Introduction: the "Terrible Lizards"

65 million years ago, an asteroid crashed into the world in what was known as the K-T event. this had mixed effects, but three main things arrived from it.

1.) mammals were able to establish dominance.

2.) the first 30 Draconequi were born from the resulting chaos

3.) the majority of dinosaurs died out

Now, it was established some time ago that birds are dinosaurs, but non-avian dinosaurs have clung to existence in parts of the world, competing with newer predators. some have feathers, others don't, but they all are still alive.

these posts will cover the known species of extant dinosaurs. they may be updated, so keep an eye out!

Coelophysoids were among the first theropods, and have all the basal features that later predators would have.

Ceratosaurs, with smaller brains than the other theropods, four fingers on each hand, and non-stiffened tails, were the "early models" for the large predatory dinosaur template.

Abelisaurs are the "most evolved" branch of this group, with stubby (occasionally nonexistent) arms. these predators, however, were more than a match for other similar-sized beasts.

Noasaurs are small, and HIGHLY specialized to one particular way of life.

COELOPHYSOIDS

Fangjaw

a quadrapedal dilophosaurid native to the Quintaglio Penninsula (southern Lemuria), the fangjaw is considered to be one of the most dangerous beasts a hunter can encounter.

Spitter

Native to Neighpon, this dinosaur can spit poison in order to blind prey items and enemies.

CERATOSAURS

Dryath

a Lemurian ceratasaur, the dryath hunts in pairs and mate for life. used as a mount by Lemurians, these are often used as scouts.

Avarusaurus

Native to Skull island, Avarusaurus is a surly opportunist that eats everything from carrion to fungus, live prey to rotten fruit. An intensely acidic stomach allows the big omnivore to bulk load whatever food it comes across for digestion later. it is solitary, but its size and tenacity keeps it safe from most predators.

Borean Shagbeast

Preferring the northern pine forests, this beast is an ambush predator.

Leaping Claw

Ambush predators found along forested trails in Concordia, the leg meat of Leaping Claws can often sell for as high as 1000 bits. It is a solitary hunter, its members only coming together during the breeding season. These creatures evidently prefer privacy at this time, as it is not yet known how they select mates. The males may help the females raise the young after they hatch, or they may simply wander off one day and never come back. It doesn't matter much; the females are more than tough enough to take care of the young. On other occasions, males and females will viciously attack one another, for the species is fiercely territorial, and explorers have reported some spectacular battles of appalling ferocity.

Bloodhead

A low-ranking predator in Concordia's food chain, Bloodheads (named after their red head color) live in groups of up to 4 individuals. While their size prevents them from tackling larger prey items, their aggressiveness allows them to occasionally drive larger predators from carcasses.

The native Prek find Bloodheads to be annoying pests.

ABELISAURS

Zabor

one of the largest predators of Lemuria, this predator was once domesticated by the Lemurians as a war beast.

Thorntail

a Concordian species, the Thorntail is a mid-sized predator.

Normally found following tyrannosaurs, Thorntails often scavenge , either picking off kills made by larger predators or scaring smaller ones off of theirs. However, they do occasionally hunt, mostly sticking to medium-sized prey

Roughsnout

A native of the Crystalline Raj, the Roughsnout is a large and powerful ambush predator.

Bear Lizard

This dinosaur is elephant-grey with red stripes running down its flanks and a yellow-green underbelly and red throat pouch. Females are somewhat larger than males. Adults pair for life, laying clutches of up to thirty eggs. These eggs are coffee cream color and are perfectly spherical. A third of the eggs are always duds, usually laid as a source of food for newly hatched youngsters. The young do not leave the nest site for two months, although young are able to walk after about two days in the nest. The adults are fierce parents, protecting their young against all comers, even if the attacker is larger than them. Ursusaurs also are highly territorial, letting no intrusion go unnoticed. This gives them the distinction of being one of the most dangerous carnivores in the world.

