Translating Multicellular species to Macroscopic species

[Rathalos]

@Deus

If the presence or absence of specific parts and functions in the microscopic stages sets dramatically constraints in the Macroscopic/Aware Stages, I’m sure the player would take temporary decreases in efficiency for the option of having these processes. Even if placing a thylakoid reduces efficiency of my lysosomes, atleast I have photosynthesis to work with. And I just had to spend 20 MP and survive a generation in the Multicellular for that option to be available - otherwise, I would have no access at all to it.

Well, I think the consensus among others is thus far that you should still be able to evolve all metabolisms in the Macroscopic Stage? I don’t necessarily agree, but if that is the case, there is no “need” to get it before you go to Macroscopic.

In any case I would really like to see being able to get access to other metabolisms via endosymbiosis in the Macroscopic Stage. Like is the case with corals, lichen, tube worms at hydrothermal vents, etc.

@Deus

if membranes have a dramatic influence on mobility, then wouldn’t than essentially mean that 4 out of the 6 membrane options result in basically no movement capabilities? Cellulose would indicate algae and “flora”, chitin would indicate fungi analogues, calcium carbonate would indicate something like a stony coral, silica would result in something like glass sponges, etc.

It’s something I actually discussed in the Multicellular parts thread. As you’re probably aware, some plants can move parts of their bodies. The force for that comes having certain cells expand (rather than contract) due to osmotic effects. So that could be used in place of muscles, it just has weird and interesting differences like the “muscles” being on the opposite side from where you would expect them, probably being inside the joints themselves, being slower but not requiring additional energy to keep constant pressure. So that basically has them moving like animated plants in “insert fantasy franchise here.”
For the Multicellular Stage, I can pretty much implement them whenever we have a model for it, for the Macroscopic I can imagine it would be more complicated. But that means it’s 4 out of 6 membrane types for full movement instead of 2!

For before we have this kind of movement solution implemented for cellulose/chitin (and still for carbonate/silicate), as you already pointed out we have the option of flagella/cilia. This is also why I made sure to include it as providing a movement bonus in the initial post. The largest animal to use Cilia as primary locomotion I believe is the Venus Girdle at 1.5m (though it can also uses muscles in short bursts). Which I think means that this is enough of a solution throughout the development of the Macroscopic Stage at least.

A few more things:

• Axons as currently in development actually aren’t locked to Normal/Double currently. The exact same method for their formation as in IRL animal cells probably could not work. But plenty of cells with cell walls do have long extensions for other reasons, so I don’t think it’s unreasonable.
• I do also have some underdeveloped ideas about motion in the “stony” species, but that would definitely be non-LAWK.
• As for “sessile mode:”
  • With what I mentioned before, at least during the Macroscopic Stage, every membrane type should still be able to have a motile lifestyle.
  • I do have some ideas I want to put in a “Macroscopic gameplay” (to parallel the editor concept) thread. But, given the above, before we implement anything specific for it, I think a valid stance is “Yo player, you chose to make an immobile creature.” That’s pretty much the status quo for the Microbe/Multicellular Stages, and some people do like watching immobile macro-algae grow apparently.

@Deus

Examples of that sort of question we should consider -
…
I’m referencing systems defined by the macroscopic editor concept not because I’m demanding that those systems are the only thing I’d accept. I just think we should approach things systemically as much as possible so that we don’t create a mosh of features, and I think trying to see if existing concepts can handle them avoid bloat, and allows us to identify a need for additional mechanics.

Well, the intention with this post was to go with what the Macroscopic design already was, but I guess it did show that some things are not entirely clear yet.

@Deus

• Does possessing photosynthesis as you transition mean a unique integumentary attribute, a unique sort of appendage that performs photosynthesis, or a metabolic process available instantly limited by your SA:V?

Considering that we have things like trees which obviously have photosynthesis ability in the leaves but not in the trunk or roots, I think this demonstrates that we need at least one of:

• Integumentary attributes not being global across the whole organism.
• There being some other category for tissue properties that is per-metaball/node/whatever, whether those be the main body or appendages.

@Deus

• Are poison glands represented as an extremity unlock which allows you to create barbs out of appendages, akin to a jellyfish, or as an integumentary attribute that deals poison contact upon damage?

Given the simplicity of this stage of development (in the biological sense), I would interpret it as contact poison. Keeping in mind my observations on the previous point, the question would be whether it is limited to one part of the body, or present on all of it.

A skin attribute makes sense, though I will note here that the current concept has skin attributes limited to one, which is quite limited for this kind of implementation.

I do also think it makes sense for having one “toxic attribute” to make it easier to unlock other toxic “abilities” but I would have to dive into the evolutionary history to be sure. And this would again be a general macroscopic editor principle that “being given something toxic at the start” just happens to plug into.

@Deus

• Does possessing a digestive complex result in a more advanced organ system state right from the beginning (we should get back to the internal organs discussion soon at this rate), or is that too far of a leap?

I would say so yes; it makes sense for that to progress it to a more advanced state. I listed it in the individual categories in the initial post, but I would envision a kind of sliding scale:

• Cell wall, and no relevant organelles (so in the Multicellular Stage, they could not hunt other cells in any way): you cannot eat from planktonic clouds or microbial mats in any way.
• Being able to engulf or having any damaging organelles means you can eat from microbial clouds or mats.
• It would make sense for multiple of the above, as well as lysosomes, to improve your digestion efficiency, but that’s a question of how many “levels” we want to this in the Macroscopic Stage. I am aware that we don’t want the same granularity you get out of individual organelles in a cell, but considering the progression pace of the Macroscopic we might want there to be a few steps to this.
• Having a digestive complex (extracellular digestion?) would be another massive step up in digestion efficiency/speed. Considering we are scaling up in the transition, this could even start you off with a small jawless mouth (/blind gut which automatically means the hole is a mouth? Maybe that’s a better way of looking at it?).

By the way, I would expect the above “skin microbe absorption” to be something that is disabled once you get a different skin type that has other benefits. So that’s a logical step for some species once they have a mouth/gut.

@Deus

I wonder if there’s a way to make it so that the player has the option to drop their non-dominant metabolic processes? So if you meet a certain threshold, you’re almost “stuck” as being a predominantly photosynthetic macroscopic organism - if you don’t meet that threshold, it’s a secondary and highly diluted process, and there would be some option to get rid of that.

Of course, plants are aerobic as well, so it isn’t so cut and dry. Still, thresholds can be useful.

I guess it calls for a general review of how to handle metabolisms in the Macroscopic Stage/Editor? Quite a lot of plant species have entirely dropped photosynthesis by the way. And like I mentioned before, a lot of parts of plants don’t do photosynthesis to begin with, and that leaves them more efficient at other things. (As in our cell specialization system)

I don’t think we want to go as far as a slider for each metabolism for each metaball. But perhaps it’s possible to have:

• A global checkbox for “does this species have access to this metabolism.”
• A checkbox per major body part for “is this metabolism active here.”

The idea would be that there’s an automatic equal ratio between the metabolisms, and all the other functions of the body part (movement, digestion, etc.) scale with how much ATP is “produced.” (I don’t think we need to actually track that during gameplay).

And then indeed, any process below a threshold in the Multicellular Stage is left out of the Macroscopic body parts.