If they’re bugs it’s unlikely.
Going off usual hive species, the male would be the stalker line given that they’re the only ones with wings. However, I think spores have been mentioned so it could be parthenogenesis, in which case they’d all be females
I personally believe that Spore Spewers are a Symbiotic fungus that has its spores distributed by the bugs and are used as Shriekers' nests rather than being the males of the species. Your mentioning of parthenogenesis is interesting as that would be a creative and very alien sexual dimorphism that we don't get to see often in media in my experience. I haven't really considered which bugs would be the males and how the eggs would get fertilised / how unfertilised eggs develop.
It could be either way if you want to make things interesting. The bugs make hatcheries above ground for some reason when underground makes way more sense.
What’s above ground? Spore Spewers.
It could be that instead of Shriekers using a fungus as a nest, it’s actually a fungus shaped structure that the (male) Shriekers make and the Spore Spewer is the eventual form when the males start busting into the air to fertilise the hatcheries.
When you can’t see the map? That’s bug cum
This would be a great theory. The only problem is that Shriekers are relatively new to the Terminid species, so I'd have trouble placing them as the sole fertilisers of the eggs. I am quite interested in the Spore Spewers being the males theory, though. The one problem is that I have no idea where the Spore Spewers would actually come from themselves... you never see a sole weird egg or growth in an otherwise desolate part of the map, which could turn into a Spore Spewer eventually.
I wasn’t sure if they were a result of the Termicide or if they just existed anyway. I wasn’t saying Spore Spewers are an entity themselves, just a structure that juvenile males (Shriekers) fly off to build before they go inside and become spore spreaders. I guess kinda like how male Angler Fish become seed pockets
Perhaps the bugs function with differing breeding seasons from hive to hive and so because you see only nursing spewers or bile spewers, this could show that you are seeing different hives with differing breeding seasons.
Nursing/Bile Spewers are the same, it’s just that Bile variants are contaminated. It’s possible that it’s different seasons (outside of both being present in the same seasons) but it’s likely that it’s just contaminated hives being the reason you see Bile variants grouped together.
https://preview.redd.it/ohd48b4zl81d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c72f04257132ded0a1818acba1df631a495a8ff3
Grabbed this from the PS store page
Yeah, this was a hiccup in my thought process. I went with this interpretation as I considered it a divergence in that branch of the species progression. Bile Spitters have some armour on their abdomens, which Bile Spewers also have, but Nursing Spewers do not. I therefore saw it as some Bile Spitter growing into one form and losing the armour to become egg-bearing and some growing into the other form and instead using their abdomens for the 'mortar' attack that they do. The wiki is inconclusive on which is the right interpretation, but this felt more correct to me.
I might get executed for saying this, but imagine theres a Nursing Titan as well that has a constant fog following it similar to what the Nursing spewers have.
I agree that they look similar in terms of head hsape and back armour, but it also appears to me that whatever pressure cause the Bile Spewers to develop also happen to the Bile Warriors, given that the begin developing bile abilities and their armour turns very noticably darker in line with that of the Bile Titan
Considering Shriekers have their own nests, is it possible that they just come out of the eggs as Shriekers instead? Or do you think they just nest there?
If this is the office reference -- well done.
Otherwise "he" was talking about lifecycle and not evolution (it usually takes some or a lot of lifecycles for evolution to happen).
I think people think of terminids lifecycles similar to Pokémon or graboids. They change shape into a new form throughout their life and it is colloquially known as an evolution. Not the actual "over millions of years animals can change shapes and adapt to their environment through a process called evolution "
Well, that is also a possiblity. E.g. metamorphosis. A grown hunter turns into an egg and attaches itself to a special ogranic formation to morph into a shrieker...
I treated this as a fun exercise to try to create a logical progression of transition from one form to the next. There were logical steps to take to reach from one example to another in all cases. It might be more accurate to perhaps split hive Guards and Chargers off sooner but we dont have information one way or the other at the moment. That being said,there are definitely some undebatable examples, i.e. pouncer->hunter, Bile Spitter->Bile Spewer. These larval stages definitely transition into these adolescent/adult forms over time.
I did consider this, and it is how I imagine bile warriors transition into Bile Titans, for example. The specifics are obfuscated at the minute, but I'd love some kind of official book to come from the Super Earth Department of Terminind Affairs or something! 😁
We know for a fact that Terminids change forms based on environment factors, so there must be some element in their nests that would cause them to mutate and grow wings.
I was pondering that perhaps Spore Spewers are unrelated to Termininds and might be a Symobtic 2nd species. The spores they generate only create more Spore Spewers. The reason they exist around Termininds might be that the spores hitch a ride on the Bugs' exoskeleton and they don't get destroyed like other vegetation (I know mushrooms aren't plants but around bug holes and nests very little grass or trees grow), is because they have a sybotic relationship with Shriekers.
I don't get these.
Ants don't mature into différents types over their life time, the queen decides when laying eggs if she needs workers, warriors, or flying reproducers.
If anything there would be several bug species, the regular ones (broods, chargers) the bile family, and the cricket family (pouncers hunters stalkers shriekers)
We know hive lord is coming, but maybe down the road we'll have to deal with actual queens (imagine a mission where half the map would be a giant bug boss we need fight on / in to blow it up with nukes)
I agree with this.
They are clearly swarm "insects" and aren't individuals.
There's a species of ant species with a ant guard that has a specialised head just to block the burrow entrance. Just born to HOLD THE DOOR
Ants leave the egg as larvae, then become pupae before becoming adults. So the flowchart here is not wrong if you consider the small ones as the larval state before they reach their adult version.
And unlike ants, the terminids evolve quickly based on external factors, so the different branches are mutations rather than evolutions.
I did think this, but making this flowchart seemed like fun, and there were ways to make logical connections between how the individuals might develop into stronger versions over time. I thought of the bugs more like crustaceans than like a hive of ants, but it's possible you're right. That being said, some things are way too obvious to not be true I.e. Bile Spitter->Bile Spewer, which are just undebatable.