Ursusaurus are found on open plains and sparse forest throughout Zebrica. They tend to pursue slower prey, mainly larger ceratopsians like the Gryf. They also hunt sauropods, such as Mokele-Mbembe. They attack by cooperative ambush, with both animals attacking from two different sides, inflicting massive wounds with their razor-sharp teeth. They then back off to let blood loss and infection do the remaining work. At kill sites, Ursusaurs are often the first large scavengers at a kill, and those who don’t get out of their way during feeding are often eaten, those few brave predators that stand up to an Ursusaur become appetizers for the larger carnivores. They then make a messy meal out of whatever the other carnivores have brought down.

Horned Moloch

a native of Southern Zebrica, the Horned Moloch chases down prey in a manner similar to cheetahs, a big cat species absent from the area it lives in.

Butcherbull

Often following the larger Vastatosaurs around the plains of Skull Island, these abelisaurs will often bully the tyrannosaurs away from a kill.

Stoa

Found in Tapiri, this small predator has three things that allows it to sneak up on its preferred prey, small animals, unnoticed.

the first is its eyes, set in chameleon-like turrets, able to move independently.

Next is its tongue, able to shoot out and grab the prey.

Finally is its greatest weapon: camouflage unparalleled by any terrestrial vertebrate.

Emperor Kasai

Titanomoloch kasai are fiercely territorial and highly intolerant of competition, the Kasai patrols the savannah in groups of 4 to 6 - most of these are females, but there are always one or two titanic males who control them. These males are distinguishable from the opposite gender by the darker, thicker stripes on their backs, whereas those on the females are narrower and less conspicuous. A group of Kasai is known as a reign, and for good reason, since the male Kasai has absolute power over all the other animals in his domain. Its terrifying roar, amplified on the ultrasonic level by a special resonating hollow in its skull, literally shakes the earth, and it uses it to declare its boundaries and intimidate rivals; valves in its ears allows it to close them and avoid damage to itself as it bellows. The size of the animal can be determined by the sound of its roar, and to avoid exchanging blows, rival male Kasai engage in bellowing contests that can blow the roofs off huts and potentially deafen any living thing unfortunate enough to be within range.

Female Kasai are the ones responsible for hunting and taking care of the young. The males take advantage of them in the dry season so they can put their freshly fertilized embryos in stasis, allowing them to lay clutches of about 5 or 6 eggs at the start of the wet season. While the males guard the eggs in a communal nest, the females bring food back for the whole family. They work extra hard when their young hatch, banding together to bring down prey items larger than they are. A hunting party of Kasai is a sight to behold, and when they do spring from cover and arrow down on their dinner, the spectacle is nothing short of unforgettable.

The primary weapon of the Kasai is its mouth, which is full of shark-like, overlapping teeth that slice through flesh much like a hacksaw. The short, compact head is reinforced with buttresses of bone, and its neck muscles are immensely powerful. Raising its upper jaw like a deadly spiked mace, it will drop its lower jaw, plow headfirst into the target while swinging its head down, and then pull its head back, thus tearing off up to 90 pounds of streaming flesh. As its primary weapon, an individual's head is often covered by a distinctive pattern of scars and calluses from combat, and abnormal bone growths form from old battles with prey, other predators, rivals, or even comrades are not uncommon.

Kasai are ambush hunters, sneaking up on unsuspecting prey with surprising ease before breaking cover and savaging it with incapacitating bites. The legs of the Kasai are powerful and gracile, allowing for short bursts of up to 30 mph, but their feet are broader and more robust than in other abelisaurs, allowing them to stalk over more uneven terrain but reducing their charging speed. As the largest carnivore of Zebrica, the Kasai considers the grassland wildlife as a great smorgasbord, and is willing to consume anything it can butcher, including the occasional and unlucky zebra. Mokele are adults' favorite food, since their offensive Zerg-Rush tactics allow them to inflict vicious wounds with little risk of injury from close combat. The poor mangled herbivore eventually bleeds to death, allowing the pack to feast at their leisure. Hadrosaurs are another delicacy, but since they rely on speed to escape danger, a surprise attack is essential. The biggest challenge for female Kasai lies in concealment, but their stripes serve to break up their outline in the dust and grass, and they can be surprisingly stealthy, using scrubland and unstable ruins to cover their advance. Males, of course, rely more on intimidation and, being the very large theropods, they sustain themselves by appropriating meals from smaller hunters - and are not adverse to devouring anyone who challenges their verdicts.

