MBW, AFO, JFC & co. - July 19

Now, we shall briefly switch our attention from AFO onto ‘Monster Bug Wars’ (MBW). No, I am not talking about how Kim and Kanye tried to double-team Taylor Swift and it backfired upon them; meanwhile, Kim’s sister Khloe tried to take-on Chloe Bennet, and it also backfired, while others, like Snooki from ‘Jersey Shore’ and Selena Gomez are trying to put their two cents in without getting involved in this for real. I am talking about an actual show, which went down in 2011-2012, instead. It would depict two sorts of invertebrates (well, arthropods – insects, arachnids, centipedes, etc.) in a stimulated natural environment, where they would fight each other as gladiators would. Put otherwise, this is AFO, only with invertebrates, and for real.

And? And, perhaps, MBW was a show that could be considered as good as AFO. Yes, there was less science, (proportionally), but there was less entertainment as well, paradoxically. By showing live subjects, MBW introduced the element of chaos into their fights, so to speak. The combatants’ behavior is unpredictable, as is the outcome, for MBW shows how a tarantula can lose to a giant cricket, for example, or how a spitting spider can overwhelm a jumping spider. Size and strength do not matter…okay, they do, but not exclusively, not unlike how these qualities were being depicted in AFO back in 2004. Here, between venom, silk, swarming, etc., a smaller arthropod can overwhelm a bigger one…sometimes. The ants, using their swarm tactic, win over their individually larger opponents, as they do in real life…

What about the flaws? Well, from a technical P.O.V., MBW has no flaws. It was (one of) the final evolutions that such a show as AFO could evolve into. The other ‘branch’ was JFC, mentioned in some earlier post, when a show is done away with the actual science altogether, and all that is left is speculation: whether or not an Utahraptor can defeat a Gastonia; a Ceratosaurs – an Allosaurus; and a(n prehistoric American) lion – a (prehistoric short-faced) bear. The last one even sounds slightly like an AFO episode, but it was nowhere as professional or precise. AFO was done…scientifically, especially the season’s/series’ finale, (which is definitely a separate discussion), while JFC wasn’t – it was more like ‘The Future is Wild’, (TFW), which discussed speculative animals of the future, (which is neither here nor there), and JFC discussed speculative fights between dinosaurs, and between other prehistoric animals, and for their season’s/series’ conclusion, they discussed the K-T mass extinction…in a very unprofessional way. Period. MBW, AFO, and TTAKD – they all have professionalism in their composition, in one way or another. JFC did not. As a result, it lasted only one season, (though its host, Dinosaur George, hanged around for some time in the future), while MBW lasted for at least two. The moral?

The years 2011 and 2012 had more scientifically integral shows on TV than 2016 does. Very sad. However, that is life. Did team Kimye win, or did Taylor? Who knows?

PS: Who cares?

Pathfinder: Divine guardian II

Another divine guardian - this one is a feeder in the depths, a shark-like monster from the Pathfinder Monster Codex:

DIVINE GUARDIAN FEEDER IN THE DEPTHS CR 9

XP 4,800

LE Huge magical beast

Init +2; Senses blindsense 30 ft., darkvision 60 ft., keen scent, low-light vision; Perception +25

Aura blood feast (30 ft.)

DEFENSE

AC 20, touch 10, flat-footed 18 (+2 Dex, +10 natural, –2 size)

hp 105 (10d10+50); blood feast, fast healing 5

Fort +12, Ref +9, Will +7

Defensive Abilities ability healing; Immune disease, mind-affecting effects, poison; Resist cold 20; SR 19

OFFENSE

Speed swim 80 ft.

Melee bite +15/+10 (2d6+10/19–20 plus deadly bleeding)

Space 15 ft.; Reach 10 ft.