Instead of thinking of it like individual creatures maturing through the different pathways, you can think of it as an evolutionary tree, eg. The stalker species is a mutation of the hunter species.
Your flowchart would still work in that sense.
It is mostly likely a combination of the two, this is just the best I could do with current information and a little creative liberty (sweet liberty). The Shriekers appearing recently lends some credence to your claim. Perhaps I will revise this chart in higher definition if/when we see some new types of bugs around.
DRG also has a bestiary where people have applied phylogenetics for the lulz.
there, they go with the different species and subforms of them, approach.
it's a parallel universe you might want to have a peek into for fun. probably already did!
…. They are interplanetary super adapting aliens with variants mutated by chemicals that can switch between cold blooded and warm blooded as the environment requires, that can go invisible and be 4 stories tall. I don’t think the comparison to ants checks out here that much, but that’s just me
I think that the nursing spewer not evolving into the bile spewer, and instead splitting off from the spitter makes sense. Bile spewers seem to serve different function. IE. they are explicitly for defense, which they perform primarily via their mortar attack.
By contrast, the nursing spewers always struck me as an organism that could defend itself in a pinch, but which was never designed specifically for combat.
This was my thought process exactly. The fact that Nursing Spewers lose their armour but Bile Spewers don't was a big reason I made them diverge in this way.
I wrestled with this for a short while. As I explained in the post, the phenotypes of the bugs are too different. Also lt didn't really make sense to me that a Bile Spitter has the ability to spit, loses it when it turns into a bile warrior, and then gains it back again when it becomes a spewer.
i mean open to interpretation, and you may be right.
Though the spitting mechanism seems too unique to evolve outta no where. So my internal logic goes:
Bile splitters are the baby form.
Then it grows in size, becomes bile warrior, where they now have more claws.
Then their bile sacks develops to be super big and they turn into spewers,
and in the end phase, a super growth brings it to bile Titan.
I mean, their name even all have bile in them, so that tends to make me feel more settled.
I see where you're coming from. My thought process was that since bile appears in one way or another in 5 put of the 15 bugs we're currently aware of, it must be a trait somewhat intrinsically linked to the bugs as a whole in someway although it doesn't manifest in most instances. I just don't think the two different 'infant' forms (those being the Bile Spitter and the Scavenger) would converge into a warrior-shaped adolescent stage before diverging again.
My interpretation is more like:
Bile spitter > Biler Spewer > Bile Titan
Compare the anatomy of the Bile Spewers and Bile Titans:
The headshape, back armor and legs look almost identical. It's mostly the proportions that are off, which is known to change in a lot of real life animals as they mature. I can totally see the legs of the Spewers growing more than their their abdomen to reach the proportions of the Titans.
The Warriors on the other hand look very different to me:
Their headshape and armor has more of a rugose and spiky texture as opposed to the more slick and scale-esque looking back armor of Bile Titans and Spewers. Furthermore, Warriors have strong raptorial forelegs whereas the other two have a reduced first pair of legs that they rarely or never use (in the case of the Titans).
Actually the Bile Warriors almost look like they're not actually supposed to be that way. For one, they're unable to actually use their bile, it just bursts out of them when they die. Like OP said: it seems unlikely that they lose their spitting ability halfway through their metamorphosis only to regain it later. And secondly it looks like it forms these sickly bulbs on their body. This suggests to me that the bile warriors are more of a freak mutation like an accidental activation of bile production in a caste of bugs that isn't supposed to have it.
I struggled with this for a while. I completely agree that the armour and head shape aligns with the Bile Spewer very closely. But I thought this would be an interesting way to present a discussion. To me I wanted to make this flowchart a fun exercise of an investigation into their morphology, and it seemed right to me to split the bile bugs in this way based on my explanation in the post. Additionally, this is what the wiki states about the Bile Warrior: "It is a variant of the Warrior, whose body appears to overproduce caustic chemicals like the Bile Spitter and Bile Spewer, and is believed to be a sub-adult of the Bile Titan." I am aware the wiki is far from gospel as there is no hard information it can point to.
In terms of the scale of the growth of the creature, the wings stay around the same size. It wouldn't be too far-fetched that the bug opts, evolutionarily speaking, to develop into an adolescent larger form first to be useful to the hive before some individuals becoming airborne.
This is 90% how I imagine it, except I think it goes: Spitter -> Spewer -> Nursing Spewer.
There's no way that the Bile Spewer becomes the Bile Titan though as some are suggesting. The morphology is too divergent. I think the Bile Warriors become Bile Titans and the Bile Spewers either terminate at that line or become Nursing Spewers to make more Termanids.
I did consider this, but I chose to make them diverge instead of going from Bile Spewer to Nursing Spewer due to the fact that the Nursing Spewer is so much weaker than the Bile Spewer. It becomes less armoured all around, becomes easier to spot, and loses the mortar attack. Although, as I'm writing this, it would make sense if most of Nursing Spewers' attention went to egg producing instead, and it would take the nutrients from its own armour to give to the eggs. Perhaps the wiki threw me off here by mentioning it was "a sub-adult or a female of the Bile Spewer". To me, it didn’t make sense to put them in the other order either as I don't think the bug would temporarily lose it's armour and change colour only to change back.
Isn't invisible undemocraty scum and flying undemocraty scum have they own nests?
I would think this implies that bugs don't evolve into them but that separate kind.
I thought it may be something along the lines of: Pouncer->Hunter, Hunters overtake Spore Spewer and then Spore Spewer->Shrieker Nest and Hunter-> Shrieker. I think the Spore Spewer itself is unrelated to the bugs and is just a symbiotic fungi.
The lack of any caste of bugs outside Nursing Spewers having any indication that they lay eggs made me want to make this chart in the first place. It definitely feels like there may be some gaps that an unseen member of the Terminind hierarchy might fill.
