Pokeshell

Pokeshell
Pokeshells are sometimes hostile critters that eat Polluted Dirt and Rot Piles. The shells they leave behind after molting can be crushed into Lime.
Location	Tide Pool Biome
Health	25
Max age	100 cycles
Can Drown	No
Can Be Entombed	No
Comfortable Range	0 ↔ 30°C 273.15 ↔ 303.15 K 32 ↔ 86°F
Livable Range	-50 ↔ 100°C 223.15 ↔ 373.15 K -58 ↔ 212°F
Diet	Polluted Dirt or Rot Pile 70 kg/cycle
Excrete	Sand 50% of consumed mass
Decor	10 (Radius: 1tile)
Drops	1 large Pokeshell Molt
Wranglable	Yes
Capture Method	Critter Trap
Reproduction Rate	wild: 60 cycles groomed: 6 cycles
Incubation Time	base: 20 cycles lullabied: 4 cycles

Oakshell
Oakshells are nonhostile critters that eat Polluted Dirt, Slime and Rot Piles. The shells they leave behind after molting can be crushed into Wood.
Health	25
Max age	100 cycles
Can Drown	No
Can Be Entombed	No
Comfortable Range	0 ↔ 30°C 273.15 ↔ 303.15 K 32 ↔ 86°F
Livable Range	-50 ↔ 100°C 223.15 ↔ 373.15 K -58 ↔ 212°F
Diet	Polluted Dirt, Slime or Rot Pile 70 kg/cycle
Excrete	Sand 25% of consumed mass
Decor	10 (Radius: 1tile)
Drops	5 large Oakshell Molt
Wranglable	Yes
Capture Method	Critter Trap
Reproduction Rate	wild: 60 cycles groomed: 6 cycles
Incubation Time	base: 20 cycles lullabied: 4 cycles

Sanishell
Sanishells are nonhostile critters that thrive in Water and eliminates Germs from any liquid it inhabits. They eat Polluted Dirt, Slime and Rot Piles.
Health	25
Max age	100 cycles
Can Drown	No
Can Be Entombed	No
Comfortable Range	0 ↔ 30°C 273.15 ↔ 303.15 K 32 ↔ 86°F
Livable Range	-50 ↔ 100°C 223.15 ↔ 373.15 K -58 ↔ 212°F
Diet	Polluted Dirt, Slime or Rot Pile 70 kg/cycle
Excrete	Sand 50% of consumed mass
Decor	10 (Radius: 1tile)
Drops	4,000 kcal Raw Shellfish
Wranglable	Yes
Capture Method	Critter Trap
Reproduction Rate	wild: 60 cycles groomed: 6 cycles
Incubation Time	base: 20 cycles lullabied: 4 cycles

Pokeshell is a critter that lives in the Tide Pool Biome. They can live in both air and liquid and can be domesticated. They will consume both Rot Piles and Polluted Dirt at 70 kg/cycle, with Oakshells and Sanishells also consuming Slime.

Behavior

Pokeshells drop a Molt when they die, which can be turned into Lime or Wood with the Rock Crusher. Normally, they are as non-hostile as other critters. However, once they are subjected to a room with finite size and laid an egg in their reachable path, they will turn red and aggressive. When this happens, they will attack any Duplicant or critter in their way (shown as "protecting" in status tab), and beat them to death without exceptions if left unattended. They calm down and return to pink and innocent eyes again when they are timely wrangled and relocated to a different room, their eggs are extracted, or they hatch.

Variants

Pokeshells have 3 variants, determined by what liquid they live in. Each Pokeshell has a different drop upon growth and death, but all consume polluted dirt and produce sand.

Pokeshell

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Pokeshell consumes Polluted Dirt or Rot Pile and excretes Sand, and sheds shells that can be processed into Lime. A Pokeshell sheds a small Pokeshell Molt when transitioning to an adult. On death, a Pokeshell spawn drops a small Pokeshell Molt, while an adult Pokeshell drops the normal-sized Pokeshell Molt.The chance of laying an Pinch Roe egg increases when not dwelling in either Water or Ethanol of substantial mass.

Oakshell

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An Oakshell sheds a small Oakshell Molt when transitioning to an adult. On death, an Oakshell spawn drops five small Oakshell Molt, while an adult Oakshell drops five Oakshell Molt. In addition, happy, well-fed adult Oakshells sheds one Oakshell Molt per cycle provided it can path to a tile without Ethanol. The chance of laying an Oak Pinch Roe increases when any Pokeshell variant dwells in Ethanol of substantial mass.

