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Description
Placerias hesternus

The Triassic was one of the most fascinating periods in Earth's history. It was an era where the earth was starting to recover from the largest extinction event in Earth's History. At the tail-end of the era, the archosaurs asserted their dominance with the most well-known dynasties of reptiles that ever walked the planet, the dinosaurs.

At this time in the Late Triassic, dinosaurs did have a firm foothold on a variety of niches across the supercontinent of Pangea. However, in some parts of the supercontinent, some animal groups still reigned supreme in various niches. Among the most famous were Dicynodonts. A group of synapsids that dominated the earth for over 70,000,000 years. Historically, many have called these creatures, "mammal-like-reptiles", however, that is largely an outdated term to describe these animals. They are very distant from their diapsid counterparts. In fact, modern mammals have far more in common with these creatures than any other reptile. A more accurate term would be stem-mammals. Among the niches they filled in some parts of the vast supercontinent were the massive herbivorous creatures, and the largest and the last of the Dicynodonts were the Stahleckeriids. They ranged in size from large pigs to the size of a small elephant, right in the middle was an ox-sized herbivore, Placerias. The predominant reason why these were among the last of the Dicynodonts is that they mainly dominated regions absent of larger herbivorous animals. Larger Sauropodomorphs had yet to take hold of various niches across Pangea. Thus, these animals were able to thrive as the megafaunal herbivores in an ecosystem and Placerias was among the largest herbivores in Triassic North America.

In 1904, Dr.Frederic Lucas, a prominent American zoologist recently appointed to be the curator of the Brooklyn Museum described fossil material found near Tanners Crossing, a site on the Little Colorado River in Arizona. He called the animal, "Placerias" meaning "broad body". The finds consisted of just a large humerus. However, in 1930 two paleontologists, Charles Camp and Samuel Wells were prospecting for fossils outside of St.Johns, Arizona and they struck gold with the discovery of more than 30 specimens of Placerias. It was in a subsection of the Chinle Formation, and it was dubbed, "The Placerias Quarry". The fossils offered a much better insight into these magnificent animals.

They were around the size of a cow, a barrel-shaped body over 11ft long and over a ton in weight. They had sprawled limbs as characteristic of many stem-mammals of the Paleozoic and Mesozoic. These were among the largest herbivores in the Chinle Formation of the American Southwest around 220-216,000,000 years ago. Distinctive among Stahleckeriids is the small tusks coming out from the sides of their mouths. There have been parallels drawn between these herbivores and the modern day-hippopotamus. The reason being is that the habitat of the Chinle was largely a floodplain environment with a wet and dry season, and they may have spent their time wallowing in the river systems of the Chinle. Similar to modern-day hippos. It would make sense as their large body is reminiscent of Hippos. Their distinctive tusks could have been used to dig for vegetation by the riverbanks, as well as defense and possibly intraspecific combat between rival males for territory or for mates.
Aside from fossils found in Chinle, fossils associated with Placerias have also been found in the Pekin Formation in North Carolina. Their primary predators would have been the various Archosauromorphs in the region from the dinosaur-like pseudosuchian Postosuchus to theropod dinosaurs like Coelophysis which could have hunted juvenile individuals.

Stahleckeriids would vanish by the end of the Triassic around 201,000,000 years ago when another mass extinction occurred. However, synapsids would persist all the way through the Mesozoic and more derived synapsids, the mammals would live alongside and eventually supersede the dinosaurs.
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Okay, this is one I threw together rather quickly just to get it done.

I should add, I've definitely settled on the Chinle Formation for Past Meets Present. I was debating between Brazil and Europe for Triassic, but ultimately, I went with Chinle.
Reasons being:
-Well, we've got a lot more material and animals to work with since it's so well known.
-The other 2 locations, I think I would've had to combine multiple Triassic Localities in Europe. IE: Plateosaurus and Lisowicia's region to make it work. And South America, I've got about half of the biota to work with, and none of the iconic dinosaurs available. So ultimately, I settled with Triassic Arizona.

So yeah, I know it's been done to death, but at the same time, I feel no one has done it properly since WWD.

In terms of changes I made, well, as you can see here, I gave them a rough ontogenetic sequence. And by that, I added juvenile and adult morphs (with Males having longer tusks). It was definitely needed since WWD literally just copy and pasted an adult model but scaled it down for it to be a juvenile/baby.
Furthermore, I gave them a little bit of hair on their torsos. These were stem-mammals so I thought I could spruce them up with some hair. The facial structure/tusk positions I decided to leave them in the same position they're in from WWD since I've seen various reconstructions both curving downward and going straight out.
Another big change, as my acquaintance WDGHK has said, these will be more active and dynamic animals in PMP. Not the lumbering hulks as portrayed in WWD. Mainly since these were basically the Hippos of the region, and I can tell you having seen Hippos, despite their looks, they are far from lumbering hulks. I've got a good idea of what scenes they'll be in, but haven't started writing them yet since well, it's for season 2.