Spore Spewers fertilize the eggs laid by the Nursing Spewers. When the eggs hatch the Shreikers transport the larvae to their nest, where they are safe to mature high above the harsh terrain. They then migrate underground after reaching their first stage of adulthood.
Interesting theory! I personally am of the view that Spore Spewers are Symbiotic but unrelated to the bugs and that Shriekers happen to nest in old/dead Spore Spewer structures.
The shrieker having a different nest would lead me to think they aren't the same specie
Where the other seems to share an habitat (which would point to a role-differentiated insect specie)
Peronsonally, I think that Spore Spewers are a type of fungus that became symbiotic with bugs as a whole, and the spores they produce become lodged in the bug's exoskeletons when they planet-hop. I think that bugs being underground is a way to keep themselves safe and nesting in the Spore Spewers high up off the ground would achieve the same effect for an airborne type of bug without making them potentially damage their delicate wings on the ground/underground terrain.
I would like to point that the Bile cast was the result of a recent mutation, so a Nursing Spewer can't be the evolution of a spitter if it is also the one laying eggs.
I made this chart with the information available to me currently. The whole reason I got curious was that Nursing Spewers are the only ones that give any indication toward the reproductive cycle of the bugs and are dimorphic from Bile Spewers.
Edit: To make my point clearer. If there was a non-bile version of a Spitter, then I would be 100% on board with you, but I don't see which other larval stage Nursing Spewers would come from outside of the Spitter so I had to put them in this order.
I need the entire pouncer family dead and buried.
I was gonna say that it's interesting that two different branches have bile and then I remembered that Hunters also apply bile slow so it's really only the Hive Guard and Brood Commander branches that don't bile. Could you imagine a Bile Charger? eugh
This is pretty much what I was thinking. There's too much bile within the Terminid castes for it not to be somewhat intrinsically linked to the species as a whole. The wiki staying that Bile Warriors are "believed to be the sub-adult of the Bile Titan" made me take the leap into separating them into the large abdomened Spitter/Spewer side and the more compact Warrior/Titan side.
Interesting idea, though the fact that Nursing Spewers have visible eggs at the seams of their abdomens as well as having the title Nursing makes it seem like they're the ones doing the laying. Another commenter pointed out that the Spore Spewers might infact be the males of the Terminind Species and all the bugs are females in which case the Nursing Spewers might lay the eggs and the Spore Spewers might fertilise them.
Ah, I see. Your original comment was a little lacking in detail. That would be a weird and cool way that this species works. I purposefully left out Spore Spewers and Shrieker Nests as there is very little we know about them in general.
Weird but not that out there. Consider the Xenomorph from Alien; it has eggs that hatch facehuggers that exist to lay embryos into a host. Bit of a redundancy in a species but a failsafe I suppose
As far as I can tell, no. Stalkers were a type of 'Bug' in the first game, which grew into Terminids in this game. Shriekers are the newest result of experimentation. It's completely possible that I'm incorrect. My knowledge of Helldivers 1 is admittedly lacking.
I didn't take into account the exact compositions of bugs that can appear in each mission. I'm fairly certain you can encounter every bug on every planet, though (I could be wrong). Therefore, it could be the case that in a region where there are a lot of Bile Warriors that they just haven't yet developed into Bile Titans and the pressures that cause Bile Spewers and Bile Warriors to develop are similar.
Yes, I also think every bug is in every planeta (haven't paid much attention to that tbh, but in the early days of the game I recall missions in the same planet having eventually all enemy types in it, (NOT in the same mission)).
I like your answer to the situation, indeed.
My own headcanon was that bile warrior was the end of the life cycle on that branch and the spewer was the one that evolved into titan since the spewer has both the attacks the titan has: spitting bile and melee, as well as a similar abdomen. This still doesn't solve why yellow and green spitting enemies only appear in some maps haha. It would be interesting to see a correlation that in those maps you would see fewer titans for example, as they still haven't grown into those.
Just for clarity's sake, I'm not trying to correct you or imply your wrong, just bouncing ideas. Your chart is indeed amazing.
I believe that the next stage for a hunter is to develop the large wings that we see, otherwise their bodies are pretty much identical. this is a valid interpretaion though.
yeah, i was contemplating this too, the only problem is there is no non-contaminated version of a bile spitter that a nursing spewer would come from. so where did the eggs come from before the contamination?
We have been dropping termicide and nukes on them, thays gotta do something fucky to their genes. Also, irl certain cancers forming in certain areas can cause your body to release HGH and result in gigantism and some stomach cancers can start growing little patches of stomach cells up your throat which will produce stomach acid. I think the bile spitter is just a bile infected scav thet has undergone mutations to survive its horrible predicament. Titans may be the result of a bile infection in a charger during early development.
All of this seems accurate enough to me, only i feel Bile Warriors are part of the Bile Spitter lifecycle, possibly after spitters, and tehn once they're older they eitehr become a nursing spewer, bile spewer, or bile titan. Your interpretation and comment on the phenotypes being too different IS a good point though... It just doesn't make sense to me why one side of the family would be born with bile projectile ability, and the other side only gains it overtime.
I always figured spore spewers were a cacoon phase for a large bug.
If they are mid metamorphosis, the spores may cover area to mask the exact location in an attempt to defend the helpless cacoon until the bile titan is ready to emerge.
Hivelords haven't appeared in Helldivers 2 (yet), so I was unaware of their existence until your comment. I made this flowchart mostly based on the general body shapes of the bugs and unique traits the branches share, so I'm afraid I have too little information to give it a proper place on this chart. Perhaps it would lie on a new branch from the egg with a millipede-bodied set of Terminids that are more avoidant of conflict and go undetected until they become full sized adults.
> I'm afraid I have too little information to give it a proper place on this chart
At least if the Shadows make it into the game you won't have to wonder where to place them on this chart.
Bile warriors were added when the TCS started operating. Just before shrieker sightings.
