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It seems Disgustedorite "ninja'd" me while I was writing this. I do agree with her: the description is on the shorter side, and could benefit from elaboration.

QUOTE (Cube67 @ Aug 31 2022, 06:36 PM)

@Coolsteph If you're wondering, it's a reference to the "Bruhs", an organism from 2s2t (which is basically a joke project I made in discord intending to host intentionally poorly made organisms (but which became a semi-serious project in its own right)). They were made by Oofle (who you also probably don't know of).

I have, in fact, heard of Oofle. For example, I've given feedback on Oofle's submission of Sruglettes. I go through organism submissions frequently and thoroughly enough I'm almost certainly aware of anyone who posts in more than five threads. I also am aware of the newest-member information at the bottom of the forum.

The instant I saw your response that I had guessed incorrectly, I immediately had the idea to make a descendant of this, the "Brollios", loosely inspired by Broly. Perhaps I'll make them pathogens. A quick check does show there is one species of ciliate pathogenic in humans, which I might use as inspiration.

"and to respond accordingly." (and respond accordingly)
What sorts of habitats tend to cause great environment stress? Streams that mostly dry up at certain times of the year, perhaps? Are there certain microbes they don't eat, or generally prefer or eat most commonly? Do they have contractile vacuoles to expel excess water in freshwater, as real-life amoebas andciliates do?

Is the name inspired by Broly from Dragon Ball Z?

I don't think organisms can really use iron as a source of food. Some organisms "breathe" with it, instead of oxygen. You can always say that it requires a fairly high volume of iron in its soil to thrive due to its specific mineral needs. Some plants, such as rice, benefit greatly from having sufficient silicon, so having unusual nutritional needs isn't that odd.

The scientific name should come immediately after the common name, on the first line of the template.
Remember to look at the template for organism submissions.

Given its broad diet, "filter-feeder" with a range given or just "detritivore" would be more appropriate.

Capitalize "eggs" in the template.

The petite, internal-looking jaws are unusual compared to Minikruggs, and are a bit more like Silkruggs. Nothing's stopping this from evolving twice, but I recommend taking note of it in the description.

Are those seams along its face, like a mantis's? Minikruggs don't have those. You'll have to explain that development, or make them a little fuzzy-looking and say they're stripes.

It seems to have two pairs of limbs rooted to one body segment. I'm not sure how this would work. The quickest solution is re-drawing the upper lines of the third pair so it's rooted to the third body segment, not the second.

The way the original bristles have been blurred suggests they are a distant or out-of-focus background detail, which doesn't make sense. The quickest solution is using the magic wand tool (if it were GIMP; I'm not sure what other image programs' name for it is), making a narrow selection, and carefully using the paint bucket to paint it black. You could also paint it over by hand.

Kruggs have prominent clocas on their last segments. From this angle, it should be visible. You can, of course, make a note in the description it has a protrusible cloaca, although it may be less of an explanatory hassle to just make a little line just below the tip of the final segment.

For something potentially small to begin with, I don't think being on an island would make it less than half its size.
"the split" should be: "Bristlekruggs split".
"white-color" Surely you just mean "white"?

Please trim the picture so most of the background is in color.

There are other things, but I'm taking a break for now.

The Cocobarrage depicted will need to be a darker shade of grey to be accurate. Right now, it looks transparent and glassy.

"Like in the": For a caption explanation, omitting "like" at the beginning is appropriate.

I don't think there's any point in the neologism "Saganflora". After all, it's not like any flora from Mason came to Sagan 4, so there's no point in distinguishing it.

I recommend trimming the images to remove white space, or filling out the edges more with color. Some official images do have a watercolor-esque look, but this looks unfinished. (And I still think the Cliff Bristler image looks unfinished.)

You'll need to get rid of the paragraph break between "Habitat" and "Size". The template should be one continuous block. I've noticed other template-separations in your other submissions, too.

Making the first paragraph just one sentence looks awkward. I recommend merging the sentences below it to the first paragraph.
"It is searching" this feels too immediate. I don't think any Sagan 4 organism description uses this, except perhaps for a brief bit of narrative flavor in the Larlap description.

