Raimdelle Reborn: The Neverending Bestiary

[Anonymoose]

<Territorial/Alpha Images>

I think we've got enough to be confident in Bomb bomb / Bomb grenade and Ochu ochu / Ochu microchu. Death Gaze we know as Genus and Species but have multiple hints for Class. Still leaning towards Voidsent despite the Simurgh FATE and links to Aevis, but we'll see.

The birds, though... the birds, man! I've seen Vultures in red and blue. Condors in red, blue, and black. Buzzards in blue. I've yet to consciously notice the white or yellow species in the game, so we have three common labels and three common colors. I can confirm five blue buzzards and four black condors. This matches Version 1.0, where these two names matched these two colorings and both were called Vulture. But the red... Sylphlands Condor. Territorial Vulture. Bateleur. Blood Bateleur. Lammergeyer.

Despite my (so far) seeing no uniform naming whatsoever, if we award each label to the coloring it shows up with most often we end up with Genus Vulture, Species Buzzard (blue), Condor (black), and Bateleur (red), two (as far as I know) unused palettes. I'll update the chart with those as the present white-celled "Guess" labels. Damn birds are as bad as the Ziz, lol.

[Lusavari]

So then Ziz of course is our whole genus... But the pallets are still super confusing... There's no consensus at all on that group. Based on encounters you have thoughout the game... most of the axe beaks are purple, as are the first ones encountered, and Ziz themselves are primarily Blue. That leaves the black and Yellow ones to figure out... The yellow one seems to be the one that falls all over the place. There are black pelicans, and then with the yellow one.... There's yellow Ziz, yellow Pelicans... The yellow one is the one that's really mucking up the whole species....

[Anonymoose]

There's no consensus at all on [Ziz]

Aye. I've been avoiding the Ziz like the plauge.

Variants:
Yellow, Sable, Blue, Violet

Common Names:
Ziz, ___ Beak, Pelican

Already we seem to be missing one. But what if we mix and match by name and color? Some random samples:

Pelican: Great Yellow Pelican (Yellow), Rothlyt Pelican (Sable), Giant Pelican (Blue)
Ziz: Brood Ziz (Blue), Molted Ziz (Blue), Ziz Gorlin (Yellow), Ziz (Yellow), Pack Ziz (Blue), Carrier Ziz (Violet)
___ Beak: Axe Beak (Sable), Gaunt Beak (Sable), Guillotine Beak (Violet), Hammer Beak (Violet), Rudis Beak (Sable), Sledgehammer Beak (???), Tomahawk Beak (Violet)

Yellow: Great Yellow Pelican, Ziz Gorlin, Ziz
Sable: Rothlyt Pelican, Axe Beak, Gaunt Beak, Rudis Beak,
Violet: Carrier Ziz, Guillotine Beak, Hammer Beak, Tomahawk Beak
Blue: Great Pelican, Brood Ziz, Molted Ziz, Pack Ziz

Conclusions? None. I've been hoping that by bumping into Territorial Axe Beak, Territorial Pelican, and Alpha Ziz would yield something to work with, or maybe there'll be a third type of grouping based on what attacks they use if I search them all out (a recommendation I got earlier).

Do you see any patterns?

Just throwing guesses out there, I'd go with Ziz as a Genus. Blue and Yellow for Pelican and Ziz, though which is which I don't know. The Sable and Violet share plumage and frill-spike coloring as well as splitting all of the Beak names between them. Perhaps there's an Axe Beak and another beak. If you discarded the visuals and just looked at the names, you could say there are Ziz, Pelicans, Axe Beaks (Sharp), and Hammer Beaks (Dull)... but I don't see a pattern yet.

(Can you tell I start to go a little nuts if not passively working on some arbitrary puzzle? lol)

[Viridiana]

Pelican: Great Yellow Pelican (Yellow), Rothlyt Pelican (Sable), Giant Pelican (Blue)

At the risk of derailing (or detouring, not sure which), I have a question about these guys. Why are the Rothlyt Pelicans on the opposite side of the (accessible portion of the) map from where the Rothlyt Sound is?

I feel like there's probably some text somewhere explaining how they were transported over by sailors way back when and took over the area due to lack of predators or some such, but I haven't seen it. . .

[Lusavari]

You can't really use those too effectively to classify though... Have you seen the Alpha Coeurl? It's a Torama.

[Anonymoose]

Have you seen the Alpha Coeurl? It's a Torama.

I did notice that ><

I've taken to the rule of thumb that the basic visual archetype (3D Model) is the Genus and all the optional pieces (horns, bulbs, various appendages) and palette swaps denote Species. Following this rule of thumb, some Alpha/Territorial names refer to genus, some to species (and some don't even do that. Roselet, to name one.). Considering the mob names do the same thing (Fat Dodo is a cockatrice, but the name refers to the Genus), it's a fair enough assumption to make. Of course, this also means that the official website bestiary is referring to the torama (species) being a cousin of the coeurl (species) and not a cousin of the entire coeurl genus.

[Lusavari]

Maybe they're migrating? Either way, we have made progress and solved a mighty mystery this day.

[Viridiana]

Maybe they're migrating? Either way, we have made progress and solved a mighty mystery this day.

Can they even fly? That would be a terrifying sight. . .

[Lusavari]

OK. Here's the next topic, Moose: Megalocrabs.

I believe in 1.0 the red ones were established in the lore as Snippers. I believe this was mentioned on the 1.0 promo-site. It said something along the lines of them washing up on the beaches and being aggressive. Low and behold, there were Red Snippers on the beaches of old Blood Shore, and they're still there today I believe (Around where Cancer pops). It's lost to time, but I think somewhere there was a reference to the green ones being Clippers. I don't think I've seen Clippers since I returned to the game though. And then the blue ones are still a complete mystery.

[Anonymoose]

Megalocrabs. <...> Snippers. <...> I think somewhere there was a reference to the green ones being Clippers. I don't think I've seen Clippers since I returned to the game though. And then the blue ones are still a complete mystery.

Though the Red Megalocrab Shell and Green Megalocrab Shell don't give the same hints a lot of the others do, simply referring to both as megalocrabs, I think the distinction still stands. I remember making a distinction for the green ones myself once upon a time, but I notice now that Clippers were red as well, so I don't know what we'd call them other then Megalocrabs now. Going by the Version 1.0 standards, original Raimdelle Codex entry, and basic snippers coming up multiple times in quests, I don't see a reason to doubt the treasure hunt mobs names: Territorial Megalocrab (Green) and Territorial Snipper (Red). I've never seen the white one. You ever seen the white one?

The blue ones, though, I think are Stoneshells. It's tough to say, given that they all have Xshell names, but whereas we only have one example of Smallshell, Flintshell, Fossilshell, Loamshell, Sandshell, and Thickshell, we have Stoneshell, Moraby Stoneshell, and Territorial Stoneshell.