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Falcolf In reply to Murasaki99 [2018-02-23 04:31:47 +0000 UTC]

Also derse are related to Rimarian horses, so it made sense to give them similar teeth from that aspect.

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Murasaki99 In reply to Falcolf [2018-02-24 03:34:58 +0000 UTC]

Aye, that does make good sense then. 

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Falcolf In reply to Murasaki99 [2018-02-23 04:29:35 +0000 UTC]

Haha, thanks Murasaki! I'm glad that you like the page and that its layout is good!

Yesss, he's thinking with his stomach just a biiit too much on this page lol. 

Their dentation is pretty similar to horses, horses being one of the species which I drew inspiration from for them. Of course they are pretty much Rimer's version of deer though haha. (The real reason they don't have antlers/horns besides it helping to differentiate them from Earth ungulates? I hate drawing them. Drakoon horns are dumb enough to draw and they're easy lol.)

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Murasaki99 In reply to Falcolf [2018-02-24 03:34:02 +0000 UTC]

The layout flows very nicely! 

I hope Kayoss has plenty of energy in reserve to face whatever it is that made the derse take flight.  (You don't have to outrun the tiger, you just have to outrun the OTHER potential food sources, to riff on the old joke.)  How much of a running start would he need to take flight?

Could derse be gentled and ridden?  I saw an amazing photo years ago of a young lady who had trained a Hereford steer to ride and he was a good jumper - good enough to ride in the local shows, which pretty much confounded all the equestrians. 

Horns and antlers are a challenge.  I've got druids coming up in my comic and the "nature form" of one of them is that of the Irish elk/deer en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_el… . Another one has the shape of the Eucladoceros en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucladoc… . Yes, I'm a glutton for punishment and I'm going to have to build models somehow so I can get the antlers right from different angles. 

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Falcolf In reply to Murasaki99 [2018-03-02 08:52:40 +0000 UTC]

That's a really good question! Falcolfs, being large beasties (and Kayoss being especially large for a falcolf,) do need a bit of a takeoff roll unless there's a handy cliff present. I reckon a modern falcolf like Anzi probably only needs about twenty metres/sixty-five feet to takeoff from flat ground, but Kayoss would need some more. (Like with airplanes, the bigger the thing, the longer the runway needs to be.) The takeoff roll is done at a full sprint, and the falcolf needs to suddenly stop almost short right at the end of it to transfer their energy from horizontal to vertical, just like a human doing a long or high jump. The wings don't flap or anything until this moment although they are held ready (falcolfs can't stroke their wings properly while grounded,) but open space is still needed. Kayoss' only hope here is to catch the derse while still on all fours because of the trees, however, falcolfs aren't particularly good runners being aerial/ambush predators. (They use their brains more than their brawn of course! Although plenty of brawn is still needed to wrestle a derse to the ground solo.)

Drakoon, being physically more powerful beings than falcolfs, are actually able to takeoff from almost a standstill, making falcolfs everywhere stupidly jealous. (Although this takes a lot of practice and it's only mature specimens with fully developed musculature that can. Drakoon also takeoff in several other wildly ridiculous ways, being able (with training,) to takeoff from water, from horseback (provided with assistance from their horse,) and they also subscribe to the ultra lazy throwing-themselves-off-of-cliffs technique whenever they can.) They probably have the greatest variety of dumb takeoff and landing tricks. (Of particular favouritism is the 'landing-as-elf-instead-of-as-dragon' technique which can go horribly wrong and lead to broken legs if the height is misjudged badly enough. Plus it involves a rapid shift in perception between two forms as transformation takes place midair and that.... that's just kinda dumb. Flashy, but dumb. One second you're this huge, springy four legged thing which can totally take an impact, then you're this totally different smaller two legged thing which is quite a bit less capable in the shock absorption department.)

