per spike, multiplied by 6. That's 38 cubic feet of spikes. An average elephant's tusk is around 60kg (source: google) each, and we can probably assume a lurker's spike is slightly heavier as it is thicker, probably made of a similar material. Maybe 75kg or more per spike. That's almost 500lbs of spike to lift by the tentacle. Add the weight of the soil/rocks/metal that the tentacle would have to displace to move itself in a wave motion, and that's... really heavy. To be honest the lurker's attack makes little sense. :p
On September 26 2012 12:23 Ponera wrote: 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!
I thought it was canon that they extended tentacles with spikes on them under the ground and "snapped" them like whips, forcing the wave attack motion?
Source? I would love to see it and how that might actually work!
I don't think that would make sense though. Considering how large the spikes are (almost as large as a marine), the lurker's proposed tentacles would have to be quite large and muscular to perform a wave motion for those spines. Underground it becomes even more complicated to do this motion because of all the soil/rock/metal the tentacles would have to displace to perform the action. The lurker's body also doesn't look to have the kind of tentacles suggested (they'd be huge and obvious and I don't see any).
Edit: There are 6 spikes, each about 6 feet high and perhaps 2 feet in diameter. Assuming they are all perfect cones that's about 6.28 cubic feet per spike, multiplied by 6. That's 38 cubic feet of spikes. An average elephant's tusk is around 60kg (source: google) each, and we can probably assume a lurker's spike is slightly heavier as it is thicker, probably made of a similar material. Maybe 75kg or more per spike. That's almost 500lbs of spike to lift by the tentacle. Add the weight of the soil/rocks/metal that the tentacle would have to displace to move itself in a wave motion, and that's... really heavy. To be honest the lurker's attack makes little sense. :p
As I recall, zerg units burrow by basically "swimming" through the ground, so as for the effort it makes a bit more sense that way They do this by vibrating millions of tiny muscles, according to ingame research, which basically breaks up the ground as they move. You're right it'd take a ton of muscle force though!
Edit: I will review these when it comes time for lurker, everyone throw down and lets make this happen...I might do lurker next, after we discuss it, as our first "community" write up! If you guys can legitimately discuss lurker anatomy without crying about balance, I would LOVE to tackle it with you all as references. I think I've already set a precedent for what a great contributor should do for this thread: contribute. It might take some research and effort so...
perhaps we should all discuss lurker anatomy! I really want this to be a community effort rather than a derp preaching about something he went to university for. :D
On September 26 2012 12:23 Ponera wrote: 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!
I thought it was canon that they extended tentacles with spikes on them under the ground and "snapped" them like whips, forcing the wave attack motion?
Source? I would love to see it and how that might actually work!
I don't think that would make sense though. Considering how large the spikes are (almost as large as a marine), the lurker's proposed tentacles would have to be quite large and muscular to perform a wave motion for those spines. Underground it becomes even more complicated to do this motion because of all the soil/rock/metal the tentacles would have to displace to perform the action. The lurker's body also doesn't look to have the kind of tentacles suggested (they'd be huge and obvious and I don't see any).
Edit: There are 6 spikes, each about 6 feet high and perhaps 2 feet in diameter. Assuming they are all perfect cones that's about 6.28 cubic feet per spike, multiplied by 6. That's 38 cubic feet of spikes. An average elephant's tusk is around 60kg (source: google) each, and we can probably assume a lurker's spike is slightly heavier as it is thicker, probably made of a similar material. Maybe 75kg or more per spike. That's almost 500lbs of spike to lift by the tentacle. Add the weight of the soil/rocks/metal that the tentacle would have to displace to move itself in a wave motion, and that's... really heavy. To be honest the lurker's attack makes little sense. :p
As I recall, zerg units burrow by basically "swimming" through the ground, so as for the effort it makes a bit more sense that way They do this by vibrating millions of tiny muscles, according to ingame research, which basically breaks up the ground as they move. You're right it'd take a ton of muscle force though!
That would solve getting the tentacle in position. But assuming the spikes don't have those vibrating muscles, getting them in place would still be an incredible burden. I can't imagine how the lurker would even do that, unless the spikes are somehow retractable or collapsible, and the tentacles would get in place before the spikes come out. The spikes would then have to be more hollow (so it can collapse in on itself and pop-up with a muscle or something) or more flexible (along the base of the spike) and thinner (to be retractable along the tentacle). The first option is probably not great, because the spike would not be hard enough to pierce or bludgeon armored units. I suppose a workaround could be that the spike fills with a semi-liquid (creep??) when extended to make it harder. The second option might work better, but the tentacle would have to be even stronger to ensure the spikes don't bend at the retracting hinge when hitting hard objects, but would lose its ability to bludgeon.
perhaps we should all discuss lurker anatomy! I really want this to be a community effort rather than a derp preaching about something he went to university for. :D
Don't be so modest. I usually skip reading all of the posts in this thread and only read yours, since you know a bit more about what you're talking about than the average poster. :p
perhaps we should all discuss lurker anatomy! I really want this to be a community effort rather than a derp preaching about something he went to university for. :D
Don't be so modest. I usually skip reading all of the posts in this thread and only read yours, since you know a bit more about what you're talking about than the average poster. :p
To be fair, I am the most modest person on the planet.
I kind of think it would be fun for people to make observations on the lurker, how it moves, how it attacks, how it ~loves~ and then I can synthesize it and learn myself.
Or better yet, I'd actually love to have some people get the chance to ask me questions about anything relevant to what I do best on skype! It would be really a cool experience for me to talk to you all and answer questions about zerg or any of my adventures! I love interaction, I'd even love someone organizing a live "lets catch him off guard live on skype" with some thoughtful contributors. I am really loving this as a tool for educating, it's really engaging!
