TuxLife

Erez, you don't seem to know what you are talking about.

Rooted underwater plants do not exist. At least, plants that evolved underwater do not exist. There are admittedly a few grasses that having conquered land, and then evolved back into the water that can be observed in shallow seas.

Seaweeds and other macroalgaes get everything they need without roots. It is all around them in the water. They lack the mass transport systems of the xylem and phloem that land plants have as it us unneeded. They rely on the continual movement of water past them to avoid nutrient depletion.

The "roots" that they do have are for anchoring themselves to the rock, called a [wiki]Holdfast[/wiki] nothing to do with mineral absorbtion. The anchoring is vital to ensure they remain in an area that recieves sufficient light. Actually eroding the bedrock would have negative consequences as they would fall off.

Artropodia Nessia : Milarqui
Evolved from: Artropodia Milarca
Gene added: +1 Poison Spike
Description: Moves along on ocean bottom eating the remains of the dead. The density of plankton in the seas where the Artropodia milarca lives raised millions of years ago, so eventually one crawler mutated and was able to start feeding on it, thus increasing the quantity and quality of the food they had access to, making their survival more likelier than the old crawlers. The absorption of all sorts of plankton has slowly given them some sort of genetical immunity to poison, and at the same time they started to produce their own poison, developing on the way a spike to deliver that poison. The poison kills its prey very fast and accelerates putrefaction, so the Artropodia Nessia can soon eat dead meat, and while he waits he can eat plankton.

Ok about the roots my mistake. I'm still sure that aren't free floating plants in the sea.

Well you simply don't get plants in the sea at all. Plants are an evolution that needed to take place for algaes/seaweeds to move onto land. Living in an air environment rather than an aquatic one meant many hurdles overcome by evolution.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sargassum is an example of a free-floating macro seaweed.

All things green obviously originally evolved from free floating chlorophyll cells, a stage we are not very advanced from.. a buoyant cluster of algae is currently the top of the food chain

Abaddon said:

Well you simply don't get plants in the sea at all. Plants are an evolution that needed to take place for algaes/seaweeds to move onto land. Living in an air environment rather than an aquatic one meant many hurdles overcome by evolution.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sargassum is an example of a free-floating macro seaweed.

All things green obviously originally evolved from free floating chlorophyll cells, a stage we are not very advanced from.. a buoyant cluster of algae is currently the top of the food chain

Click to expand...

Thanks! Now I know something new thought those are plankton at the open sea, and not fully sized plants - which is what the picture seem to show them as. Which leads me further - in the NES we only have plants, not the others...

As for my use for the word plants, I meant the green photosynthesizers as a whole.

Great update

Oronger : Daftpanzer
Evolved From: Sponger
Genes (3): Plankton Eating x2, Swimming x1
Description: The adult stage of these life-forms appears identical to the Sponger. The difference is in the sophisticated 'larval' stage, in which the Oronger now spend most of their lives; small globular animals with bands of tiny cilia for locomotion, and one or two large trailing tentacles lined with similar cilia for catching plankton particles on the move - an inverted form of the adult feeding apparatus. With the Oronger, the sessile adult stage is entered only as a means of spawning the next generation.

Click to expand...

-> Gene Added: Cold Resistance

Orophulas: Daftpanzer
Evolved from: Oronger
Description: Under stong predation pressure, some Oronger have mutated to survive cold waters. Here they can spawn in relative peace. Indeed they have returned to a more sessile state of being - when enough plankton can be found in shallow waters, even the larvae ground themselves on the seabed. Inviduals will still venture into warmer waters when faced with starvation.

EDIT: assuming we have plankton in nutrient-rich cold waters, as in RL - this would suit me nicely

Hahah, Abaddon basically covered all of my points. Basically, an oceanic plant is going to have a few resources that are chronically on tight supply, but it is still able to acquire enough of these resources to live. The reason the Haptor captures passing lifeforms is basically just for a nutrient boost- similar to how predatory plants capture insects to make up for living in resource-poor environments.

I know its not good to plan ahead in this kind of game, but cant wait for a couple more evolutions, I may have a nice symbiont for you Iggy

Cool Daft! Incidentally, your map also reflects a bit of the nutrient diversity of the seas that I was talking about, if you take plankton density as being correlated with the available nutrients in the water. Of course, that map shows more than that- it also shows how photosynthetic phytoplankton undergo seasonal booms in the north and south as they enjoy exceptionally long and bright summers, triggering similar blooms in zooplankton and their predators, all the way up to migratory whales.

We should remember earth is a relatively stable world. Early evolution earth would have been a lot less stable. Massive booms of very few creatures initially until more niche evolve. Modern world plankton is richest at the poles because in comparison there is few predators and nutrient cycling than in the warmer waters. Do not mistake these numbers however. There is many many many times more food and nutrients in warmer waters, just many higher levels of organism stores. Many many trophic levels etc. The poles booms are a bit of an anomaly - not a rule.

