Plagues
Plagues are organisms created with express intent to wipe out a significant portion of a lineage, making them a form of metagaming. They were historically used to cull "Earth clones" and remove lineages which were deemed implausible. They used to be a common phenomenon, but they have always had controversy surrounding them and their use has now been restricted to genuinely unfixable lineages which violate the laws of physics, such as impossible diets and unjustified giant cells.
Plagues also exist in the Beta timeline, where they have thus far only been used once to cull a lineage of implausible Earth-clones on majority vote. Plagues in the Beta timeline have not gained the prevalence or reputation they have in Alpha, as they are discussed and voted on by the team and stricter moderation practices from the beginning prevent implausible lineages from evolving in the first place.
List of Plagues
This is a list of plagues and their meta reasons for occurring, if the information is available. This list is currently incomplete due to there being no pre-existing list of plagues which occurred after Generation 105; it will be updated as additional plagues are found.
Sauceback Plague
The Sauceback Plague occurred in Generation 68. Details on how it came to be have been lost, but the reason it occurred is still known. It was created to solve the issue of there being entirely too many predatory saucebacks living together in the same habitats competing for the same food.
Plent Plague
The Plent Plague occurred in Generation 81. The meta reasons surrounding it have been lost, but its description seems to suggest it was to cull Plents in the area to make room for other lineages.
Shrew Plague
The Shrew Plague occurred in Generation 95 and was spread by the Death Soriparasite. It is the only plague to be caused by two unrelated species. Unlike with most plagues, much of the context surrounding the Shrew Plague has been preserved via the Wayback Machine.
The Shrew Plague was originally proposed by Giant Blue Anteater, the creator of the shrew lineage, in the organism ideas thread on the original forum. Though another member, Bonosaber, is commonly associated with the Shrew Plague, it is unknown how much his species influenced the decision to have the plague; in fact, archived forum posts show he was actually initially in favor of it. There is speculation, but no confirmed information, that the Shrew Plague was at least partially created to prevent a descendant of the Lemupus from gaining sapience.
Plent Pox
The Plent Pox occurred in Generation 104. Its meta reason for occurring is unknown, but may be related to the then-recent gamma-ray burst extinction event and how caves had become overfilled with fauna just before it occurred.
Cave Plague
The Cave Plague occurred in Generation 116. It caused the extinction of all plents in Rabid Sandstone Caves. Its meta reasons for occurring are unknown, but it could be related to the caves being overfilled, much like with the Plent Pox.
Markopolio (Roach Plague)
The Markopolio, or Roach Plague, occurred in Generation 127. It wiped out the "Roach" lineage. Its meta reason is unknown, but is suspected to be because several Roaches evolved an extra pair of legs independently from the same ancestor.
Odos
Odos were a lineage of microbes descended from the Odo which were created to outcompete various implausible microbes starting in Generation 131. This multi-generation plague ended with the Odo Plague in Generation 134.
Purple Plague
The Purple Plague occurred in Generation 133. It was probably related to an effort to eliminate the sky ecosystem, which had been deemed implausible.
Symbioship Plague
The Symbioship Plague occurred in Generation 134. Its meta reasons for occurring are unknown, but it caused the extinction of a very large number of species and may be one of the deadliest plagues as a result.
Airsickness Plague
The Airsickness Plague occurred in Generation 138. It was the final nail in the coffin to the sky ecosystem of the time, which had been deemed implausible.
Golden Plague
The Golden Plague occurred in Generation 144. Similar to the Cave Plague, it caused the extinction of all plents in Rabid Sandstone Caves. Its meta reason for occurring is unknown.
Foi Plague
The Foi Plague occurred in Generation 144. It was made to cull implausibly massive foi, which are unicellular but were often misinterpreted as multicellular fauna.
Kelpoggle Plague
The Kelpoggle Plague occurred in Generation 144. Its meta reasons for occurring are unknown, but may be related to the Kelpoggle lineage being misinterpreted as multicellular, similar to what happened with foi.
Swarmer Plague
The Swarmer Plague occurred in Generation 144. It was apparently a failed attempt to kill off the entire swarmer lineage, but it failed because it didn't cover the entire range of where swarmers existed.
Epidemics
A handful of smaller "plagues" have occurred which were created by members other than Hydromancerx. Unlike Hydro's plagues, these are generally very small-scale.
- The Anti-Sticky Plague occurred in Generation 105. Its meta reason for occurring was to prevent stickyballs from "taking over everything".
- The No-Snarf, also known as the "Nodent Plague", occurred in Generation 140 and caused the extinction of various Nodents.
Non-Disease "Plagues"
A handful of plague-like events occurred which were caused by fauna or flora wiping out many species in a given region.
- The Chitinbane and its descendants were Purple Flora which evolved starting in Generation 126 and caused the extinction of all chitin-users in their environments. Their purpose was to create a worm-free environment for the purpose of producing unique assemblages of flora and fauna on different continents.
- The Cellulosebane Crystal and its descendants were Crystal Flora which evolved starting in Generation 127 and caused the extinction of all cellulose-users in their environments. Their purpose was to create a plent- and purple flora-free environment for the purpose of producing unique assemblages of flora and fauna on different continents.
- The Fungibane and its descendants were Black Flora which evolved starting in generation 131 and caused the extinction of all fungus-users in their environments. Their purpose was to create a crystal-free environment for the purpose of producing unique assemblages of flora and fauna on different continents.
- The Tumorflora evolved in Generation 145 and wiped out a large number of species in Scifi Polar Shallows. The meta reason for this is unknown.
- The Acidfruit Megaplage was a species of purple flora which produced acidic fruit, which caused the extinction of most life on Truteal Island in Generation 147. The meta reason for this is unknown
Reverted Examples
- The Burncumference was a species of glass flora which wiped out most of the organism residing in Drake Tundra in Generation 151. The meta reason for this, if one exists, is unknown. It was eventually reverted for being implausible and causing some continuity errors.
Plagues in the Beta Timeline
The Beta timeline has only had a single plague, the Cish Plague, which occurred at the end of Beta Week 2. As Beta is more focused on scientific plausibility, Earth clones are generally frowned upon; the Cish were not only Earth clones but had broken anatomy from misinterpretation, removed their ancestor's alien features in favor of replacing them with ordinary chordate features, and their descriptions constantly referred to how great they were. They were also dramatically smarter than their ancestors with no transition, despite evolving during a period roughly equivalent to the Cambrian explosion.
The idea of the Cish Plague was originally proposed by Disgustedorite, and it was discussed heavily by Beta's moderator team until all active staff agreed to hold a community vote. Even the creator of the Cish, FourEyesIsAFish, voted in favor of the plague. The plague itself and how the sole survivor was chosen were directly inspired by Alpha's Shrew Plague, down to the sole survivor surviving specifically because it lived in a river.