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The Rules tab defines how organisms interact with each other and with their environment. Two sections cover predation constraints and the five behavioral force multipliers that drive each organism’s decision-making every tick.

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Predation settings

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Same-species protection

When Same Species Protected is checked (the default), the predation check short-circuits for two organisms of the same species — even if the size ratio condition would otherwise be satisfied. This encourages intra-species flocking and gives smaller individuals a survival buffer.

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Food chain (Rock-Paper-Scissors) mode

When Food Chain is enabled the simulator uses canEatInChain logic instead of the default open-predation check. Each species index s can only eat species (s + 1) % numSpecies. This creates a cyclic dependency where no species can dominate all others simultaneously, producing oscillating population cycles similar to a three-species Lotka–Volterra system.
Food Chain mode is most effective with 3 or more species. With 2 species it degenerates to a one-directional predator–prey pair.

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Behavioral force sliders

Each frame, the net velocity for an organism is computed by summing all active force vectors (hunt, flee, flock, food, separation), each weighted by its respective slider value, then clamped to the organism’s speed gene.
Setting Flee Drive significantly higher than Hunt Drive (for example, Flee at 2.5, Hunt at 0.4) shifts the ecosystem toward a prey-driven dynamic: prey scatter effectively, predators rarely catch them, and food attraction becomes the dominant survival strategy. The reverse — high Hunt, low Flee — creates efficient predator-led culling.