In Shashnia, dinosaur-like creatures have retained their existence. In fact, much of the world could be comparable to a prehistoric Earth. It is very moist, lush, covered with extreme environments. There are lots of jungle, swamp, but also sand and snow. The conditions are ripe for the living conditions to sustain large plant masses and an incredible amount of bioenergy. Would increased oxygen content in the air affect the size restraints on creatures? Dunno, regardless, there be dinos in dem dar jungles, and swamps, and furry mountain dinosaurs, and armoured slow desert behemoths.
They range in intelligence and size, the intelligent ones all have to have a minimum cranial size. Essentially, the three dominant species types on Shashina are: The Shashnimyn, representing the 'mammalian' contingent, the dinosaurs, representing the saurian families (incl all birds and driving the lizards extinct) and the true insects and the Metansects (vascularized just got a name), the most intelligent of which are eusocial (collective intelligence).
The dinosaurs are too individual for psychic abilities relating to communication. They were the first large dominant creature; excellent predators ro efficient consumers. The Shashnimyn used tribes and tools and ingenuity to forge a dominant wedge. Magic, intelligent individualized coordination made a planet wide 'quiet revolution' possible. They did it without knowing it, and did so without affecting the harmony of the planet. They still try to live in harmony with the land and its existent guardians. The metansects took their dominance forcefully and many areas are still plagued with their mindless predation... it's life. The metansects that remained realtively small relied on complex mechanisms and eusociality to obtain dominances in their niches.
Dinosaurs were the first advanced civilization on Shashnia. Their reign collapsed with an ecological disaster caused by by the Magic War befell the world and drove most of them extinct.
They are also referred to as the ancient race. The intelligent species was a Deinonychus-like predator. The functional digits and large brain size were the important factors. They retained their original form, but grew larger craniums with ornate headcrests and oposable digits. 3v1.
The artifacts left over from their era are usable with 6 digits, but awkwardly. Many of the machines also have bird-like perches, requiring two individuals to coordinate since the scales of anatomies differ. Artifacts are buried in temples/ancient structures that time has grown over. Often they're full of an ecology of many creatures, dinosaurian and not.
The remaining species of Dinosaur are intelligent, but not the type that forms cities. Most are long-lived nomadic predators, they change in size and ability with age. They are most recognized by large Therapod predators. Six-legged behemoth crocodiles (jungle/swamp), sea monsters, moa, roc, brachiosaurs/ankylopod/ceratopsian
An example is a towering ostrich-like dinosaurs that depredates cloud farmers. Yellow-brown, white boned. You cannot see their feet because they usually strike from clouds. Just the neck and beak sticking up from a cloudtype.
Naturally, the evolution to birds also took place, but the transition out from an archaeopteryx like form was never complete. There are two types of birds, 4 limbed dino-origin birds, and 6-limbed mammal origin birds.