EVOLUTION ATTEMPTS: Senses- 1+1.5=2, Speed- 5, Size- 5, Camo- 5
(dice still hates you)
The greater-tentacled swimemone is far larger than its ancestor, at half a metre long. It has developed the classic camouflage of marine animals, the black-top-white-underside. Small grooves on the side of its body, originally for detecting pressure, have deepened and largely replaced the pouch-gills inside of the body. These gills also help it speed up, as it can squeeze water through them to act as a small and simple jet. It has evolved simple fins as well, letting it swim or stop far faster.
The symbiotic tentaclets and tentablob have also evolved. The adult form is called the nestblob, and serves as a sort of base for the greater swimemone. They are guarded fiercely by both types of tentaclet that swarm around it, and swimemones form their territory around it. The tentaclets are called guidelets, and are the main reason that the swimemone hasn't been outcompeted by the rapidly-invading predators of further lands. Different species of swimemone also exist, but they have switched to sight instead of symbiots, due to their need to avoid other predators.
GENERATION 5:
Greater-tentacled swimemone
A black-and-white fish-like animal with a tentacled head that swims over the surface of the reef, hunting for food. They swim with their finned foot, and use their fanged tentacles to attack and kill their prey. They grow up to 50 centimetres long, and their offspring are called tentaclets.
SENSES: It has a sense of touch that lets it figure out if it's touching food, and a fair sense of smell/taste. Symbiotic guidelets help it hunt live prey.
REPRODUCTION: It lets out male cells when they form swarms, and growths grow on the area of the body derived from the bases of the tentacles. Younger animals are mostly male, and older animals are female, due to the pressures of swimming while pregnant. Tentaclets follow their mother until they can be dropped off at a nestblob. They eat mucus that the nestblob creates (although the nestblob sometimes takes either type of larva to supplement its diet) and, when they are large enough, swim with a suitable guidelet to form a territory.
MOVEMENT: They move by rippling their foot, swimming like a fish. Sacs of carbon dioxide keep them buoyant. They also have simple jets on their side-gills.
EATING: It impales nearby blobs and digests them by drawing them into the tentacles.
PREDATION: Not hunted by many creatures, due to its toxins and size. Some species of jawworm, however, are able to feed on the occasional tentaclet without dying horribly. Most creatures are on the menu.
COMPETITION: Swimemones are still mostly hunters of slow-moving blobs, and so stay out of the niche of the jawworm. They have outcompeted the carnivorous crawlers.
ENVIRONMENT: A shallow sub-tropical sea. Layers upon layers of various types of blobs have built massive networks of reefs. Tentablobs grow above the rest, filtering food from the open water, while crawlers of various species create ditches and clear space. Aciblobs fill the majority of space for animal life, burrowing and swimming and crawling on the seafloor. Flapworms have migrated from the open ocean, and are efficient filter-feeders and danger-avoiders. Jawworms have also arrived recently, and hunt free-swimming animals. Nestblobs are two metres or so wide, and form the base of the territory of swimemones.
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Topic: Competition- An evolutionary suggestion game (Read 102127 times)