Well, I was going to evolve Spongietta instead, but some Crawlers are trying to crawl into the Clawer's turf!

Not gonna happen. Prepare to get stabbed. Repeatedly. For great justice.

Alternate Evolution for future said:

Spoiler :

Sponger : NPC
Genes (2): Plankton Eating x2
Description: Clings to the ground, filtering plankton from the enviroment.

Spongy
Genes (2): Plankton Eating x2
New Genes: Stinging Tentacles
Description: The Sponger population soon dropped due to Vampira Minor predation, which dug into it's soft, quivering flesh with their hard, throbbing mouth-bits. However, some Spongers fought back with mild chemical "Stings" protruding from their main flesh. Evolution allowed these less-desirable meals to survive, leading to the rise of the Spongy line (due to their lighter, fuzzier appearance by being covered with tentacles.)
These tentacles also served to direct plankton-rich waters into it's maw(s).
Simple: They grew relatively energy-efficient stinging tentacles not only to avoid some predation but also help direct plankton-rich waters for eating.

Click to expand...

As for Plants/Animals, this is what I think.
Plants rely mostly on gathering energy from natural sources. Now wait! I mean either from the sun (photosynthesizing) or from mineral sources (chemical synthesizes). Therefore, most "Plants" don't have tougher muscle tissue, and any digestion of said plants would be focused on Chlorophyll or the broth of microbacteria for miners.
Animals rely mostly on gathering energy from other live, multi-celluar things. Whether it's eating plants or other animals. Any digestion of animals need to focus on the flesh- namely muscle, fat, and organs.
As for "Passive" animals or "active" plants, I say just go to the descendent to check, although this can change, a look at the common descendent can show what the main "energy possibility" of a creature is. Venus Fly Trap? Plant. Dew Spider? Animal.
For Spongs, IDK.

As for specialization, I say that the more specialized you go the more energy you get. Complex Digestion<Live Things Eating<Flesh Eating<Sponge Eating<Sponger Eating. The tradeoff is specialized species quickly die out when prey dies off, or need to constantly trade their more specialized genes as time goes on.

I'm editing Stabber to "Eating Live Things". If you think that "Complex Digestion" is better, then also take off "Eating Dead Things".

I'm going to start working on the next era, but I will still accept new evolutions.

Sorry, here's my evolution:

Altum Carnem: Popcornlord
Evolved from: Altum Comedentis
Gene added: +1 Flesh Eating
Description: As the Altum Comedentis survived in the scarce underworld, some began to eat the raw flesh of the miners, out of necessity. A few found the right genes in their systems, and thus Altum Carnem evolved. Although there was not as many creatures in the deep, Carnem's strength lied in the lack of competition, and the few predators, outside others of their own species.

Honestly, the plant/animal distinction is just for convenience's sake, as it's only grounded in a somewhat archaic view of Earth's life. Plants are photosynthetic, but so are many bacteria and other single-celled lifeforms outside of Kingdom Plantae. They tend to have hardened cell walls and produce their own food with chloroplasts, but some plants are parasites which don't produce energy themselves. Compounding this is the fact that nothing requires us to follow the same evolutionary paths taken historically on Earth- consider the Haptor, which is a semi-motile photosynthesizer with a limited capacity for carnivory.

Sea Drifter/SouthernKing
Evolved from: Floater
Gene added: +1 Photosynthesis
Description: The Sea Drifter evolved out of the Floater by evolving chloroplasts in its upper half of the body. Not only is it now able to feed off of plankton, it is also able to transform sunlight into energy for use when plankton are sparse. Because of this development, it now drifts closer to the surface, only a few feet under it, to be able to get the best of both energy sources.

Vampira Minor : Omega124
Evolved From: Crawler
Genes (3): Eating Dead Things x1, Flesh Eating x1, Crawling x1
Description: The Vampira Minor is notable for its ability to eat live multi-celled unlike the crawlers they evolved from.

Turns into...

Vampira Major: Omega
Evolved from: Vampira Minor
Gene added: Teeth X1
Gene removed (optional, you may remove up to 1 gene): N/A
Description:While the start of what could be considered teeth started with the evolution of the Vampira Minor, it was not until the Vampira Major where they could match to the skill of the claws of Crawlers. Using teeth to kill and disember its foes, it also helps making the food easier to digest by cutting it down.

"Greetings dragons and wyrens! The Terrance Telechannel now presents another flame-blowing episode of: TuxLife; Evolution Exploration: The Second Era"

[The camera is crawled over by crawler-family descendants]

"Err... we have technical difficulties with Camera Two. Camera Two, over? over?"

