I had one of those bastards in one of my aquariums at one point, snuck in on some liverock I had bought. Nothing is more fun that cleaning your tank and getting punched by one of those punks. For the record though, there are two "sects" of Mantis shrimp, ones that punch, and ones that spear. Both of which suck...
Also, Octopi can eat them pretty easily.
source: mine did
The Internet says they have murder sticks which produce undersea shockwaves and kill inferior animals like octopi even when they miss (if the inferior animal is not boiled to death). Also, it obviously never punched you because your hand/wrist would have been severed from your arm and would probably crack a tectonic plate, causing an earthquake.
I wonder if they've ever been studied in water mixed with high-density liquids like glycerin (or an extremely high-salt environment). That seems the ideal way to breed superpowered mantis shrimp.
I'd assume they come from a super high salt environment.
So max out salt content to the highest point where they can still live healthfully. Even a muscle tone increase of 10% on these fuckers would make their visible abilities much more evident. Eventually, I'd guess you'd hit a wall where their limbs can no longer support the force, or they burn themselves to muscle death. If these could be trained as animals of war and launched an amphibious invasion, we could probably conquer Canada with relative ease. Just imagine if these things could be trained to jump from ground to the head of a Canadian, to spear out their eyes (extra points - barbs pull out the eyes in-tact). They would surrender the same day, and we would own all of the precious oil sands.
Brb, gotta teleconference with Rumsfeld & team. This is great!
Canada might have some bigger stuff than us though...
US Ship: Please divert your course 0.5 degrees to the south to avoid a collision.
CND reply: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the South to avoid a collision.
US Ship: This is the Captain of a US Navy Ship. I say again, divert your course.
CND reply: No. I say again, you divert YOUR course!
US Ship: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS CORAL SEA*, WE ARE A LARGE WARSHIP OF THE US NAVY. DIVERT YOUR COURSE NOW!!
CND reply: This is a lighthouse. Your call.
