Analysis: Are Nerubians closer related to Spiders or Ants?

[Sapprine]

Nerubians always claim to be Spiders (they refer to Ajol'Nerub as the Spider Kingdom), but are they really?

I've done an analysis on their lore, social lives, boilogy and compaired them to other animals.

Their body structure, way of movement, the fact they have queens and live in underground nests as colonies with multiple 'ranks' greatly suggest they are more closely related to Ants.

The only features they have which are somewhat similar to Spiders are their mandables, the fact they have more than 2 eyes and their abillity to produce silk (even though its shot from their mouths and not their abdamin).

Burrowing is out the question here, because both Spiders and Ants can burrow.

Sadly, blizzard doesnt give us any clue to what their diets are.
Possibillities are:
Fungi
Mushrooms
Other Nerubians (cannibalism)
Blight (for undead ones)
Insects of some sort? (likely not)

Now, there are ants in the wild that produce their own Fungi as a cource of food, which they spend time feeding chewed up plant material. There are no Spiders recorded that do this.

Because of the way they shoot 'silk' trough their mouths, suggests its not silk at all, but saliva or some kind of chemical they extract from their food, which could very well be originating from mushrooms or fungi.

I'm not 100% accurate on this, but my estimate is that they are:
45% ant
45% spider
10% miscelanious (humanoid features)

What do you think of this topic? Let me know below!

 

[stein123]

Interesting point, if i recall, they're carnivores, the carrion swarm and the carrion beetles from the Crypt Lord are proof enought, also, the nerubians, mantids and quiraji are descendants of the aquir, and each one evolved to different paths, thus having a different, specific insect (spider for nerubians, mantis for matids, and hornets for the quiraji) as their biological model (Maybe the Aquir were more similar to the ants?); In Naxxramas, the spider quarter contains not only nerubians, but real spiders (like, a LOT of them), and they're coexist as colony; another point to add is that the elite or royalty members have beetle features, like the Crypt lord, or the quiraji gladiators and prophets.

 

[Naze]

Interesting. Although in the backstage of my mind I've always found their shape strange, I never consciously questioned their ant-like shape.

Maybe the Aquir were more similar to the ants?

And I thought that we could get to know the appearance of the aqir somewhere (like in some shady part of WoW or in concept art). Is there such a thing?

Since this is discussing lore, I moved the thread to the WoW forum.

 

[DwarfBoy]

This is one of those things where you wish that Ajol'Nerub zone was made and not converted into two separate 5-mans.
It's definitely an interesting theory but I don't think there's alot evidence to sway this ether way.

 

[stein123]

I suppose that in BfA there will be some of them, since the faceless and old gods are taking a lot of relevance, also i recall seeing some kind of hybrids that are similar to the qiraji with faceless features, maybe they're some kind of neo-aquir?

 

[Sapprine]

Why was my thread moved to here? I was refering to the Warcraft 3 Nerubians. I dont even know nearly anything about WoW.

Anyway, I found out that the Mushroom in the Ajol'Nerub missions are green mushrooms.

And the 'Silk' which ive determined isnt Silk (because its shot from their mouths) is also green! Coincidence? I think not!

 

[DwarfBoy]

Why was my thread moved to here? I was refering to the Warcraft 3 Nerubians. I dont even know nearly anything about WoW.

To be fair, WoW is heavily tied to the lore of Warcraft, considering it's own the story has been progressing.
Anyways, If we want to sit down and talk about the Nerubians, may I recommend a certain video to help you out?

 

[Sapprine]

At least they put it back.

But still funny xD

 

[stein123]

X'D so, only WC3 nerubians, not the expanded info that appears in WoW?

 

[Sapprine]

no idea of WoW i hate that game

 

[TheLordOfChaos201]

there is a type of bug that looks like that

it isn't an ant or a spider

it's its own thing

looking for pictures now

well couldn't find much besides this link

www.findaspider.org.au/info/spiderfood.htm

 

[stein123]

no idea of WoW i hate that game

Well, that shrinks a lot the theme X'D, in wc3 are two different types, the undead (Crypt Fien, Crypt Lord and the Carrion Beetles spawned by the latter); and the remmaining living ones (Nerubian Queen, Spiderlord, seer, webspinner,warrior and spiderling), they still carnivores, and i think theyr'e closer to spiders than any other species, altough still having features of different insects (ants, beetles, locusts, and mantis) : p

 

[DwarfBoy]

no idea of WoW i hate that game

"I hate WoW, now let's talk about lore that's heavily tied to the lore of WoW."
Just don't. Trying to talk about one of the races of Warcraft while excluding WoW, which is heavily tied to the lore of the franchise, is simply idiotic.

 

[Sapprine]

I hate WoW for the emptyness of their world, the subsrcibtions, raid bosses are unrealistic giants and questing is the virtual equivalent of doing chores.

And im talking about WC3 nerubians in general.

I dont hate the Lore, just the game.

 

[DwarfBoy]

Cool. Too bad that it's heavily tied to the lore, and ignoring it simply because you hate it is really stupid when discussing something about the lore of Warcraft.

im talking about WC3 nerubians in general.

...They're the same thing!

 

[Sapprine]

They have 7 features overlapping ants and only 2 compairible to spiders

Ant features:
1. Live in Colonies
2. Apply task distribution or 'ranks'
3. Have Queens
4. Their Legs and limb count
5. Their Movement (spiders take pauses between every bit of movement, nerubians walk like ants.)
6. They Live underground
7. They dont seem to hunt insects, but likely scavenge and/or eat fungi (ant do this)

Spider Features:
Their Mandibles
Have more than 2eyes

I've determined the silk they shoot isnt silk.

And I've determined their abillity to burrow is counted for neither spider or ant, since both can do it.

 

[Duke]

Never though about nerubians as ants, but I have to give it to you that it makes perfect sense. Basically the only spider features are webs and eyes.

 

[Sapprine]

Their mandibles are spiderlike too, and the silk isnt really silk since its shot from their mouths, its green and splashy.

These are not exactly the charactaristics of spider silk, but likely saliva mixed in with some kind of binding chemical.

The substance is also green and the mushroom that grow across the Ajol'Nerub missions are also green, coincidence? I think not!

 

[Sapprine]

Myrmarachne - Wikipedia

^^^^ This is what nerubians are based off!!!