Such hunting strategies are not instinctive. Hatchlings have to learn how the hunt is performed, so once they hatch, their parents brood them carefully for six to seven years and help them practice their hunting skills. Reigns of juveniles follow their parents at a safe distance, observing and reenacting the battles they witness. Like other abelisaurs, they are more awkward but faster and more persistent than their parents and rely instead on speed to take down their prey. As they grow older and their stripes begin to show, the Kasai become slower but stronger, and alter their fighting style a little to accommodate this.

As reigns grow up, they become more distant from their parents, perfecting their hunting and fighting abilities and establishing their own territories. But to ensure a good supply of food and mates, male Kasai need to work extra hard in terms of interspecies warfare. Only one or two males control the reign, and as they grow older, stronger and more virile individuals will soon get rid of them and usurp their reign. To ensure that the females go into season faster, the new rulers frequently kill and eat any hatchlings from the previous owners that they can find - the juveniles must take leave or be executed. Many Kasai do escape, for conflicts most often occur during the dry season when they are being weaned. But not all of them do - a quarter of the juveniles do not make it to adulthood, and more than half of the fatalities are from the teeth and claws of usurping adult males.

Enormous, abhorrent, and merciless, the Kasai is nonetheless a symbol of nobility and strength that has left its mark on the grassland in more ways than one. Through a combination of grace, speed, power, and majesty, the Emperor of Beasts truly deserves its title as the undisputed top predator of the Savannah.

Ravager

another Zebrican abelisaur, Ganeotherium sobekii has adapted to a unique amphibious lifestyle.

One other advantage that the Ravager has over other predators is its defensive armor. Once it moved onto land, it found, to its dismay, that there were other meat-eaters that could easily overpower it if it didn't evolve a top-notch security system. If it weren't for its armor, other predators such as the Kasai could easily destroy it with little effort. The bony plates on its back therefore evolved into the ultimate suit of armor: The neck, back, and tail are protected by overlapping plates sheathed in horn, forming the basis for flattened spikes, while the legs are covered in rings of a similar material. It has no armor on its belly or under its chin; when resting or threatened, it flops down onto its belly, presenting an impenetrable and utterly inedible shield of horn to any potential enemies.

As a primarily aquatic hunter, the Ravager is designed to subdue and hold prey rather than kill it outright. Its body is low-slung but very muscular, and its jaws are relatively weak for a killer dinosaur. However, it does not rely on the force of its bite to hold on, because it doesn't need to. Its skull is built rather like that of a python, since its lower jaw can dislocate and is used to grip and swallow prey larger than its head. Its upper jaw is its prize weapon; its teeth are built for grabbing and tearing instead of direct slicing as in other abelisaurs. The upper teeth are reinforced, hooked, and serrated, and once they plunge into the flesh of a victim, there is no escape.

With jaws that can drag down heavy animals and swallow victims whole, the Ravager would be as dangerous a land predator as any other abelisaur, but for one critical disadvantage: it is excruciatingly slow. Its short legs are adapted exclusively to hold its body weight just over the ground, and its body armor is so heavy that it can only top at about 4 to 5 miles per hour at the very maximum. Thus, on solid land, it is laughably incompetent as a hunter, for herbivores simply gallop away when it approaches. Therefore, it has developed not as a fast-moving predator, but as a slow-moving scavenger. Its forelimbs have vanished completely - shoulder girdle, bones, claws, muscles, and all - while its legs are jointed to lift the body straight upwards off the ground and lumber forward at its own pace. It bothers little with smaller hunters, even though they often arrive at carcasses before it does. But they can only tear off strips of flesh, and don't process all parts of a carcass. The Ravager does things differently, using its unhingeable jaws to swallow its meals whole. Its stomach acids, with a pH of 1.0, are the most acidic of any creature, allowing it to digest every last bite, even bones and hair. Once it has eaten its fill, it rests for several days to digest its meal. Gregarious by nature, Ravagers often gather in groups to take apart larger carcasses, and often squat in the sun together, communicating through constant belching. As they bask in the sun, other animals show no fear of them during this period, and many even rest in proximity to them, often sitting right next to or even on top of them.

