Proposed [Fauna/Monster] ~ Middle Suvan.

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This is the first step to starting a lore article. Please hold all conversations about lores here in this forum. No development takes place here ie Article posting. This forum is simply for threads that want to hash out what a lore should or shouldn't include as well as its merits and flaws. One can also gauge interest in new lore here as well. Polls are encouraged.

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Proposed [Fauna/Monster] ~ Middle Suvan.

Postby Zuriel on March 2nd, 2014, 9:33 pm

Ok so HD approval has been granted to develop.

Process seems to state I should post here to make sure there's actually some interest in the critters before going near the peer review forum?

If you do take the time to read, please leave a comment! interested? not interested? Reasons?(or not)


Turmoil


Image:

Image

Name:
Turmoil

Frequency:
Medium

Threat level:
Their pack behaviour causes them to be a High risk for anyone swimming in the water. Though they will not attack boats of any reasonable size, a small wooden canoe, rowboat or ships boat could easily be in danger of being targeted and sunk by a large or hungry pack of squid (if not well defended).

Abilities:
Discharges large volumes of mucous filled, Djed charged ink.
Usually releases ink in globs about the size of the squid itsself, these act as doppelgangers which confuse prey (and predator).

Most common in:
Middle Suvan Sea, they follow their prey with the climate, heading far enough north to be spotted north of Kenash in the summer and far enough south to be spotted on the north coast of Eyktol during winter. Svefra intervention is the main reason for them not spreading further north as they are becoming more and more invasive.

Physical characteristics:
  • Coloured a dark, almost black blue.
  • Four metres in length (Including head and tentacles).
  • Large fins on the head used for extremely swift maneuvering.
  • The outer surface of the tentacle is covered with a plated shell, short, round plates overlay each other up the tentacles and around the mouth. This maintains flexibility while allowing the squid to lock its tentacles in front of its body when swimming, for an extremely aquadynamic shape
  • As a result of the shell, these squid have no suckers on their tentacles
  • They do however, have back-facing barbs all along the inside of their tentacle shells
  • The ends of their tentacles hold a sharp spike with a backward facing barb for spearing and holding prey. These are often used to lethal effect on any perceived weak-points of the prey once it has been caught, stabbing at eyes, gills and necks.

Social Structure:
Packs consist of around 5 - 20 members with no discernible leaders or alphas and will fight and eat other packs if they come in contact though will not actively hunt them. When a pack war is going on, all members of each pack will release as many doppelgangers as they can. The difference in numbers at this point seems to multiply considerably and the lesser pack is usually driven away.

Miscellaneous:
The squid moves using four large sacs around its body which it fills from four separate inlets on the tentacled side of its body but squeezes through one hole at the tip of the head. This outlet is also attached to the two large ink sacks and mucous glands of the creature. They move at about 30kph and can speed up for extremely intense bursts when attacking

The Turmoil hunt in relatively sophisticated packs, confusing prey by squirting sticky mucous filled and Djed charged "living" ink into the water. These ink doppelgangers confuse the prey into thinking there are more squid in one direction than there actually is, allowing a single squid to “herd” a school of fish into the maws of his real pack.

Although the squid are good at herding schools of small fish into the shallows where they can be pressed and as many taken as possible, they are opportunistic hunters and will happily attack a lone dolphin or a smaller pod, sharks hunting alone may also find themselves prey to these ruthless squid.

They kill by propelling themselves into their prey at high speeds, spreading their tentacles at the last fraction of a second before collision and wrapping them around, piercing the prey with the barbed tentacles and then tearing into them with their sharp beaks. The beak of the creature carries enough biting force to crack human bone.

Turmoil flesh is chewy but both it and the ink of the creature are delicious. The ink is a very dark sheen of blue and is useful in drawing, if taken directly from the ink sack it can be applied thinly to paper, or if squeezed from the creature it will mix with mucous making it thicker and stickier, allowing it to be applied like a paint to surfaces such as stone, ink can be mixed to produce lighter hues of blue.

When spooked by a large predator, the packs have been known to squirt out their entire ink reserves at once, resulting in a truly massive black squid doppelganger charging at the predator. This is a fear tactic and doesn't have much physical effect on the predator, but can obscure its vision and be extremely intimidating (this sometimes happens as a response to large ships).

The squid cannot be fished with lines as they will bite and break them or jet away and pull the line with them, an extremely durable net would be needed to net them or they will simply bite through. Because of this, accidentally trapping squid with fishing nets can be devastating to a fisherman. Spears or harpoons are necessary.

Notes :
The name is a placeholder but can be solidified if people like it. Also, the frequency & pack size are something I'm really not sure about as it depends on the rest of the ecosystem which I am not entirely familiar with at this point.

The initial idea was that the squid mix their ink with mucous (making it nice and sticky so as to stay together as it forms) and charge it with ((not sure if) pre-stored or generated) Djed as it exits the body, this "animates" it with squid behavioural patterns while it holds together.

As the squid themselves are black-skinned creatures it makes them very much indistinguishable from their inky counterparts.

Given the size of the creature more than 20 would seem hard to sustain (food wise) in a single pack and less than 5 would probably hinder their ability to defend themselves against the efforts of larger predators. I think the rarity of encounters should move more toward the rare side if the packs are larger and more toward the common side if they are smaller, whatever people like the idea of.
Last edited by Zuriel on March 9th, 2014, 12:17 am, edited 4 times in total.
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Proposed [Fauna/Monster] ~ Middle Suvan.

Postby Lenz on March 2nd, 2014, 9:57 pm

I think this would be a pretty cool creature to create. You should definitely send it to the peer review forum! At this time, I have no real questions of concern other than some grammar and spelling issues, but those can be corrected in the peer review forum.

I see great potential in this and I like the doppelganger idea you have going on. Good luck!
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