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Dragon idea
Topic Started: Dec 11 2010, 10:15 AM (658 Views)
Carlos
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So, as you know by now, my opinion on Dragons: A Fantasy Made Real as a scientifically accurate program are low. However, the visuals are still pretty, and while I hate the look of the Prehistoric Dragon the cenozoic dragons are nice enough for me. And recently I've developed a love (in many more ways than one) with Choristodera. So I had an idea.

(Note: this is an idea. Does not mean I'm going to make a project around it, at least not for now, as I am busy with many, many other things)

So, in the late Cretaceous, choristoderes decided to make one more evolutionary experiment. They had already produced several long necked plesiosaur/Tanystropheus like forms and several long snouted metriorhynchid/polycotylid like forms, so one day one of the generalist aquatic lizard like forms decided "What if I looked like a mixture of the two?", and so came a form similar in appearence to the Marine Dragon of DAFMR: somewhat long necked but with long, crocodile like jaws. You know, like a nothosaur, only with the nostrils in the wrong part of the snout. If it developed horns or small wings for some reason it is of your choosing.

Then a rock fell and everyone on land died, and the bizarre choristodere went Pristichampsus on everyone's asses and became a terrestrial predator (the "Forest Dragon"). At first its body was long and the limbs somewhat short, a souvenir of its time on the water, and nice to hunt on the rain forest. However, time went by, and as the grasslands expanded the giant, ferret bodied animal had to run faster or else die. So the body became shorter, the tail more stiff and the legs became longer, sort like a canine reptile, and ence was born the body design of the more derived dragons (aka "Mountain Dragon").

In this scenario I don't know if the wings and fire breathing could develop; although they certainly could develop I don't know if they'd make a lot of sense. Surely the "fire bladers" in DAFMR could evolve, originally as "swimming bladers" by the aquatic forms, before using the availiable hydrogen for combustion. The wings would be more tricky to explain, since as I explained in my essay before extra limbs on vertebrates aren't exactly feasible. Maybe only the more derived dragons have them, having evolved from the front limbs, which makes more sense than extra limbs.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

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https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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Scrublord
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Interesting idea, but you've got to admit one thing: the only way to have true six-limbed dragons is if they AREN'T DESCENDED FROM TETRAPODS AT ALL. Stay tuned. . .
My Projects:
The Neozoic Redux
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The Big One



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Holben
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Ermmm...

Why? Hox genes can be changed (unless they belong to a mammal), and that one in a billion mutation will result in a surviving specimen. It's certainly possible, as JohnFaa said, and possible in tetrapods by extension.

Certain gene groups will have to be copied, but such a development is less radical than that from no brain or nervous system to a brain.
Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
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Carlos
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I believe you two both missed on how I had already explained before that extra true limbs aren't very plausible. Although things that wings could evolve from, like bony structures on the back, could occur, in this case I would most likely opt for front limbed derived wings
Edited by Carlos, Dec 11 2010, 11:51 AM.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

My Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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Holben
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JohnFaa
Dec 11 2010, 11:50 AM
I believe you two both missed on how I had already explained before that extra true limbs aren't very plausible. Although things that wings could evolve from, like bony structures on the back, could occur, in this case I would most likely opt for front limbed derived wings
This is certainly true, but the point i was refuting is that dragons couldn't have wings not derived from original limbs in tetrapods.

To claim it is plausible would, as you said, be a lie. But possible yes.

Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
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Cephylus
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The only way six limbed dragons can evolve is for them to be something else. Not tetrapods. Maybe some fish (sarcopytergii) could have evolved six limbs (it's easier for a fish to have six limbs than for a giant sauropsid to have six limbs) and maybe these fish evolved into a seperate lineage, hexapods with six limbs which later evolve into wings and they give rise to the griffins and six-limbed dragons. But I think a bit far-fetched.
Dragons don't have to be six-limbed. I had an idea similar to Johnfaa's about Lungs, them evolving from choristoderes or dyrosaurs or phytosaurs. And I was also thinking of bird-like dragons evolved from monitor lizards?
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Carlos
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Possibly, although my dragons all belong to the same clade. If flight doesn't develop they'd end up with a body akin to the mountain dragon anyway, since it is quite usefull for a cursorial species, and after the grasslands replace forests dragons are defenitely going to get cursorial.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

My Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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Cephylus
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Maybe, although it may be a bit of a stretch, some choristoderes may even develop 'hooves' like pristichampsids, evolving into macropredators, specialised megafauna hunters in grasslands?
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Carlos
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Then again, maybe I could explain away the wings as bizarre cartiladge structures originally conceived for oxygen absortion by the aquatic ancestors, and in terrestrial species then becoming ossified and used for flight. But that seems silly.

And indeed, hooffed choristoderes sound like a nice idea.
Lemuria:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/topic/5724950/

Terra Alternativa:
http://s1.zetaboards.com/Conceptual_Evolution/forum/460637/

My Patreon:

https://www.patreon.com/Carliro

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Holben
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Perhaps large sails for transferring heat energy, developed from copied ribs. though muscle attachment and strength are lacking there.
Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea.

"It is the old wound my king. It has never healed."
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