During the dry season, the Ravager is at its most docile, devouring the carcasses of animals that have perished from heat or thirst. In the wet season, however, it is an entirely different story - at least three feet of water is all it takes to turn this slow-moving evolutionary embarassment into the ultimate freshwater killing machine. Thirsty herbivores flock to the refreshing water in huge numbers, and migrate over the rivers to reach the literally greener grass on the other side. This is what the Ravagers have been waiting for. As an herbivore splashes into the water, it neither sees nor hears the giant noasaur gliding towards it, tucking its legs back against its body for greater speed and sculling along with its powerful tail. When its target least expects it, the Ravager explodes out of the water, rolling its lips and gums back to expose its horrid teeth. If it can get a grip on the prey's muzzle or neck, the rest will be easy. Once it grabs hold of its victim, the Ravager reverses at maximum speed, preventing the prey from surfacing and turning the surrounding water red with its blood. A drowned meal will either be ripped apart in this way or be stowed on the river bottom until the meat begins to pickle. Often, one large herbivore will be more than enough to sustain a single Ravager, so they frequently attack a single meal in groups, tearing it apart with numerous deadly bites.

Ravagers do not compete indiscriminately during the wet season. On and off, they form teams - they don't recognize family relationships, but they do have a sense of community, and band together on occasions that would result in violent conflict in other abelisaurs. Larger animals have the first priority both in terms of feeding and breeding, and smaller ones usually back down. Equally sized individuals do exchange blows frequently, but their armor is so impervious to even their own teeth that they merely leave dents or scratches, and the conflicts are usually resolved through reconciliation rather than fights to the death. Breeding, likewise, is not very ritualized, with each male breeding with as many females as possible. Only females take care of the young. A riverbank may soon have around a dozen unkempt mounds of rotting vegetation, each housing fifteen to twenty eggs at a time. These hatch in two to three weeks, and the females carry the seven-inch chicks in their mouths to the safety of riverside pools. The chicks are faster than their parents and hunt riverside wildlife such as birds and insects, and it takes them twenty years to grow to full size, during which they gradually move on to larger animals and after five or six years, the dry season's first fetid carcasses.

The Ravager is a fearsome hunter in one season, a docile scavenger the next. It has almost no enemies in its freshwater environment, except for one. In recent years, Ravagers have become increasingly and illegally poached for their hides and dermal plates, which are used to create quality armor and textile goods. The long time it takes for them to grow to maturity does not help, and many juveniles are also enslaved as exotic pets for several years, rather than as combat beasts, before being abandoned and killed.

Barroth

Native to Bumbleland, Barroth are commonly found in or close to watering holes and oases, staying in the more vegetated sections and avoiding the hottest portions of the plains. They will claim muddy bogs for themselves and fiercely defend their territory, though they will venture away from their bogs when in search of food.

Barroth mostly eat insects, which can grow to sufficient sizes in Bumbleland to sustain such a large creature. Extremely territorial, they will lie in wait underneath their bogs and lash out at anything that disturbs them. Due to their aggression and power, only the most powerful predators are capable of defeating a Barroth. When traveling, they'll occupy numerous waterways and estuaries and feed on numerous crustaceans and mollusks.

They cool down in mud pools at the hottest parts of the day. the nostrils are located on the top of their head, which allows them to remain almost completely submerged in mud for prolonged periods of time without the danger of suffocating. In addition, its feet are lobed that presumably enable them to walk on the top of mud without getting stuck. Like alligators and crocodiles, Barroth are very hard to detect when submerged, only having the crown of their head visible. This gives them the perfect chance to ambush intruders from the cover of its bog. They spend most of the day resting under the mud. When searching for food or threatened, they will emerge and shake the mud from their bodies. They will not stay out of the bog for too long, however, as they will overheat quickly. When this happens, they will return to the mud and begin to roll around, coating their backs with more mud. If need be, they can burrow underground to escape. They are extremely territorial and will attack anything that enters their bog. When defending themselves, they prefer to use their hard tail and thick head to attack.