Special Attacks swift bite

Spell-Like Abilities (CL 10th; concentration +12)

At will—blood biography (on any creature bitten in the past day, DC 15), dimension door

3/day—alarm, knock

1/day—arcane lock, augury, clairaudience/clairvoyance, commune, dismissal, hold portal, summon monster V (summons 1d4+1 hammerhead sharks or 1d3 great white sharks)

STATISTICS

Str 24, Dex 15, Con 20, Int 13, Wis 19, Cha 18

Base Atk +10; CMB +19; CMD 31 (can't be tripped)

Feats Combat Reflexes, Improved Critical (bite), Intimidating Prowess, Iron Will, Vital Strike

Skills Intimidate +23, Knowledge (religion) +11, Perception +25, Sense Motive +5, Swim +15; Racial Modifiers +10 Perception, +5 Sense Motive

Languages Aklo, Aquan, Infernal

SQ blessed life, divine swiftness, sacred site

ECOLOGY

Environment any oceans

Organization solitary

Treasure none

SPECIAL ABILITIES

Blood Feast (Su) When a creature within 30 feet of a feeder in the depths takes bleed damage (including ongoing damage), the feeder heals an equal amount of damage.

Deadly Bleeding (Su) A divine guardian feeder in the depth's bite causes bleeding wounds that resist healing. The first bite that damages a creature deals 1d4 points of bleed damage, and each subsequent bite increases the amount of bleed by 1d4. Stopping the bleeding requires a successful DC 24 Heal check or the application of any magical healing. However, anyone attempting to cast a healing spell on a creature suffering from deadly bleeding must succeed at a DC 24 caster level check or the spell does not affect the bleeding creature. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Keen Scent (Ex) A feeder in the depths can notice creatures by scent in a 180-foot radius underwater, and can detect blood in the water at a distance of up to 1 mile.

Swift Bite (Ex) When making a full attack, a feeder in the depths can make a second bite attack at a –5 penalty.

Animal Face-off: shark vs. hippo - July 17

To finish the matter of sharks and AFO, let us look at the second (and the last, for now), episode of AFO that dealt with a shark – the bull shark. It went against the hippopotamus, and-

Well, yes, lost. It lost for a very simple, AFO, reason: a hippopotamus, (we are talking a common hippopotamus here, not the pygmy one), weighs about 2800 kg. The bull shark weighs only 280. The hippopotamus fight the Nile crocodiles on a regular basis. The bull shark often ends up eaten by the crocodiles on the same regular basis instead. Yes, these are usually saltwater crocodiles, rather than the Nile crocodiles, but the two species are similar to each other in most aspects, and while the Nile crocodile is smaller than the saltwater one, it isn’t that much smaller, and may even compete with the saltwater crocodile in terms of size and strength…which is nowhere near to successfully fight and defeat a hippopotamus in water or on land.

True, the hippopotamus is not all that – the African elephant can defeat it quite handily, (or is it ‘trunkily’?), but the African elephant was not in this episode (‘bull shark vs. hippopotamus’), it was fighting the African white rhinoceros in its own episode. In this episode, the hippopotamus owned the bull shark and killed it with a single bite, because this is what it does to the Nile crocodiles: once it gets one good grip and bite with its jaws, it usually can kill the reptile, (in no small part because it has an unarmored belly). Where does the bull shark fit in?

A shark and a crocodile fit into two similar econiches, if not one and the same, save that the sharks live (mostly) in seawater, and the crocodiles live (mostly) in the fresh. Given a chance, one would handily kill the other, not just literally by eating it, but by out-competing it in the econiche in question. To a hippopotamus, (and crocodiles will readily eat the hippopotami, if given a chance), a bull shark is not very different from a Nile crocodile, especially if it starts to harass the hippopotamus first. …Why a bull shark?

Because AFO did its’ best have the element of authenticity/realism in its episodes. This is one of the reasons why it was a good show, actually. Until Escobar brought hippos to South America, where the bull shark also lives, BTW, the former lived only in African rivers, on one hand, and on the other, the bull shark is the biggest shark that can live in fresh water. Most cartilaginous fish – sharks, rays and their relatives – cannot. Moreover, because AFO went for realism, it could not just throw any shark at the hippopotamus, (unlike the saltwater crocodiles, hippos usually do not go out into the sea), it had to be a bull shark, period.

