mc-speculation

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YOUR BEAUTIFUL AND CLEVERLY DRAWN PFP M A S S A C R E D BY THE NEW UI WHAT THE HELL 😭😭😭

MY BOYYYY

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I'm also a gullible autistic, what's the joke?

The joke was just that they could be crafted lol

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Update: it’s a joke and once again I am a gullible autistic

Mc live spoilers

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Thoughts on the new ghast varient?

I love them from a gameplay view, but cannot figure out what the hell is happening lore wise

No clue! I gotta be honest I don’t like that they can be crafted - and not just because it’s confusing lore-wise. I think it kind of cheapens them? Makes them less rare and interesting. I’d much prefer it if they were like the Sniffer, in that they’re kind of difficult to acquire. (Which may also help with balancing. Why would you ever get an elytra if you could just craft a friendly ghast?)

Ultimately I’m going to wait for the actual release to decide anything when it comes to them. I plan to do for that all the new additions, anyway.

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Where does it say that the new ghasts can be crafted? I can't find it?

I found it in the wiki, and digging deeper apparently it’s from a tweet by Cubfan? So take that with a grain of salt since it’s not an official source

Here’s the tweet

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Pleeeease talk about your decision to make bees a vertebrate I must know!! This blog is so cool

Thank you!!

My thought process was pretty much as follows:

They have a different number of legs than any other in-game arthropod.

Huh. They have the same number of legs as sniffers. There could be something there

They have live birth and no queen, which makes them wildly different to their real-world counterparts and also other in-game arthropods

It would be weird

And lastly,

5. Fluffye

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Mc live spoilers

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Thoughts on the new ghast varient?

I love them from a gameplay view, but cannot figure out what the hell is happening lore wise

No clue! I gotta be honest I don’t like that they can be crafted - and not just because it’s confusing lore-wise. I think it kind of cheapens them? Makes them less rare and interesting. I’d much prefer it if they were like the Sniffer, in that they’re kind of difficult to acquire. (Which may also help with balancing. Why would you ever get an elytra if you could just craft a friendly ghast?)

Ultimately I’m going to wait for the actual release to decide anything when it comes to them. I plan to do for that all the new additions, anyway.

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A Closer Look: Conchosomites

Conchosoma is a genus of invertebrates made up of 3 distantly related subgroups, the few survivors of Primordial Death. These groups are hypergeozoona (over world animals), enneapoda (nine-footed) and mesopia (middle face).

Examples of conchosomites. From left to right: the squid (Endobranchia atramentum), the ghast (Enneapoda coccinora), and the shulker (Xanthopus purpura).

Hypergeozoona is by far the most diverse of the conchosomite clades. The Primordial Death left the waters of the overworld poisoned and barren, inhabited only by the single surviving member of hypergeozoona: the squid (H. atramentum). It was only a matter of time before they diversified to fill the empty waterways.

Enneapoda and Mesopia are both monotypic genuses, containing the ghast (E. coccinora) and the shulker (X. purpura), respectively.

Return to full tree.

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Mobs that have babies (in game):

Armadillos

Axolotls

Bees

Camels

Cats

Chickens

Cows

Dolphins

Donkeys

Drowned 1

(The) Ender Dragon 3

Foxes

Frogs

Glow Squid

Goats

Hoglins

Horses

Husks 1

Llamas

Magma Cubes 4

Mooshrooms

Mules

Ocelots

Pandas

Pigs

Piglins

Polar Bears

Rabbits

Salmon (?) 5

Sheep

Skeleton Horses 2

Slimes 4

Sniffers

Squid

Striders

Turtles

Villagers

Wolves

Ziglins (Zombie Piglins) 1

Zoglins (Zombie Hoglins) 1

Zombies 1

Zombie Horses 1

Zombie Villagers 1

Mobs that do not have babies (in game):

Allays 6

Bats 7

Blazes 8

Bogged 2

Breezes 8

Cave Spiders 9

Cod 9

Creakings 8a

Creepers 10

Elder Guardians/Guardians 8b

Endermen 7a

Endermites 9

Ghasts 7b

Iron Golems 8

Parrots 7

Phantoms 11

Pillagers 12

Pufferfish 9

Ravagers 7

Shulkers 9

Silverfish 9

Skeletons 2

Snow Golems 8

Spiders 9

Strays 2

Tropical Fish 9

Vex 8

Wardens 13

Witches 12

(The) Wither 8

Wither Skeletons 2a

Whatever manner reanimates different kinds of zombies seems to reanimate the young as well as adults, regardless of their species or the type of zombie (ie. husks, drowned).

Conversely, whatever reanimates skeletons does not reanimate the young, and thus they are likely reanimated in a completely different fashion to zombies. The only exception is the skeleton horse, which must in turn be reanimated in a different manner than other skeletons. Perhaps it has more in common with zombies than other types of skeletons.

2a. Whether or not wither skeletons are reanimated in the same or a similar way to other skeletons is questionable. They share the trait of lacking young with other skeletons, but are otherwise quite different.

3. The Ender Dragon does not have young, but it does produce an “egg”. Assuming it is in fact an egg, and not some strange byproduct of the beast’s biology or death, this counts - regardless of if it can be hatched by a player or not.

4. Both magma cubes and slimes are capable of asexual reproduction.

5. Salmon can be found in three different sizes. Whether these different sizes are genetic, a product of the environment, or an indicator of age is not entirely clear. 6. Allays are capable of asexual reproduction (in this case it is a magical process rather than a biological one), but they are created as fully-formed adults, and thus technically do not have any subadult phases.

