Alien Visitation
Turn 8 Part 1
This turn is already one of the longer ones I’ve done, and I’m only half-way done with it. I’ve decided to split it in half and publish this half first, then the second half when that’s finished.
In this turn:
Extra-terrestrial smugglers use the planet as a hiding place for stolen goods
Eekraw of the rainforest see lights in the sky and take it as an omen to travel
Two Eekraw of the southern temperate forest make a long-distance flight to an unheard of distance
Overview
I am doing a project of incremental worldbuilding. In other words, I’m taking aspects of worldbuilding and changing them slowly over time, in hope of creating a world that has the real weight of history behind it. In addition, I’m using randomness and ‘game-like’ mechanics, as well as assistance from ChatGPT, to help work my way through this process and ensure that I am sometimes surprised by the results.
The Eekraw are an avian species that has recently developed sentience. They’re slightly shorter than human height, and live around 80 years absent illness or injury. They can’t lift off vertically, requiring a cliff face or tree to jump off to successfully initiate flight. They have strong and dexterous foot talons, meaning their feet rather than wings are needed to work tools. They live in communal nests, with a nest of four-six adults raising their young together.
At the beginning of Turn 8, the Eekraw inhabited world looks like this:
Regions 1 and 11 are in the equatorial, scrubland mountain region that is the Eekraw’s original home. Region 2 is in a savannah biome. Regions 6 and 7 are in tropical deciduous forests, while 5, 8 and 10 are coastal/island tropical deciduous forest regions. Regions 3, 4 and 12 are in temperate forests. Finally, region 9 is in a tropical rainforest biome. So far, the central continent has been pretty much fully inhabited other than some marginal biomes, but the Eekraw have only barely reached any of the other continents.
Incidentally, I hadn’t fully thought this through before, but here’s my thinking on Eekraw population numbers. Each nest is made up of 4-6 adult Eekraw, 2-4 younglings (roughly 15-25 years of age) and 2-4 younger than 15.
I realize that I don’t really have a word for these parts of the Eekraw lifespan even in English, so I come up with some. I update the species description as follows:
Lifespan: Can live 60-80 years absent illness or injury. Three main life stages: Nestling (0-15 years) - largely helpless, cannot fly. Youngling (15-25 years) - can fly and contribute to gathering, but don’t reach full social and sexual maturity. Adult (25+ years) - fully socially and sexually mature.
I estimate a clan is generally around 10 nests with children and 2 or so without, so around 50-70 adults, 20-40 younglings, and 20-40 nestlings. There are around 20 clans in each region. The population per region, therefore, ranges from around 2,000 to 3,000 Eekraw in each region. The overall Eekraw population, then, is 24-36,000 individuals at the beginning of Turn 8 when there are 12 inhabited regions.1
At some point I may start being even more precise on numbers, especially when agriculture starts allowing increased density, but for now a vague feeling that a region is around three thousand individuals works well enough for me.
Turn Order
Random Event: Roll on the random event table, then roll to see what region it occurs in
Prominent Individuals:
In any region that had a prominent individual last turn, determine how that individual is remembered and/or how the remembrance has changed, then move them into Myths/History.
Roll a region. If that region has anything in myths/history, see how that remembrance has changed over time.
Roll a region. That region has a new individual come to prominence. Conduct a basic language development on that region.
Expansion: Roll a region. That region will expand to 1d2 of the nearest regions. If the region is populated, that region will migrate to a nearby region, and the activated region will take their place (waves of migration pushing previous waves away).
Biome Generation:
Generate a biome for the regions that have been expanded into. Every nearby biome will contribute one feature to the new biome, and there will be two taken at random from a different biome as well.
Develop new words to describe all new creatures.
New regions and source region each undergo basic language development
Language Development: Roll a region. That region undergoes language change in all categories
Advancement / Development:
Roll a region to determine which undergoes technological/social/cultural advancement.