[The camera settled on the bottom, a giant, scaled hand fell into view, covered with small crawlers, a grey dragon missing a tail and an arm, trailing blood, is seen swimming away before a censor blocked it]

"Oops, hehe. Nevermind. Play the intro again, Bill!"

[screen quickly turned black, before fading into the intro]

"Greetings dragons and wyrens! The Terrance Telechannel now presents another barbequing episode of: TuxLife; Evolution Exploration: The Second Era"

[The camera slowly zooms over the landscape crawling with crawlers. Notably, the ever present "Live" sign on the lover right hand corner is missing.]

"Welcome back to Hammus Tuxedorum! We come back after putting ourselves in the time-warper for a few million years to find ourselves in an new Era! Oh Jolly!"

[The camera slowly pans up, displaying both the entire scene; blobs of floaterus, towers of Spongerus, green splashes of Slimerus and everpresent striving of crawlerus]

*in a grave tone*"A world devastated by climate change! Hundreds of species whipped out! Entire lines destroyed!"

[The Camera flashes to another, which is zooming in on two clawerus, a Stabber and a Artropodia Nessia, eating on the edge of a dead sponger]

"Oh! The apo... *confused tone* oh? That is for Era 33? Nevermind! Play it again bill!"

[screen quickly turned black, before fading into the intro]

"Greetings dragons and wyrens! The Terrance Telechannel now presents another barbequing episode of: TuxLife; Evolution Exploration: The Second Era"

[This time, the screen focused on a small glass tub of Crawlerus]

"Welcome back to Hammus Tuxedorum! This time we're on the science-lab of the Silver Spear, due to some technical difficulties down below."

[A floaterus corpse fell onto the viewing floor. A swarm of clawerus descended upon it. The camera zoomed in to focus on the raging battle over the corpse.]

"It is now the Clawstrum era, where the only major remains are the claws of the slowly evolving Clawer we met last era. They have dominated the sea floor and they, and their cousins, are soon evolving further."

[Several crawlerus are seemingly dueling with sharp claws]

"The Clawer with an appetite is known as the stabber!"

[Zoomed into a stabber ripping over another clawer. As the clawer went limp the stabber rushed in and started scooping the flesh into it's mouth]

"Already used to fighting, they are becoming more used to actually killing thing not bothering them!"

[Scene shifts to a smaller, agile clawerus slowly inching on the triumphant Stabber]

"However, several of the competition soon returned with revenge. Meet Artropodia Nessia, descendant of the Antropodia Milaricas"

[The Nessia dashed foward to stab a poisonous spike, into the stabber, then retreated from the flailing blades]

"Formerly a Crawler who also filtered plankton to escape Clawer competition, it has come to be quite a hunter itself!"

[The stabber stabbed itself a few times lightly, twitched, and died]

"None of it's opponents have any resistance to it's poison!"

[Time lapse of the Nessia returning to poke at the corpse, then hiding again. It filtered some green water.]

"However, they still need to rely on it to be softened for them to digest it. Even with the help of their poison they are in a similar position as the clawer in the last era."

[it returned to tug on the meat and ate some. Time lapse to show it coughing it out and then returning to hide.]

"Namely, they still need to wait for evolution to help the few enterprising eaters for it to work."

[A darkish figure moved towards the Nessia, it was hesitating a bit, as viewers can see]

"And they sometimes find their poison took too long to regenerate"

[The Nessia bit onto a piece of flesh for keeping, and fled from the Vampira Major]

"However... it was useful when used in the defensive, although matched by weapons of various kinds"

[Flash to two Vampira Majors dueling, "watched" by several other Crawlerus]

"And now, for the MAIN competitor for crawling predator: the Vampira Major!"

[One of the Majors "roared", and sharp teeth poked out.]

"This era, they developed the actual tools for the job!"

[The two Majors charged each other again. Scene shifts to a Major dueling Clawer, almost like the last era]

"And with their millenia-old instinct, this might give them an edge over the Clawer's genetic memory of fighting!"

[The Vampira bit the Clawer, but this time it's teeth cut into the obsolete scavanger. Ripped to pieces with a blow and a shake, the Vampira ate]

"Well, that's all folks! Watch the next episode for the new Open Water developments, deep sea dangers, or even plant panics!"

In order to not be held liable for future wierdness, the Terrance Telechannel will no pledge to not view events occuring beyond the "stability zone"

Here's what I've got done so far. I hope to fully finish the next era and have it posted sometime tomorrow night.

Cthulu!

(Jaws theme song, A Halthor picks up a swarm of screaming floaters and eats them)

They look great. Pretty daft, huh?

EDIT: I mean deft. But yeah, the second meaning still stands.

Slimer secondus looks cute!