The result? One of the most predictable and straightforward fights in the AFO, period. Usually, whether it was ‘the African elephant vs. the white rhinoceros’ or ‘the saltwater crocodile vs. the great white shark’, let alone ‘the lion vs. the tiger’ episode, of course, (but we’ve discussed that piece separately in the past), the audience is left wondering until the CGI fight itself, as to who will win. In this case? The hippopotamus overwhelmed the bull shark so much that no fan was probably surprised when it won – as it was fair.

What else can be said? The ‘bull shark vs. the hippopotamus’ episode showed some of the limitations of AFO’s sort of show layout: dealing with any animal combatants from a purely technical P.O.V. can be simply limiting and basic and not necessarily exciting to watch…yet it is still better, from a scientific P.O.V, than such mockumentaries as ‘Megalodon: the monster shark lives’, which was featured in a ‘Shark Week’ of 2014 or 2015 as a real documentary instead.

AFO may be limited in scope, but it still did its’ best to be scientific, and not just entertaining. (Yes, it did have its various amusing bloopers, but it also had some scientific revelations too.) Nowadays, the shows shown on the Discovery channel, as well as on Animal Planet, do not even do this – a sad deterioration of TV standards…and probably a discussion for another time.

Animal Face-off: Croc vs. shark - July 15

Getting back to AFO, let us remember one of the first episodes of the show – crocodile vs. shark. Well, technically, it was the ‘saltwater crocodile vs. great white shark’ episode, but…the truth is that it was really just crocodile vs. shark, period. Shark and crocodile species do show different behaviors between each other (bull, great white, and tiger sharks live different lives, for example), but it isn’t as complex and well-defined (or well-studied) as that of the mammals. Humans scientists have studied the lives of tigers, lions, leopards a lot and they know how they act similarly, and how – differently, but crocodiles or sharks – not so much. And it shows.

Let us be honest – any fight (I am talking about CGI, on-screen, not real life) is controversial in terms of an outcome.  However, while the fight between a lion and a tiger caused many arguments, and there is an actual page on the Wikipedia dedicated to the matter of which of the two big cats is the better fighter and/or killer, the fight between a crocodile and a shark…did not.  No Wiki page, no nothing. And?

And nothing. Human beings are prejudiced – we are always prejudiced. Either we want one of the combatants to win ‘for real’, or we do not care either way. Our feelings influence our choices and our choices color our feelings. The AFO episodes of ‘lion vs. tiger’ and ‘saltwater crocodile vs. great white shark’ are not too different, yet audience’s reactions to each of them, were.

Anything else? Yes, unlike crocodiles and sharks, the great cats (and also bears, BTW), utilize not just teeth and jaws, but also paws and claws. Unlike, say, DW, AFO usually has fairly limited material to work with from the start, and the ‘saltwater crocodile vs. great white shark’ was an especially limited episode. Yes, it worked – to a point; it showed the audience that the crocodile was a ‘crusher’, while the shark was a ‘slicer’, but otherwise the two animals were equal, and if in case of the lion and the tiger most of the audience’s sympathies were on the lion’s side, here they didn’t really have any preference – so why did the shark win?

Because from a technical point of view it is a bigger and a heavier combatant, and in AFO this is the winning champion. Sometimes this is the proper P.O.V., (as it was in the brown bear and the Siberian tiger face-off), but other times it is not. A great white shark might be heavier than a crocodile, even the saltwater crocodile, but the crocodile actually has a very powerful bite, and its death roll is much more energetic than it how was depicted in this episode. On the other hand, the shark’s skeleton is made out of cartilage, (just feel your nose or your ears), meaning that it is even more vulnerable to a crocodile’s crushing bite than an antelope or a zebra is. In real life, the saltwater crocodile would have hurt the great white shark much more so than how it did on the show, to a point where it wouldn’t have continue the fight once the crocodile broke off and went to the surface to breathe, but just swam off to recover, (hopefully). But apparently this was not good enough for AFO, (unlike JFC, all of its episodes resulted in one opponent dead and the other – alive, while JFC was more flexible), and so the shark won – just because. Well, good luck to it.