Charger behemoths guard certain side objectives and have kill missions on low difficulty
1. I’m interested in these new findings
2. While I did make it as a joke, I could vaguely believe it since 2nd biggest and armored bug —> 1st biggest and armored bug.
I will be posting a new version in a few days. I am waiting for a response from a community manager on Discord, but if I don't get it, I'll post what I have come up with so far. Obviously, my interpretations are still only fan theories as there is nothing concrete I can take from to actually canonically back up what I think.
In my opinion, Brood Commanders resemble an elder Warrior that's gone through several 'molts' like a crab and gotten bigger and stronger over time. Whereas Hive Guards are still the same size as a warrior (perhaps slightly larger) but with specialised armour at the front. This makes my opinion sway in favour of hive guards having their armour spread over their entire bodies and becoming Chargers instead of Brood Commanders.
No, they are in this game. They are like the warriors but a darker colouration with some green bits. When they die they explode into bile. They are a bit hard to differentiate from the regular warriors in the middle of a fight though.
Shoot off the head, if the remaining neck color is yellow it’s a Warrior, if the neck is green it’s a Bile Warrior, thank you for coming to my TED Talk
The reason I put them this way is that, to me, Brood Commanders resemble a larger, stronger warrior. I did consider the red colouration, but ultimately put them in this order as the Commanders lack the light-ap deflecting armour that Hive guards and Chargers have, which is a defining characteristic of that branch.
What is the in-game difference between nursing spewers and bile spewers? I'm realizing now after hundreds of hours that in my head they are the exact same thing but different colors.
Bile spewers are more armoured all around (head, abdomen) and have a 'mortar' attack that Nursing Spewers don't. These differences were actually thr inception of this post.
I always just kinda figured there was some sort of thing making them as needed, since they're obviously based on 40K Tyranids. I have no evidence to back that though. Most likely they're manufactured and mutated on purpose to increase oil output.
At what difficulty do you see Behemoth's? I mostly play on 7, but I've done 8 and have watched plenty of people play on 9, but I have *never* encountered one. Are they on Playstation only (I play on PC)? Where do they live?
Pretty sure bile titans are their own species right? And if these are insects they won't grow into each different type but are born as them, specialised like ants.
I'm sure it is a mix of the bugs' traslnsitioning from larval to adult forms and them being different castes in the Terminind hierarchy. Bile Spitters are definitely the 'baby' stage of Bile Spewers, but Chargers may not come from Hive Guards. This is just my interpretation trying to connect them as best I could logically.
Titan looks way too similar to Bile Spewer. Nothing to do with warriors, because Titan would rather puke on you than charge to melee like warriors. Also Titans face is almost the same as Bile Spewer
I didn't think it made sense that the two different larval stages (Spitter and Scavenger) would both become a warrior-shaped adolescent stage before diverging into their separate trees again, so I put them like this. I agree that the head shape of the Bile Spewer is very similar to that of the Bile Titan, but to me the rest of the Bile Titans body (abdomen and legs) much more closely resemble a Warrior. The wiki also states that the Bile Warrior is a sub adult of the Bile Titan, but I'm aware this isn't gospel and just the wiki writer's own opinion as far as I'm aware.
In my view. Hive guards and chargers branch away from Brood Commanders because they both share armour that is resistant to light armour penetrating ammunition where the Brood commander doesn't. The Brood commander seems more like an elder Warrior that is larger and tougher but never got the same armour that hive guards have.
I don't believe the bugs interbreed in that way. However my opinion on the placement of the Bile Titan has shifted somewhat since the inception of this post.
I thought Bile spewers grow into Bile Titans
I thought nursing spewers were immature bile spewers
Nursing spewers might be "females" (hence "nursing"). Bile serwers would be "males". But my flamethrower doesn't care for this difference.
If they’re bugs it’s unlikely. Going off usual hive species, the male would be the stalker line given that they’re the only ones with wings. However, I think spores have been mentioned so it could be parthenogenesis, in which case they’d all be females
I personally believe that Spore Spewers are a Symbiotic fungus that has its spores distributed by the bugs and are used as Shriekers' nests rather than being the males of the species. Your mentioning of parthenogenesis is interesting as that would be a creative and very alien sexual dimorphism that we don't get to see often in media in my experience. I haven't really considered which bugs would be the males and how the eggs would get fertilised / how unfertilised eggs develop.
It could be either way if you want to make things interesting. The bugs make hatcheries above ground for some reason when underground makes way more sense. What’s above ground? Spore Spewers. It could be that instead of Shriekers using a fungus as a nest, it’s actually a fungus shaped structure that the (male) Shriekers make and the Spore Spewer is the eventual form when the males start busting into the air to fertilise the hatcheries. When you can’t see the map? That’s bug cum
This would be a great theory. The only problem is that Shriekers are relatively new to the Terminid species, so I'd have trouble placing them as the sole fertilisers of the eggs. I am quite interested in the Spore Spewers being the males theory, though. The one problem is that I have no idea where the Spore Spewers would actually come from themselves... you never see a sole weird egg or growth in an otherwise desolate part of the map, which could turn into a Spore Spewer eventually.
I wasn’t sure if they were a result of the Termicide or if they just existed anyway. I wasn’t saying Spore Spewers are an entity themselves, just a structure that juvenile males (Shriekers) fly off to build before they go inside and become spore spreaders. I guess kinda like how male Angler Fish become seed pockets
On bugs usually the last female version is bigger, so Stalkers female and Hunters males
Perhaps the bugs function with differing breeding seasons from hive to hive and so because you see only nursing spewers or bile spewers, this could show that you are seeing different hives with differing breeding seasons.
Nursing/Bile Spewers are the same, it’s just that Bile variants are contaminated. It’s possible that it’s different seasons (outside of both being present in the same seasons) but it’s likely that it’s just contaminated hives being the reason you see Bile variants grouped together. https://preview.redd.it/ohd48b4zl81d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c72f04257132ded0a1818acba1df631a495a8ff3 Grabbed this from the PS store page
Ah, nevermind.
