The Chamax: Gotta Love To Hate 'Em!

[sabredog]

It could be a flexible cuticle instead of a rigid exoskeleton. I was wondering about the size issue and saw that Chamax is only size 6 so the weight might be explained that way. Less gravity, less weight. Of course the things need some better respiratory system than crustaceans or arthropods, but maybe a supercharger system to supplement at least book lungs might work for short bursts in order to catch their prey.

The acid might help serve as a component of this supercharger system which could also explain why the things need something like that in the first place.

The beetle predators could have semi-rigid chitin layer that doesn't have to be heavy enough to support weight, just create a shield to prevent acid damage. It could be concentrated around the head and forequarters, with flexible, softer sections layered over the limbs. This would reduce weight and protect the areas most likely to get sprayed.

If the beetles triangulate and are a bushwacking type of predator that lunges out from the surrounding earth to attack the chamax as they tunnel through it maybe more protection can be found from the earth's composition itself. Does it have a high alkali content that neutralizes the majority of the acid effects?

The predator in that case might have stiff, sticky hairs that cover the areas not protected by the semi-hard shell so the high alkali soil cakes onto the body and acts as that "ablative" layer you were describing. The advantage here would be that the ablative protection would be repaired as the creature tunnels through the ground. No caloric expenditure. Reduced caloric expenditure means more energy for search and catch time.

Maybe a good weapon for capturing a chamax that would also help limit exposure to the unprotected (or less protected) areas of the predators would be a harpoon that the predator "fires" in a manner similar to a cone snail. Again, the chemicals within the creature could form an explosive mixture that propels the dart through the wall of the chamax tunnel so the predator doesn't have to expose so much of itself. The dart doesn't even have to be poisoned because the chamax will destroy itself.

Then the predators can continue following the tunnels and signals to the maternal's lair.

Just some thoughts.

 

[Blue Ghost]

So, a giant kodiak bear with armor of an anklyosaur and the weaponry of a bomardier beetle?

Oh my.

 

[boomslang]

Or, taking a page from Hans, the Darrians were experimenting with the bugs, and accidentally mutated them into an unstoppable force...

I dunno about "unstoppable"... the idea that people who claim to use solar flares as civilization-flattening strategic weapons were never able to devise an HE Snubmachinegun or a Grenade Auto-Launcher seems a little farfetched to me.

You just gotta make sure you use the proper tool for the job... and that includes all y'all's proverbial Bug Hunts there, Traveller.

Horde of Chamax versus VRF Gauss Gun? No worries... and don't start me on the delights of the RP-A Gun in its non-point-defense application...

 

[Blue Ghost]

What's an RP-A gun?

 

[sabredog]

Type A Rapid-pulse Plasma gun per Mercenary

 

[robject]

I dunno about "unstoppable"...

Makes me wonder why, if the Chamax sophonts seemed to know all about the hibernation reflex common on their world, and knew how to build hibernation-triggering freezers, they didn't make the final connection and develop "freezer guns". Or maybe they did, but it was always too little, too late.

 

[sabredog]

There is enough about the chamax bugs themselves that doesn't make good sense when looked at too critically and applying basic biology. They are really just the Alien critters from the movies in another rubber suit. Not that they aren't pretty good and well thought out, as far as they go for a game, but they don't make sense in so many ways its best just to take them for what they are: alien army ants to create a fun unstoppable horde adventure.

The biggest problem with them is the fact that they go into hibernation for "centuries" until another food source shows up. Shows up from where? How the heck can something with the size and metabolism of these things store enough energy to survive hibernating long enough for what, another prey item to evolve or something? A squirrel or even a bear can literally starve to death while hibernating if it doesn't have either enough fat deposits and muscle tissue and/ or (in the squirrel's case) extra food close by to replenish what it loses. But it makes a dandy place to hang a lantern as they say in show business when you want a plot device to lure in the characters who get suddenly swarmed by scary monsters on an otherwise deserted alien world.

Likewise things like brine shrimp survive when their water environment dries up only because water will come back next rainy season. If not, eventually the eggs die off, but its only the eggs that go into a stasis - not the actual animal.