If anyone wants to organize this, by all means do it behind my back or in front of my back (wait...) As always, I am available (and fresh of the helicopter, this time!) to throw down!! :D My new fungal friend has me so energized about this it's stupid, I think my F5 Key will break.
In defense of this post, I will submit to you: would have read that amazing reply to me if I hadn't pointed it out? Praise is fast to wane, but people who want to engage will actually try! :D
I have been reading this thread for the past hour or so. I study Biology at Uni and have just done a lot of work about Evolutionary Biology, so I can see where a lot of your ideas are coming from.
Going back to your ideas on the Drone: I see the Drone as the Stem Cells of the Zerg. They have the capabilities to become any other cell (or structure) but will not begin this transformation until a certain signal (in real stem cells these signals are still unclear and much researched, in Zerg these signals would be player actions ) is received.
I must say as someone who studies biology this is awsome . I for once would like to see how you explain the broodlord and its ability to produce broodings so fast also its ability to fly consider it doesnt seems to work on hot gas? maybe it using thermal columns, like big birds do? this would make them not work on night maps :D sounds fair to me
If you guys want, later on tonight, I will be availble on skype to answer your questions (I will record it and chuck it up on youtube.) Ask me anything you want about biology or the zerg, or any alien for that matter.
That's a link to a tumblr I follow of some webcomic artists I Love.
They started with a simple creature (at the bottom of the archive) and they take turns transforming it into other things, presumably through biological pressures. A neat tumblr to check out if you're looking for more things to think about in terms of fantasy/sci-fi creatures. (They update every few days, too.)
Regarding the overlords you could say the spikes/huge teeth are there for discouraging any potential unintelligent predators from harming them. Should make sense, seeing how they can be used to scout out new worlds which might have dangerous wildlife, or since a single overlord carrying some drones could sneak past a defended perimeter and establish a hidden base or something. The last thing you would want to have is your only surviving scout killed by a flying shark .
On September 07 2012 20:36 bluQ wrote: My girlfriend also suggested that you should take into consideration how some parts might be of display for mating (ultra theeth). If something like this does even happen in Zerg race cO, some lore nerd here? :D They could, like former elephants or animals with antlers, work as a presentation for "strength" in terms of size.
And do maybe the wings of lings work in a different fashion than normal insects wings does? I always imagine they use the wings to kinda give them a nitro-boost, considering a lot of sc plays in space it could be more logical if they use them as an forward-moving-enhachment device.
Edit: and of course AWESOME read :D
Even if it's not for mating for Zerg units, it may be a trait which is inherited from the original host creature, that the transformation didn't get rid of
Let's be clear here: Zerg don't mate. All Zerg are one, and the Zerg are many. Get it? =D
It means that the entire species is one organism, with the Overmind being the brain, and overlords and cerebrates, and queens being synapse creatures. The zerglings and ultras are merely organs without sentience, and can only be grown, but will not breed with each other.
So no more talk about sexual mating between zerg organisms. That is simply not acceptable as lore.
Well as for the Fungal Growth acid thing which can chew through neosteel and Protoss armour, I tend not to think of them doing damage via their acidity, but I imagine there are countless intelligent microbes in glaive wurm juice and FG slime physically chewing their way through the structures.
If you watch the first Alien movie, one scientist comments that the Aliens have "some sort of molecular acid as blood", that burns through several decks of Ripley's spaceship. Maybe anyone can explain what is "molecular acid"? Or do you guys think the intelligent microbes make more sense?
On September 29 2012 01:10 akatama wrote: Regarding the overlords you could say the spikes/huge teeth are there for discouraging any potential unintelligent predators from harming them. Should make sense, seeing how they can be used to scout out new worlds which might have dangerous wildlife, or since a single overlord carrying some drones could sneak past a defended perimeter and establish a hidden base or something. The last thing you would want to have is your only surviving scout killed by a flying shark .
Confirmation: fungal appressoria DO generate massive amounts of pressure. But it is over an incredibly small area, and the function of the appressorium is to penetrate host PLANT cell walls. Animal cells are a lot easier to penetrate, b/c they don't have cell walls, only cell membranes. If you want to attack animal cells, as a fungus, it makes a lot more sense to produce mycotoxins, kill the cell, then 'eat' it. Fungi that produce appressoria are generally root endophytes, and after entering their host plants (us. Orchidaceae, but also some ericoids), they live as commensal mutualists or weak pathogens.
With regards to the "wings" and the tendency for zerg units to have lots of growths with spikes or webbing, could these be used for temperature regulation? The spikes could be a kind of passive deterrents for predators seeking to harm the growth more so then the body in general.
Zerg are based out of Char (fiery lava planet), they seem to have upgrades consistent with increasing and already high metabolic output, and some of them also potentially carry mass quantities of heated acidic goop.
Using the Zergling as an example, could the "wings" be an appendage designed to increase the surface area of Zergling, with each "wing" being loaded with blood vessels. Wing movement could be designed to improve air flow and cooling of the blood during periods of high metabolic activity (running/attacking). At high speeds they could double as some kind of rudder that improves movement stability or perhaps supports turning at high speeds.
It could also explain why Fire from Firebats or Hellions can be so effective against Zerg units. Temperature control might the draw back of being so metabolically hyperactive. This also supports the notions people talking about with the cancers and short life spans from rapid mutations from such highly active cells. Rapid generational turnover from this plus environemntal factors would lead to the primary trait of evolving new adaptations relatively quickly.
If this was suggested already, sorry, I must have missed it.
I love the idea that morphing zerg air units will have a sort of an "anchor" to the ground that can be hit ground to ground only units like tanks. as you said it makes sense plus from a gameplay point of view it will also mean a lot more where you morph your units.
As for the changling being made out of creep, well that is just mind blowing to me. the units and abilities that blizz can make off that are so much more then "your units can move faster"...