Synergy with Ethanol Distiller

Crushing Oakshell molts yields Wood, which can be fed into an Ethanol Distiller. As the dirt produced by an Ethanol Distiller offsets much of the cost for feeding Oakshells, Oakshells can be more resource-efficient for sand production than other Pokeshell variants - each Oakshell produces 171.5 kg of wood/cycle (assuming 15 Oak Pinch Roe are laid), which amortizes to 12.83kg polluted dirt/cycle for 17.5kg sand/cycle (136.3% mass conversion efficiency).

Power production

Oakshells can be a way of providing a small amount of renewable power but they are generally worse than other critters. Inputting the wood directly into a Wood Burner yields a maximum net power production of 71W per Oakshell. To compare, a Sage Hatch can net 140W per critter through a Coal Generator, although will eat twice as much polluted dirt.

Sanishell

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Sanishells consumes Polluted Dirt, Slime, or Rot Pile and excretes Sand. The Sanishell does not produce any shells, but instead occasionally removes 888.8 germs a second from nearby liquids. This cleaning action can occur at most once every 30 seconds. On death, both Sanishell spawns and adult Sanishells drop 4,000 kcal of Raw Shellfish which can be cooked into 6,400 kcal of Cooked Seafood. The chance of laying an Pinch Roe egg increases when dwelling in Water of substantial mass.

Breeding Morphs

The volume of liquid required to change a Pokeshell's reproduction chance is 350 kg. The is the same level at which buildings flood. To operate, the Grooming Station must be placed out of the liquid, meaning the Pokeshells spend some of their time not in liquid. If an Oakshell or Sanishell spends less than 3300 seconds (5.5 cycles) of their first 6 cycles as an adult out of liquid, they have a chance to produce default Pinch Roe eggs.

As a result, all groomed Oakshell/Sanishell ranches will produce some Pokeshells, and automated systems should account for this. On the other hand, Pokeshell ranches can be setup to never produce Oakshell or Sanishell roe, since they live outside liquids, and a small layer of liquid to prevent any offgassing will not change their reproduction chance if kept under 350 kg.

A red, cramped pokeshell in killer mode found in his native biome. Notice his egg on rightmost of the tide pool chamber.

Feeding troubles

Rot Piles, Slime and Polluted Dirt are messy food sources, sublimating into Polluted Oxygen and thus naturally uncommon and transitory. Which makes feeding domestic Pokeshells quite a task. Note, however, that if groomed, Pokeshells will live long enough to reproduce once even if not fed. As their lay rate is the same whether fed or not (as long as they're tame and groomed), ranches of unfed, but groomed, Pokeshells can be quite efficient (though you'll need to feed them to increase the size or quantity of those ranches)

Ethanol Distiller

Ethanol Distillers provide a reliable source of Polluted Dirt. Since each Pokeshell needs 116 g/s of Polluted Dirt, an Ethanol Distiller running can feed nearly 3 domesticated Pokeshells.

Water Sieve

A Water Sieve produces small amount of Polluted Dirt when purifying Polluted Water and is commonly found cleaning lavatories. However, not even a constantly running Water Sieve is enough to feed one Pokeshell.

Rotting food with Polluted Water

Pokeshells can be used as a garbage disposal for getting rid of any unsightly food debris. Since food items weigh very little, this method is not feasible for maintaining fed Pokeshells.

Outhouse Cleanup

Pokeshells can be used to eat up polluted dirt emptied from outhouses to supply sand for deodorizer, serving as a medium for temporary clean oxygen solution in remote regions, or during early game. For each cycle, all Outhouses in a room needs to be visited by Duplicants at least 8 times in sum and emptied timely to satiate a Pokeshell. They can be kept in their innoctous mode for decacycles before laying an egg (Critters typically lay eggs by 2/3 of their life. Check age to avoid putting a egg-laying prone crab in dupe's frequent outhouse). However, once a Pinch Roe is laid, it's imperative to send dupes to attack the angry pokeshell in protecting mode to prevent harm.

Keeping crabs wild

A reasonable alternative to domesticating Pokeshell is simply to wrangle all the wild Pokeshell in the map to a single room of decent size where they will remain a perpetual source of Pokeshell Molt for a supplemental amount of Lime. Be careful to disallow access to this room using door permissions so duplicants do not accidentally run into a mass of murderous Pokeshells if there are any Pokeshell eggs in the room.

Once domestication time comes, it is still better to start with one Pokeshell, and keep the rest of wild population self-sustaining.

Tips

• The roof or floor segments made out of unpassable Pneumatic Doors can help with the safe egg extraction.
• Feeding Pokeshells with Polluted Dirt is easier in the DLC, due to the existence of asteroid types that have a lot of Polluted Dirt seams.