For the rest of us, things are not so rosy, and no, I am not talking about the Marvel comics’ Civil War II for a change – that is actually shaping to be something interesting. I am talking about the recent terrorist attack in France – and even more recent attempt at a coup in Turkey. We are living in interesting times – and I can only hope that we can survive them.

Truth about Killer Dinosaurs II - July 13

Now, to conclude the matter on ‘TTAKD’. As it was written in the previous installment, the program already broke the canon by depicting Tyrannosaurs as not being invulnerable and unbeatable – it could be defeated…especially if you were a Triceratops. Other dinosaurs…who knows?

However, the Tyrannosaurus-Triceratops conflict was small fry compared to what the program did to the other ‘killer dinosaur’ – the Velociraptor. Yes, by now, it is accepted that the raptors from ‘JP’ franchise are not ‘real’ but fictional, make-believe animals that just look realistic, like their real-life counterparts could’ve looked like, but back in 2005 this knowledge wasn’t as widespread as it is now; back then the epiphany that the Velociraptors were feathered and were the size of a small turkey – not as big or scaly as they were in the JP franchise.

Later on, by 2010, other raptor species were discovered, especially the Deinonychus and the Utahraptor – more ancient species of raptors, who were much bigger than the Velociraptor was, and less feathered than it, too, (probably).

Now, the feathers and dinosaurs… Yes, birds are dinosaurs and are feathered; yes, the odds that at least some of the non-avian dinosaurs – the raptors, the troodontids, the alvarezsaurids – were also feathered are good; but nowadays paleontologists and paleoartists tend to stick feathers on most of the dinosaurs regardless of any other evidence.

Just compare the skeletons of a Velociraptor and a Tyrannosaurus, for example. Yes, the Velociraptor’s bones are very light, almost bird-like: this was a predator built for speed, not physical power…but Tyrannosaurus was. Built for power, that is. There is no sensible reason to depict it as feathered…yet some scientific programs do just that, (via CGI). God knows why,

Again, birds are dinosaurs – well, theropod dinosaurs, to be more precise. Yet, as the existence of Archaeopteryx shows, the family trees of birds and non-avian theropods (from Composognathus to Tyrannosaurus and co.) have begun to split during the Jurassic, and by the early Cretaceous there already were birds on Earth, just not modern ones. Raptors and their relatives had feathers; some even had wings and could glide (think flying squirrels rather than bats or birds), but they were not birds. Many therapods – spinosaurs, carnosaurs, abelisaurs – were not very bird-like, (including the tyrannosaurs, likely), and this goes double for sauropods and the bird-hipped dinosaurs (whether or not we are talking about a Triceratops or an Ankylosaurus, for example).

End rant, return to the ‘TTAKD’-related discussion. The second part of the program put a Velociraptor against an ankylosaur: not an Ankylosaurus itself, just a general armored dinosaur. For the greater percentage of time, the second part of the program went rather like the first, comparing two dinosaurs…with guest stars: Tarbosaurus and Protoceratops. Tarbosaurus was the Asian version of Tyrannosaurus (in the program – Tyrannosaurus with a different skin color), while Protoceratops was an older, and much smaller, relative of Triceratops (without any brow horns).

Okay, this alone made the second part of ‘TTAKD’ more interesting (and sort-of diverse) than the first. However, the decisive factor were the raptors’ killer claws – according to the program, the raptors did not slice with them – just stabbed, as if they were some strange rapiers (rather than swords). They did not have a cutting edge – just a sharp point, and as such, they were not dangerous to adult ankylosaurs – just to their young.

Okay, this sounds rather anthropomorphic – for all of its flaws, AFO was never anthropomorphic – but compared to the JP franchise, for example, or the JFC show, this is not a really severe case. Yet ‘TTAKD’ was buried…because it broke through the clichés and depicted raptors from a different P.O.V. – not slicers but stabbers. Paleontologists, (and paleoartists), don’t like apocrypha, and while they couldn’t renounce ‘TTAKD’ (you don’t mess with BBC), they probably made sure that ‘TTAKD’ never became mainstream and remained on periphery, replaced by more canonical programs and shows, like JFC. Of course, JFC itself did not last for too long…but that is another story.

