These creatures would be defined by their small size, their charm and beauty, and their relative ubiquity as a bit of color in the background. They’re non-threatening, bottom-of-the-food-chain prey animals that often die at the hands of space cats or space hawks (or alien children with slingshots). Thus we might define them as Small, Winged Fliers who act as Herbivores and likely involve a meditation on communication methods.
Space Birds in GURPS Space
On a trophic level, I suspect we’re dealing with gathering herbivores. A lot of birds seem to favor seeds and fruits, which have high levels of calorie compared to the effort to get them, and they can afford to get to these, as it’s easy for them to get high up in the branches, and they tend to burn a lot of calories flitting around.
When it comes to Mobility, we’re obviously looking at Winged Flight. That can fit anywhere, but I’m primarily thinking of woodland birds. That said, we can apply “space bird” to pretty much any terrain, though they might start to become different sorts of birds (sea gulls at the sea, parrots in the jungle, etc).
When it comes to Size, they’re obviously Small. But how small? Well, robins are about 6 inches, which puts it at SM -6, but their mass is about 0.05 lbs, which puts it under SM -7, while a robin is about a foot long (SM -5), but weighs about 0.2 lbs, which is SM -6, and never mind the wingspan. I think SM -5 with 1 HP will work out fine. Space birds are less dense than space rats for obvious reasons.
Once again, we’d expect bilateral symmetry, two limbs per side (a wing and a leg), a tail with no special features. It’s hard to imagine how it would fly with any other symmetry! Being gathering herbivores implies at least 1 set of manipulators with Bad Grip, though normal DX might also be plausible; this is probably the feet (though there’s no particular reason they couldn’t have a second set of limbs just for grabbing at yummy fruit). We also expect an internal skeleton, right? Though, again, small creatures, an exoskeleton is also plausible.
When it comes to Skin, a classic bird has feathers. If they had skin, Space says to expect Soft Skin, akin to the skin of a snail; I’m not sure how well that would work but I imagine normal skin would work fine. Scales aren’t impossible according to Space: we’d expect to see DR 1 scales in such a case. If they had fur, it would be a normal fur (like a bat). Feathers would tend towards normal feathers; and if it had an exoskeleton, we would expect a light exoskeleton (DR 0).
Classic birds would have two sexes, egg-laying and would likely lean towards K-strategy. This likely makes sense: egg laying is safer for a flying animal than carrying around a child which would weigh it down, and birds need some practice and some time to gain strength before they can, literally, leave the nest.
For Senses, Vision is going to be amazing: the most plausible is a toss-up between normal vision and telescopic vision, though as a prey animal, I think peripheral vision would be more valuable than forward facing telescopic vision, and they tend to be mutually ecxlusive. Hearing is probably normal, touch is unimportant (Space says “-1 DX” but I can’t see a bird lacking DX), and sexual gathering herbivores should have a somewhat improbably high level of taste and smell. For special senses, 360* vision makes sense, as does peripheral vision, or absolute direction.
When it comes to Alien Minds, we probably expect birds to be “Low Intelligence,” but they can easily verge into high intelligence, especially at larger sizes or with more of a K-strategy. Pair-bonding is likely (and permanent pair-bonds have an especially romantic “love bird” connotation); the most likely social organization is pair bonding (though “small group” is not implausible)
This gives them a generic Psychological Profile of Chauvinism -1 (Broad Minded), Concentration -1 (Distractible), Curiosity +1 (if we extend the omnivore bonus to gathering herbivore; Curious), Egoism +1 (Selfish), Empathy -1 (Oblivious), Gregariousness -2 (Loner), Imagination +1 (Imaginative) and Suspicion +2 (Fearfulness).
Generic Space Bird Stats
We’re largely on our own here, as Pizard doesn’t have any birds, and neither DF Allies nor Basic has anything like a songbird (but we do have some birds).
We know that the ST would be 1 and the IQ would be 1 to 4-ish. DX and HT are harder; DF Allies clocks the Macaw, Bat and Owl at DX at 12 so… I guess. All the DF allies have an HT of 12, but songbirds strike me as a bit on the delicate side, so perhaps HT 11 instead. Their Ground Move is probably 2, and the simplest way to handle their Air Move is assume a Basic Speed of 6.0 and thus an aerial move of 12. High levels of perception are totally plausible given our superior sight and smell (Though I wouldn’t give them Discriminatory smell, because nobody would expect that), so I think a Per of 14 is plausible, with Peripheral Vision. I suspect they have low Will, given their lack of concentration and high levels of suspicion, so perhaps a 9?