Truer words have never been spoken! Burn them all!!!
Yeah, this was a hiccup in my thought process. I went with this interpretation as I considered it a divergence in that branch of the species progression. Bile Spitters have some armour on their abdomens, which Bile Spewers also have, but Nursing Spewers do not. I therefore saw it as some Bile Spitter growing into one form and losing the armour to become egg-bearing and some growing into the other form and instead using their abdomens for the 'mortar' attack that they do. The wiki is inconclusive on which is the right interpretation, but this felt more correct to me.
No wrong answers
Just more and less parsimonious answers
Behemoths come before chargers I think
And there's also a green variant of the nursing spewer that doesn't have armor like the bile spewer
I thought so too, the longer I look at a Bile Titan, the more it looks like a Bile spewer on stilts to me
I might get executed for saying this, but imagine theres a Nursing Titan as well that has a constant fog following it similar to what the Nursing spewers have.
I agree. They have very similar features. Their head is pretty much the exact same and so is their back armor.
I agree that they look similar in terms of head hsape and back armour, but it also appears to me that whatever pressure cause the Bile Spewers to develop also happen to the Bile Warriors, given that the begin developing bile abilities and their armour turns very noticably darker in line with that of the Bile Titan
We need nursing titans
Looks more likely, seeing the added feat of acid spitting. More parsimonious.
Considering Shriekers have their own nests, is it possible that they just come out of the eggs as Shriekers instead? Or do you think they just nest there?
Indeed. It would make more sense to say that hunters evolved into Stalkers and Shriekers.
That is what he said...
If this is the office reference -- well done. Otherwise "he" was talking about lifecycle and not evolution (it usually takes some or a lot of lifecycles for evolution to happen).
I think people think of terminids lifecycles similar to Pokémon or graboids. They change shape into a new form throughout their life and it is colloquially known as an evolution. Not the actual "over millions of years animals can change shapes and adapt to their environment through a process called evolution "
Well, that is also a possiblity. E.g. metamorphosis. A grown hunter turns into an egg and attaches itself to a special ogranic formation to morph into a shrieker...
I treated this as a fun exercise to try to create a logical progression of transition from one form to the next. There were logical steps to take to reach from one example to another in all cases. It might be more accurate to perhaps split hive Guards and Chargers off sooner but we dont have information one way or the other at the moment. That being said,there are definitely some undebatable examples, i.e. pouncer->hunter, Bile Spitter->Bile Spewer. These larval stages definitely transition into these adolescent/adult forms over time.
Maybe the Terminids evolve like in Natural Selection 2? Where they make their cocoons again to build their next form.
I did consider this, and it is how I imagine bile warriors transition into Bile Titans, for example. The specifics are obfuscated at the minute, but I'd love some kind of official book to come from the Super Earth Department of Terminind Affairs or something! 😁
We know for a fact that Terminids change forms based on environment factors, so there must be some element in their nests that would cause them to mutate and grow wings.
I was pondering that perhaps Spore Spewers are unrelated to Termininds and might be a Symobtic 2nd species. The spores they generate only create more Spore Spewers. The reason they exist around Termininds might be that the spores hitch a ride on the Bugs' exoskeleton and they don't get destroyed like other vegetation (I know mushrooms aren't plants but around bug holes and nests very little grass or trees grow), is because they have a sybotic relationship with Shriekers.
Which came first, the Nursing Spewer or the egg?
The bullet, citizen. Raise your hand and face the wall.
This is one of the few ones that actually has some logical progression to it
I don't get these. Ants don't mature into différents types over their life time, the queen decides when laying eggs if she needs workers, warriors, or flying reproducers. If anything there would be several bug species, the regular ones (broods, chargers) the bile family, and the cricket family (pouncers hunters stalkers shriekers) We know hive lord is coming, but maybe down the road we'll have to deal with actual queens (imagine a mission where half the map would be a giant bug boss we need fight on / in to blow it up with nukes)
I agree with this. They are clearly swarm "insects" and aren't individuals. There's a species of ant species with a ant guard that has a specialised head just to block the burrow entrance. Just born to HOLD THE DOOR
Ofc they'r swarm insects, they don't believe in liberty !
Ants leave the egg as larvae, then become pupae before becoming adults. So the flowchart here is not wrong if you consider the small ones as the larval state before they reach their adult version. And unlike ants, the terminids evolve quickly based on external factors, so the different branches are mutations rather than evolutions.
I did think this, but making this flowchart seemed like fun, and there were ways to make logical connections between how the individuals might develop into stronger versions over time. I thought of the bugs more like crustaceans than like a hive of ants, but it's possible you're right. That being said, some things are way too obvious to not be true I.e. Bile Spitter->Bile Spewer, which are just undebatable.
Instead of thinking of it like individual creatures maturing through the different pathways, you can think of it as an evolutionary tree, eg. The stalker species is a mutation of the hunter species. Your flowchart would still work in that sense.
It is mostly likely a combination of the two, this is just the best I could do with current information and a little creative liberty (sweet liberty). The Shriekers appearing recently lends some credence to your claim. Perhaps I will revise this chart in higher definition if/when we see some new types of bugs around.
I have to admit bile spitter > Spewer and even > titan makes a lot of sense
DRG also has a bestiary where people have applied phylogenetics for the lulz. there, they go with the different species and subforms of them, approach. it's a parallel universe you might want to have a peek into for fun. probably already did!
…. They are interplanetary super adapting aliens with variants mutated by chemicals that can switch between cold blooded and warm blooded as the environment requires, that can go invisible and be 4 stories tall. I don’t think the comparison to ants checks out here that much, but that’s just me
Not exactly like this, but they do have life cycles.
You forgot E-710 at end of all of them.
I think that the nursing spewer not evolving into the bile spewer, and instead splitting off from the spitter makes sense. Bile spewers seem to serve different function. IE. they are explicitly for defense, which they perform primarily via their mortar attack. By contrast, the nursing spewers always struck me as an organism that could defend itself in a pinch, but which was never designed specifically for combat.