For now, let us just say good-bye to ‘TTAKD’, which tried to take over where AFO left and failed, because by the times that the Velociraptor and the ankylosaurs came onto the screen, the AFO format was too tight for the new program, and go and talk about something else.

Truth about Killer Dinosaurs I - July 12

After the entire ‘lion vs. tiger’ debacle, I grew tired of AFO for a while, and decided to look at another classic – ‘The Truth about Killer Dinosaurs’ (TTAKD). It was a two-part TV program of BBC’s, aired back in 2005. In some cases it was known as ‘Dinosaur Face-off’ instead – yeah, the connotations and connections to AFO are not obvious, but they are there.

What was TTAKD about, (if someone has forgotten)? Well, in the first part of the program, the narrator – Bill Oddie – compared and contrasted Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops in a very AFO-like manner too, complete with biomechanical models of the two dinosaurs, and a CGI stimulation of what would, or could, have happened if a Tyrannosaurus and a Triceratops have fought each other. In the more recent dinosaur-related programs (Jurassic Fight Club comes to mind), Tyrannosaurus is often depicted as invincible as it is in the movies (Jurassic Park/Jurassic World franchise), a creature that cannot be stopped by anything else (except for the main hero of the movie, for example).

TTAKD showed that that was not necessarily so; it showed that a Triceratops had a chance to defeat a Tyrannosaurus, especially in a fair fight – so far so good. In fact, this was BBC beating AFO, (an American program) at its own game – it had everything that AFO did: biomechanical models, CGI fight, scientists to consult with and to root for ‘their’ character – everything but the live footage, because now-a-days the only dinosaurs around are birds, and the crocodilians are close cousins of the extinct dinosaurs instead – not dinosaurs proper.

Of course, if you look at a Tyrannosaurus’ skull, the family traits with the crocodiles and the caimans will be very obvious: not unlike them, Tyrannosaurus was built for power – not just in its skull (odds are, being bitten by a Tyrannosaurus was one of the worst things to happen to anyone or anything), but in its entire body. Unlike a similarly sized dinosaur, such as an Allosaurus (or any other carnosaur), a Tyrannosaurus (and its close cousins – Tarbosaurus, Daspletosaurus, even Albertosaurus and Gorgosaurus) was much more robust and built for power: a lion, or even a bear, as opposed to a tiger (or even a leopard). The alternate predator – one that is built for speed and/or finesse is a raptor; not so much ‘just’ a velociraptor, but its’ entire family…

Back to Tyrannosaurus. It was a great, powerful predator, but was it unbeatable? No more so than the modern lions and bears are: just think back to AFO’s ‘polar bear vs. walrus’ or ‘African lion vs. Nile crocodile’ episodes – there is always someone bigger and stronger lurking in the shadows, alas!

This is especially true for carnivore vs. herbivore interactions – whether we are talking about modern times or the Mesozoic, or any other time period. There is proof of buffalos successfully fighting-off lions, and if the lions are smaller than the buffalos are, it still does not stop them from having that buffalo meal fairly regularly. Of course, as we have talked about the ‘polar bear vs. walrus’ episode of AFO, it is the same old story all over: the predator is usually ‘just’ fighting for its’ lunch, the prey – for its’ life. Of course, if the predator really needs a good meal to go on living, things will be different, but usually the herbivore has a good chance of escaping…or not. It is a case-by-case scenario, especially in real life.

However, in dinosaur documentaries, the carnivores are usually depicted winning – or just fighting each other instead. Yes, this goes great over in fiction, but in real life? It is unrealistic, which is why something like JFC (Jurassic Fight Club) is also unrealistic. Of course, JFC has plenty of other reasons why it was unrealistic, and in the end, cancelled after a single season (apparently cancelled, or maybe it was initially designed to be a single-season show), but it still had 12 episodes in it. TTAKD was largely a single-shot, (two-parter or not), and while it became fairly popular on YouTube and the rest of Internet, it never got to be aired very often…at least in Canada. AFO, for comparison, also really flourished even in its original run of 2004, but various episodes got to be aired in the future years, (during Shark Week and similar tripe, but still). TTAKD? Not really. Why?