Also: I've done preliminary stuff for the swarm host as well as the hydralisk. I have been in the field a lot of late, so I am resolving time to sit down and write these observations up and then post them/youtube them.
Thanks for your patience! I haven't even played starcraft 2 in weeks, thanks to work and borderlands...Strangely, I will try to cover the anatomy of some of the aliens in borderlands as well, once I get back on track with starcraft. Starcraft is my first free-time priority (no, I don't count my addiction to a new video game as 'free' time as I'm sure you all don't either T_T)
I also plan on expanding my series "Learn to draw." If you are a subscriber you saw that I put my artistic abilities to the test, in one take, and posted it on youtube. I am taking requests, but I do have a few backlogged so if you lovely people want to see a specific thing (doesn't have to be zerg) and how to draw it easily, quickly and without a silly amount of talent/software, then PLEASE let me know!
It feels a lot to me like I've lost a bit of momentum with this, as I'm sure a few of you can identify with. No worries! River and I still plan on handling the protoss morphology as a whole and Desc (the lovely chap that made the terran counterpart to this project of his own awesome accord) has let me know that we can work together in the future, whatever that may look like! Az, the fungal growth expert, is in regular contact as are several other academics interested in contributing, so stay tuned: "Shit is about to get EXTRA real!"
Dude, I might be a bit late for this, but write-ups rock, videos are for kids. And when it is about to get real and dirty with biology and shit, only true men stand tall!
The Swarm Host is a rather unique creature in the starcraft 2 universe. It is, however, not that unique when compared to life on Earth. They have a very hydralisk-like head, with the derp jaws included. They have a large cephalic (head) shield, presumabily protecting the soft neck and thorax. The limbs are really interesting. Clearly designed for burrowing, they have a very lumbering gait which is awkward at best. This isn't unheard of on Earth, but they do have a strange angle coming off the shoulder where the arm dips down then comes back up to the elbow region. There are random spikes at the wrist, projecting upwards, which really are not necessary. If anything, they should have armour projecting upwards to protect the apparently softer upper arms. I must say that I really like how they walk. It is clearly off balance a bit with the heavy structure on their back end. Now I am going to talk about what we all think of when we think about swarm hosts. Yes, that's right, the hydralisk derp jaw. Naw, the structure on its back is what we all think. It's actually clearly a hybrid of what you see with the frog Pipa pipa: You can see it carries eggs on its back.Later on in the development, they actually go inside the skin and then hatch out. It's rather neat. Belostomatidae also does it: So realistically, it's not that weird. Basically the swarm host would hatch out with a compliment of sperm. Sperm storage is exceedingly common, as some animals mate once and lay eggs for their entire life. Or they could simply do parthenogensis, where they effectively provide bother sets of chromosomes. They could also just provide one set of chromosomes, as it's not like the locust is going to be actually doing anything but damage and die. The locust is a really neat little friend. It seems like the whole face opens up to shoot out the projectile. This makes me think that the limitation on the lifespan of the locust is because they never actually eat- what they hatch with is what they get. This would allow for their entire gut structure to be reworked to basically becoming an assembly line for producing the projectiles. What that might look like is anyones guess.
You can see here that the bloated aft-end of the locust is supported by some spindly legs. This would be why it doesn’t move very fast. It also has heavy appendages on its front end, with the vestigial (and celebrated) anus coming off the back end. All said, this is an awkward creature mass produced in a hurry to mass produce projectiles and shoot them.
From the excellent discussion going on over at the bnet forums, about the Swarm Host:
Well maybe hives give off some sort of repressive pheromone to prevent them from developing into full adults kind of similar to what queen bees do. The queen in the nydus network level seemed like she was laying eggs. Unless they were just eggs transferred down?
Also I still think Locusts maybe Symbiots or parasites like the Mutalisk glaive wurms.
I would think it would actually be easier to do it the other way: the Hive would need to provide the proper stimulus, rather than an inhibitor. The queen in the nydus network actually was hatching the eggs, I don't recall that she was actually laying them.
I don't think Locusts are true parasites, unless you count mammalian foetuses or various eggs as parasitic (which I absolutely do.) They are no more a parasite though than a fertilized chicken egg, but the leech on resources is still there. A symbiont actually has to provide something in return; even then, there are not true examples of truly egalitarian symbiotic relationships. It is always skewed, even slightly, in ones favour. This can be really subtle, like the viral DNA that permanently incorporated itself into a song birds genes. The benefit for the virus is that it doesn't have to do anything for its genes to propagate at the cost of having no ability to adapt on its own (the virus is extinct except for its whole genome incorporated into the birds.) This can be thought of as hyperspecialization, so you are very successful when times are good but when times aren't so good you lose out to generalists.The reason why it's parasitic is that it's dead weight for the bird; every transcription and translation, repair or cell division you have this junk DNA. It's very subtle, but it is skewed in favour of the virus as it's not like the virus is making the bird sick or anything.
This is in contrast, of course, to some of the nastier parasites like tapeworms or even parasitoids, like Ichneumonid wasps. They actually fly up to a caterpillar, lay their eggs in them and fly off. The eggs then hatch and their larvae eat the caterpillar alive.
Come to think of it, the Locust may be a parasitoid. If they are a different strain, which I think they actually are, the newly forming/hatched Swarm Host may have a third party (which would be one of those background zerg units we never get to see) lay developing eggs in the Swarm Host. Since they would leech so much health, perhaps the consumption and metabolism of Swarm Hosts is quite high; in fact, it would presumably have to be in either scenario. This is contrary to their derpy (but awesome) gait. Instead of being fast as hell like a zergling, they simply repair the damage done by the parasitic eggs at an astonishing rate. In fact, the 'eggs' themselves could be a form of semi-permeable cyst. So the larvae begins developing and as it develops, the flexible cyst around it grows with it, allowing for passage of nutrients. Perhaps the rationale behind this could be explained in that Locusts have inhibitor proteins that interfere with proper cyst construction and also some that manage the numbers of Locusts developing at any given time. So those embryos that are in stasis (these could number in the millions) go through something like a Kangaroo's hyperfetation, where they can have successive generations of foetuses but with only one that is actively growing (or none, they can put all of them in diapause.)
