Characteristics for New Monsters

[Atgxtg]

On 5/8/2017 at 0:19 AM, g33k said:

Airborne creatures are subject to entirely different constraints; swimmers to yet others.

Different, yes, but not entirely different. They still have to be able to take the stresses associated with moving in a high-G environment. 

 

On 5/8/2017 at 0:19 AM, g33k said:

The sphere is of course the "best" shape -- strongest, best surface/volume ratio, etc.  Evolution might drive less "perrect" shapes for other considerations -- eating, avoiding being eaten, reproducing, etc...

 

Yes, but the shape would still have to be viable in the environment. So the creature would probably have to be strong enough to withstand the forces being exerted upon it. If it is just using inner pressure to counteract out pressure, then it will still need a way to handle changes in pressure when it gets moved around. Even if it havs some sort of anchor that allows it to keep in the same pressure zone, it would have to be strong enough to resist being moved. 

It's why I kinda think a sumbarine ring hull structure might be best. The bones and even skin could be of a strong advanced material (something like organic carbon fiber), and it could have multiple blow holes in various parts ofit's body that it could open up to quickly equalize internal and external pressure. 

Hmm, come to think of it, if so many parts of the body could be opened like that, functions like digression and reproduction could be done eternally. Perhaps there could even by some sort of sybotic lifeform that fires in and out of the airwhale? We're probably going to need something for the whale to feed on too.  

[Joerg]

Funny how this thread is straying from a creature design question through challenge to discussion of the environment, but still enjoyable (at least to me).

I missed this before - there is no "liquid" or "gaseous" state on "gas-planets", only a fluid, supracritical phase with properties of both, so anything living in this environment would be moving like through a low friction liquid or a high friction gas.

The recent craze of discovery of planets, and especially of super-earths (rocky planets with more than 1.25 g) has spawned the discussion whether these would be anything like rock planets or rather variants of neptune.

Before putting a whale-like filterer into the atmosphere of a gas giant, I would be interested in what kind of autotrophs (algae-analogon) or small predator (krill-analogon) these beasts are supposed to feed upon. In a reducing atmosphere, the "food" would have to be the oxygenating agent while the reducing agent would be part of the atmosphere. Likewise, a metabolic waste would have to be "airborne" or to be precipitated down into the gravity well.

If you make such a nekton floater a potential autotroph itself, by what means? Electro-magnetism, using the atmospheric currents for passive movement through field gradients allowing induction?

After all, function dictates form. Whale (or fish) shape is optimized for autonomous movement through a dense medium, in pursuit of food.