In addition to this the rate at which the bugs reproduce and the amount of energy that has to go into the maternal let alone the hunters to support thier search and catch time has to be enormous. The range hunters would move from their maternal to find food and be able to bring back enough to sustain her might explain part of why they are rproduced in such huge numbers, but then you get diminished returns...more eggs means more energy required, and fast growth in order to catch prey to feed the hunters and maternal means more energy that doesn't go to the maternal to make enough eggs to ....you get the idea. Carrying the maternal around like a swarm of giant army ants merely exacerbates the problem as the prey leaves the area faster than the bugs can find them, or is devoured faster than the prey can reproduce.

Even if we know that the bugs were not the apex predators of their biome they couldn't possibly have been as numerous as thier reproductive rate suggests. Army ants and similar get away with it because they are so far down on the food chain that they are eaten by everything else..yes, and army ant column is scary, but they are still just ants and not super-predators the size of "great danes" like the chamax bugs are.

Yes, the apex predators that eat the chamax bugs would have to have been very efficient at doing so in oreder to keep them in check. But, again, why would the bugs themselves then go into hibernation for centuries when the food supply drops? Predator / prey ratios are self-correcting so there wouldn't be any evolutionary or environmental pressure to develop such a response. The apex predator would keep the chamax bug population low enough that the bugs wouldn't have to worry about stripping the countryside of food (as described in the adventure), and the predator population would rise and fall according to the bug supply so if the bugs did suddenly bloom then the predators would respond.

I'm not trying to take away the fun in trying to figure out the bugs and what ate them and all, just playing the devil's advocate speaking from the background of my education in biology, zoology, and evolutionary biology. I like BEM's as much, maybe more than the next guy, but sometimes its enough just to say "Yes its a giant acid spitting killer bug, so roll the dice and save the scientist's daughter already."

 

[robject]

Well, at least they don't grow from tiny little silicon-spitting babies to huge bone-crushing badasses in a few days, apparently without eating (Aliens always seemed to grow a bit fast... speed of plot, and all...).

 

[rancke]

Well, at least they don't grow from tiny little silicon-spitting babies to huge bone-crushing badasses in a few days, apparently without eating (Aliens always seemed to grow a bit fast... speed of plot, and all...).

I agree with Robert. The Aliens don't make sense, so that PROVES that the Chamax do. PROVES, I tells ya!


Hans

 

[boomslang]

Well, at least they don't grow from tiny little silicon-spitting babies to huge bone-crushing badasses in a few days, apparently without eating (Aliens always seemed to grow a bit fast... speed of plot, and all...).

I am fairly certain the those Aliens only used humans as hosts for their larvae; after hatching, for food they actually subsisted on plot holes and shadows.

(I read somewhere that it was proposed they actually ate metal and silicon and plastic, which if you take a deep breath and handwave the biochemistry away, makes a little more sense as to why they nest and infest where they do... and why they ooze so much acid -- they are like hortas with the addition of legs and claws, I suppose, and like mosquitos, only need human blood to feed their early developmental stage.)

 

[sabredog]

I am fairly certain the those Aliens only used humans as hosts for their larvae; after hatching, for food they actually subsisted on plot holes and shadows.

Donut holes, maybe? And I like milk chocolate shadow myself, the dark is too bitter.

 

[Blue Ghost]

There is enough about the chamax bugs themselves that doesn't make good sense when looked at too critically and applying basic biology. They are really just the Alien critters from the movies in another rubber suit. Not that they aren't pretty good and well thought out, as far as they go for a game, but they don't make sense in so many ways its best just to take them for what they are: alien army ants to create a fun unstoppable horde adventure.

The biggest problem with them is the fact that they go into hibernation for "centuries" until another food source shows up. Shows up from where? How the heck can something with the size and metabolism of these things store enough energy to survive hibernating long enough for what, another prey item to evolve or something? A squirrel or even a bear can literally starve to death while hibernating if it doesn't have either enough fat deposits and muscle tissue and/ or (in the squirrel's case) extra food close by to replenish what it loses. But it makes a dandy place to hang a lantern as they say in show business when you want a plot device to lure in the characters who get suddenly swarmed by scary monsters on an otherwise deserted alien world.