One thing that should be considered, though, is that it is very possible that, in this case, the third, egg-laying party could be entirely eliminated. While on earth organisms tend to reproduce only with their own DNA, it's entirely possible that the guided evolution of the swarm could have left the swarm host able to essentially give birth to organisms that had a genome entirely distinct from that of the creature itself. Given the apparently high capacity of the zerg for complex genomes, the swarm host could contain DNA for producing locusts through a mechanism similar to asexual reproduction- that is, essentially create fertilized eggs itself for what would be another species entirely. While this obviously does not occur on earth, due to the simple reason that animals need to reproduce, the members of the swarm are produced from larva, removing this difficulty.
Let me give you some insight into why I say what I say in my updates:
1. Parsimony (Occam's Razor): The simplest explanation is most often and likely correct, so it is always assumed that the simplest answer is right.
2. Uniformitarianism: (since wikipedia says it more elegantly that I would, here is an exerpt from their page on it) is the assumption that the same natural laws and processes that operate in the universe now, have always operated in the universe in the past and apply everywhere in the universe. This way we restrain some of the craziness and it allows us to critically assess whether structures would work or wouldn't, or at least try to justify why they are the way they are.
3. Comparative Anatomy: Self explainitory, but grounding this in tandem with uniformitarianism by comparing to life we do know and how it lives, dies, evolves and goes extinct.
As far as references are concerned, just for your edification:
I did Five years post-secondary in Paleontology, Entomology, Comparative Anatomy and related fields obtaining a double major in Earth Sciences and Biology (most of the Earth Science was paleontology.) I have Six years professional experience in Paleontology and Comparative Anatomy. I have bred everything from placental skinks to cockroaches, having worked with dozens of species of reptile, Amphibian, insect and fish, as well as a smattering of bird and mammal over the last 12+ years. I did an undergrad literature review on the evolution of limb reduction, which was a comprehensive tome consisting of every shred of research done in the last 100 years, with the exception of one obscure doctorial dissertation out of Australia, which I couldn't get my paws on. I also did an undergrad thesis on plesiomorphic snake vertebrae. I have courses in some rather specific things as well, such as parasitology, insect pathology, medical and veterinary entomology, freshwater invertebrates, marine invertebrates (including a week of fun times at a world renowned marine research center in Canada [Bamfield])...the list goes on and on. I've even dissected cats, sharks, lizards and other treats, having worked at body worlds for about 6 months and taken human osteology, I am very VERY familiar with what I am talking about. I have done work at two World Heritage Sites, including actual research at the Burgess Shale. On top of this, the majority of my friends are in PhD programs ranging from entomology to mycology and even comparative anatomy, so if I am not sure I have a whole facebook list of people who are willing to help me (as Az did with the fungal growth video.) That's just off the top of my head while I sit here in my fancy hotel room (okay, not that fancy but it doesn't smell of urine and Vicodin so I'm happy.)
I'm really not trying to simply "Plead to a higher power" on this, I'm simply saying that as far as references go I'm pretty decent. When I say something, it's not just "spit-balling" or arm waving as I have a very comprehensive grasp on life today and in the past. There is a reason why I'm not doing terran or protoss tech: I am not an engineer, nor do I pretend to be and I recognize the limits of my knowledge base.
The Viper is fascinating (Sorry CwnAnnwn), a frog-like tongue, weird propulsion (counterweight to yanking?), blinding cloud, strange metabolism that converts living tissue into whatever energy mana is (closest I can think about it is eating chocolate...).
On October 14 2012 13:39 CwnAnnwn wrote: Uncertain????? I've been requesting protoss since this thread started. They have some cool biology.
I have to arrange with river to sit down and do that, you're right! We are going to work together on it, next time I see her on I'll make sure to hit her in the mouth with that suggestion! TOP OF THE PILE (as far as river/I collab). I won't do it without her, and I really feel that if I am covering an entire race in one broad stroke, I should do something special. Any suggestions for what sort of special? Also feel free to ninja me on what you think their biology is all about.
I agree, also, the viper looks promising but things keep changing so fast as far as spells.. -_-
I am also willing to revisit past units!! ALSO! If you want to suggest something, go ahead and be enthusiastic and be a cool nerd like me, make a suggestion of something you see! I will cover it or tell you why it isn't as likely, no answers are wrong (cept if you try terran, terran is always bad)
I would very much like to see an analysis on the Lurker if possible! They are very interesting, for example, how does the lurker aim while being underground? How does it relate to a Hydralisk? If you have time, please do.
On the Locust and Swarm Host, and potentially the Zerg in general, why not chimeric organisms? It doesn't make sense to burden the different Zerg forms with DNA encoding the resources of the full Swarm, the larvae could be an organism made up of a large amount of different cells like a chimeric organism, and when it is given the appropriate cues, it forms a cocoon so it can rapidly grow the cells belonging to the desired Zerg strain, while killing off all of the cells that belong to strains that are no longer required. I think this would make the whole "even Zerg cells fight each other as a show of 'survival of the fittest' as the larvae grows" (paraphrased) make at least some amount of sense.
For the purpose of the Swarm Host, it could keep the cells that will eventually turn into Locusts on its back (perhaps frozen at an early stage of development, i.e. embryonic diapause), and then it just gives them the cue to grow when in a favorable environment (rooted into the ground).
