Average Sizes?

I was wondering: Are there any "average size" rules for the ever-popular giant naga species? The entry implies that nagas as a whole have a very wide range of sizes, but given the relative abundance/lack of food, do some areas of Felarya naturally yield larger/smaller nagas at adult size? What about babies? Is there a specific growth rate that we should keep in mind as we draw/write our characters?

(Reason I ask, in part, is because I was working on a terror bird-esque predator that, like most cursorial predators, would find snakes and snakelike creatures prey...and may explain the relative rarity of field and/or desert nagas. I have nothing against nagas - far from it - but picked up the idea of a 'sand walker gone bad' and ran with it.)

Also, given the smaller size of Cactus Dryads, would the same average size apply to desert nagas (i.e. adult size being in the 80 foot range)? I'd assume so, but thoughts on this point would not hurt. They seem underpopulated in any case.

Adult Giant nagas are usually around the 100ft range. They're not common.
"Nagas" refer to human size nagas,. They are very under-represented in stories in spite of being much more common according to canon.

Anime-Junkie wrote:

Adult Giant nagas are usually around the 100ft range. They're not common.
"Nagas" refer to human size nagas,. They are very under-represented in stories in spite of being much more common according to canon.

So there's virtually nothing between the two extremes, then? (Not that this is a bad thing; it does happen in nature that way, just double-checking.) As for the under-representation, someone should get on that...*Plotplotplot.*

Well most of the Nagas featured in my stories are of the smaller variety.

LamiaSybaris wrote:

Anime-Junkie wrote:

Adult Giant nagas are usually around the 100ft range. They're not common.
"Nagas" refer to human size nagas,. They are very under-represented in stories in spite of being much more common according to canon.

So there's virtually nothing between the two extremes, then? (Not that this is a bad thing; it does happen in nature that way, just double-checking.) As for the under-representation, someone should get on that...*Plotplotplot.*

Keep in mind, the 100ft average for giant nagas AJ mentioned is just that, an average. Heights vary just as much as it does with humans. Crisis is 115ft tall, but 90ft tall or 130ft tall ones likely aren't all that rare.

Another big difference comes in tail length as well. Most nagas tend to fall between a 1/3 to 1/4 vertical-to-horizontal ratio.

Crisis, as mentioned, is 115ft tall. I'm not sure if her length was ever given (although, I DID actually measure a pic of her used in her bio, and she had almost a perfect 1/3 body ratio), but we can use her "standing height" as an example. If she's got a 1/3 ratio body, and the part held upright is 115ft tall, then the part horizontal along the ground would be 230ft long, giving her entire body a length of 345ft.

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If we take Crisis again, and want her to have a longer tail, we could bump her up to a 1/4 body ratio. In this case the part held upright is still 115ft, but the horizontal portion is now 345ft, giving her a total body length of 460ft.

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Of course there's no real rules that all nagas have to fall into either or, and it is very likely that most nagas don't, and instead fall somewhere in the middle. I just use these because any shorter than 1/3 and their tails look too short, and any more than 1/4 and their tails begin to get long enough to be a potential hindrance.

Also, yes. As AJ said, human-sized nagas are much more common than their giant counterparts. This is actually true for a lot of species. Dridders, Mermaids and Harpies also have a lot of human-sized varieties as well.

EDIT: I derped. Crisis is 103ft tall. My bad, although my point about tail length is still valid

VISUAL AIDS! Since they are always a bit easier to, well, visualize

Alright, some things to preface with:

1: Image was taken from Karbo's Crisis bio-comic, as it is one of the only pictures I know of (maybe the only one) that shows her entire body at once, mostly stretched all the way out.

2: All lines are the exact same line, just copied and pasted (and recolored in the case of the last one)



You'll notice that Crisis has an almost perfect 1/3 body-tail ratio. I included what the 1/4 one would look like. The naga Fiona, as an example, uses a 1/4 body ratio. She is nearly the same height as Crisis (just a hair shorter, really), yet her tail is a good bit longer.

I've been looking around and been wondering.. Since it's implied Giant Naga start out life much much smaller and eventual grow into their more colossal size. (I could be wrong though just kinda trying to be certain.)

Just kinda wanna know how long it takes the Giant Naga to well become.. Giant. Or to their size as hatchlings.