Roll a 1d3 - 1 is technological, 2 is social, 3 is cultural. The selected region will have a minor advance in that category.
That region will also undergo basic language development.
Random Event:
I won’t fully reproduce the random event table, but it’s in this post:
I added a new possible random events to the table:
32. Planet-wide advancement - every region goes through some change: 1. Language; 2. Culture; 3. Society; 4. Technology; 5. Genetic
If I roll this, it’ll make for a very long turn, but I think it would be an interesting possibility. Plus, I like adding new things to the random events table - although at some point I may do like the Prominent Individuals and pull some of them out to be part of the regular turn order. The problem with having 32 entries is it’s less likely that any of them will happen, which is fine for some of them (technology, region or culture changing), but I’d like things like biome features to be able to happen more frequently potentially. I may separate out ‘planetary’ or ‘environmental’ events from the ‘cultural’ events, and roll for each. Not this turn, though
I roll a 31. Wow, that’s the one that could potentially be a ton of work, and could also be really interesting. Here’s the description:
31. Major Event of Planet-wide importance - instead of rolling to pick a region, roll to see which of these events occurs: 1. Another species gains sentience. 2. Global cooling. 3. Global Warming. 4. Major volcanic eruption. 5. Meteor impact. 6. Extra-terrestrial visitation (probably without contact, probably leave artifacts somewhere). 7. Major plant/animal die-off. 8. Major disease. 9. Sea-levels rise. 10. Sea-levels fall.
Before I roll, I’m going to rule out #8 - major disease. Partly because the population is so low already, partly because there’s not really any trade or contact between the Eekraw, and partly because I don’t want to have any of my few regions die out at this point - I’d say I want at least twenty or thirty regions inhabited before I let that happen.
For this time, I’ll say if I roll an 8 it’ll be a days-long fall of shooting stars, visible from all locations on the globe (that therefore will probably affect all regions with new cultural thoughts).
However, I roll a 6 - extra-terrestrial visitation.
Some extra-terrestrial species visits the planet. I labeled all the continents on the planet on the map below, and I’ll roll for one of these 10 continents to see which continent they visit/stay on. They’ll leave some evidence of their existence behind on whichever continent is chosen.
I roll a 4, so there was an extra-terrestrial visitation on continent 4, one of the continents to the southwest of the original continent.
Now I need to figure out what they’re here for, how long they’re going to stay, and what they’re going to leave behind. Not to mention, if the Eekraw notice anything (they won’t have sustained contact, but there might be some noticing). The aliens aren’t going to be making a permanent colonization, but they may have intentions for a long-term stay of some kind.
Possible reasons for the visit:
Resource harvesting - problem might be if it takes up important minerals from the locals, but I think I can avoid that
Research - Of the planet or ecosystem or something like that. Or possibly, to do research that isn’t allowed in their home
Some kind of small-scale long-term stay — due to being a prison colony, a group of exiles, military outpost or something like that
Survey (think Star Trek style survey team)
Short-term stays (military training, tourism)
Damaging uses (dump waste, test weapons, something like that)
Vault or storage of some kind
When I roll, I get a 7: vault or storage of some kind. Here are a couple of options for what they’re storing / why they would pick a random planet that’s not special to store stuff.
Dead drop - i.e., it’s used by smugglers or spies to drop off stuff that other smugglers or spies can then pick up
Time capsule - the alien species leaves behind records of their culture either because they want to recover it centuries later or they want the Eekraw to recover it when they’re ready
Hiding spot - a pirate chief or rebel group or something like that leaves weapons, treasure or some other valuables to hide them from their adversaries
Sentient AI storage/quarantine - a dangerous AI system is stored in this area to keep it away from its creators
Reality anchor - the aliens are fighting against an enemy that messes with the frameworks of reality, they put a reality anchor in place to keep what’s real real
I roll a 1, so the extra-terrestrial visitors use this planet as a dead-drop for illegal or surreptitious transfer of resources/equipment or material.
