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Physical Sizes

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Numsgil:
Shell's only drawbrack is the mass it adds.  If we make shell no more massive than other things, then it would mean we need another drawback to lots of shell.

shvarz:
How about real life approach?
Shells don't make much sense untill you cover most of the body with it - imagine a turtle with only half a shell :)  No protective effect.  Also, a thin layer is not much help.  We can make it so that shell is almost not effective in small amounts, but its effects increase as you collect more of it.  By that time it will contribute to mass so that it will slow down shell-making creature.  And remeber - it is pretty costly to make shell and you can't recover energy back from it.
Also, in real life many of shell-creatures can't grow beyond their shell size - they have to throw the old shell away and start a new one if they need to grow bigger.  Something like that can be implemented (but it is a whole different idea).

Did you notice the "need waste" for proteins?  What do you think?  I basically decided to equate waste to simple nitrogen-containing compounds.  Building proteins requires nitrogen, destroying them - releases it.  For many plants nitrogen is an essential nutrient.  And in the ocean, nitrogen-containing compounds are the limiting factor for growth of plankton.

Numsgil:
I think I'm going to implement waste as phosphates (I think that's it.  Whatever is released as ATP is turned to ADP) and then make plants use phosphates to grow.

If you have a second (okay, more like ten hours) read through all the posts we were writing in your absense.  THere are some ideas that I'm using from them that you may like to comment on.

Maybe we could make shell work in quadrants.  You can protect your back but keep your front unshielded, or vice versa, or protect both.

Maybe shell is applied towards surface area, so largere bots need more shell to get the same effect.

I like the idea of shell preventing physical growth.  I'll play with the idea, see if I can make it work.

shvarz:
I am reading through all the posts.

Bad idea with phosphates.  These are not building blocks in any sense and their realease doesn't reflect the metabolism.  You split ATP - make AMP and two Ps.  But you don't throw away these Ps - you'll need them to make ATP again.  And cell uses them up almost immediately - there is almost no free phosphate in the cell - it is all in form of ATP.
Nitrogen compounds is another story entirely - every time you pee, you release all the extra urea (thus the name urine), which is the safest way to throw away extra nitrogen.  Nitrogen is an essential block of proteins (and nucleic acids, but it is less important now).  You eat proteins - you convert their energy to fat - extra nitrogen appears, you need to get rid of it.  As true to concept of waste as it can be.  And as I said before - nitrogen compounds are extremely important for plant life.

shvarz:
This is mostly for my own reference of what sizes and mass would be in system with metabolism.  But feel free to read :)

Energy to make stuff:
1500 energy = 5 carbs = 10 fat = 1 protein
(note: protein creation needs waste in 1:1 ratio)

Energy during utilization:
1500 energy = 6 carbs = 12 fat = 12 proteins
(note: shell and slime cannot be utilized to get energy)
(note: protein utilization produces waste in 1:1 ratio)

Mass
1 carb = 1 protein = 8 fat
(note: I know it is not intuitive, I was surprised myself)

Size:
1 carb = 5 protein = 8 fat


Example with three bots investing 30,000 nrg into different things:

Bot 1 puts it all in carbs. It makes 100 carbs. It weighs 100.  Its size is 100.

Bot 2 puts it all in fat. It makes 200 fats.  It weighs 25. Its size is 25.

Bot 3 puts it all in protein. It makes 20 proteins.  It weighs 20.  Its size is 4.


Bot 1 is 4-5 times heavier than the other two. It is also 4 times bigger in size than bot 2 and is 25 times bigger than bot 3. Being so heavy and huge it makes it almost impossible for this bot to move. This is your typical plant.

Bot 2 is intermediate in size. It is hard for it to move. It mostly sits around and eats. But it can extract a lot of energy from it's fats, so if necessary it can run at high speed, but it costs a lot. This is your typical fatty grazer.

Bot 3 is compact and it is very easy for it to move (all that muscle makes it especially cheap). On the other side it is heavy enough to deal quite a damage to other bots (if shots are proportional to mass). It can only extract small amount of energy from degrading protein, but it is enough to run around and hunt. This is your predator.

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