Tribbles
 

 
Updated: 01.10.2023, 22:51 Uhr by Schatten EMPIRE (50) - URL: game.en.stne.net/Manual.aspx?id=100


Tribbles or Tribbels respectively are small, furry animals which are held as pets in some cultures - but there are certain strict precautions required for husbandry: If Tribbles have access to food, they will consume it rapidly and spawn at a abnormal high rate until the very last free storage space is filled. As soon as the food supply is used up, the reproduction stops, however Tribbles have the ability to survive without any nutrition even though their number doesn't increase in that case.

Examples for the reproduction of Tribbles:
In the Delta-Quadrant Tribbles are used as "biological weapons" occasionally and beamed onto colonies by pirates to cause a famine. The Tribbles eat all food, fill the storage space and the crew and the inhabitants respectively starve. This kind of use of these animals is proscribed.

If you beam goods from a ship or planet, on which there are Tribbles, you can easily catch a Tribble accidentially: Instead of beaming 20 Duranium for example you might beam 19 Duranium and 1 Tribble to your ship without showing an entry in your "protocol" . The only possibility to find out is to check the numbers in your freight storage where there will be 1 . In the next turn this one animal could already have developed into a manace.


Overview:
  1.   How can I get rid of Tribbles?


  2.   Article from the 8th issue of "Delta-News"


Top

1.   How can I get rid of Tribbles?


Tribbles don't sarve if their food supply gets cut off. It's impossible to jettison them to space, because they are living creatures even though they are very annoying ones - you would see the protocoll message: "You simply don't jettison living creatures!" Killing a Tribble results in a loss of 5 reputation across the Delta Quadrant, even if a foreign ship with Tribbles on board is destructed.

First of all the Tribbles should be isolated by beaming all of them onto one ship. If there are only few of them a ship with a small freight storage (a Venture for example) which can supply it's crew with it's solar powered replicator is the best choice. Bigger numbers of Tribbles require a freighter. This ship should not be supplied with food which means that the crew won't be able to operate the ship over several turns. If there is a replicator on board, it will feed the existing Tribbles too and they continue to reproduce, until they fill the complete storage room.

If you don't want to park your ship in orbit for all times, there are several possibilities to proceed:
compare:
  STNE-Wiki: Tribble-Menace  


Top

2.   Article from the 8th issue of "Delta-News"


In the public federation database Tribbles are described as follows:

Tribbles: Small fur-bearing animals (»Furpug«), without recognisable limbs, homeworld: Iota Geminorum IV. Tribbles exist in all colours and like everything that moves.


History of Tribbles

Only few people hate Tribbles as much as Klingons. These proud warriors call the Tribbles "most despicable creatures".
By the end of the 23rd century the Klingons decided to send out their wariors to purify the galaxy from all Tribbles, and a klingon amada annihilated their home world. This would have been the end of the story, unless Arne Darvin, a klingon spy who travelled through time from from the year 2373 to the space station K-7. Darvin's effords, to change the timeline, have been defeated by the crew of Deep Space Nine from the 24th century. On their timewarp back to their time they accidentially took along a Tribble. Soon after Deep Space Nine was flooded with Tribbles, exaclty like K-7 more than a century ago.

Strategies for survival

Tribbles get born pregnant and reproduce at an alarming rate. An average Tribble can give birth to approximately 10 offsprings every 12 hours - which leads to more than a million of young Tribbles in less than three days. This may seem exagurated, but it was a required survival stragtegy on their homeworld. The home of Tribbles was full of predators and only few reached adulthood.
But as soon as Tribbles get taken out from their natural habitat and brought to a living space without predators, the reproduction leads to a problem.
Newborn Tribbles have a diameter of three centimeters, grown up can get up to 30 centimeters. 50% of the Tribbles metabolism is used for reproduction.
The only purpose of a Tribbles life seems to be eating and reproduction. Obviously they are able to locate food anywhere. They squeeze through gaps and machines and even climb up walls. Tribbles can hold to flat surfaces with the aptitude of a spider.
If their supply with food is limited, their ability to reproduce is limited: starving them is the easiest way to contain their reproduction.
Various intelligent species find Tribbles attractive, and intergalactic traders often sell them as pets or souveniers. When they are held in the hands or petted, Tribbles create a gentle purr which calms the nerves of humans and many other species. Sometimes they sway gently while purring. But the ability of Tribbles to reproduce so quickly upsets some owners. As Dr. Leonard McCoy remarks: there is no practical use for these creatures. Indeed some people consider them as varmin.

(T'Kar)

Top
 
This page has been viewed 4376 times.