Suggestion: Praying Mantis

[Snabbaronen]

Suggestion, adding the Praying Mantis

Add the formidable and horrifying Praying Mantis in the game. It should only be spawned by using a new Lure Trap with grinded part from a dead p.mantis added as an ingredient (workbench item).

Behavior

If nothing attacks the p.mantis and the lure has been sniffed enough, it will eventually move to an area with dense grass vegetation.

At the p.mantis hideout, it will be waiting for spiders, ants and of course small humans to pass by and attacks with a short warning. However, if the p.mantis attacks a soldier ant, all nearby ants will swarm in and try to kill it. This may also affect the population of the ants for a short period of time. The p.mantis is rather hard to detect because it has the same green colour as grass and blends in naturally in dense vegetation while waiting for it's next victim.

A p.mantis have long and quick front legs with rather extensive range. For this reason, a hand weapon with longer range should be added to the game (maybe constructed with the front leg from a defeated p.mantis?).

The fight

The p.mantis should have better stamina than the wolf spider since the attacks will only burst out in a fast forward motion from a standing point. Suggest that the p.mantis raise the body a bit just before the attack so that the player could anticipate the attack, if fast enough.

If outside the p.mantis attack range, it's should be rather easy to outrun the p.mantis since it will stay near it's hideout.

The Ride

It should also be possible (but difficult) to jump up on it's back and ride it. If a player succeed, the p.mantis goes berserk and attacks everything and everyone nearby until the player can't hold on anymore and falls off (maybe just by fluttering it's wings to kick off the passenger). The p.mantis is now very exhausted and is much easier to kill. When dead, it will leave a part from the front leg that can be used to make a new lure trap or weapon (long an powerful spear perhaps?).

 

Edited September 12, 2020 by Snabbaronen

[Gnith]

A Praying Mantis would be a nearly impossible opponent to defeat.
It's speed and precision are unmatched.
Able to snatch a flying Hummingbird from the air.
We would be slow, easy prey for them.

The mantis is really cool, but I think it would be more than we could handle if made even moderately accurate.

[McSquirl Nugget]

On 9/12/2020 at 1:43 PM, Gnith said:

A Praying Mantis would be a nearly impossible opponent to defeat.
It's speed and precision are unmatched.
Able to snatch a flying Hummingbird from the air.
We would be slow, easy prey for them.

The mantis is really cool, but I think it would be more than we could handle if made even moderately accurate.

agreed,  I think people are just posting their favorite insects to put in the game without thought of how they'd actually affect the game.  Nothing wrong with that, suggestions are great to have for the dev's to figure out if they should be included.

[Snabbaronen]

Well, the Praying Mantis is not my "favorite insect" and my suggestion was not "without thought" as you can read in my suggestion.

A praying mantis is almost stationary during it's attacks. It reaches the pray with it's long and retractable front legs. So I would think that it could be defeated with a long range weapon or just make it a bit slower as the other insects, already incorporated in the game.

One shouldn't compare the exact real life behavior of the praying mantis with game mob/characters behavior. The already in-game insects are only life like anyway.

If we for fun play with the thought that it's really possible to shrink a human into an ants size, it would be equally difficult to defeat a spider. The human reaction time is at best about 200 milliseconds and that would not be enough time to react from a spider attack. Also, a spider does not show any warnings with movement or specific posture before an attack as the insects do within the game.

I've been handling spiders and other exotic insects for many years so I have some insight in this matter. About 35 years ago, I had an unusual large Mexican Red Knee Tarantula that attacked without any detectable warnings and despite of it's size with a speed that the eyes could barley see until the fangs was sunk into the pray. Smaller spider (such as the wolf spider or the orb weaver) are even faster in real life.

However, the Praying Mantis was only a suggestion. The Obsidian team have already incorporated a spider option for gamers that have arachnophobia. It would be rather easy to add the same option for any other hard-to-defeat or scary insects in the game as well.

...and I can see now that I'm by far not alone to suggest the addition of the praying mantis in Grounded.

With this said, I will continue to enjoy Grounded, with or without praying mantises  .

[Gearhart]

On 9/12/2020 at 3:43 PM, Gnith said:

A Praying Mantis would be a nearly impossible opponent to defeat.
It's speed and precision are unmatched.
Able to snatch a flying Hummingbird from the air.
We would be slow, easy prey for them.

The mantis is really cool, but I think it would be more than we could handle if made even moderately accurate.

Fortunately, a praying mantis will likely ignore us; due to their large size, we'd be too small for it to consider for a meal.  Plus, their eyes are designed to detect movement rather than color and shape, so we can always move slowly near it to avoid detection.

Now, imagine if we were able to somehow lure a praying mantis to the frisbee in the hedge zone, and pit it against the brood mother.

[Victor02151997]

I think they could add centipedes, crickets, grasshoppers, butterfly, red Wasps, earth worms, mole cricket, I could keep going on with insects. These are some of things I'd like to see added to Grounded if possible..

[ScritchOwl]

Mantis would prioritize maintaining distance were they have reach. F anything you would want to close the distance for rapid pain treatment then it would jump back on wingbeat to where it could strike.  They are just not designed to be super Kung Fu users. They are ambush predators. If you want an agile day ruiner then you want a hunting predator like a jumping spider, centipede or assassin beetle. If you want it under water then giant water bug or dragonfly nymphs though players may claim unfair as they tend to be very voracious.

[Nicholas Berstecher]

23 hours ago, Victor02151997 said:

I think they could add centipedes, crickets, grasshoppers, butterfly, red Wasps, earth worms, mole cricket, I could keep going on with insects. These are some of things I'd like to see added to Grounded if possible..

I am really wondering, why do I keep seeing suggestions for Centipedes and Praying Mantis, we are the size of an ant! I also didn’t fight the Broodmother yet because of its size and health. I fought the Mini-Boss though, so maybe I can do it now with the new level 7 Salt Morning Star; but still, those would maybe make the Broodmother look tiny. I would probably avoid them altogether, like how I treated most creatures when I started the game along with every new creature added. Hopefully this all makes sense.

[Reina]

There are tiny Mantis that could prey on us at that size which was why I suggested it as well. At approximately 1 cm in length when fully grown, Bolbe pygmea is the smallest species of praying mantis in the world. This species for example. And if you think on it too much the Mosquitoes in game do attack us, when in reality they would not be interested in us either, just gives us enemies to fight so we have more to do, or at least more enemies then tiny spiders and ants.

[Nicholas Berstecher]

 

4 hours ago, Reina said:

There are tiny Mantis that could prey on us at that size which was why I suggested it as well. At approximately 1 cm in length when fully grown, Bolbe pygmea is the smallest species of praying mantis in the world. This species for example. And if you think on it too much the Mosquitoes in game do attack us, when in reality they would not be interested in us either, just gives us enemies to fight so we have more to do, or at least more enemies then tiny spiders and ants.

I didn’t know Praying Mantis could be that small, that is actually possible at our size.

[Reina]

Yup, was researching these cause my fiancee's thing is Mantis. Who knew it would ever turn out to be actually useful. XD