Merku wrote:

I've been looking around and been wondering.. Since it's implied Giant Naga start out life much much smaller and eventual grow into their more colossal size. (I could be wrong though just kinda trying to be certain.)

Just kinda wanna know how long it takes the Giant Naga to well become.. Giant. Or to their size as hatchlings.

There's still some uncertainty and wiggle room, but in general pred reproduction is devided into three categories:

Egg-laying hybrids
This group includes the majority of nagas, as well as mermaids, dridders, hapies, along with other reptilian, insect, arachnid and a lot of aquatic hybrids. Common traits of the offspring of egg-laying preds include...

1: The actual pregnancy is barely noticeable. The mother can remain active and mobile right up until she lays her eggs. This is very advantageous to the mother, as a full human-like pregnancy out in the middle of the Felaryan wilderness is a death-sentence without others to help and support you.

2: At the time of hatching, the newborn is very small. Around human-sized, maybe slightly smaller.

3: At the time of hatching, the newborn is much more developed than, a human newborn for example (or any other live-birth giant). They can move around very soon after birth, and go straight into eating solid food. In theory, a naga hatch-ling could survive on it's own without any parental care. Of course, the odds of surviving to adulthood are quite small without any kind of help or even the most basic of teaching from those older than it.

4: They usually take around 40-50 years to reach their full size (human age equivalent of 18-20).
**Note** It is currently undecided if human-sized egg-laying hybrids take as long to reach full size. They would be fairly tiny at birth though, given their origins.

TL;DR
- Very small, yet highly developed children who grow slowly into their full size

Live-birth hybrids
This group includes all humanoid giants, such as elves and fairies, along with most mammalian hybrids, including centaurs, pantaurs and so on. Human-sized species such as nekos and inus fall into this group as well. Common traits include...

1: The pregnancy is very similar to a human one, which means the mother becomes much less mobile while in this state. Most live-birth hybrids tend to be more social species, which is a necessity if you want to have children. Without a pack, herd, family or friends to aid her, an expecting mother is going to be in for a seriously difficult time, and the condition is potentially fatal due to her immobility and vulnerability.

2: At the time of birth, they are much larger than their egg-laying counterparts and would be around the same size as a human newborn, relatively speaking of course.

3: At the time of birth, much like human newborns, live-born hybrids are extremely undeveloped and completely incapable of taking care of themselves.
**NOTE** It is likely that centaurs (and perhaps pantaurs) would be an exception to this. Newborn foals do learn to walk very quickly. However, the child would still be less capable of surviving without parent aid than any egg-born hybrid. I believe that giving centaurs a longer pregnancy would help offset this, as it makes the mother have to deal with the consequences for a longer period of time.

4: They take a much shorter amount of time to reach maturity, comparable with humans actually, and usually reach their full size at roughly 20 years of age.

TL;DR
- Larger, much more helpless children who reach maturity at a quicker rate

Dryads
This group includes, well... dryads.

1: Dryads do not actually carry their children themselves. When a dryad wants to reproduce (this is likely influenced by ecological/environmental factors), she fertilizes her seeds with pollen collected from the air around her, put into the air by various wild plant-life in the region. She then releases her seeds into the winds to scatter them.

2: The seed will travel for potentially great distances before it touches down. If the local environmental conditions are not correct, a dryad's seed will either sprout into a normal plant, or not at all. It is entirely possible only a tiny percentage of the seeds released are capable of becoming dryads anyway. The formation of a new dryad will only occur if the seed lands in a location that meets it's internal criteria.

3: A large, tough plant will sprout from the seed. When it reaches approximate human-sized the tough outer layers peel away to reveal the infant dryad. It is at this point that her mind connects to the network for the first time.

4: The young dryad will be nurtured by the thoughts of the network (perhaps dryads can tell which minds are of their own children?), and survive through the subconscious/instinctual use of illusions. As she grows, she will become more aware, more intelligent and gain more active control of her illusions. When dryads are young, they possess an overabundance of photosynthetic cells, allowing them to survive almost exclusively off sunlight and water. As they grow, new photosynthetic cells are added at a much lower rate, and they will begin to need to catch and eat food to supplement their photosynthesis.

**NOTE** I don't believe an age has been set for dryad maturity. Given their generally long-lived nature and large sizes, it's likely that they take just as long, or longer to grow up than egg-born hybrids.

TL;DR
- Dryads are weird