Spies
Thieves
Smugglers
Rebels/dissidents
I roll a 3, so they’re smugglers.
Hi-tech equipment
Dangerous research (bio-engineered organisms, nanobots, etc.)
Weapons
Raw materials/resources
Art/artifacts
Alcohol/drugs/mind-altering substances (VR skulljacks?)
Data/information
I roll a 4, so they’re smuggling raw materials or resources that are illegal to possess or trade for some reason.
Illegally mined
Stolen
Dangerous
Precursor for something dangerous
Simply really valuable and therefore heavily taxed
I roll a 2, so they were stolen.
Large quantities of ‘normal’ minerals (gold/silver/aluminum, something like that)
Processed (i.e., future analogy to steel, some kind of really strong alloy, doped silicon)
Rare/exotic mineral
I roll a 1, so these smugglers store massive quantities of a ‘normal’ mineral, destined for a forge world or maybe a resource-poor colony planet or space station. They steal it, from a mining colony, ore transport or just using creative accounting techniques, then drop it off on this out of the way planet for a while to lose the heat, then sell it.
I’m assuming that the smugglers only were in operation for one turn or so - I haven’t specified the lengths of these turns, but I’m assuming they’re somewhere between 10,000 and 50,000 years each. Therefore, for some reason or another, by the next turn the smugglers are no longer in operation on this planet.
Now, there’s two further questions I need to answer - did the Eekraw notice anything, and what did the smugglers leave behind?
For the first question, I think the Eekraw generally didn’t notice much - the smugglers were landing on a different continent and avoided long-term stays on the planet’s surface. There’s maybe a chance though that some of the local cultures noticed bright lights in the sky, as the smugglers’ ships landed. I’ll say that each region had a one-in-ten chance to notice and care about the lights, and incorporate them into their culture/myths. For that, I’ll roll 12d10, and any region that rolls a 10 will have noticed it.
Region 9 is the only region that rolls 10. Region 9 is the tropical rainforest biome in the west of the central continent.
Possible interpretations/Myths:
Gifts from the sun - the sun sent out parts of itself to the planet
Dance of the ancestors - the spirits of the ancestors dance in the sky
Tricks/portents of the evil Varook
Spirits of ancestors who got lost on their way to the afterlife
A “Sky Clan” of Eekraw who fly much higher than any others
Omen (a tale of a time of great prosperity or scarcity, triggered by the lights)
Sign of leadership - a Eekraw is born under the sign who is considered destined for greatness [Create a prominent individual]
Omen of travel - the clan should migrate towards the lights [Trigger a migration]
I roll an 8, so the Eekraw in region 9, or some portion of them, see the lights as an omen that tells them to travel in that direction. Because of that, I’ll do an additional round of expansion in that direction as well.
However, there’s a problem with that - the next continent to the west is too far away from the central continent to travel directly except across the parts that are closer together further north. For the Eekraw of region 9 to reach that continent, they have to go northwest first, then southwest. If they go southwest immediately, they’ll reach a dead-end.
I have three possible resolutions to this - first, they just go southwest, replace the part of region 10 that is directly southwest of them. Second, they decide to just fly, trusting the ancestors, and I’ll roll to see if they get carried by a lucky gust of wind or something (not really likely, considering their flying distance is around 70 miles max, and the distance between the continents is around 300 at that spot.
Finally, I could assume that they learn at least the basic geography from the Eekraw in region 10, and know that they have to go northwest first before going southwest. In that case, I’ll have them occupy the coast along the western continent, which also solves a problem with region 10 - it doesn’t make sense that region 10 occupies both coasts, since they are separated by such distance along most of the length. So these Eekraw, who see the lights in the sky as an omen, travel through the land of the Eekraw of region 10, before arriving in the new land on the east coast of the new continent.
So, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll create a new region 13, along the eastern coast of this western continent, where part of region 10 is already. I’ll keep the biome the same as region 10 - since it was already supposed to be part of the same biome.
