Animal Deities Stats (think Anansi Boys)

[Hick Jr]

Okay, the title might have been a bit misleading, but here's the sort-of-short version- i'm putting together a Variable Abilities (it's on the Custom Powers master list and is super cool, go look at it) list that's basically someone who can channel the various Animal Gods like Tiger, Spider/Anansi, Crocodile, Shark, Wolf, Bear, Bird, Snake, all the good stuff. The basic idea behind it is that each god grants a different sub-list according to that animal's physical, mythical, and metaphorical abilities. I need help with some of them. The long version is ahead.

This is the "blank-slate" list, that's basically one-size-fits-all.

Animal
-Up to two levels of Strength.
-Up to two levels of Speed.
-Up to two levels of Toughness.
-Up to two levels of Recovery.
-Natural Weaponry, with or without Potent, Venomous, and Ranged upgrades.
-Diminutive, Hulking or Titanic Size.
-Spider Walk [-1].
-Wings [-1].
-Aquatic [-1].
-Any Echoes of the Beast
-Spiritual Co-Pilot (Animal)
-Marked by Power (Animal)
-(Animal) Shifting

-On top of this, each animal has some unique stuff appropriate to it- Octopus would have Extra Appendages, Shark and Crocodile have Aquatic, Tiger has Cloak of Shadows, so on and so forth.
-Along with the physical stuff, each animal also has Incite Effect regarding one "element" that it can control. Tiger is a tenebrokinetic (shadows), Crocodile and Shark are hydrokinetics (water), Bear is a terrakinetic (earth), Lion is a photokinetic (light), and so on and so forth.
-Each animal has it's own agenda, influence, and ideas. It's basically Lash with a shamanic flavor- a voice in your head that grants you power, but also tries to influence you.

For example, here are the writeups for Tiger and Snake. If some of the powers seemingly don't make sense, it's because i'm basically making up the lore for this. There's no established reason, for example, for Snake to grant toxikinesis. But it makes sense to me.

Tiger
Tiger is the spirit of all predatory big cats. He’s a stealthy, brutal, cruel, vicious, and an incredibly intelligent and extremely cunning hunter. The only thing that matters to him is the hot blood of worthy prey. Things like social mores and due process of the law bore him. Most binders prefer not to even try with Tiger- he’s one of the more powerful of the ancient gods, but also one of the most difficult to control. Compels regarding his influence generally involve stealth, predation, and cruelty.
-Up to three levels of Strength.
-Up to two levels of Speed.
-Up to two levels of Toughness.
-Up to two levels of Recovery.
-Spider Walk [-1]
-Natural Weaponry (Potent, Ranged)
-Familial Shifting (Predatory Felines) [-4]
-Echoes of the Beast (Tiger, provides +1 to Stealth while barefoot) [-1]
-Cloak of Shadows [-1]
-Blood Drinker [-1]
-Superhuman Acrobatics [-1]
-Marked by Power (Tiger) [-1]
-Might over Magic (Enhanced) [-2/4]
-Supernatural Sense [-2] (Enhanced animal senses. Able to detect magical and psychic residue via scent. Alertness.)
-Incite Effect (Tenebrokinesis, with Discipline) (Any Upgrades. Mental upgrades incite fear.)
-Spiritual Co-Pilot (Tiger) [-1]
-Swarm Body [-3] (Represented as a shadow form.)
-Immunity (All physical stress, while standing in darkness.) [-7]
-Shadow Stalker (Stealth): You can use Stealth to defend against physical attacks. In addition, after a successful dodge using this stunt, you can spend a Fate Point to make an immediate ambush attempt against the attacker.
-Rapid Teleportation, with the Limitation of only being able to teleport through shadows [-2]

The inspiration behind Tiger is part Shere Khan, part Mr. Blonde of Reservoir Dogs, part Tiger of Anansi Boys, and all killer.
Snake
Snake is the spirit of most legless reptiles. He's sneaky, clever, and flips between idiotically agressive and comically cowardly at the drop of a hat. Snake wants to come out ahead. No matter what. His use of exotic poisons and extremely powerful hypnosis is indicative of his mindset- if you can't beat em, enslave em'. Compels regarding Snake's influence generally involve being aggressive in situations where that is a terrible idea, immediately fleeing a situation as soon as it starts to go badly for you, use of poison, and the creation of thralls.
-Up to two levels of Strength.
-Up to three levels of Speed.
-Up to two levels of Toughness.
-Up to three levels of Recovery.
-Natural Weaponry (Potent, Venomous)
-Snakefangs (Fists): You roll to place the POISONED aspect on your enemies at +2.
-Virulent Venom (Fists): The attacks from your poison are Weapon:2.
-Incite Effect (Toxikinesis, with Discipline) (Any Upgrades. Mental upgrades incite Confusion.)
-Enthrallment (Superior)
-Immunity (All toxins, venoms, and poisons.) [-2]
-Familial Shifting (Serpentes) [-4]
-Superior Hold [-2]
-Amorphous Form [-1]
-Echoes of the Beast (Snake) [-1] (Provides +1 to escape or maintain a grapple, use the thermoreception of certain viper species)
-Spiritual Co-Pilot (Snake) [-1]
-Marked by Power (Snake) [-1]
The inspiration behind Snake is part Kaa, part Steve Buscemi as Mister Pink, part Magellan of One Piece, and part two-bit con-artist.



So, after all that, why did I post this? I kind of want to see what people come up with, and I just wanted to post this idea in case someone needed a character concept or something.

[Sanctaphrax]

This is a pretty neat idea.