I think it's been established by lore that larvae have the DNA for all the strains and just need the right stimulus. Yep, diapause seems like the proper course for the swarm host at least!
Only thing I would like to add Ponera is I saw a fairly recent expirement done by neurologists in the US where they used an electromagnetic field to alter brain function in volunteers. This magnetic field often caused hallucinations or certain emotions to be felt depending on the strength of the field. So the psionics might be bio-magnetism rather than electronic as I first thought. Anyway, I agree that protoss biology is boring and the only interesting part is trying to work out the psionics without resorting to "hurr durr magic".
Good video, i'm looking forward to the write up and sorry for the hard to pronounce name!
The electromagnetic signals works to explain the telepathy, but it doesn't really take care of the more outlandish stuff like merging consciousness and converting 2 bodies into energy without external help, or creating lightning that fries people's brains (unless the "storm" actually isn't literal and just represents what someone feels like they're experiencing as the templar messes with their brain)
On October 24 2012 07:50 Ponera wrote: Yeah bio magnetism could work, EM fields are known to mess with people pretty hard. So Bio electrical magnetism?
I am going to have to do a separate thing about psionics. Damn.
I am currently looking for people who are into this that want to ask some questions about their favourite zerg or netural units based on their own observations, recorded on the spot, live, on skype or if you cuties want I can do it in writing, but I plan on being blindsided by all of them. I'll even take questions about protoss and psionics, or *gasp* Kerrigan's bio-heels or why she needs to look so damn good despite being a non-reproductive!
Let me know if you are interested and we can plan from there. Feel free to PM me or just post here and let me know; I will make arrangements with you guys.
Excellent! PM me with skype info. It will go down sometime between this weekend and next weekend, in the evening. I am going to talk to Az (the fungal growth video guest) just so there is someone to call me out if I am full of shit, which I am not, but just so you can all observe!
Think of the best way to shiv me with a question, and I do mean shiv, as I will be giving all written questions to river without reading them so she can censor them (and subsequently shiv me) and the episode will be done in all one take, with me and az or just me. We will take live callers, recorded of course, to ask it and give follow-up if they want. Looking for at least 3 thoughtful viewers with 2 questions each, but we may cut it to 1 question if we get 6 viewers interested, so far we have 2!!!
Asking any pro, mod, game dev, keener, nerd...well any noun, really, anyone that reads this and enjoys it (see: everyone) is welcome!
Why do you not like the protoss anatomy so much? As you know, on Earth there's the concept of convergent evolution, which basically is the idea that completely unrelated and non-interacting species can end up looking essentially the same. Early hominids evolved our morphology in order to better walk and run upright, so maybe it's possible that on Aiur the early protoss fulfilled a similar function as scavengers/runners? We know certainly they were tribal like early humans, and that their planet is jungled in a similar way to Earth. According to lore, it was only after the Xel'Naga intervened that the protoss lost their mouths and got their psionic powers activated, so we don't have to deal with that in the same way you have to accept that zerg are going to have spikes(the Xel'Naga are, at this point, unable to be explained in any suitable manner as far as comparison to biology as we know it)
thanks! Saw the wall of text, not going to read it so I can get sucker punched by it's lovely contents. If you don't want to ask me on skype while I record, I am more than happy to read it out.
Upon reflection, I think that a lot of aspects of the protoss would make a lot of sense if were to consider the possibility that their psionic communications are actually some form of electrical communication. This would give a very logical and simple explanation for how their shield generator implants could be powered (simply with electricity, rather than through some inexplicable magic or any unnecessarily complicated method of converting another form of energy into something that could power electronics), and might actually explain psi storm. While this is clearly very much unfeasible, were we to allow a certain leniency in what's practical (as only seems to make sense given many of the other elements of starcraft), might it be at least possible that psi storm is actually just a more powerful use of the same organs used to generate the small electric fields for communication? Clearly, this would seem to involve impossible amounts of energy, but a potential explanation might come in the form of the Khaydarin amulet. Were we to assume that the Khaydarin amulet was made of some extremely energy dense substance with a structure such that the contained energy could be harnessed easily, or comprised of some substance that allowed the protoss to very easily fission or fuse it through some hidden piece of technology somehow incorporated either into their suits of armor, or into the amulet itself, this might provide an explanation for the incredible energies released during a psionic storm, that, if not practical, might at least be possible. This clearly causes issues when one considers the difficulties in directing the incredible energies involved, but might be a step in the right direction.
Regarding the use of the spines located on the knees and head-shield of the Lurker, they might be used to prevent enemies from pulling it out of the ground. I'm quite confident the spikes on the head-shield are used that way. However, the knee spikes seem counter-intuitive, as they point downwards, and increases the difficulty of burrowing for the Lurker.
Behold - The derp jaw!
This Lurker seems more accurate and more suited for its purpose, as you can see from the knee spikes pointed upwards and smaller spikes overall to improve movement in the ground. Since (I think) the Lurker burrows headfirst, the leg on its butt could help it to slowly reverse backwards should it hit a blockade, or also deter enemies trying to pull it out.
Edit: ...Still not sure what the spike on its head is for :\
At Ponera's insistence, I have decided to do a write up on the hydralisk!
WARNING: this post will be very image heavy.
The hydralisk has a very unique build that I have yet to see in any other sci fi creature or real life creature. But after breaking it down, I can find many real life inspirations for its different parts.
Let's start with Ponera's favorite: the derp face.
Although Ponera heavily dislikes this face, I believe that there is a real reason for such a face: protection.
If you take a look at this drawing of the hydralisk's face, it is apparent that the outer lower jaws are made to perfectly cover the face of the hydralisk. Now, although, admittedly it doesn't cover much, it covers most of the face which is assumedly the most important part of a hydralisk's body.