So, new words to describe the new creatures:
Creatures (7):
Teek - dangerous creature
Skikka - non-threatening/harmless creature
Varkee’rikun’yi - Large avian creature, large light-sensitive eyes, hunts nocturnally. Will snatch a fully grown Eekraw if they are alone.
Tirteek’yi - Large reptile, has large tail with spikes on it
Tik’r’teek - Dog-sized insect, with green camoflauge skin and strong legs. Ambush predator
Skikkaar’yi’taki - Large semi-amphibious segmented worms that feed on dead plants and animals, as well as seaweed and other ocean plant-matter
Rateer’skikka - Large herbivore with armored hide and two large horns
Takitalu’skikka - Medium-sized animal with hard exoskeletal shell, four legs and slightly webbed feet for swimming. Feeds on the star-shaped fruits and the funghi, travels in small family groups
Kratir’skia’teer - A medium-sized creature with tough skin and sharp tusks
Skikka’ree - Bioluminescent beetles that live in colonies and feed on tree sap, release a noxious gas when threatened. Has luminescence that alters based on the season.
Takikrew’skikka - Small, vibrantly colored fish which live in shallows and coastal pools, feeding on small insects and algae
Plants (8):
Teer - plant
Varskit - bushes and small trees
Tav’k - tall tree that can be jumped off
Tirt’r’var’yi - Floating fruit-bearing plants tethered to the ground by long vines. They drift in the canopy catching sunlight, held aloft by gas-filled sacs next to the fruit.
Tav’k’teer - Star-shaped fruit produced by one of the tree-species
Varskit’Riji - Bark of a certain tree that is flexible but durable, could be used for weaving baskets
Rikjil’Teer - A bioluminescent moss that grows on the upper canopies of trees in this biome
I’ll also create the word ‘Rikrere’ (from Rikun, meaning night, and rere, meaning sun) to represent the lights in the sky that caused the Eekraw to migrate.
I’ll do a round of language transfer between the two regions too, like I did with regions 3 and 12 last turn. However, I’ll do it a bit differently. This time, I’ll transfer 1d10 words each way, but I’ll just roll randomly among all the words - if it’s a word with an equivalent in the other language, it’ll replace it. If not, it’ll be added.
So, region 10 to region 13: 9.
There are 66 words in the lexicon for region 10, so I’ll roll 9d66 and transfer those words: 19, 12, 15, 11, 54, 9, 33, 13, 59
Skigka - totally useless
Varka - evil force of darkness
Krit - shelter
Ratrak - clan
Tikru’teik - Dog-sized insect, with green camoflauge skin and strong legs. Ambush predator
Ekiek - youngling
Talril - to light/illuminate
Traki - life
Riikeikka - Bioluminescent beetles that live in colonies and feed on tree sap, release a noxious gas when threatened. Has luminescence that alters based on the season.
Meanwhile, region 13 has 75 words. I’ll roll a 1d10 - 1. So one word will transfer - word 72:
Tirt’r’var’yi - Floating fruit-bearing plants tethered to the ground by long vines. They drift in the canopy catching sunlight, held aloft by gas-filled sacs next to the fruit.
The two regions split only a little while previously, so the languages were mostly already similar. I’ve decided that since they’re already similar culturally, they won’t do any cultural exchange either.
Now I just do basic language evolution for region 13 and 9.
Region 13:
Plants (8):
Tyri - plant
Vaskit - bushes and small trees
Tavuk - tall tree that can be jumped off
Tirvayi - Floating fruit-bearing plants tethered to the ground by long vines. They drift in the canopy catching sunlight, held aloft by gas-filled sacs next to the fruit.