Likewise things like brine shrimp survive when their water environment dries up only because water will come back next rainy season. If not, eventually the eggs die off, but its only the eggs that go into a stasis - not the actual animal.

In addition to this the rate at which the bugs reproduce and the amount of energy that has to go into the maternal let alone the hunters to support thier search and catch time has to be enormous. The range hunters would move from their maternal to find food and be able to bring back enough to sustain her might explain part of why they are rproduced in such huge numbers, but then you get diminished returns...more eggs means more energy required, and fast growth in order to catch prey to feed the hunters and maternal means more energy that doesn't go to the maternal to make enough eggs to ....you get the idea. Carrying the maternal around like a swarm of giant army ants merely exacerbates the problem as the prey leaves the area faster than the bugs can find them, or is devoured faster than the prey can reproduce.

Even if we know that the bugs were not the apex predators of their biome they couldn't possibly have been as numerous as thier reproductive rate suggests. Army ants and similar get away with it because they are so far down on the food chain that they are eaten by everything else..yes, and army ant column is scary, but they are still just ants and not super-predators the size of "great danes" like the chamax bugs are.

Yes, the apex predators that eat the chamax bugs would have to have been very efficient at doing so in oreder to keep them in check. But, again, why would the bugs themselves then go into hibernation for centuries when the food supply drops? Predator / prey ratios are self-correcting so there wouldn't be any evolutionary or environmental pressure to develop such a response. The apex predator would keep the chamax bug population low enough that the bugs wouldn't have to worry about stripping the countryside of food (as described in the adventure), and the predator population would rise and fall according to the bug supply so if the bugs did suddenly bloom then the predators would respond.

I'm not trying to take away the fun in trying to figure out the bugs and what ate them and all, just playing the devil's advocate speaking from the background of my education in biology, zoology, and evolutionary biology. I like BEM's as much, maybe more than the next guy, but sometimes its enough just to say "Yes its a giant acid spitting killer bug, so roll the dice and save the scientist's daughter already."

Hibernation-starvation may have been another factor (among many) as to why these things didn't ovrrun the continent. I'm not an entemologist nor zoologist of anykind, as my real point is one might fill the plot holes with an after thought or two... which might lead to more questions about the nature of these critters.

Consider; not just a hive mentality, but perhaps a massive scaled hybrid of a den mentality married to a hive structure. Perhaps there's a sort of "familial" association such that the chamax rely on suckleing from the queen until that new food source comes about. The gist here being that hadwaves should probably be seen as opportunities for creation, and perhaps not shortcomings of the authorship.

Just my 0.02cr

 

[sabredog]

Hibernation-starvation may have been another factor (among many) as to why these things didn't ovrrun the continent. I'm not an entemologist nor zoologist of anykind, as my real point is one might fill the plot holes with an after thought or two... which might lead to more questions about the nature of these critters.

Consider; not just a hive mentality, but perhaps a massive scaled hybrid of a den mentality married to a hive structure. Perhaps there's a sort of "familial" association such that the chamax rely on suckleing from the queen until that new food source comes about. The gist here being that hadwaves should probably be seen as opportunities for creation, and perhaps not shortcomings of the authorship.

Just my 0.02cr

First the hibernation thing: I have no issue with that as a survival mechanism when the prey drops to a level that cannot sustain the predators, but normally that means the prey have to come back fairly soon or the predator population goes away for good through starvation, another predator moving in, or the breeding population dropping too low to sustain itself.

Still, handwaves aside, this is an alien critter so I would buy that the prey population might migrate or hibernate or maybe even reproduce slowly enough that maybe, just maybe the bugs would have to enter a hibernating state (probably best in a cyst or something so they don't dry out or get eaten) for a SHORT time. Like a season at most. And before that the bugs would need to go on a real orgy of feeding to fatten up for it or they'll starve while hibernating. You just can't handwave enough for a centuries-long hibernation in response to prey scarcity.