Although docile when undisturbed, Barroths become extremely territorial when a creature interrupts its sleep. It will release an initial warning roar. If that fails, it will continuously attack until the threat is exterminated. Barroths engage in exceptionally brutal fights when looking for bogs of their own.

Most breeding habits of the Barroth is unknown. What is known is after mating the female will make a nest and lay 10 or more eggs. After hatching the young stay close to where they were born eating insects around their home until large enough to travel on their own.

Krenkel

Tartarus' only abelisaur, the Krenkel is a solitary predator that specializes in slow-moving prey.

Gourmand

the Tapiri equivalent of the Ravager, the slow-moving gourmand is protected from other meat-eaters by a back armor of bony plates sheathed in horn. Its scavenging lifestyle is very different from that of its ancestors.

The legs are jointed in such a way that they lift the body straight upwards off the ground. The animal is a scavenger, moving slowly across the pampas and swallowing whole the carcass of any dead animal it discovers. The skull is very flexible and the jaws can unhinge to enable it to engulf its prey. Once it has eaten, the gourmand rests for several days while it digests its meal. It does this while lying motionless in the grass. The armor protects it from predators during this period.

Blackhorn

Found in Equestria's Badlands and throughout Concordia, where they are coveted for their namesake attribute, as it turns out that they can be ground into Strength-boosting potions and have large status value amongst the crazy trophy hunters that dot every southwestern Equestrian town. They are solitary hunters for the most part. They roam the forests, plains, and deserts in search of prey, only coming together during the mating season. At this time, opposing males will step up to one another and carefully lock their horns together, after which they engage in a shoving match. The sharp horns are far too dangerous to be used in outright ramming attacks. The stronger male wins the fight and a mate. The male may or may not stay with the female to help tend the young; if not, she can do the job quite well on her own.

All rival predators are driven out of Carnocornus' territory by the points of its horns. The only exceptions are others of its kind, in which case the interlocked-horn shoving match comes into play again. This species is not very bright compared to, say, the allosaurs, but its instincts allow it to keep destructive combat between members of its own kind to the absolute minimum.

Charger

these Nova Island dinosaurs attack by charging head-on at prey items and enemies

NOASAURS

Termit'osaurus

a Skull Island noasaur specifically adapted to feast on termites and ants

Peracerdon

Long and lean, Peracerdon is a bipedal predator of fish, seabirds, eggs, crustaceans, and even seal pups (if it gets the chance). Peracerdon is found all along the perimeter of Skull Island, from the rocky coasts to sedate swamps. Powerful claws keep Peracerdon anchored in even the roughest of waves, allowing it to remain steady in pounding surf. It usually remains still, darting its head down to snatch up prey items.

Goreclaw

A Noasaurid native to Skull Island, the goreclaw is a common predator in forests throughout Skull Island. the first claw on the hand has been enlarged to form a hook, used for a number of purposes ranging from impaling small prey, intraspecific combat, and marking territory. Prey is varied, any animals small enough to be killed can be eaten. Lizards and young dinosaurs are common targets, but broken eggshells and dug up burrows are testaments to the varied diet of this species. When holding the neck erect a full grown adult can look eye to eye with the average pony. Despite this, the goreclaw actually quite shy and fearful of equines. This may stem from the fact that the natives once hunted it for its beautiful striped pelt.

Shadowfoot

Native to the Crystal Tundra, Shadowfeet are perfectly adapted to burrow into a carcass. Their arms are extremely short and hidden under the plumage. they are known to first feed on the head and than go down the throat into the rib cage to reach heart and liver.

During daytime they mostly sleep in caves or self burrowed den and invade the land when the sun begin to sink. Sometimes they hunt in groups and follow their prey until it's to exhausted to fight.

Sawtooth-Rex

A native of Equus, this massive fish-eater also feeds on various land animals, as well as plants. Females are smaller than the males, and they have no sail like structures on their neck and tail. The males use these features for sexual display.