Certain species of derse can be tamed and ridden! There's a species in Thundarica called the blandal which has been successfully trained and is in the process of being domesticated, since they're better mounts than horses in the mountainous terrain, plus, being native to Rimer, they're a lot hardier. Rock derse are too skittish, although attempts have been made to tame them, these haven't been successful. Plus native predators which avoid Earth horses see a derse trapped in a paddock and... yeah.

Cows are so adorable when they jump and run. They look like such lazy animals, but then they gallop around and it's so cute!

I salute your bravery, those are some complicated antlers! That sounds really interesting though, it'll be neat to see some druids!

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Murasaki99 In reply to Falcolf [2018-03-25 03:34:05 +0000 UTC]

I kind of thought Kayoss might need a longer takeoff runway unless Rimer's gravity was less than Earth's.  Once he's airborne I bet he can do some cool stuff and a dive attack would make good sense then. 

Got to agree, trying to switch forms in mid-landing from drakoon to elf sounds like an invitation to have a wreck.  Do the elders yell at the youngsters for hazarding this stunt?  And I hope they all have good healers!

Aye, derse in a paddock would need heavy protection from whatever native predators might come around.  A big geodesic dome of electrified mesh? 

The one druid will look like this:

And I can already see mistakes I'll have to watch out for as I do those horns again... and again. 

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Falcolf In reply to Murasaki99 [2018-04-01 03:37:51 +0000 UTC]

I'm actually not sure how good of a flier Kayoss is, that's something I haven't actually considered! I'm sure that he's at least competent at it, since he made it to adulthood as a mortal! I like to think that Anzi (modern, mortal falcolf) is probably superior on wingtip to Kayoss, and Kayli probably is too. (But she's a bit smaller than he is too, so better for manuvering?)

Ho man, the young drakoon definitely get in shit for pulling stupid stunts. They're clumsy and because their bodies aren't fully developed, they're a lot more prone to injury than their elders. And, I know that sounds pretty normal, but like, consider how you wouldn't ride a small foal - that's how injury prone and potentially delicate young drakoon can be with all of their parts still developing. Of course they're still tough little things compared to a human probably, but their elders don't mess around with letting them do stuff which might get them in serious trouble. Of course, a drakoon's concept of what might get their kid into serious trouble is quite different from ours. A drakoon will let its fifteen year old tackle dangerous prey (with supervision - and drakoon usually hunt as-dragon because as-elf hunting is cheating - drakoon respect their prey more than their enemies haha) whereas I don't see a human letting their teenager bite an apex predator like a fugara in the butt.

Drakoon have very good healers! There's an entire strain of non-combatant who are healers (a lot of jobs are mainly genetic) although drakoon standards of healing aren't always as nice as human ones. Drakoon pretty actively practice euthanasia and depending on what's wrong, they may not do surgery or amputate. (Don't worry, they do sedate their surgery victims - usually.) If a drakoon messes up its wing, that wing ain't coming off (although thinking about this, that's quite practical since lopping off a wing would cause massive blood loss. Drakoon are generally physically light years better at handling blood loss than humans, but I think wing amputation might be nearing the point of asking too much of them.) Also, if you somehow lose your sense of smell and a healer finds out, he will consider it immediate grounds for euthanization because drakoon rely on their noses more than their eyes. (Blind? Deaf? Get on with it, you're fiiine!) They probably also wouldn't generally amputate a tail; tails are pretty crucial for flying, but I think if it got hacked off in battle they'd probably clean it up so that it would heal better.

Because healers have a nasty habit of fairly openly dissecting dead bodies on the battlefield for self learning, most drakoon don't like them very much. (Which is saying something for a species which considers it totally fine to leave dead bodies laying around in the forest and have a pretty 'meh' response to death. Dead drakoon aren't useful drakoon - bodies are promptly abandoned unless they happen to be everska or sketzine - then drakoon will drag the corpse across the continent if they have to in order to bring it back to the capital. They do mourn their dead, they just don't care about corpses. They basically just raid it of anything useful and then promptly leave - waste not, want not!) 

That is very pretty! Love the piebaldness!

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