Hello everybody! What do you think Draeyls were based off of? I'm thinking of the dinosaur Parasaurolophus but I could be wrong... very wrong. The picture is down below of what it looks like.


V.S

Squirrel seems about right for the Ferrikki, maybe with a bit of weasel/ermine/stoat/ferret thrown in in terms of its body plan. As for the Ryori, its head is very reminiscent of the Mew/Mewtwo Pokemon, and its body is very domestic cat-like, but fur-less. Maybe the closest real-life comparison is the Sphynx cat, which is a species of domestic cat that is hairless & has very large ears (or at least seems to).

When it comes to the Draeyl, I think youre right in terms of the group of dinosaurs its based on (Hadrosaurs or duck-billed dinosaurs), but not the specific one of those. Rather than the Parasaurolophus, Id say its based more on the Corythosaurus (or another species called the Saurolophus). That one had a crest, too, but rather than elongated, it was rounded, in kind of a half-circle shape.

why would you make me look at that horrifying reconstruction of a parasaurolophus with mine own two eyes. Those hands, yeeesh, they're so creepy. (Why would you even make a bipedal-but-tripodal-on-tail-for-balance reconstruction of a dinosaur that's been known to be a quadroped for so long I'm in pain)

(I can't help but put a relatively more accurate reconstruction image in, though for some reason the maker skimped on the cheeks)

I'd say thy have some dragon thrown in on the concept of dinosaurs and a little bit lizard (though stance-wise they're uh. bit outdated for a dinosaur save a rearing one. Silly Draeyls with their weird kangaroo-tripod stance)


I don't think ryori would really fit into an evolutionary tree since they're "mostly incorporeal creatures" that seem to primarily live in a different dimension


Obviously with sylesti it's... pretty hard to place them in evolutionary trees that would be accurate to the world of sylestia itself, since we don't have genetics, we don't have fossils, magic exists, we have only a very few species, and they're honestly just made For Fun.

Like, are Kelpari and Qitari convergent or divergent? Is the kelpari horse-like ancestor + water magic? or is it water-dwelling animal for whom attracting prey happened to be easier for those who looked more like the friendly land horses?
Could the kelpari be more closely related to the sylvorpa?
Is it some kind of escaped magical experiment?

Both the qit and kelp are horse-like and have scales, so there is that, though kelps are carnivores while qits are herbivores, but that's just a thing that happens sometimes in evolution.

How do griffi play into things? They have beaks, paws and hooves?


Ny'vene are "one of the few direct descendants of the ancient Sylestian Dragons"- 'one of the few'- what are the others?
I had a nice theory back before the vene revamp that venes and nytes were related, since they both shared the two 'thumb' digits+one wing-supporting digit. I was very sad when the venes revamped with boring old common dragon-style wings, I thought what they had had was very nifty.
And that of course, brings up: Aurs are birds, nytes seem to be... some kind of related but different theropod-like lineage, cousin-species.
Are Draeyl also from a different 'dinosaur' lineage? (and on that note, are draeyl herbivores or carnivores? I'm leaning towards herbivore, honestly. And about as safe to stand near as a rhino or african buffalo)

Yea. Let's just YEET Ryori out and focus on something else.

There's the Aeridini and Nephini, which are said to be related.

But what's their actual ancestor?

ALSO, HOW DO RESTRICTED TRAITS WORK?

I think the logical conclusion to restricted traits would likely be 'magic' or 'the gods did it'?
The genetics for those traits is not present natively in the species, and can only be obtained either by creating the pet with a special item or using a 'magic potion' on them after all.

And obviously, we can't know what the ancestors of things really are beyond "nyvene/aeri/neph ancestry lies in dragons?*") and basic traits, since... as said, not like we have genetic evidence or fossils

On basal traits, the ancestor of the mammalian-based sylesti presumably had fur at the point when they diverged from eachother, unless this is a trait which evolved more than once.

Aeri and neph share the trait that they've both naturally got six limbs when no mutations are present. Interestingly this is also seen in griffi and kelpari (though the kelp's hind limbs are very much reduced, to the point that externally only the digits can be seen, like with seals**)- so maybe kelpari are related to them in actuality rather than qits?

Perhaps hexapodalism is, in fact, the ancestral trait of the sylesti species as a whole and all the others just lost it long ago save atavisms that we call mutations?

(* Neph specifically referred to AS a dragon, Ny'vene said to be descended from "ancient Sylestian Dragons", Aeri are listed as being thought to be "a close relative" of Nephini "due to their dragonkin ancestry"
There seems to be a distinction between 'dragon' and "ancient Sylestian Dragon", and a lesser one between 'dragon' and 'dragonkin')

(** seals are so weird. like You don't think about the fact that seals have legs inside their bodies until you're staring at a seal skeleton and just wilding out because seals have legs and knees and everything inside them??)

Bump!

bump

How does it even begin to make sense that despite most Sylesties being mammals, they LAY EGGS?

Did someone say c o m m u n i s t?