7. These animals do, in fact, have young. Their young are altricial (meaning they are born unable to move or eat independently, and are dependent on the parent(s)), so it is more that they are very unlikely to be seen due to the way that they are reared.

7a. Endermen are also altricial, and hide their young in burrows to protect them from predators, competitors, and their dangerous environment. 7b. Ghasts are another altricial species. They protect their larvae within their largely hollow gas-filled bodies, in a somewhat similar manner to the mouthbrooding of certain fish and other animals.

8. These creatures are created (or suspected to be created), not born, and thus don’t have any subadult phases. These creatures are called constructs.

8a. In the case of Creakings, little is known about their nature in general. At this present time, they seem to be created by the Pale Oak, rather than having their own reproductive abilities.

8b. Guardians are constructs. but are also capable of reproducing. They typically have a eusocial colony structure similar to that of bees - the Elder Guardians being the queens, or reproductive females. Should the Elder Guardians die, however, the smaller drones can reproduce amongst themselves to produce more drones. Notably, drones cannot metamorphose into Elder Guardians like some other eusocial animals. This suggests that the different castes within their species were manufactured by their creators.

9. Similar to altricial species, these creatures do have young, they’re just unlikely to be encountered or noticed by players. In these species, it is because the young are born as very small larval stages, and are often hidden from view of potential predators - like players.

10. Creepers have consistently thwarted any attempts of study or classification. Whether they are a plant, an animal, a construct, or something else entirely, is up in the air. How, or even if, they reproduce is not fully understood.

11. The nature of phantoms is strange and little is known about them. They are undead, but do not resemble any living counterparts that could have died and been reanimated to create them. It is possible they are not animated by an external force, like how zombies and skeletons are, and instead are their own unique organism animated by other means. This makes their method of reproduction a real mystery, one yet to be studied and solved.

12. Pillagers and witches seem to be the product of environmental change in villagers. Thus, the reason their are no baby witches or pillagers is likely not because they cannot reproduce (though granted, it’s not been proven that they can reproduce), but is more likely because the young would just be villagers, and would only become pillagers or witches as they grow.

13. Wardens are bizarre and seldom studied organisms. Much of their life history is unknown, including how/if they reproduce and how/if they develop. This may be difficult to study - for a number of reasons, really, but chiefly because they are seemingly not from this realm at all, and the conditions they now live in may not allow them to reproduce or rear their young.

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Free sneak peek because I want everyone to see the incredible squid I drew before doing some studies vs. the squid I drew after I did the studies

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Six hours of studies later here are my conclusions: octopods are freaks and nautiluses are extremely cool

Next post is going to be delayed by the fact that cephalopods are nightmare animals and simply are not possible to draw. Never been done before

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Next post is going to be delayed by the fact that cephalopods are nightmare animals and simply are not possible to draw. Never been done before

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Since the fireflies are so small, we can't tell what they look like. they could have evolved from anything. Tiny wolves with wings

Absolutely enthralled by this visual

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I know there aren't any new mobs in the drop but where would the fireflies (though they are particles) stand in the taxonomy?

Not certain yet! Outwardly they’re similar to bees, so I could make them neopolypods. Then again, I have more than enough vertebrates so I could make them a new taxon of panarthropoda! Or I could even make them a plant the way the Creaking is!

Speaking of the new update, I do definitely plan to add the new variants to my taxonomy, I’m just waiting for them to be released since they could still change!

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Aaaand that’s it for vertebrata! It’s been fun but also such a pain in the ass lol why are there so many damn vertebrates

Next is conchosoma, as per the poll I did a little white back! It shouldn’t take as long just because there’s far fewer than them (but at the same time it might take just as long because I’m working on other things as well)

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Polypodus

The Many-Footed

Polypodus is a lazarus taxon, and an ancient one at that. They are about as distantly related to the other vertebrates as one can get - and among extant species they are indeed the most distant cousins.

Neopolypodus

New Polypods

A monotypic genus only containing the bee (N. flavitta). Bees are a relatively new species evolved from an unknown, hidden ancestor otherwise only represented in the fossil record.

A few bees; two adults and one juvenile (bottom right).

Anchipolypodus

Old Polypods

Another monotypic genus whose only member is the sniffer (N. aeternovis). The sniffer is a lazarus species rather distantly related to the bee. The sniffer was only known from the fossil record until unhatched eggs were discovered, which miraculously hatched once the conditions were right.

A sniffer splooting.

Return to Vertebrata.

Return to full tree.

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Just hit 100 followers on this blog, which I was not expecting at all

Welcome ye merry nerds

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Brachipteryxus

The Wing-Armed

Brachipteryxus is a small clade with few members. It is nearly exclusive to the overworld, save for the estranged netherian striders.

Myriapinna

Many-feathered

Myriapinna contains all the overworld brachipterxans: the chicken (M. polynativas), the parrot (M. polychromia), and the bat (M. troglodyta). The chicken is the only myriapinnite to have survived Primordial Death, and the other two have since split from them.

The myriapinnites. From top to bottom: the parrot, the bat, and the chicken.

Lepidoscelus

Hard-legged/Scaled-leg

Lepidoscelus is a monotypic genus, with the only extant member being the strider (L. igneamantis). The strider is a lazarus species, one of many that repopulated the nether during the netherian explosion.

A strider.

Return to Vertebrata.

Return to full tree.