Takutur - Star-shaped fruit produced by one of the tree-species
Rikil’Tyr - A bioluminescent moss that grows on the upper canopies of trees in this biome
Region 9:
Environment (6):
Reere - sun
Talo - ground/soil
Ta’ki - water source
Vafa - above the canopy
Voa - forest canopy
Varta - under canopy
Faki’tee - shrub layer
Rakee - day
Ikun - night
La’ke - sunset/sunrise
Vikro - flight
Teela - something that is reflective (metal or water, for example)
Now, I’m going to add a note in the myth/history for region 13. “The skylight omen - Some of the Eekraw once saw lights in the sky, over and over again, pointing this way (southwest). They left their old homeland, and traveled for long days and nights, until they reached their current location. Some say they did not fulfill the omen, and ought to keep going until they can go no further.”
I’m not sure if I should add anything to region 9’s myth/history - possibly something about the some of the tribe leaving after that omen? I’ll say there’s a one in three chance that those Eekraw remember that (most of them haven’t remembered past migrations). I’ll roll a 1d3, and if I get a 1, they remember. I roll a 2, so they don’t.
Great. Finally, the last thing I need to do for this alien visitation, is figure out what they physically left behind. This isn’t relevant now, and probably won’t be for a long while, but eventually the Eekraw will find the vaults that the smugglers left behind. The question is, where on the 4th continent did they leave the vaults, in one location or several, and did they leave the minerals behind there too?
I’ll take those questions in opposite order. I think there’s a one in four chance they left minerals behind - they wouldn’t want to, but maybe they got arrested or something. Otherwise, they just no longer found this method of smuggling useful. 1d4, a 1 is they left it, otherwise they didn’t. And, I rolled a 1, so these vaults are full of massive stores of raw materials - metals, largely.
Next, how many sites did the smugglers have? Realistically, as I think about it, there’s not much reason for them to have more than one, so I’ll just go with that. There is one site that is a massive vault complex, hidden below ground, full of minerals.
Finally, the location. On continent 4, there’s a large valley (150 miles wide) between two areas of higher elevation. Within that, there’s a small hill that overlooks the rest of that valley. I’ll say that the smugglers make their vault there, in that location. Sometime in the far future, the Eekraw may find this remnant of extra-terrestrial visitation.
Cool! That was interesting, and it’s kind of cool that I left behind a thing that far-future Eekraw might end up finding. Or it may just never come up again - I don’t know.
Prominent Individuals
First, I go to the region that had a prominent individual last turn - region 4:
Prominent Individual:
Rakir’ka - Rakir’ka was a young adult Eekraw, just past her full maturation. She was taking care of a group of younglings of the clan when she saw a Kre’tikk (avian predator) diving at the younglings. She thought quickly and mimicked the call of Tikk’tikru (other dangerous predator), which caused the Kre’tikk to veer away sharply in fear. She then was able to quickly pull the younglings into the shelter of the trees, protecting them from the predator.
Possible ways it changes:
Stays mostly the same
Adds a new additional character
She fights off the Kre’tikk, not just tricks it
She actually summons a Tikk’tikru, not just mimics it
Trickster - her trickiness is emphasized
Instead of a Kre’tikk, it’s a Fark (evil spirit of darkness)
Blessed by the sun
I roll a 4, so she summoned a Tikk’tikru, not just mimicked it. Her name also changes - to Akir’krat (drop the first consonnant and add the verb “Krat” - to defend - to the name).
Akir’krat - Akir’krat was a young adult Eekraw, just past her full maturation. She was taking care of a group of younglings when she saw a Kre’tikk diving at the younglings. She used magic to summon a Tikk’tikru, which attacked the Kre’tikk and gave her time to pull the younglings into the safety of the trees, protecting them from the predator.
Change to myth
Now I’ll roll a region to have a change to myth/oral history: Region 12, the Eekraw of the northern temperate forest who were pushed out of their home last turn.