Dual jaws are by no means impossible to find in nature. Moray eels, for example, possess a second pair of jaws within their throat known as pharyngeal jaws.
These jaws are believed to have evolved from gill arches (the same way normal jaws are believed to have evolved. After millions of years of use (or the effect of Zerg bioengineering), I would imagine that they could definitely evolve into something similar to the StarCraft 1 Hydralisk, which could then evolve into a StarCraft 2 Hydralisk.
It is also interesting to note that the outer lower jaws of a hydralisk are separated into halves. In real life, this can be observed in snakes which alternate each jaw when chewing to drag the food down their throat. + Show Spoiler +
Now let's move to the basic body structure.
It is well-known that the hydralisk was based off the slothien, "a peaceful, caterpillar like herbivore that lives in large nests." Judging by their name, it is safe to assume that they live a similar lifestyle to our modern sloths. This makes sense, because their long claws are perfectly evolved for holding onto tree branches or other platforms. Take a look at a sloth's hand. + Show Spoiler +
Now, this statement mainly refers to a StarCraft 1 hydralisk. If we assume that their old appearance is indeed canon and a less evolved strain, it is apparent that the new hydralisk merely evolved to gain more spikes on their arms through bioengineering and not any kind of natural selection (perhaps Zergling DNA may have been spliced for this). This adaptation could be somewhat useful for melee attacks (will need Ponera to confirm it for me).
For movement, the hydralisk rely mostly on their ventral scales (in essentially the exact same way as snakes). This could reflect on their lack of need for legs for their life in nests and foliage.
Now, lets move onto the most important part: the attack. Hydralisks have had different attacks in SC1, WC3, and SC2 but for this we will just focus on SC2. Take a look at this picture. + Show Spoiler +
When attacking, the hydralisk lowers its head, and raises its back. It opens up the flaps on its back and reveals an array of spikes that are subsequently fired at the target. According to the StarCraft wiki, this adaption evolved from the slothien's use of urticating hair which is basically stinging hairs found on stuff like tarantulas, caterpillars, and stinging nettle. + Show Spoiler +
Because hair is made of the same substance as horns (keratin), it is incredibly easy to change the hairs into sharp darts seen in this image. + Show Spoiler +
As for how they are fired, I believe that they are merely squeezed out by muscles (this would explain the huge neck of a hydralisk). After being fired, it is likely that the next spine is then shifted down in a cyclical pattern similar to how a shark loses and replaces teeth. + Show Spoiler +
This way, hydralisks can store hundreds of spines and can deploy them all at once without having to worry about growing new ones in time.
Well, that concludes my analysis of this killing machine. Please leave your thoughts. Thanks guys.
Yeah extra claws are a failsafe for melee. So if they lose a claw, they have more and don't lose battle effectiveness.
I suspect that the projectiles are more than squeezed out, I think it likely has some powerful launcher mechanism, perhaps relying on the elasticity of tendon. If they are held serially, like a shark tooth row, it is feasible that they could fire multiples from each launcher before the need to make more.
Good work, saves me from having to write it up :p
One criticism: I find the Hydralisk to be rather..top heavy. I think this is a flaw in their design. Also, as far as grooved spines go: If you look at the canine tooth of a cat, they have a groove (as many mammalian predators do, as do monitors) to allow for blood to trickle down it. This prevents a vacuum from forming, easing the entry (and exit) of the tooth. I dunno about how it would impact aerodynamics but it could be a relic from the launching mechanism, perhaps the canal exists for an additional tendon or muscle, allowing for more surface area and therefore more force upon leaving the hydralisk.
On October 29 2012 10:58 Ponera wrote: Yeah extra claws are a failsafe for melee. So if they lose a claw, they have more and don't lose battle effectiveness.
I suspect that the projectiles are more than squeezed out, I think it likely has some powerful launcher mechanism, perhaps relying on the elasticity of tendon. If they are held serially, like a shark tooth row, it is feasible that they could fire multiples from each launcher before the need to make more.
Good work, saves me from having to write it up :p
One criticism: I find the Hydralisk to be rather..top heavy. I think this is a flaw in their design. Also, as far as grooved spines go: If you look at the canine tooth of a cat, they have a groove (as many mammalian predators do, as do monitors) to allow for blood to trickle down it. This prevents a vacuum from forming, easing the entry (and exit) of the tooth. I dunno about how it would impact aerodynamics but it could be a relic from the launching mechanism, perhaps the canal exists for an additional tendon or muscle, allowing for more surface area and therefore more force upon leaving the hydralisk.
Also what is your take on the hump on its back?
Hm... Maybe thats why hydralisks are so damned slow.
As for the hump, I have a decent explanation. As we all know, hydralisks have soft bodies ("caterpillar-like"). Thanks to their large head filled with hundreds of muscles and spikes, they put strain on their soft, soft bodies. Their heads bend forward as cobras do when they are showing off their patterns, hence forming the hump. KERRIGAN. PLEASE FIX IT THEIR SOFT SOFT BODIES. ITS CAUSING SO MANY PROBLEMS D:
I suspect that the hump also has some substantial musculature to help keep the head up, as well add power to the downward striking method seen in their melee attack.
Probably more relevant given that it's got acid in it! Still, I didn't know that about termites. This is why I am always trying to get helpers and contributors beyond me, as I don't know everything!
I'm loving your posts and videos, read them all, and I would like to add something to the zergling's behavior. As they come in pairs, I always thought that they could be twins, and instead of hunting in packs, they would have better coordination with their twin brother. This would allow commands being sent to a pair rather than a single zergling. A pair of twin zerglings would be better at killing a single marine than two non-twins. They could have some kind of relation, like the SEALS, having almost a sixth-sense where your twin would be.