"Lift itself up slightly. Just enough": These sentnces should be merged.
"net. Hanging" this is a similar run-on sentnce problem. "pseudopod's will separate": Pseudopods. This also needs to be merged with the following sentence. I recommend refreshing your knowledge on sentence flows and run-on sentences. Using a sentence checker on a word processor or Grammarly may also help you.

This is your sixth submission this Generation. Since your submissions tend to require a lot of feedback, I recommend focusing on getting your present five non-rejected submissions approved before starting another submission. The one closest to approval (that is, with the fewest problems) is the Bristlekrugg, so I recommend focusing on any problems with that one first.

An easy way to get used to Sagan4's organism submission style without worrying too much about plausibility issues or acceptability is making a fairly ordinary flora or microbe. An easy way to do this is to select two real plants at random and find a way to plausibly merge their traits together. For example, combining a kale plant with a lemon tree could yield an organism submission that's a tropical species with big, edible leaves and sour fruit. (In case one wonders whether a plant can have edible fruit and leaves: moringa trees have human-edible leaves and young seedpods.)

You could also make a fauna not substantially different from its ancestor. Even my own first two submissions, the Jongfoll and the Biplane Tonboswarmer, didn't do anything particularly weird, or differ all that much from their ancestors.

QUOTE (Disgustedorite @ Aug 29 2022, 01:02 PM)

The ancestor exclusively ate ferines, and ferries are an entire genus of flora, so I figured it should be sufficient. I could add more stuff but most of what would be in the same edibility range is in different kingdoms.

If its ancestor was indeed the Dualtrunk, then the Dualtrunk also ate Supershrooms and Sapshrooms:

" Mycovore (Supershrooms, Sapshrooms), Folivore (Arid Ferine leaves) "

In fact, that's listed as the first and second thing in its diet. (Though it is admittedly improbable something so big would eat large quantities of mushroom-esque organisms in its particular habitats.)

That it eats Supershrooms and Sapshrooms may suggest they are sources of protein or other nutrients to supplement its diet of leaves. Expanding its diet to include Ferry shoots, at least, could be a good compromise, or making note of having specialized microbes that help it gain protein off just leaves and fruit of a particular genus, or granting more detail of its need to migrate with precise timing to get sufficient nutrition from new growth or catch fruits in fruiting seasons. Some of the habitats (plains, veldt, chaparral) might not have many Ferries. Yes, they would be in bush/shrub form, but I'm not sure if they would exist in enough abundance to support herds of thousands of hungry migrating Hexatrunks that eat only Ferries' leaves and fruit.

One compromise is simply to go into detail on them being ecosystem engineers, like like bison, which do not simply follow waves of fresh, nutritious growth. Like bison, they could force the plants they feed on to be locked in early-spring mode of nutrition for weeks. I'm not sure how this would go for trees/bushes/shrubs, which might be harder to cultivate to this end, but it's sufficiently plausible.

The thorns wearing down herbivores' teeth wasn't a novel trait, and it doesn't require significant quantities of iron. I based this on real plant defenses against herbivores, like phytoliths in leaves.

The simplest, most practical route to achieving your goal is starting from scratch with this submission and going in plausible, small steps.

QUOTE (Cube67 @ Aug 29 2022, 08:06 AM)

What a nice and funky little creature. The coloration makes it resemble some sort of fantasy candy animal. One thing I found odd, though: would they really only eat ferries? I know it's a whole genus, sure, but there's nothing to indicate they're completely specialized for them. What's stopping them from exploiting the other flora in their range?

You raise a good point. I think its dependence on ferries is partly an artifact of how several of its habitats (
(Wallace Chaparral, Wallace Bush, Central Wallace Tropical Scrub, etc.) have no large flora, or local flora at all. While it's plausible this could be mainly a browser (eating leaves and shoots, not "grass"), it's still odd a large, widespread herbivore could eat only Ferine leaves and fruit. Eating Ferine shoots, flowers, and flower buds in addition to leaves and fruit would be more plausible in meeting its nutritional needs through each season, although since they migrate, they don't need to meet their nutritional needs year-round in any one area. (Unless tropical populations don't migrate.)

HethrJarrod, achieving iron-fortified quills is probably possible, but you'll need to start from scratch. I recommend consulting the information I have given you on the best ways to achieve your goal. As things are, if it uses trace quantities of iron, it wouldn't be enough to have truly iron-fortified quills, no more than supposing a human has internal iron plating simply because the human contains a lot of iron in the human's blood, muscles, and liver.