Oral History/Myth:
Var’Dol - Var’Dol was a young Eekraw who was generally derided as being clumsy. However, she went and found several other Eekraw - Talik, the brave male, Ektu, the wise female, and little Dalti, the male tracker - and convinced them to form a hunting group, even taking down a Ra’kutik. Her demonstrated leadership convinced the other three to form a nest group with her. Later, due to her wisdom and leadership, she grew to leadership over the whole tribe.
Raik’tal Vaarik (the scared/fearful journey) - Once the tribe lived in a different part of the forest, warmer and more southerly. Then a different tribe of Eekraw came and pushed them out, upon which Var’Dol led them to their current home in a more northerly part of the forest. She guided the tribe on the long and difficult journey as they retreated from the invaders who moved into their land.
I’ll do changes to each of those two myths separately, even though they are intertwined. First I’ll change the names.
Var’Dol —> Var’thol
Talik —> Taluk
Ektu —> Ekhitu
Dalti —> Daldalti
For the first part of the myth (the story of Var’Dol - now Var’thol), possible changes:
Stays mostly the same
Adds a new character
Emphasizes a different character
Omit or minimize a character
One of the other characters gets a story of their own
Emphasize the group as a whole
De-emphasize the hunt
A specific location is identified for the story
Remove her initial clumsiness
Add an antagonist
Add a spiritual aspect (blessing by the sun)
I rolled a 7, so the hunt is further de-emphasized.
Var’thol - Var’thol was a young Eekraw who was generally derided as being clumsy. She found several other Eekraw - Taluk, the brave male, Ekhitu the wise female, and Daldalti the male tracker, and formed a hunting group together. Her demonstrated leadership led to the four forming a nest group, and then her becoming the indisputed leader over the whole clan. Eventually, the whole tribe asked for her guidance.
For the second part (the Raik’tal Vaarik), here are some possible changes -
Stays mostly the same
Emphasizes a different character
Emphasize group wisdom
One of the other characters gets a story of their own
Added challenges - face predators, starvation, etc.
Religious/Spiritual undertones
Fault of the Eekraw - they messed up a taboo or something, and that’s why they were forced to retreat
I rolled a 1, so the story stays mostly the same. Boring… but oh well
The updated overall oral history/myth is:
Var’thol - Var’thol was a young Eekraw who was generally derided as being clumsy. She found several other Eekraw - Taluk, the brave male, Ekhitu the wise female, and Daldalti the male tracker, and formed a hunting group together. Her demonstrated leadership led to the four forming a nest group, and then her becoming the indisputed leader over the whole clan. Eventually, the whole tribe asked for her guidance.
Raik’tal Vaarik (the scared/fearful journey) - Once the tribe lived in a different part of the forest, warmer and more southerly. Then a different tribe of Eekraw came and pushed them out, upon which Var’thol led them to their current home in a more northerly part of the forest. She guided the tribe on the long and difficult journey as they retreated from the invaders who moved into their land.
New prominent individual:
I rolled region 4, so the region that got a prominent individual (Rakir’ka - Akir’krat) last turn gets another one. That’s the temperate forest in the south.
I’ll roll 1d2 male/female - 1, so male.
Here are a few possibilities for why he rose to prominence:
He led the whole clan in a long ritual to break a spell of bad weather.
He was particularly skilled at hunting Tuur’jeekti (mouse-like prey)
He found and carried a massive pile of Ekra’tir (insulating moss) back to the nest just before winter started
He was really good at teaching younglings how to hunt
He’s really good at making Ratirkri (tree-markings with luminescent moss)
He won a conflict against another clan
Made a stirringly long-distance flight
He killed a member of another clan during an initiation ceremony of trading younglings with another clan, making him infamous
During a period of scarce food, he was caught hoarding food
During a predator attack on the clan, he fled instead of defending it
I realize that the prominent individual doesn’t have to be good, so I added in a few possible bad things too. However, I rolled a 7, so he’s known for making a really long-distance flight.
