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<blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 6580794" data-attributes="member: 177">See the Fithp, from Larry Niven's novel, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Footfall" target="_blank">Footfall</a> for small elephantine sentient creatures.Well, it is important to note that we don't have &quot;information&quot;, as we have no examples of such that we know of.&nbsp; We only have speculation about how it could happen.We then have questions - what do you mean by &quot;fine manipulation&quot;.&nbsp; Parrots, ravens, and crows do a whole lot of manipulation with beak, claw (and, in the parrot's case, tongue).&nbsp; These are also pretty smart birds.&nbsp; Dolphins don't do much physical manipulation of objects, but they do a lot or manipulation of prey with aggressive sonar.&nbsp; A group of hunting dolphins are... sort of like playing soccer with the prey as the ball, a complex interaction.You then get the issue of - if a creature is smart enough for fine manipulation, if there are individuals who are better at it, they will tend to survive better, such that if the species brains are capable of it, over evolutionary timescales they may be apt to develop the ability.The key note for intelligence is this - it costs a lot of energy.&nbsp; The human brain burns up something like 20% of our body's energy budget.&nbsp; If you aren't using it for something valuable, that extra energy burn is a competitive disadvantage.&nbsp; So, for any creature you want to be smart, there should be some way for it to *use* those smarts.&nbsp; Their behaviors should be complex - whether those be social behaviors, or interactions with the environment that don't include direct physical manipulation.But, in game terms you may be setting yourself for an issue - how many people are going to be interested in playing a character with very limited interactions with the environment?&nbsp; It sounds cool as a concept, but the player may end up feeling like they spend most of their time, well, sitting on their hands.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Umbran, post: 6580794, member: 177"] See the Fithp, from Larry Niven's novel, [i][url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Footfall]Footfall[/url][/i] for small elephantine sentient creatures. Well, it is important to note that we don't have "information", as we have no examples of such that we know of. We only have speculation about how it could happen. We then have questions - what do you mean by "fine manipulation". Parrots, ravens, and crows do a whole lot of manipulation with beak, claw (and, in the parrot's case, tongue). These are also pretty smart birds. Dolphins don't do much physical manipulation of objects, but they do a lot or manipulation of prey with aggressive sonar. A group of hunting dolphins are... sort of like playing soccer with the prey as the ball, a complex interaction. You then get the issue of - if a creature is smart enough for fine manipulation, if there are individuals who are better at it, they will tend to survive better, such that if the species brains are capable of it, over evolutionary timescales they may be apt to develop the ability. The key note for intelligence is this - it costs a lot of energy. The human brain burns up something like 20% of our body's energy budget. If you aren't using it for something valuable, that extra energy burn is a competitive disadvantage. So, for any creature you want to be smart, there should be some way for it to *use* those smarts. Their behaviors should be complex - whether those be social behaviors, or interactions with the environment that don't include direct physical manipulation. But, in game terms you may be setting yourself for an issue - how many people are going to be interested in playing a character with very limited interactions with the environment? It sounds cool as a concept, but the player may end up feeling like they spend most of their time, well, sitting on their hands. [/QUOTE]

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