QUOTE (Disgustedorite @ Aug 28 2022, 10:41 PM)

No, the rule is 3 types now.

Evidently, that hasn't gotten updated.

Last time I checked, using "primus" as the species name is discouraged due to overuse. You could probably use a name referencing finches or the fact it walks.
"it's population boomed" is a typo.
There's some choppiness here, too. Like several other submissions, I'll have to come back later. There have been so many submissions lately that some earlier ones haven't gotten sufficient attention.

The limited biome rule says a species can have up to two habitat types and up to three flavors. This lives in temperate, subtropical, and tropical habitats. Is this your wildcard? Do you have any other wildcard species, who have gone extinct or whose ranges have shrunk to non-wildcard ranges?

It's possible you didn't see my quick edit after my initial post. After a few minutes of thinking about it, I determined it was actually fine. Just go into detail on how and why it occurred. You could list wing tearing as one of multiple factors.

"lamarck," Lamarck.
"Hollow Bone" should be "Hollow Bones".

Completely losing its wings all at once, in one step, is certainly odd. Given the time scales of Generations, and the fact a finger deletion is so simple, this is probably possible, but it does bring up the question of why it would spread. One could argue that the wings were prone to frostbite and had limited value (due to cold conditions) for large parts of the year, and perhaps that flight was difficult for a big, heavy grazing herbivore (something like hoatzins), and perhaps it had no predators that necessitated flight throughout its entire lifespan, but why wouldn't the wings simply become vestigial? Humans themselves have several vestigial or near-vestigial traits, such as third eyelids, simply because there was no evolutionary pressure to lose them entirely.

A drastically shorter wing-finger with a tiny finger-webbing-esque wing could be a good compromise. It would be easy to hide under fluff right next to the body's warmth. Alternatively, you could give them turkey-wings too small relative to body size to let adults fly, but the young could do brief, low-altitude bouts of flight. (Though perhaps not to escape predators: no predators are listed, and the main cause of death in the ancestor's young seems to be starvation and freezing.)

EDIT: On second thought: it's fine. Just go into extensive detail on how it would occur and why it spread.

QUOTE (Disgustedorite @ Aug 28 2022, 08:30 PM)

I have added a note about soil conditions. The diversity of fruit size and shape is actually based on the cherry genus.

I did consider comparing it to the genus Prunus (the cherry genus), and briefly checked Google Images about it. Checking Malus came a few seconds afterward, most likely because of residual knowledge on the diversity of forgotten apple cultivars. In any case, what it was based on is irrelevant, since it remains plausible.

I appreciate the note about their soil fertility requirements. It means they aren't too ecologically dominant on Wallace and Koseman, and suggest niches for other flora, or even genus-derived descendants.

"new research has found it"
Sagan 4 is written from the perspective of absolute knowledge, occasional retcons aside. You can, however, point out this submission's lineage derives from the Pioneer Quillball, which sported four species of symbiotic microbes, and so highlight its potential to form symbiotic relationships with multiple kinds of microbes. (Though, admittedly, the Pioneer Quillball's symbiotes were all closely related.)

A retcon saying the Pioneer Quillball and its descendants had iron-reinforced thorns and quills helped by rustmold symbiotes this entire time is such a major retcon it cannot be accepted. If that were true, it brings up plausibility issues for the lineages' herbivores. For example, if they had iron-reinforced quills and thorns, how could the Ramchin eat them without special adaptations? The lineage is simply too ancient and well-integrated into the planet's ecology for this to be permitted.

I recommend looking up how real plants interact with iron, and their relationships with root microbes.

QUOTE (HethrJarrod @ Aug 28 2022, 06:40 PM)

Yes. What do you think about it/its ancestors having formed a relationship with some rustmold in the past? QUOTE (Coolsteph @ Aug 27 2022, 09:29 PM) I see you've made another submission in your plan to make a flora that's like a worm. Do you still plan to finish this?

You'd have to make a retroactive submission to establish a retroactive rustmold association, although I'm not sure if any slots are left, and it might be frowned upon, or prohibited entirely, to create a detail so significant as that. Retroactive submissions must be done carefully.