On October 30 2012 00:35 lunkfumble wrote: I'm loving your posts and videos, read them all, and I would like to add something to the zergling's behavior. As they come in pairs, I always thought that they could be twins, and instead of hunting in packs, they would have better coordination with their twin brother. This would allow commands being sent to a pair rather than a single zergling. A pair of twin zerglings would be better at killing a single marine than two non-twins. They could have some kind of relation, like the SEALS, having almost a sixth-sense where your twin would be.
I believe that Zerg units already have their minds linked in a psionic fashion with each other, and they can presumably read one another's thoughts (whatever they're thinking). However, the thought that Zerglings that hatch out from the same egg have a greater link with one another is interesting...
On October 18 2012 03:33 Ponera wrote: I think it's been established by lore that larvae have the DNA for all the strains and just need the right stimulus. Yep, diapause seems like the proper course for the swarm host at least!
Yeah it is, it's just trying to figure the 'how'. The two possibilities that immediately come to mind are either a stupendously large genome (like 100s of chromosomes), which I would imagine would be cumbersome for the kind of rapid duplication Zerg DNA requires, and needs a ton of extra features for snipping out DNA that is unnecessary for a given strain, or something like a weird Chimeric organism so the DNA is more distributed and parallelism can be more of an asset.
Also, given the discussion of the Hydralisk I wanted to post some other official Blizzard concept art on the Hydralisk anatomy. The pictures are kinda big so I'm sticking them in spoiler tags.
If you look at ants, all the casts are identical in genes but they are morphologically quite diverse in a genus like Atta or Acromyrmex. So a hormonal/nutrient "inject" (lol) can determine huge diversity, even determining which drones become full reproductive queens. I think you are right on that they can't have like 100 chromosomes; perhaps they actually streamline it along with the hormonal/nutrient stimulus?
edit: Just wait til the ant/zerg episode. It will all be made clear.
On October 29 2012 10:58 Ponera wrote: Yeah extra claws are a failsafe for melee. So if they lose a claw, they have more and don't lose battle effectiveness.
I suspect that the projectiles are more than squeezed out, I think it likely has some powerful launcher mechanism, perhaps relying on the elasticity of tendon. If they are held serially, like a shark tooth row, it is feasible that they could fire multiples from each launcher before the need to make more.
Good work, saves me from having to write it up :p
One criticism: I find the Hydralisk to be rather..top heavy. I think this is a flaw in their design. Also, as far as grooved spines go: If you look at the canine tooth of a cat, they have a groove (as many mammalian predators do, as do monitors) to allow for blood to trickle down it. This prevents a vacuum from forming, easing the entry (and exit) of the tooth. I dunno about how it would impact aerodynamics but it could be a relic from the launching mechanism, perhaps the canal exists for an additional tendon or muscle, allowing for more surface area and therefore more force upon leaving the hydralisk.
Also what is your take on the hump on its back?
as for launching mechanisms, why not look at the mantis shrimp? its 'club' can accelerate really quickly and can even smash some aquarium walls. this might be the way a hydra accelerates its spines.
On October 31 2012 14:57 Ponera wrote: If you look at ants, all the casts are identical in genes but they are morphologically quite diverse in a genus like Atta or Acromyrmex. So a hormonal/nutrient "inject" (lol) can determine huge diversity, even determining which drones become full reproductive queens. I think you are right on that they can't have like 100 chromosomes; perhaps they actually streamline it along with the hormonal/nutrient stimulus?
edit: Just wait til the ant/zerg episode. It will all be made clear.
Yeah, I figure that kind of thing is how you go Hydralisk->Lurker or Mutalisk->Devourer or Guardian, but since the other Zerg strains are all supposed to be from different organisms, I'd figure they should all have different genomes.
On November 01 2012 09:33 poogpoogs wrote: as for launching mechanisms, why not look at the mantis shrimp? its 'club' can accelerate really quickly and can even smash some aquarium walls. this might be the way a hydra accelerates its spines.
Interesting, I never thought of that.... The hydralisk's extensive musculature may be used to pull the tendons for the required elastic strength to shoot the spikes out, although the reload mechanism is a bit harder to imagine, but it would definitely be disgusting.
Episode one of Anatomy of Sci-fi! This one is about the Xenomorphs in the Alien series. Let me know what you guys think, there are four of us (Brutaxilos, Doncroft and zappy) all talking about them. It's really awesome.
I was wondering if you wouldn't mind doing an analysis of the Nydus worm. The term "celebrated anus" is used a lot, I figure that'd be a major part of this one too.
I sometimes wonder if Rebecca Black had as many fans when she was debuting her album?
Anyways, really awesome (and better) take on the Learn to Draw series. I expect things will get better and better...just turn down volume so his fandom doesn't ruin your day.
Next episode is done, this one is about Nydus Worm!
Oh, by the way, Novawar from Lagtv joined us for this one.
I wonder if maybe the derp arms coming from the worm's head are used to assist with the loading and unloading of units. Also all those spikes that face backwards would explain why you can't retract a Nydus head once it comes out of the ground.
Cool analysis guys, I really enjoy these :D
An analysis of the HotS Viper unit would be pretty interesting, considering how it looks like it would be completely impossible for them to fly with those itty bitty little wings, the spike placement makes no sense, and it doesn't appear to have eyes, which I thought was rather important for a flying organism. To be perfectly honest the viper doesn't make much sense at all. It's able to pull any unit regardless of size, I have no idea how a viper could pull a colossus while also keeping itself in the air. I think they'd either have to make the viper a ground unit or it's actual size is much larger than they use in game. (Like how a battlecruiser is capable of carrying a thousand plus crewmen but is roughly the size of eight hellions in game.) I wonder if the hooks on the claws are used for roosting and/or grabbing prey like a mantis. If the front legs are used to latch onto prey then they seem like they'd be way too big. The distance between the claws makes it look like they were built to latch onto prey roughly the same size as the viper. If that's the case it doesn't make much sense, because of how small the head and body are, it would only be able to eat a portion of whatever large animal it caught. That seems very inefficient, it'd be like killing an entire cow every time you wanted a steak.
