Flightless Piddlepoddler

The Flightless Piddlepoddler is a species of hooktail that lacks wings.

=In fanon games=

In Pikmin: Dual Worlds
The Flightless Piddlepoddler is a species of hooktail in Pikmin: Dual Worlds. It is considerably larger than its male counterpart, the Flighty Piddlepoddler, about the size of a small colony of Aggregating Poofspores, but is incapable of flight. It can be found near or in particularly large piddlepoddler nests, where it will occasionally return to eat any prey it captured and sleep for an eighth of a day, usually at noon, while Flighty Piddlepoddlers protect it. It may move to a different nest in the area in between days, but will always remain in the same place in Mission Mode and Battle Mode stages.

It produces sticky threads to insulate the nests it inhabits, but won't exclusively use it for this purpose; it can feed the thread through the curled hook on its tail, similar to the eye of a needle, to weave it into a sort of net. The threads initially emit a sweet scent that regularly attracts Pikmin and certain enemies, even larger ones, such as Red Bulborbs, Orange Bulborbs, Nectarous Dandelflies, and Fragmenting Mosshops. The Flightless Piddlepoddler can rapidly retract its threading, almost guaranteeing the deaths of anything small caught in the net. Particularly with large prey, it often simply throws the net onto them from afar rather than lying in wait with it, afterward dashing toward them to wrap them up.

Either way, its foe ends up tightly wrapped up in its threads, tied to a thread on its hooked tail, and dragged around as it continues to prowl the general area. When it is seen out and about, the wrapped-up bodies of prey it captured, usually their corpses, will trail behind it in a chain, both notifying the player and any other creatures that the Piddlepoddler is close ahead as well as acting as an easy and simple way for it to keep its meals with it. Some creatures might be bold enough to attempt to abscond with one of the bodies at the back of the chain, though in open areas (and when the Piddlepoddler has abandoned its chain temporarily to prey on these when they think it wouldn't notice) this will often end poorly. Once it has either deemed its captured hoard to be adequate or simply grown tired of hunting for the moment, it will make its way back to its nest and eat one or multiple of the larger captured creatures, the smaller ones being eaten by the Flighty Piddlepoddlers at the nest, the rest either hung on the many threads hanging above or beside the nest on the trees above or the general environment or carried by one or several Flighty Piddlepoddlers to the other nests in the area. Once this is finished, it will have the Flighty Piddlepoddlers in its nest remove the wrappings from the eggs, afterward wrapping them up in fresh threads and replacing them in their prior places.

Attacking it while it is asleep is the safest time to attack, as it will likely be unaware until attacked and most, if not all Flighty Piddlepoddlers will be away, carrying food to other nests. Attacking while it is eating, on the other hand, is the most dangerous, as its nest will be cluttered with bodies that it can easily remove but Pikmin can't, it is entirely awake, and most if not all Flighty Piddlepoddlers that stay at its nest will be present. If encountered out and about and it has at least one body with it, it may attempt to knock Pikmin and leaders aside with it or crush them. Once at seven-eighths of its maximum health, it will abandon any bodies aside from the one immediately behind it for higher speed and agility, casting them aside and leaving them in a tangled heap. At this point, it will begin to lunge at Pikmin or leaders in an attempt to eat them, knocking any Pikmin on it off in the process, as well as jumping around on occasion in an attempt to crush Pikmin. Any leaders it eats will be chewed up and spat away, dealing one-fourth of their maximum HP. If it reaches one-fourth of its maximum health, it will abandon the remaining body, throwing it towards the pile of entangled bodies. It will soon after begin to dash towards large groups of Pikmin, knocking them over and subsequently eating them or crushing them with its large tail. It may also jump on Pikmin as it did in prior stages, wrap itself in threads to cause Pikmin thrown on it to become stuck to it and increase its defense, and slash at Pikmin with the sharp hook on the end of its tail. If defeated, it will cry out and leave a single thread on the ground. The scream will attract the Flighty Piddlepoddlers from its nest to the location the scream originated from. If it is carried, the thread will trail from where it was defeated to its current location, as well as occasionally trip up Pikmin directly behind the Piddlepoddler. Flighty Piddlepoddlers will follow the thread to the Flightless Piddlepoddler, and will immediately begin to attack Pikmin carrying it, at which point one will attempt to wrap the Piddlepoddler in its thread, and if it succeeds the other Piddlepoddlers will put the hooks of their tails in the wrappings, carrying it back to their nest afterward. Unless somehow stopped, they will nurse the Piddlepoddler back to health after getting back, and will fiercely guard it. Once it heals, and this will take about a day and a night, it will attempt to seek out your own base along with several Flighty Piddlepoddlers, though some will stay behind to guard the eggs. Alternatively to what occurs if defeated, if it defeats the squad of Pikmin or they run away but it was badly wounded, it will bring the bodies it has collected back to its nest, eat some of them (more than it would otherwise), and promptly collapse while the Flighty Piddlepoddlers guard it and the nest. If it isn't badly wounded, it will continue about its day as normal. If fought in its nest, it will do mostly the same as it would otherwise, though it will likely have some of the Flighty Piddlepoddlers take the eggs away from the nest, the rest fighting alongside it. It may also call the Piddlepoddlers to it so that they might carry it in flight, as it weaves nets to attempt to capture Pikmin and leaders.