After they re-appeared later in the first season in "The Battle", the producers thought that they didn't make a suitable adversary and plans for their continued use in this role were dropped. Their role as major villains in The Next Generation was eventually taken by the Borg. By the time that they appeared in Deep Space Nine, they were used in a comedic fashion. The look of the Ferengi and their ship was created by Andrew Probert. The vessel was inspired by a Horseshoe crab and was built by Greg Jein. Michael Westmore was responsible for taking Probert's designs for the Ferengi and creating the make-up for the actors to meet that design. In Probert's original concept, the Ferengi had ears which were pointed like a bat. There were concerns from the producers that these would appear simply to be larger versions of the already known Vulcan ears, and so Westmore was told to round off the ears when it came to producing the make-up. Other elements which were changed at the make-up stage included modifications to the nose to increase the volume of wrinkles and dropping the idea of an extended chin as Westmore thought it would save time in applying the make-up. A set of false upper teeth were also created, which were added to a single head piece and a nose piece which comprised the prosthetics for the Ferengi. Westmore was not pleased when a shot of an actor in costume was leaked without the teeth, he said "I was annoyed about that photo because the make-up was incomplete. After all the work that went into it, we would have wanted our design in proper form. The photo was like a pirated version of our make-up, because none of us would ever approved it under those circumstances." Michael Okuda designed a rank designation tattoo which Westmore applied to the right part of each Ferengi forehead. The symbol means "Dog eat dog" and was painted green as that is the color of American dollar bills. Each bar (referred to by the production crew as a "rocker") to the side of the symbol designated a rank, with more bars meaning a higher rank. Writing and casting In Richard Krzemien's original draft, Portal was referred to as Dilo. Executive producer Maurice Hurley saw Portal as being a sort of guard-dog, but thought that the Ferengi turned the concept into "silliness".