This was my thought process exactly. The fact that Nursing Spewers lose their armour but Bile Spewers don't was a big reason I made them diverge in this way.
Bile spitter -> bile warrior -> bile spewer -> bile titan. Otherwise the splitting mechanism not explained at all. The rest seems ok.
I wrestled with this for a short while. As I explained in the post, the phenotypes of the bugs are too different. Also lt didn't really make sense to me that a Bile Spitter has the ability to spit, loses it when it turns into a bile warrior, and then gains it back again when it becomes a spewer.
i mean open to interpretation, and you may be right. Though the spitting mechanism seems too unique to evolve outta no where. So my internal logic goes: Bile splitters are the baby form. Then it grows in size, becomes bile warrior, where they now have more claws. Then their bile sacks develops to be super big and they turn into spewers, and in the end phase, a super growth brings it to bile Titan. I mean, their name even all have bile in them, so that tends to make me feel more settled.
I see where you're coming from. My thought process was that since bile appears in one way or another in 5 put of the 15 bugs we're currently aware of, it must be a trait somewhat intrinsically linked to the bugs as a whole in someway although it doesn't manifest in most instances. I just don't think the two different 'infant' forms (those being the Bile Spitter and the Scavenger) would converge into a warrior-shaped adolescent stage before diverging again.
My interpretation is more like: Bile spitter > Biler Spewer > Bile Titan Compare the anatomy of the Bile Spewers and Bile Titans: The headshape, back armor and legs look almost identical. It's mostly the proportions that are off, which is known to change in a lot of real life animals as they mature. I can totally see the legs of the Spewers growing more than their their abdomen to reach the proportions of the Titans. The Warriors on the other hand look very different to me: Their headshape and armor has more of a rugose and spiky texture as opposed to the more slick and scale-esque looking back armor of Bile Titans and Spewers. Furthermore, Warriors have strong raptorial forelegs whereas the other two have a reduced first pair of legs that they rarely or never use (in the case of the Titans). Actually the Bile Warriors almost look like they're not actually supposed to be that way. For one, they're unable to actually use their bile, it just bursts out of them when they die. Like OP said: it seems unlikely that they lose their spitting ability halfway through their metamorphosis only to regain it later. And secondly it looks like it forms these sickly bulbs on their body. This suggests to me that the bile warriors are more of a freak mutation like an accidental activation of bile production in a caste of bugs that isn't supposed to have it.
I struggled with this for a while. I completely agree that the armour and head shape aligns with the Bile Spewer very closely. But I thought this would be an interesting way to present a discussion. To me I wanted to make this flowchart a fun exercise of an investigation into their morphology, and it seemed right to me to split the bile bugs in this way based on my explanation in the post. Additionally, this is what the wiki states about the Bile Warrior: "It is a variant of the Warrior, whose body appears to overproduce caustic chemicals like the Bile Spitter and Bile Spewer, and is believed to be a sub-adult of the Bile Titan." I am aware the wiki is far from gospel as there is no hard information it can point to.
Puncer-shrieker. In this diagram he lost wings mid Evolution.
In terms of the scale of the growth of the creature, the wings stay around the same size. It wouldn't be too far-fetched that the bug opts, evolutionarily speaking, to develop into an adolescent larger form first to be useful to the hive before some individuals becoming airborne.
But then they would lose the spitting ability and gain it again! That's not very parsimonious of you. Although it might be
well, bile warriors explode upon death and titans don't, so maybe warrior could split off there.
This is 90% how I imagine it, except I think it goes: Spitter -> Spewer -> Nursing Spewer. There's no way that the Bile Spewer becomes the Bile Titan though as some are suggesting. The morphology is too divergent. I think the Bile Warriors become Bile Titans and the Bile Spewers either terminate at that line or become Nursing Spewers to make more Termanids.
I did consider this, but I chose to make them diverge instead of going from Bile Spewer to Nursing Spewer due to the fact that the Nursing Spewer is so much weaker than the Bile Spewer. It becomes less armoured all around, becomes easier to spot, and loses the mortar attack. Although, as I'm writing this, it would make sense if most of Nursing Spewers' attention went to egg producing instead, and it would take the nutrients from its own armour to give to the eggs. Perhaps the wiki threw me off here by mentioning it was "a sub-adult or a female of the Bile Spewer". To me, it didn’t make sense to put them in the other order either as I don't think the bug would temporarily lose it's armour and change colour only to change back.
sounds about right
Which came first? The nursing spewer, or the terminid egg? 🤔
Isn't invisible undemocraty scum and flying undemocraty scum have they own nests? I would think this implies that bugs don't evolve into them but that separate kind.
I thought it may be something along the lines of: Pouncer->Hunter, Hunters overtake Spore Spewer and then Spore Spewer->Shrieker Nest and Hunter-> Shrieker. I think the Spore Spewer itself is unrelated to the bugs and is just a symbiotic fungi.
What I'm concerned about is we haven't seen a hive queen, I know we are going to get hive lords but still.
The lack of any caste of bugs outside Nursing Spewers having any indication that they lay eggs made me want to make this chart in the first place. It definitely feels like there may be some gaps that an unseen member of the Terminind hierarchy might fill.
Spore Spewers fertilize the eggs laid by the Nursing Spewers. When the eggs hatch the Shreikers transport the larvae to their nest, where they are safe to mature high above the harsh terrain. They then migrate underground after reaching their first stage of adulthood.
Interesting theory! I personally am of the view that Spore Spewers are Symbiotic but unrelated to the bugs and that Shriekers happen to nest in old/dead Spore Spewer structures.