Because it did not go for the stereotypes. JFC did. Tyrannosaurus is supposed to be invincible, especially in fiction, and so it is – on screen. The movie ‘Jurassic World’ has certainly delivered it, and while Tyrannosaurus was tougher than a carnosaur was, (which is what the Indominus was, period), a fictional Tyrannosaurus is something else. People expect a certain something when the ‘tyrant lizard king’ comes on air, and it has nothing to do with facts. It is slightly like the case with the lion – everyone expects a lion, (at least a fictional one) to be a hero rather than a villain, and so it happens! As a rule…

Yet back in 2005 TTAKD actually ‘measured’ a Tyrannosaurus and a Triceratops against each other, fair and square, very much in the vein of AFO, and proved to the audience that a Tyrannosaurus was not invincible after all. Perhaps this is why TTAKD has not made much of a return?..

Perhaps. Yet ‘The Truth’s’ take on Tyrannosaurus, (and Triceratops), is nothing compared to the second part of the program, which focused on Velociraptor – but that is a story for another time…

Pathfinder: half-dragons II

More Pathfinder half-dragons - a dire lion and a dire crocodile this time.

HALF-DRAGON DIRE CROCODILE CR 11

XP 6,400

N Gargantuan dragon

Init +4; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision; Perception +14

DEFENSE

AC 23, touch 6, flat-footed 21 (+19 natural, –4 size)

hp 162 (12d8+108)

Fort +15, Ref +8, Will +8

Immune acid, sleep, paralysis

OFFENSE

Speed 20 ft., fly 40 ft. (average), swim 30 ft.; sprint

Melee bite +18 (3d6+31/19–20 plus grab) and tail slap +13 (4d8+14)

Space 20 ft.; Reach 15 ft.

Special Attacks breath weapon (30-ft. cone of acid, 12d6 acid, Reflex DC 25 half), death roll (3d6+19 plus trip), swallow whole (3d6+13, AC 16, 13 hp)

STATISTICS

Str 45, Dex 10, Con 27, Int 3, Wis 14, Cha 4

Base Atk +9; CMB +26 (+30 grapple); CMD 36 (40 vs. trip)

Feats Improved Critical (bite), Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Run, Skill Focus (Perception, Stealth)

Skills Perception +14, Stealth +0 (+8 in water), Swim +29; Racial Modifiers +8 Stealth in water

SQ hold breath

ECOLOGY

Environment warm rivers and marshes

Organization solitary, pair, or colony (3–6)

Treasure none

HALF-DRAGON DIRE LION (SPOTTED LION) CR 7

XP 1,600

N Large dragon

Init +6; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision, scent; Perception +11

DEFENSE

AC 17, touch 11, flat-footed 13 (+2 Dex, +8 natural, –1 size)

hp 76 (8d8+40)

Fort +9, Ref +8, Will +3

Immmune fire, sleep, paralysis

OFFENSE

Speed 40 ft., fly 80 ft. (average)

Melee bite +12 (1d8+25 plus grab), 2 claws +13 (1d6+15)

Space 10 ft.; Reach 5 ft.

Special Attacks breath weapon (30-ft. cone of fire, 8d6 fire, Reflex DC 19 half), pounce, rake (2 claws +13, 1d6+7)

STATISTICS

Str 33, Dex 15, Con 19, Int 4, Wis 12, Cha 12

Base Atk +6; CMB +14 (+18 grapple); CMD 26 (30 vs. trip)

Feats Improved Initiative, Run, Skill Focus (Perception), Weapon Focus (claw)

Skills Acrobatics +11, Perception +11, Stealth +7 (+11 in undergrowth); Racial Modifiers +4 Acrobatics, +4 Stealth (+8 in undergrowth)

ECOLOGY

Environment warm plains or hills

Organization solitary, pair, or pride (3–8)

Treasure incidental