I'd like to see your insights into the confusing creature that is the Viper, because I'm not a biologist so I could be totally wrong about everything. :D
Congrats to you on Lagtv joining your discussion! I think the purpose of the "side arms" is to move/destroy debris in front of the head away while burrowing, which would solve the 'moving through bedrock/metal' thing. The "side-anuses" might be for eating (ironic ).
By the way, could you do one on the Infested terran if you haven't done so already? I know its not a true Zerg organism, but I just want your analysis on those.
Edit: So... If you make another Nydus network, it will have (1+2) + (1+2) = 6 anuses o_O Also, how does the addition of extra anuses allow more worm heads to be "created" at the same time (assuming all the anuses are connected to the central "stomach)?
Just popping in to announce that EGiNcontroL will be on the show in then next 9 days. We will be talking about Protoss tech, along with the host of Mechanics of Starcraft (zappy).
Contributors will be drawn randomly as there will be one other spot on the show for one lucky fan!
Been reading the posts here and watching the channel so I thought I'd throw in my two cents. I don't have a background in science or anything, just a SC fan with some free time.
Explaining the External Jaw/Mandible in Zerg
I’ve been enjoying the show and the articles, Ponera. It's good stuff :D. The constant references to the extra, or eternal, jaw of the Hydralisk and other Zerg, like the Queen, got me thinking about their possible function. I was thinking that a possible explanation for the jaws is that they are a sensory organ. This touches on what bahunto28 and papalio on page 5 and 8 suggested but I wanted to further explore the idea.
Couldn’t the tissue or at least the surface of the connective tissue, between the external jaws and the interior jaw, be lined with chemoreceptor’s? The opening of these jaws could be an action similar to the flehmen response seen in mammals so that the Hydralisk can get scents and pheromones to the vomeronasal organ (Jacobson’s organ) or an equivalent structure. This would also explain the absence of nostrils on the hydralisk (at least I can’t seen any) as well as the absence of nostrils on the queen who also has rather large external jaws/mandibles. If it isn't the tissue that has the receptor cells then perhaps the interior of the external jaws are lined with sensillum ( I think that's the right term XD ). This theory also lines up because external jaws are not present in overlords who have antennae and thus have an alternate way to pick up chemical signals from other zerg. Zerglings also have nostrils, albeit slight, so they might not have need for the extra jaw if it does serve a chemical sensory function.
I suppose they could also be heavily modified antennae, but I’m leaning toward the chemosensory idea. These appendages seem more like mandibles than antennae. The slipper lobster is the only example of a creature I could find with highly modified antennae that are flat and hard looking.
The only other possibility that comes to mind is that between these jaws are salivary glands that secret a saliva which aids in digestion of food.
Zergling and Their Giant “Face Claws”
The zergling’s giant curved horns, or “face claws”, on its head do seem a bit absurd, but there might be an actual reason for these to have been evolved by the swarm. They remind me of a bull’s horns and it seems to me they might be ideal for breaking the covering of a Terran marine’s face shield. Another purpose might be to aid in burrowing. They might be using these horns like shovels. The digging aid probably isn't likely though sense they seemed to burrow just fine in Starcraft 1 when they didn’t have these “face claws”.
I like what prev. post was saying, but I think the extra "face-claws" might be an adaptation from the original !#$@%%@ dune-runner. If the dune runner is from some sort of desert planet (DUNE!), and it's' a mammal, then perhaps it is a biological adaptation for surviving predators... use those extra limbs to help burrow through sand or climb up slopes faster than the predator. The zerg could have then merely repurposed those limbs for combat, or specifically, bashing in the faces of zealots. Additionally, they may also serve some purpose in climbing up while simultaneously tearing through larger foes, (zerglings climbing on top of dragoons, tanks, etc.) Really, the game doesn't do it justice when you see lings only surrounding a thor on ground level. Ideally I thinking they would be veritably "swarming" those bigger dudes, and the extra limbs serve some use for tearing larger stuff. Interesting topic for continuation?
Love the work into this thread guys :D. Just trying to keep it alive.
EDIT: Although they are supposed to be more insectoid than mammalian... hmm
On February 12 2013 10:06 Doominator10 wrote: I like what prev. post was saying, but I think the extra "face-claws" might be an adaptation from the original !#$@%%@ dune-runner. If the dune runner is from some sort of desert planet (DUNE!), and it's' a mammal, then perhaps it is a biological adaptation for surviving predators... use those extra limbs to help burrow through sand or climb up slopes faster than the predator. The zerg could have then merely repurposed those limbs for combat, or specifically, bashing in the faces of zealots. Additionally, they may also serve some purpose in climbing up while simultaneously tearing through larger foes, (zerglings climbing on top of dragoons, tanks, etc.) Really, the game doesn't do it justice when you see lings only surrounding a thor on ground level. Ideally I thinking they would be veritably "swarming" those bigger dudes, and the extra limbs serve some use for tearing larger stuff. Interesting topic for continuation?
Love the work into this thread guys :D. Just trying to keep it alive.
EDIT: Although they are supposed to be more insectoid than mammalian... hmm
You can't really call them mammals or insects (mammalian or insectoid is okay though) as they ARE aliens. I'm hoping to do the locusts soon as I think that they definitely appear mammalian in their portraits.
EPT![[image loading]](http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb57889/starcraft/images/e/ec/ZerglingSCIIsamwise.jpg)
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I will certainly read the rest of this series. ![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/x6fOf.jpg)
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