As for suckling off the maternal, that wouldn't work as well only because she is too big and they'd have to get even more calories into her before the hibernation period than if they just went into it as do other animals. Or better yet, she dies in response to the hibernation trigger and lays a few special eggs that are encysted in her carcass. The eggs hatch out at the end of the hibernation (the one who hatches first wins and gets to eat the other eggs as they hatch to induce early growth) and so another maternal is born.

Second: as for overrunning the continent (I assume on Raschev?) maybe it was because they are confused by the radio transmissions and can't "decide" on a direction. Maybe not enough prey....these things just have to eat a lot, not to mention that they can't move too far from the maternal or they won't be able to bring back enough food for her since the hunters would need it for themselves.

I'm inclined to go in the lack of food direction. They are stripping the local area of food, and on a world larger than they were evolved on so they are having a harder time moving around, burning more energy doing do....

They evolved on a size 6 world and Raschev is size 8. Even though they are pseudocrustaceans or arthrods, they still have a structure that suggests like bone mass and more soft tissue. Its described as "spongy". No mention of mucular or integument structures in the adventure, but I think they move using the same mechanism arthopods like spiders do. Internal fluid pressure and short muscle groups. The spongy tissue is engorged with fluid that inflates the beastie (so to speak), and the short muscles at the contract against this pressure to move the legs. When the muscles relax the leg extends due to the spongy pressure tissue, and when they contract the legs close. Poke a hole in one large enough and the beast "explodes", and I'd bet that's as much from the internal pressure as from the acid reacting with whatever.

So put these critters on a heavier grav world than they evolved on and they'd have a lot harder time getting around, carrying monster maternals, chasing prey.....all this means less calories to go around and the whole nest just can't spread like it would on Chamax.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Incredible analysis, saberdog.

A passing thought, I'm wondering if there was simply one kind of predator for the chamax, or they need a certain temperature or other environmental specifics to really thrive.

 

[sabredog]

Since the adventure says the colonists inadvertantly exterminated the bugs' predator we have to go with that.

But personally I think that as nasty as the bugs are they were not the apex predator....they might have been a couple rungs down on the food chain and once their population started to boom because apex predator (the "pest" the colonists wiped out) was destroyed, the lesser predators were overwhelmed by the reproductive rate of the bugs.

The bugs are R-strategy animals....meaning they reproduce in large numbers and the young are capable of fending for themselves almost right away. Most animals on the bottom (or prey levels) of the food chain have evolved this strategy to make sure they have so many young the predators (which are always in lesser numbers) can't eat them all. Not all prey types are like this, but the bugs clearly are. As opposed to K-strategy animals that is.

But the farther up the food chain you get, and the higher evolved a predator is the more likely it is to be a k-strategy animal. That means its young take a long time to grow before they can hunt and defend themselves, they have to be taught to hunt, and they have smaller litters. Like lions, tigers, and even bears (the polar bear for instance is an apex predator).

So to illustrate where I'm going: grizzlies (the apex predator in this biome) will take down an elk or a deer if they need to, but they are opportunistic and omnivores so they only account for a small portion of the elk population control. However, when they do take down an elk it will be a large one. Cougars take down more because they are carnivores who actively hunt large deer and elk. Wolves take down even more because there are more of them and they primarily hunt them since they are the most energy efficient prey item in terms of search and catch time.

Remove any one of the three predators and the elk population increases. The other predator pops. go up, too, but much more slowly and because of territorial issues competition for food gets rough and complicated. Grizzlies will chase cougars and wolves away, cougars don't like other cougars around, wolf packs create their own barriers. The predator pop. gradually adjusts but usually not before the prey overgraze, start to die off for various reasons, and in turn the predator pop. has the same thing happen.

But what if the elk were bugs and the grizzlies were killed off. A few more bug maternals survive and breed like mad. The "cougars" and "wolves" don't breed fast enough to make up for the loss so maybe just those few extra maternals are enough to allow the bugs to overwhelm the k-strat lower predators after the apex predator is gone.

I think that given the high reproductive rate there had to be at least a few smaller, less numerous predators that lost too much ground when things got out of balance.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Very interesting, but unlike the chamax, elk and deer don't turn on wolves, cougars, bobcats, mountain lions and whatever else. Still, either way, that must've been one rough planet to live on. And I suppose that continent in particular. Kind of like their Africa to our North America in terms of predator-prey interactions.