ST: 1 |
Basic Speed: 6.0 |
SM: -6 |
DX: 12 |
Ground Move: 2 |
Air Move: 12 |
IQ: 4 |
Perception: 14 |
|
HT: 11 |
Will: 9 |
DR: 0 |
Traits: Avian; Peripheral Vision; Restricted Diet (Fruit and Seeds); Sharp Teeth (Beak); Sharp Claws; Voice;
Variations
Chitin
So, as with the rat, an exoskeleton is as probable as an inner skeleton. What would a chitinous bird look like? Well, probably just a large dragonfly, or maybe a large butterfly (counting wingspans, you definitely see some of the largest butterflies reach the size of some of the smallest birds). So the wing structure certainly changes. Are there any other major considerations? Well, the sense of touch drops precipitously to, technically, DX -2. Again, I find it difficult to imagine clumsy alien butterflies. We can reduce the perception, though, especially if we’re going to make the case that insects should have inferior vision. And in return we get… nothing, because the exoskeleton is no better than feathers when it comes to protection. But we can push things up to a DR 1 to make a difference. We might not expect a larynx, thought we might make them Attractive.
Lens (Chitin Bird): Per -2; DR 1; Replace Avian with Winged Hexapod. Remove Voice.
Fish Bird
I somewhat struggle to think of a scaled bird. People no doubt start thinking of archaeopteryx, though that had feathers, or the pteradon, which had skin (as far as I know). But one interesting way of picturing it might not be a lizard with wings, but a fish with wings. Their “fins” would extend out to great membranous wings. This is allowed, of course, because a secondary locomotion for winged flight is swimming, and that’s not so odd: ducks swim and fly. So our fish-birds would swim and fly.
We could re-emphasize the loss of DX (it’s a little more tenable to imagine a clumsy fish than a clumsy insect, for me), add the DR and give some amphibious traits.
Lens (Fish Bird): DR 1, Doesn’t Breathe (Gills), No Legs (Aquatic; Water Move 6); remove Sharp Teeth, Sharp Claws, and Voice. Replace Avian with Ichthyoid..
Handsy Snake Bird
So there’s another interesting possibility: a great tail. “Slithering and Sliding” is another possible option for secondary locomotion, and its possible for our bird to have a long tail, and if so, like a kangaroo, it could “sit” on its tail, and like a snake, it could move on it. What would remain of its feet? Well, they could become manipulators.
Feather boas aside, I struggle to see how one could slither on feathers or fur; skin is possible, but Space implies soft skin, which implies a mucus layer, which I suspect would make it difficult to get a sharp, aerodynamic form. So, let’s go with scales once again, though possibly more of a “lightly scaled skin” rather than large, DR-providing scales.
(Of course, we could just skip the “snake-bird” and give them a sixth set of limbs that can act as arms, such as in the picture. In this case, just remove No Legs (Slithers))
Lens (Snake Bird): No Legs (Slithers); Replace No Fine Manipulators with Bad Grip;
Love Birds
We often have deeply romantic connotations with songbirds. What if they were true? Mostly this is a psychological change: what if our birds definitely had permanent pair bonds and had Strong-K, lovingly raising their baby-bird for quite awhile (perhaps implying a longer lifespan) and gathered into small bird tribes of four to ten sets of birds that cooperated with one another, using their birdsong to attract mates and find one another when foraging for food?
This would justify a slightly smarter bird, and some slightly different psychology:Chauvinism +2 (Racial Intolerance), Concentration +0, Curiosity +2 (Curious (9)), Egoism +1 (Selfish), Empathy +2 (Empathy (Sensitive)), Gregariousness +0, Imagination +2 (Versatile) and Suspicion +2 (Fearfulness).
Lens (Love Bird): IQ +1; Remove Hidebound from Wild Animal; optionally, add Curious, Sensitive and Suspicious
Talkative Bird
Beautiful bird song isn’t the only possible means of communication, though sound has quite a few advantages: it travels pretty far and it “broadcasts” in all directions and there aren’t that many things interfering with it: other animals are trying to be quiet so predators don’t come after them, but being high up in trees, birds are less worried about predators so they don’t mind advertising their presence as much. But in what others ways could they communicate?
Well, they could communicate in subsonic or ultrasonic tones. Subsonic likely involves resonance cavities larger than the bird itself, so that’s out. Ultrasonic has a few issues. First, it takes more energy and, second, it doesn’t travel very far. The primary advantages to to using ultrasonic pulses isn’t communication, but sonar (and that’s more about accurately targeting small prey than it is about seeing things). Even so, if you want to communicate with one another and there are predators that can reach you, ultrasonic might make for a decent form of communication.