In any case, all you could do with a retroactive submission is suggest the lineage leading up to the Quillfence has the potential to form significant relationships with rustmolds. For example, when I specified the Quillfence stored energy in the form of inulin, a specific biochemical pathway, that could be interpreted to mean its ancestor did so, or simply that its ancestor had a biochemical pathway that allows inulin storage to be developed in one step by a descendant.

A simpler, less controversial path would be beginning a rustmold association starting with this organism in particular. A quick way to encourage this kind of development in its close relations, or encourage horizontal gene transfer things in its relatives later on, is to make this submission form root relationships with related species. This link could be a good start on how to do this, but since this is such a new phenomenon on Sagan 4 (at least in this timeline), you'll have to move carefully.

Judging by the sheer variety of fruit morphology in one crabapple species alone, the plumleaf crabapple, the genus-wide fruit variation seems sound.

Overall, this seems ready for approval, though I am still a little curious about the preferred soil conditions of the genus.

It seems that, lately, Discord users have been getting banned for changing their profile pictures, profiles, and online statuses. It's recommended to avoid doing that for a while. I do not know if this has affected anyone in the Sagan 4 community specifically.

Sources:

https://scarew0lves.tumblr.com/post/6937002...ng-on-right-now
https://www.sportskeeda.com/gaming-tech/new...rofile-pictures
https://twitter.com/IsDiscordDown/status/1563378535514787841

QUOTE (Disgustedorite @ Aug 27 2022, 09:27 PM)

Nachoetoes sound like they would make sense as a genus group. Spearsore makes more sense as a widespread single entry, but I wonder how that interacts with the wildcard system; I personally wouldn't count it under wildcard since it's a microclimate thing, but Mni might. Alternatively it can be a notable subgenus in a broader genus group that does similar things.

How about making Spearsores a notable, comparatively annoying and severe subgenus in the Nachotoes genus? They have similar pathologies and hosts, after all.

QUOTE (Disgustedorite @ Aug 27 2022, 09:24 PM)

Since it's a genus group that might potentially outlast the nodents, I don't want to be too clade-specific. Anything that would be poisonous to an insect can probably be assumed off the menu.

Yes, it might be awkward to mention Dundiggers by name if it outlives them, but plents, in general, should last for a while. Therefore, a mention of whether it favors or disfavors certain very broad categories of organisms when it comes to scavenging could be appropriate. As for things that would be poisonous to an insect...that's very broad. Nicotine is poisonous to many kinds of insects (and also mites), but the tobacco hornworm has no problem with it, and small doses of nicotine are not fatal to bees. As a compromise between sheer species variety and generally unspecified "chemicals" in Sagan 4 descriptions, you could say, you could mention three specific chemicals in applicable Sagan 4 descriptions and then follow it up with "and other poisons which are typically poisonous to Earth's beetles and aphids".

Is there a reason they are generally found in "small ground flora"? Is it because they tend to be more digestible, soft, nutritious, or simply tastier than trees?

The description mentions that species in temperate regions have eggs that can lay dormant, but this also lives in polar areas. It would be best to specify, "in environments with cold winters" or "environments with long, cold winters" (to exclude subtropical environments with relatively mild winters) in the description. I wonder if this winter adaptation also applies to boreal environments.

When they feed on carcasses, do they feed on fresh, rotten, or mostly-decayed bony remains, or exploit pre-existing wounds or soft areas, like the eyes or mouth? I'm not sure if they could gnaw through thick skin, unless they are ferry specialists with stronger jaws.

Two errors I pointed out remain in the description: ""The site get's" and "However the surrrounding". It's possible this happened because you worked on the memory of what I said, instead of copying it down and going point-by-point through the description. It should help to write descriptions on text processors with grammar checks, or use to use Grammarly.

"where self-sustaining": "where a self-sustaining".
"that use to have": That used to have.
"Father away it would" would sound more fluent with a comma after "farther away".

Here's a quick comment. I'll have to come back later for more.

Are there any kinds of organisms they prefer to scavenge on, or won't eat? Plents (especially the Dundigger) might smell or taste bad due to ammonia-sweat. It's not impossible they would ignore this or even find it tasty, bu it's worth pointing out.

I see you've made another submission in your plan to make a flora that's like a worm. Do you still plan to finish this?