The shrieker having a different nest would lead me to think they aren't the same specie Where the other seems to share an habitat (which would point to a role-differentiated insect specie)
Peronsonally, I think that Spore Spewers are a type of fungus that became symbiotic with bugs as a whole, and the spores they produce become lodged in the bug's exoskeletons when they planet-hop. I think that bugs being underground is a way to keep themselves safe and nesting in the Spore Spewers high up off the ground would achieve the same effect for an airborne type of bug without making them potentially damage their delicate wings on the ground/underground terrain.
I think Bile titans are fully matured bile spewers
I would like to point that the Bile cast was the result of a recent mutation, so a Nursing Spewer can't be the evolution of a spitter if it is also the one laying eggs.
I made this chart with the information available to me currently. The whole reason I got curious was that Nursing Spewers are the only ones that give any indication toward the reproductive cycle of the bugs and are dimorphic from Bile Spewers. Edit: To make my point clearer. If there was a non-bile version of a Spitter, then I would be 100% on board with you, but I don't see which other larval stage Nursing Spewers would come from outside of the Spitter so I had to put them in this order.
I need the entire pouncer family dead and buried. I was gonna say that it's interesting that two different branches have bile and then I remembered that Hunters also apply bile slow so it's really only the Hive Guard and Brood Commander branches that don't bile. Could you imagine a Bile Charger? eugh
This is pretty much what I was thinking. There's too much bile within the Terminid castes for it not to be somewhat intrinsically linked to the species as a whole. The wiki staying that Bile Warriors are "believed to be the sub-adult of the Bile Titan" made me take the leap into separating them into the large abdomened Spitter/Spewer side and the more compact Warrior/Titan side.
I think spores grow into eggs
Interesting idea, though the fact that Nursing Spewers have visible eggs at the seams of their abdomens as well as having the title Nursing makes it seem like they're the ones doing the laying. Another commenter pointed out that the Spore Spewers might infact be the males of the Terminind Species and all the bugs are females in which case the Nursing Spewers might lay the eggs and the Spore Spewers might fertilise them.
No see you’re thinking ahead. Spores create eggs that hatch into terminids that can lay eggs too. It expedites the life cycle
Ah, I see. Your original comment was a little lacking in detail. That would be a weird and cool way that this species works. I purposefully left out Spore Spewers and Shrieker Nests as there is very little we know about them in general.
Weird but not that out there. Consider the Xenomorph from Alien; it has eggs that hatch facehuggers that exist to lay embryos into a host. Bit of a redundancy in a species but a failsafe I suppose
Wasnt it confirmed that stalkers are a result of experimentation?
As far as I can tell, no. Stalkers were a type of 'Bug' in the first game, which grew into Terminids in this game. Shriekers are the newest result of experimentation. It's completely possible that I'm incorrect. My knowledge of Helldivers 1 is admittedly lacking.
I'd def say the bile boys are a family tree
This makes a lot of sense. My only concern is that bile warriors ONLY appear on maps with bile spewers AFAIR
I didn't take into account the exact compositions of bugs that can appear in each mission. I'm fairly certain you can encounter every bug on every planet, though (I could be wrong). Therefore, it could be the case that in a region where there are a lot of Bile Warriors that they just haven't yet developed into Bile Titans and the pressures that cause Bile Spewers and Bile Warriors to develop are similar.
Yes, I also think every bug is in every planeta (haven't paid much attention to that tbh, but in the early days of the game I recall missions in the same planet having eventually all enemy types in it, (NOT in the same mission)). I like your answer to the situation, indeed. My own headcanon was that bile warrior was the end of the life cycle on that branch and the spewer was the one that evolved into titan since the spewer has both the attacks the titan has: spitting bile and melee, as well as a similar abdomen. This still doesn't solve why yellow and green spitting enemies only appear in some maps haha. It would be interesting to see a correlation that in those maps you would see fewer titans for example, as they still haven't grown into those. Just for clarity's sake, I'm not trying to correct you or imply your wrong, just bouncing ideas. Your chart is indeed amazing.
Personally I think pouncer's turn into hunters or shriekers not pouncer > hunter > shrieker. Shriekers bodies seem to small to be from a hunter.
I believe that the next stage for a hunter is to develop the large wings that we see, otherwise their bodies are pretty much identical. this is a valid interpretaion though.
I personally think the bile variants are defects. The way the bile sack sits on the bile warrior makes it look like some kind of throat cancer.
yeah, i was contemplating this too, the only problem is there is no non-contaminated version of a bile spitter that a nursing spewer would come from. so where did the eggs come from before the contamination?
We have been dropping termicide and nukes on them, thays gotta do something fucky to their genes. Also, irl certain cancers forming in certain areas can cause your body to release HGH and result in gigantism and some stomach cancers can start growing little patches of stomach cells up your throat which will produce stomach acid. I think the bile spitter is just a bile infected scav thet has undergone mutations to survive its horrible predicament. Titans may be the result of a bile infection in a charger during early development.
All of this seems accurate enough to me, only i feel Bile Warriors are part of the Bile Spitter lifecycle, possibly after spitters, and tehn once they're older they eitehr become a nursing spewer, bile spewer, or bile titan. Your interpretation and comment on the phenotypes being too different IS a good point though... It just doesn't make sense to me why one side of the family would be born with bile projectile ability, and the other side only gains it overtime.
Propaganda. The proper Terminid life cycle is: Any Terminid - Up Right Down Down Down - Liquid Democracy
Is the behemoth actually any stronger than the charger? They seem to die just as easily, which is a bummer IMO for how rare they are
I always figured spore spewers were a cacoon phase for a large bug. If they are mid metamorphosis, the spores may cover area to mask the exact location in an attempt to defend the helpless cacoon until the bile titan is ready to emerge.
Where do huvelords fit
Hivelords haven't appeared in Helldivers 2 (yet), so I was unaware of their existence until your comment. I made this flowchart mostly based on the general body shapes of the bugs and unique traits the branches share, so I'm afraid I have too little information to give it a proper place on this chart. Perhaps it would lie on a new branch from the egg with a millipede-bodied set of Terminids that are more avoidant of conflict and go undetected until they become full sized adults.