Communicating with color and light is quite plausible. Real creatures do that! They just generally do it underwater. This is likely because the murkiness of the water allows the glow to stand out, and you see it more at deeper depths than higher up. So, for “bio-luminescent birds” we might expect them to be nocturnal or live in a region with a great deal of mist, or is otherwise quite dark. Why they would active in such a dark time or region is unclear to me, but they might live low down in a canopy, or there might be extraordinarily dangerous predators by day. Note that they’d need to get rid of their feathers, unless they have some sort of fiber-optic feathers.
While I don’t note it below, chameleons primarily use their color-changing to communicate with one another. It’s plausible for space birds (without feathers) to have the Chameleon trait, to use it to hide when predators are around, and then to signal once they’re not around.
Finally, it’s possible to communicate by smell. Many animals communicate by scent: the most common way to do this is with “rubbing” or “spraying” where the animal somehow marks its territory. This is easier with terrestrial creatures, because you know roughly the height other creatures will be, and the rough area. Birds tend to range over quite an area, so this might be less useful. Alternatively, they could plausibly issue clouds of pheremones that travel on the wind. Arguably, this is what flowers do to attract pollinators, which is a form of mating, so sweet-smelling “flower birds” isn’t that far-fetched.
Finally, we could go with something even more exotic, like a radio bird. This implies some ability to generate electricity, which isn’t impossible, but it would also require them to receive the signal. If they can send and receive radio signals, they could plausibly do radar. But GURPS Space says “no” to small radar animals. Sorry!
Lens (Ultra Bird): Replace Voice with Ultraspeech;
Lens (Bioluminscent Bird): Replace Voice with Bioluminescence and Nightvision 2; Remove feathers.
Lens (Flower Bird): Replace Voice with Perfume and Discriminatory Smell
The Spherical Bird
Buzz buzz buzz – Jellyfish, Spongebob Squarepants
So I mentioned struggling to imagine how a radial symmetry bird would work. Seems fun in the bible, but seems improbable with actual biology. But if we’re going to go towards the improbable, why not lean into it. We had a spherical rat, why not a spherical bird? This actually makes even more sense, because a bird lives in a 3-dimensional environment; air doesn’t counteract gravity unless we are a bouyant flier. So a floating spherical thing might work. Aerial jellyfish!
I personally think such a creature would struggle to be a “gathering herbivore” so we might imagine an environment with air replete with food. Perhaps a world that has well-pollinated air and the “bird” eats the pollen. This would make it akin to a grazer or a filter feeder, rather than a gathering herbivore. If so, we can safely make it limbless, give it something like a hydrostatic skeleton (though it might technically be a pneumatic skeleton?), no manipulators, though it might have very small cilia that bring pollen to its mouths, if it doesn’t just somehow absorb it directly.
Reproduction might change. They may still have sex, but it might be more akin to pollinating. If they eat pollen, they might just spreads out something similar and then rather than eat their own pollen, they move it to, er, the proper place. Thus, they might be hermaphroditic (all sphere-birds send out pollen, and all sphere-birds are equipped to “consume” sphere-bird pollen). This leans towards Strong-r strategy.
Senses might change. Vision drops to an average of Bad Sight; hearing improves to Normal Hearing with Extended Range (though what range, I wouldn’t know). Taste/smell drops to No Sense of Smell/Taste (Sense of Taste only -50%). 360° Vision seems more probable than Peripheral Vision.
Their Intelligence would probably drop to IQ 1 with Cannot Learn, though we could delete that second element. Their mating behavior is probably Mating Only, and their Social Organization, according to Space, would be Solitary, but I think Large Herd would be highly probable, given how they end to breed and that aerial shoaling might be their only reasonable defense against predators.
When it comes to communication, something I haven’t discussed much, it’s certainly possible for them to be musical. They likely use little jets to move around, so they could “flute” to one another with modified jets. On the other hand, we might picture them as bioluminescent or using other means of communication, but see Talkative Birds for more on that.
Their Psychological Profile: Chauvinism -3; Concentration -1; Curiosity -2; Egoism -1; Empathy +0; Gregariousness -2; Imagination -2; Suspicion +2;
ST: 1 |
Basic Speed: 6.0 |
SM: -6 |
DX: 12 |
|
Air Move: 6 |
IQ: 1 |
Perception: 10 |
|
HT: 11 |
Will: 8 |
DR: 0 |
Traits: 360° Vision; Flight (Lighter than Air); Invertebrate; Ovoid (Aerial); Restricted Diet (Pollen);
Voice.
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