#SE bonkeys

[translunaryanimus]

It's that time Featuring Kot-aa attacking Temiraan on a scenic landscape of the chenesht homeplanet's northern polar region.

[translunaryanimus]

New Sophont just dropped Meet Bonkeys! The name isn't permanent, but it's too funny to stop using right now. They're a bipedal carnivorous mammal hailing primarily from the arctic steppes regions of their home planet. They're fairly small, only about chest height for the average human, but make up for their lack of size with their speed and numbers. Interestingly, Bonkeys are not the only sapient to emerge from their planet, and are a rare case of altruism enabling dual sapience to emerge. I haven't come up with much for them biologically yet aside from their blood being green and their scent-marking organs present on their wrists.

Bonkeys are part of the Sacred Estuaries setting and will be drawn with Chenesht in the future! They'll be developed alongside them as I keep worldbuilding, and hopefully get a proper species name in the future. The portrait is of Kot-aa, a xenoanthropologist specializing in pre-contact cultures. (She/Her)

[translunaryanimus]

Rough and Less Rough animations of the two currently designed Sapients of Sacred Estuaries. Left shows a Chenesht walking with their bipedal gait, right shows a bonkey pitching a ball. More information on each animation under the cut.

Chenesht, despite being technically capable of bi-quad movement, look somewhat awkward and front heavy while walking bipedally and will often revert to four legged movement after a short period of time or when their social obligations no longer call for a bipedal stance. Their Bipedal walk is slower and often assisted with a cane when necessary for extensive periods of time. Bipedalism is considered the polite norm for interacting with other sapients, with a quadrupedal stance being seen as childish, uncouth, or even condescending/intimidating to those shorter than them (which, as of now, are all other sapients). Bonkeys throw a pitch much like a human would! Their arm structure, though oriented more like a bird's wing, doesn't keep them from having a wide range of motion with their tosses. Bonkeys have excellent hand-eye coordination and, once introduced to the sport, quickly began to form and dominate baseball and softball leauges. Baseball is also similar to a Bonkey home planet sport, Tkee-ta, in which a ball is pitched towards a set of two 'swatters' (batters) and two 'chasers' (catchers). When a swatter hits the ball, the opposing team's chaser must run after it at top speed to stop it from hitting the ground. If they catch the ball, they must then run it to the end of the field and throw it into their team's basket or hoop (baskets being more traditional) to score a point. The chaser of the same team as the swatter who hit the ball has the job of stopping the opposing team's chaser before the point is scored, and can only stop them by making them drop the ball. Each team also has three runners who's job it is to prevent the chasers from scoring point depending on their team. Runners may interact with other runners and may only interact with the opposing team's chaser. Tkee-ta has gained some traction in the sports world of humans, but humans lacking the thickened skulls of Bonkeys makes the tackling aspect of the sport more dangerous, and they often have to wear a combination of american football and baseball gear to remain safe.