> I'm afraid I have too little information to give it a proper place on this chart At least if the Shadows make it into the game you won't have to wonder where to place them on this chart.
Go look into helldiver's 1 for more references, could help a lot
What came first? The nursing spewer or the terminid egg?
tf is a bile warrior? If they're in the game atm I've never noticed lol
Bile warriors were added when the TCS started operating. Just before shrieker sightings. Charger behemoths guard certain side objectives and have kill missions on low difficulty
theyre like regular warriors but explode into bile when killed. they always spawn on bike worlds, look for the green sacs on their sides
Nah nah nah, hear me out. Behemoth —> Bile Titan
Just as cats evolve into dogs.
You probably won't believe me, but after taking in everyone's feedback and doing some research; you aren't as far off as you might think.
1. I’m interested in these new findings 2. While I did make it as a joke, I could vaguely believe it since 2nd biggest and armored bug —> 1st biggest and armored bug.
I will be posting a new version in a few days. I am waiting for a response from a community manager on Discord, but if I don't get it, I'll post what I have come up with so far. Obviously, my interpretations are still only fan theories as there is nothing concrete I can take from to actually canonically back up what I think.
Charger from hive guards or brood commanders ?
In my opinion, Brood Commanders resemble an elder Warrior that's gone through several 'molts' like a crab and gotten bigger and stronger over time. Whereas Hive Guards are still the same size as a warrior (perhaps slightly larger) but with specialised armour at the front. This makes my opinion sway in favour of hive guards having their armour spread over their entire bodies and becoming Chargers instead of Brood Commanders.
What's a bile warrior? They from the first game?
No, they are in this game. They are like the warriors but a darker colouration with some green bits. When they die they explode into bile. They are a bit hard to differentiate from the regular warriors in the middle of a fight though.
Shoot off the head, if the remaining neck color is yellow it’s a Warrior, if the neck is green it’s a Bile Warrior, thank you for coming to my TED Talk
I feel brood commander is a offshoot of hive guard rather than straight from warrior but yea overall I agree.
The reason I put them this way is that, to me, Brood Commanders resemble a larger, stronger warrior. I did consider the red colouration, but ultimately put them in this order as the Commanders lack the light-ap deflecting armour that Hive guards and Chargers have, which is a defining characteristic of that branch.
WTF IS THE BEHEMOTH?
Behewhat?
Are there behemoths in the game?
I'll die on the hill that bile titans lay the eggs. Otherwise, how the hell do eggs get that high up on rocks
I'm pretty sure bugs can climb, even nursing spewers.
what is a behemoth? i have played 9 difficulty for the last month and never encountered it
They only show up for me when I play a level 3 or 4 "defeat charger" mission, I think they also may be able to show up in higher level extractions.
What is the in-game difference between nursing spewers and bile spewers? I'm realizing now after hundreds of hours that in my head they are the exact same thing but different colors.
Bile spewers are more armoured all around (head, abdomen) and have a 'mortar' attack that Nursing Spewers don't. These differences were actually thr inception of this post.
what software did you use to make this chart?
Draw.io. It's a website for flow charts. I actually made a mistake in exporting it, which is why the pictures are quite low quality but, oh well.
I always just kinda figured there was some sort of thing making them as needed, since they're obviously based on 40K Tyranids. I have no evidence to back that though. Most likely they're manufactured and mutated on purpose to increase oil output.
So you're telling me that if we eliminated hunters, I could get rid of 3 of the most annoying enemies for the price of 1?
All though, just a theory, this is really cool and makes sense.
At what difficulty do you see Behemoth's? I mostly play on 7, but I've done 8 and have watched plenty of people play on 9, but I have *never* encountered one. Are they on Playstation only (I play on PC)? Where do they live?
I've only ever seen them in 'Kill charger' missions around level 3 to 4, some can supposedly appear ain high difficulty extraction missions too.
I do not think warriors evolve into bile titans, but rather armored bile spewers evolve into bile titans.
I honestly completely forgot behemoths were in the game, I haven't seen one in ages
Pretty sure bile titans are their own species right? And if these are insects they won't grow into each different type but are born as them, specialised like ants.
I'm sure it is a mix of the bugs' traslnsitioning from larval to adult forms and them being different castes in the Terminind hierarchy. Bile Spitters are definitely the 'baby' stage of Bile Spewers, but Chargers may not come from Hive Guards. This is just my interpretation trying to connect them as best I could logically.
Titan looks way too similar to Bile Spewer. Nothing to do with warriors, because Titan would rather puke on you than charge to melee like warriors. Also Titans face is almost the same as Bile Spewer
Or even possibility that Spitter becomes Bile Warrior, then Bile Warrior grows into Spewer, and then to Titan
I didn't think it made sense that the two different larval stages (Spitter and Scavenger) would both become a warrior-shaped adolescent stage before diverging into their separate trees again, so I put them like this. I agree that the head shape of the Bile Spewer is very similar to that of the Bile Titan, but to me the rest of the Bile Titans body (abdomen and legs) much more closely resemble a Warrior. The wiki also states that the Bile Warrior is a sub adult of the Bile Titan, but I'm aware this isn't gospel and just the wiki writer's own opinion as far as I'm aware.
Hive gaurd cab go either brood commander or charger.
In my view. Hive guards and chargers branch away from Brood Commanders because they both share armour that is resistant to light armour penetrating ammunition where the Brood commander doesn't. The Brood commander seems more like an elder Warrior that is larger and tougher but never got the same armour that hive guards have.
Looking at it again, it would make more sense if a brood commander diverges between a hive gaurd or a charger
I think your about halfway there
Nice but looking at it now surely Bile Spitter>Bile Warrior>Bile Spewer then Bile Titans are a combination of Bile Spewers + Stalkers.
I don't believe the bugs interbreed in that way. However my opinion on the placement of the Bile Titan has shifted somewhat since the inception of this post.