Loose tangent; I think it was you who mentioned in passing jest "silicon dinosaurs" I think this concept demands a new thread :smirk:

 

[sabredog]

S
But what if the elk were bug and the grizzlies were killed off. A few more bug maternals survive and breed like mad. The "cougars" and "wolves" don't breed fast enough to make up for the loss so maybe just those few extra maternals are enough to allow the bugs to overwhelm the k-strat lower predators after the apex predator is gone.

I think that given the high reproductive rate there had to be at least a few smaller, less numerous predators that lost too much ground when things got out of balance.

Thats what I meant here; once the predator prey balance got out of whack, the "prey" became the predator because of numbers.

And yeah, Chamax must have been a regular "Deathworld", as in the book where the whole planet (literally) is one killer biosphere.

 

[Blue Ghost]

I guess my question is would that really happen? Wouldn't a new "apex predator" rise to the occasion? It seems like the more plentiful the food supply the more opportunity for growth of any species. At least that's what I recall from both my high school biology and college economics classes.

Anyway, I'm just rambling here. Good analysis, Saber.

 

[sabredog]

I guess my question is would that really happen? Wouldn't a new "apex predator" rise to the occasion? It seems like the more plentiful the food supply the more opportunity for growth of any species. At least that's what I recall from both my high school biology and college economics classes.

Anyway, I'm just rambling here. Good analysis, Saber.

So long as the prey population wasn't as voracious and reproduce as fast as the bugs do that would usually be true. We just don't know anything more about Chamax other than the predator that kept the bugs in check was destroyed so the bugs ate everything else. So we are left with speculating on an entire ecosystem and chain of evolutionary biology based on one species that also doesn't make sense unless we make some pretty broad assumptions and a lot of handwaving.

But its still fun to speculate - you never know what you can come up with!

Now it doesn't make a lot of sense unless there was only one predator on the whole planet, but the planet might also have not been very productive animal -wise, either. Considering how much the bugs eat I doubt that, it had to have had at least periods where it was overflowing with life for something like them and the predator that kept them in check to evolve.

Have you ever read "Deathworld" by Harry Harrrison? Its a world with an ecosystem so nasty and aggressive that everything, even the grass, has incredibly nasty protective strategies for survival. Everything can, and will kill you. Maybe Chamax was like that? Deathworld had another underlying cause to account for part of its equation, but even with that solved the flora and fauna were still as nasty as ever - it just was a little easier to live there, especially given the stubbornness of the colonists.

But given the defensive and reproductive strategies of the bugs, and thier omnivorous nature I don't think anything less than an apex predator would be able to survive the transition before the bugs overwhelm it. And then the bugs start eating the lessor predators' food source while also eating up all the plants. The loss of grazing material kills off what herbivores escape the bugs, then the lesser predators go, and all you have left are bugs.

Then the hibernation thing kicks in, but like I said before - if everything else is dead and gone, then hibernating for any period of time isn't going to do anything for survival of the species. Unless its just a seasonal hibernation to allow the wildlife to replenish itself or to get past the winter season - since they must do becasue cold kicks in that response. But "centuries" - no way.

Sorry for the long answer...these are the sorts of things that get me going.

 

[sabredog]

A passing thought, I'm wondering if there was simply one kind of predator for the chamax, or they need a certain temperature or other environmental specifics to really thrive.

Sorry - I didn't answer this but my last rant reminded me: hot and humid. Maybe even similar to the Carboniferous Era here on Earth? Higher concentration of oxygen and higher constant humidity would help the bugs absorb more oxygen into their system...since they don't seem to have lungs they absorbed it somehow, but also this environment supported an enormous amount of life in all biomes so it might do the same elsewhere and support voracious bugs and the predators that ate them.

The only thing would be the drop in temperature triggering the bugs' hibernation reflex, so Chamax probably had a winter of sorts, maybe the plants were more diverse and recovered faster from the winter. Or the bugs were just a regional animal until a climate change allowed them to spread more, then the predator was killed off , then the bugs spread more and more, which altered the climate as ecosystems were overwhelmed....