For Past Meets Present:
Past Meets Present (Pt4 is Up) - The ZT2 Round Table

Original Model by DinosaurManZT2
Placerias (HENDRIX) | ZT2 Download Library Wiki | Fandom

Description
Placerias hesternus

The Triassic was one of the most fascinating periods in Earth's history. It was an era where the earth was starting to recover from the largest extinction event in Earth's History. At the tail-end of the era, the archosaurs asserted their dominance with the most well-known dynasties of reptiles that ever walked the planet, the dinosaurs.

At this time in the Late Triassic, dinosaurs did have a firm foothold on a variety of niches across the supercontinent of Pangea. However, in some parts of the supercontinent, some animal groups still reigned supreme in various niches. Among the most famous were Dicynodonts. A group of synapsids that dominated the earth for over 70,000,000 years. Historically, many have called these creatures, "mammal-like-reptiles", however, that is largely an outdated term to describe these animals. They are very distant from their diapsid counterparts. In fact, modern mammals have far more in common with these creatures than any other reptile. A more accurate term would be stem-mammals. Among the niches they filled in some parts of the vast supercontinent were the massive herbivorous creatures, and the largest and the last of the Dicynodonts were the Stahleckeriids. They ranged in size from large pigs to the size of a small elephant, right in the middle was an ox-sized herbivore, Placerias. The predominant reason why these were among the last of the Dicynodonts is that they mainly dominated regions absent of larger herbivorous animals. Larger Sauropodomorphs had yet to take hold of various niches across Pangea. Thus, these animals were able to thrive as the megafaunal herbivores in an ecosystem and Placerias was among the largest herbivores in Triassic North America.

In 1904, Dr.Frederic Lucas, a prominent American zoologist recently appointed to be the curator of the Brooklyn Museum described fossil material found near Tanners Crossing, a site on the Little Colorado River in Arizona. He called the animal, "Placerias" meaning "broad body". The finds consisted of just a large humerus. However, in 1930 two paleontologists, Charles Camp and Samuel Wells were prospecting for fossils outside of St.Johns, Arizona and they struck gold with the discovery of more than 30 specimens of Placerias. It was in a subsection of the Chinle Formation, and it was dubbed, "The Placerias Quarry". The fossils offered a much better insight into these magnificent animals.

They were around the size of a cow, a barrel-shaped body over 11ft long and over a ton in weight. They had sprawled limbs as characteristic of many stem-mammals of the Paleozoic and Mesozoic. These were among the largest herbivores in the Chinle Formation of the American Southwest around 220-216,000,000 years ago. Distinctive among Stahleckeriids is the small tusks coming out from the sides of their mouths. There have been parallels drawn between these herbivores and the modern day-hippopotamus. The reason being is that the habitat of the Chinle was largely a floodplain environment with a wet and dry season, and they may have spent their time wallowing in the river systems of the Chinle. Similar to modern-day hippos. It would make sense as their large body is reminiscent of Hippos. Their distinctive tusks could have been used to dig for vegetation by the riverbanks, as well as defense and possibly intraspecific combat between rival males for territory or for mates.
Aside from fossils found in Chinle, fossils associated with Placerias have also been found in the Pekin Formation in North Carolina. Their primary predators would have been the various Archosauromorphs in the region from the dinosaur-like pseudosuchian Postosuchus to theropod dinosaurs like Coelophysis which could have hunted juvenile individuals.

Stahleckeriids would vanish by the end of the Triassic around 201,000,000 years ago when another mass extinction occurred. However, synapsids would persist all the way through the Mesozoic and more derived synapsids, the mammals would live alongside and eventually supersede the dinosaurs.
___________________________________________________________________________________________

Okay, this is one I threw together rather quickly just to get it done.

I should add, I've definitely settled on the Chinle Formation for Past Meets Present. I was debating between Brazil and Europe for Triassic, but ultimately, I went with Chinle.
Reasons being:
-Well, we've got a lot more material and animals to work with since it's so well known.
-The other 2 locations, I think I would've had to combine multiple Triassic Localities in Europe. IE: Plateosaurus and Lisowicia's region to make it work. And South America, I've got about half of the biota to work with, and none of the iconic dinosaurs available. So ultimately, I settled with Triassic Arizona.

So yeah, I know it's been done to death, but at the same time, I feel no one has done it properly since WWD.

In terms of changes I made, well, as you can see here, I gave them a rough ontogenetic sequence. And by that, I added juvenile and adult morphs (with Males having longer tusks). It was definitely needed since WWD literally just copy and pasted an adult model but scaled it down for it to be a juvenile/baby.
Furthermore, I gave them a little bit of hair on their torsos. These were stem-mammals so I thought I could spruce them up with some hair. The facial structure/tusk positions I decided to leave them in the same position they're in from WWD since I've seen various reconstructions both curving downward and going straight out.
Another big change, as my acquaintance WDGHK has said, these will be more active and dynamic animals in PMP. Not the lumbering hulks as portrayed in WWD. Mainly since these were basically the Hippos of the region, and I can tell you having seen Hippos, despite their looks, they are far from lumbering hulks. I've got a good idea of what scenes they'll be in, but haven't started writing them yet since well, it's for season 2.

For Past Meets Present:
Past Meets Present (Pt4 is Up) - The ZT2 Round Table

Original Model by DinosaurManZT2
Placerias (HENDRIX) | ZT2 Download Library Wiki | Fandom