I think I’ll make it a 50/50 chance that he did it alone - 1 alone, 2 with others. Got a 2, so he wasn’t alone. Possible options:
He flew with one other
He flew with a nest group
He led an entire clan in a long flight
Rolled a 1. So he and one other went on a long flight. The other - 1 male, 2 female — 1
I came up with a name for each - Tarkay’kre (day-landing) and Tuur’yiti (mouse).
Why did they go on their long flight?
Sacred quest - they were directed by their clan’s Yeek (priests) to go on a long flight
Going to a distant clan to make a marriage alliance
Fly across the massive lake (80-90 miles at its widest point) on a dare/to prove themselves
To prove their worth and impress a pair of potential nestmates
To compete with each other - they each refused to be the first to stop flying
As a ritual to gain the attention of the sun and beg for its blessing
To impress another clan so they would take their nests’ younglings as Eki’va (accepted younglings)
To place their clan marking far outside their normal range to show up a rival clan
To chase down a rival Eekraw
To flee punishment after they did something bad
I rolled a 2. So, here’s the story -
Tarkay’kre and Tuur’yiti were both younglings, members of a clan that was large, and therefore hard for a youngling to make a mark. They heard there was another clan that had been devastated by disease or predators, and therefore needed new males to fill out its ranks. They traveled a long distance through the forest to find this clan, and at one point stayed in the air for around 80 miles, further than most Eekraw even thought possible. Eventually they reached this new clan and had so impressed the clan that they were accepted into a new nest as nestmates of females of the clan.
I’ll also do language evolution for region 4. As I’m looking at it, I get the idea of combining the word ‘youngling’ (Ekee) with the word ‘big’ (var) to specifically mean the ages between 15 and 25, when Eekraw are able to fly and gather, but aren’t yet fully mature.
Thus, Ekee now means ‘nestling.’ ‘Ekevar’ means ‘youngling.’ I also add the word ‘varyie’ (big-you) to mean ‘adult.’
I roll for the category of language change and get a 5,
Other (5):
‘chee - suffix for small
‘thi - suffix for young
‘ga - suffix for new
‘vaar - suffix for big
Rah’ - prefix for important/sacred
I started off with different numbers. To begin with, I thought of each nest as made up of 4-6 adult Eekraw with 3-6 younglings and 3-6 infants. A clan is made up of around 10 nests, so around 40-60 adults and 80-120 juveniles.
On second thought, that seemed way too heavily weighted towards younger Eekraw, and I rethought the numbers and decided that the number of younglings and infants should be reduced, to somewhere around 2-4 instead of 3-6.
So, each nest is 4-6 adult Eekraw, 2-4 younglings and 2-4 infants. (Still weighted towards juveniles, but way less heavily).
Then, I estimated a clan is generally around 10 nests with children and 2 or so without, so around 50-70 adults, 20-40 younglings, and 20-40 nestlings. Then, I assumed there were around 10 clans in each region, so around 1,000-1,500 Eekraw per region. Based on these estimates the total Eekraw population at this point is around 12-18 thousand Eekraw in total - not very high.
Based on a quick google (I’d be interested to find more specific numbers) there were around 100,000 humans about 200,000 years ago when Homo Sapiens became ‘specieized’ as a distinct species, and there may have been multiple population bottlenecks going as low as 1-10 thousand individuals over the next couple hundred thousand years. In addition, as mentioned last-time, 0.1 individuals per square mile is a reasonable upper bound for a primitive hunter-gatherer society. All of these regions are large enough that such a number would be far more than 1,000 per region - more like 50,000 or more. I think I’ll increase the numbers a bit - I’ll just double the number of clans per region (around 20). That gives me around 2-3,000 Eekraw per region, and 24-36,000 Eekraw overall. It’s still low, but the number is a bit better. I thought about increasing the number of nests in a clan too, but once we start getting to 300 Eekraw in a clan, that’s just too many. The real way to resolve this would be to split the regions up more, but that’s doing a little too much in the interest of realism at the expense of usability/usefulness.