Macromoeba

The Macromoeba is a rapidly evolving mob created from Biomass.

## Appearance

The Macromoeba is a strange mob—it consists entirely of inky-black blocks. They can be quite large, as they are made up of blocks of this sheen.

They have different appendages they may grow, but those would look as you might imagine—inky black, and in some cases (like with the Eye and Tongue) other colors, like white or pink.

## Attacking the Macromoeba

To attack the Macromoeba, you just have to break its blocks. This is easy enough, considering that they only take one hit (at least, the normal ones do). However, they can grow "shields" on outer blocks which prevent those blocks from being easily broken. Drops will come from breaking the blocks, as more powerful (and rewarding) appendages grow the larger the size and subsequently the harder the fight.

## Gaining Mass

Macromoebas gain mass by destroying biotic organisms and breaking them down into proteins it can store in its inky black outer layers. In other words, if you have living or decaying mass on you, you're screwed. For instance, it will not attack skeletons, as they have no nutrients.

Zombies give a little nutrients, as they are decaying and thus less enjoyable as a snack.

Trees, despite taking long times to disintegrate, give much mass.

Other methods of gaining mass include ingesting Biomass (disconnected blocks of Macromoebas) and stealing food from chests, the ground, etc.

## Center of Gravity and Collapses

Each Macromoeba will attempt to take on a bipedal form. In this, they have a center of gravity. When there is a large unbalance of mass between the two halves, the Macromoeba collapses in that direction and takes a while to reform and regrow all of the appendages that were destroyed. Collapses like these are essential when dealing with Goliaths, a term I invented for the largest Macromoebas.

## Appendages

This is a list of appendages Macromoebas may grow to aid in attacking, defense, collecting mass, etc. Each appendage still has weight, so these will not always spawn if the Macromoeba cannot create a sufficient counterweight from its extra mass (which is stored on its back when it cannot contribute to appendage making, overall size, counterweights, and repairing missing chunks). These are in no specific order.

* Tentacle—Attack/Biomass Collection—The tentacle basically performs longer range attacks. It can also pick up food or biomass, and infiltrate chests for biotic organisms.
* Eyeball—Attack/Biomass Collection—The eyeball basically uses Biomass on the Macromoeba to send out a damaging ray of liquid Biomass. It can surround plants and animals and turn them into larger amounts of Biomass.
* Shield—Protection—The shield generates as a block state of the typical Biomass block. While not technically an appendage, it allows Biomass to take more abuse before being lost forever.
* Disease—Indirect Attack/Supporting Smaller Macromoebas—Disease spawns as bubbles and explodes into Biomass using other Biomass. These bubbles (and the launched Biomass, for a time) are red and continuously hurt and blind the player. Smaller Macromoebas absorb Diseased Biomass to grow in size.
* Tongue—Attack—The tongue is quite long and lashes out at the area surrounding it. It creates an Area of Effect attack and burns the player on direct hit. However, one hit can take off more than just one block of Tongue.
* Tooth—Attack—Also spawns in mouth areas. It may fall from the Macromoeba's mouth, causing a huge Area of Effect attack.

## Weaknesses

This mob may seem unstoppable at various masses, correct? Well, it has its fair share of weaknesses.

* 1x1 Iron Block lines—The reasoning behind this is that it acts as a blade. These strips of iron will split up parts of the Macromoeba, which may cause collapses.
* Water—Water will dissolve the Macromoeba into an even more shapeless form. It does make it harder to destroy blocks, but when you do it separates the blocks from the Macromoeba.
* Soaked TNT—a new block made with TNT and four water buckets. It can be launched at the Macromoeba to cause explosions that displace its mass, which can cause collapses. Regular TNT actually hardens the Macromoeba, lending to an idea that the Macromoeba is a sentient non-Newtonian fluid.
* Large falls—Large falls have both a great and horrible effect on Macromoeba. It temporarily hardens them, making it harder for them to die, but it also restricts their maneuverability.
* Traps—While being a player-made weakness, you can encase Macromoebas in different rooms. If they cannot break out, however, they may harden themselves into a husk of their mass and transfer their sentience and some mass into another Macromoeba. It will often make holes in walls (yes, it can, using its own mass, destroy blocks over time. Stronger it is=more mass used) before it does this.

## Abilities

* The Macromoeba can clog up Dispensers using Hardened Biomass. It does this by placing part of itself on the dispensers and hardening it. It mainly does this when the dispensers hold water or arrows. These must be manually removed.
* The Macromoeba can, when large enough, turn water into Liquid Biomass. This can turn Undead into Macromoeba and build up normal Biomass when it encounters plant and animal life.
* The Macromoeba saves its data and doesn't despawn by turning itself into certain blocks when all players exit and would make other mobs ordinarily despawn. This works due to their blocky structure, and when players return of the chunk is loaded, the game tests for these blocks and turns them into an appropriate Macromoeba.