Might be too expensive for most games, though. Each of the animal god lists is gonna be 2 or 3 points, and being able to switch between them will increase the cost even more.

Also, I just thought of another way you could do this: combine them all into one list, and attach a condition that in order to take a Power, you first need to take Echoes Of The Beast and Spiritual Co-Pilot for an animal associated with the Power.

PS: There are some things on those lists that I think are a bit unbalanced. Notably Family Shifter.

[Hick Jr]

I just picked Family Shifter off the list because I thought it was appropriate. I honestly think the Power is really weak for costing the same as True Shapeshifting. If you mean the stunts, Snakes's poison is meant to be his primary fighting tactic, and I have no idea whether or not Shadow Stalker is balanced.

Do you have any ideas for other lists, Sanctaphrax? I was thinking of doing Bat (acoustokinesis) and Tortoise (chronokinesis) next.

[Sanctaphrax]

I honestly think the Power is really weak for costing the same as True Shapeshifting.

It isn't. It provides 2 form points, with only slightly less flexibility than normal Modular Abilities. And it provides something clearly better than Beast Change, almost as good as True Shapeshifting. Plus, for some insane reason, it offers Pack Instincts for a negative cost.

So for 3 Refresh you get a slightly weakened 4 Refresh ability, a meaningfully weakened 4 Refresh ability, and a full strength 1 Refresh ability. 7 Refresh would be a fairer cost for all of that.

If you mean the stunts, Snakes's poison is meant to be his primary fighting tactic, and I have no idea whether or not Shadow Stalker is balanced.

It isn't. I wouldn't allow it even without the ambush effect. Moving the entire Athletics defence trapping to your apex skill is in my opinion too good for a stunt.

And why does it matter whether poison is meant to be the snake's primary attack? A stunt is a stunt, and should be balanced as a stunt.

Do you have any ideas for other lists, Sanctaphrax? I was thinking of doing Bat (acoustokinesis) and Tortoise (chronokinesis) next.

Those sound good to me. Maybe shark or octopus afterwards.

[Hick Jr]

Okay, wow. Upon a reread, I realized I forgot a really important clause in Shadow Stalker: while in the dark, you can use Stealth to dodge physical attacks. If you excise the Ambush trapping, is that a balanced stunt? Regarding Snake's poison stunts, is your point of contention giving poison a weapon rating, or the stunt that provides +2 to the roll to poison someone?


Huh. I just thought Familial Shifting was sort of dumb because True Shapeshifting is a hell of a lot more impressive in-story. I'd take it off the lists, but I really like how well it represents the "turn into any animal of this family" ability of a binder of the ancient gods. True Shapeshifting and a Limitation could do it, but still...

Tortoise
Tortoise is the spirit of most tetsudines, meaning tortoises, turtles, and terrapins. He is old, wise, obdurate, enduring, and defensive. Tortoise is absolutely the one to sit, wait, and watch until the time to act, if he decides to act at all. People like Tiger often refer to Tortoise as apathetic and paranoid, and they're not entirely wrong. However, because of Tortoise's almost ridiculously unfair power over the nature of time itself, nobody is willing to argue with him. Compels regarding Tortoise's influence often involve staying on the defensive, waiting for a "better" time to act, and being slightly more paranoid than is healthy.
(Stunts and powers marked with asterisks can be found on their respective lists or the wiki.)
-Up to two levels of Strength.
-Up to three levels of Toughness.
-Up to three levels of Recovery.
-Natural Weaponry
-Aquatic [-1].
-Echoes of the Beast (Tortoise)(+1 to defense when making a full defense action.)
-Spiritual Co-Pilot (Tortoise)
-Marked by Power (Tortoise)
-Tetsudine Shifting
-Incite Effect (Chronokinesis, with Discipline) (Any Upgrades. Mental upgrades slow down thought processes.)
-Ritual (Chronokinesis)
-Inexplicable Knowledge (Any Upgrades)
-Unbreakable Shell (Endurance): Your natural armor is almost comically tough. Add an additional two points to the Armor rating you have gained via Toughness powers.
-Shrug it Off (Endurance)*
-Was That Supposed To Hurt? (Endurance)*


I'd like to throw Immunity to physical stress in there, but I'm not sure what should bypass it.
-Physical Immunity (All phy

[Sanctaphrax]

Okay, wow. Upon a reread, I realized I forgot a really important clause in Shadow Stalker: while in the dark, you can use Stealth to dodge physical attacks. If you excise the Ambush trapping, is that a balanced stunt?

I'd say so.

Regarding Snake's poison stunts, is your point of contention giving poison a weapon rating, or the stunt that provides +2 to the roll to poison someone?

The latter, mostly. It's a +2 accuracy to poison attacks. The first one is probably okay. Probably.

Huh. I just thought Familial Shifting was sort of dumb because True Shapeshifting is a hell of a lot more impressive in-story. I'd take it off the lists, but I really like how well it represents the "turn into any animal of this family" ability of a binder of the ancient gods. True Shapeshifting and a Limitation could do it, but still...

I'd let you do it with Beast Change. Maybe make you upgrade for 1 Refresh, maybe not. Being able to turn into a hundred different tigers isn't much better than being able to turn into one, long as they have the same skills.

-Unbreakable Shell (Endurance): Your natural armor is almost comically tough. Add an additional two points to the Armor rating you have gained via Toughness powers.

No. No flat +2 armour stunts. No flat +1 armour stunts either. The book is clear: you can have +1 armour with a limitation.

I'd like to throw Immunity to physical stress in there, but I'm not sure what should bypass it.
-Physical Immunity (All phy

You forget to finish this one?