Hello hello! Congrats on being selected for a Quest Fairy, jackie! I see there's some confusion and debate concerning Bart's species. As someone who plays a were-character and wrote most of the TiH Species guides (ahaha one day the Monster guide will be updated and written I swear), please allow me to chime in.
Let me touch briefly on the different forms a student/Halloween creature can have:
Humanoid Form: The neat thing about humans is that you can shove a ton into a small space! If you wanted to be super technical then this would be "reaper form" since humans live in the human world and whatnot, but the important thing to note about them is that humans don't have appendages that can get in the way like tails and whatnot!
I mean, just picture what it'd be like to try and walk in a crowded hallway with a naga slithering away in front of you. It'd be impossible to step on their tail, right? And then let's not forget the giant centaur butt blocking the stairs. It'd be a nightmare of a school to attend!
To fix this, every student in Amityville wears a
skull pin. These things host a ton of enchantments that mark your character as being a student of the school. The most well-known benefit of wearing one of these is that no matter what, it forces your character into the compacted humanoid shape. They will keep
some aspects of their normal form, which is why despite the attempts to make students compact some have
gigantic wings (SIX OF THEM WHY),
gigantic amounts of hair (its getting everywhere help), and
is that a walking bush???The fun thing about the skull pin is that your character can't take it off
UNLESS they're in an area where they're allowed to, such as off campus or in their dorm rooms. Once they take it off they revert too their
Natural Form! This is what a character looks like normally. Here you have your monsterous shapes, your centaurs with their large cabooses and a reason to holla to your nagas. This applies mostly to Monster type students:
Taima Student Form vs
Taima Natural FormMuka Student Form vs
Muka Natural FormMerope Student Form vs
Merope Natural FormDamien Student Form vs
Natural FormAJ Natural Form vs
Natural FormBut it can apply to non-Monsters too! Like
Gabriel the ghost and his
natural form here.
Whew! That's a ton of natural forms. These are all students, so if you see one that you'd like to learn more about please don't be shy to hit that player up for more information/RP, and if you're not sure who plays who please let me know and I'll be happy to point you in their direction.
smile NOW! Let's go onto wereforms.
About Were-Forms: We treat "were" forms as a hybrid between humanoid and natural forms. So for Bart, he would be a bipedal creature with rabbit ears, a nice rack, and possibly very long claws.
Here's were-art of
Professor Red, my staff-level character (and Amityville's gym teacher) in her werewolf form, and
here is how she looks in her boss form (it's a long story).
NOW! Let's focus on Bart and his natural ability.
Quote:
Natural Ability: Shapeshift- Bart has two basic forms: humanoid form, and super scary were form. In humanoid form he looks, of course, human. Well, excluding the sand colored rabbit ears and antelope antlers. His were form is much more intimidating. In his were form, the only cute or charming things about Bart is his fluffy bunny ears, and tail. Even his antlers become very menacing looking. In this form, Bart is about 7'5" tall and around a ton of pure muscle (not that anyone has ever weighed him). His skin also takes on a bit of a tan tint as well. In this form he looks more like the Hulk gone wrong than dashing young Bartholomew. This form can come out of rage and/or emotion or if he simply wants to change. However, in a non rage attack he can only hold the form for about an hour an a half, in a rage it only lasts about thirty minutes. Regardless of the situation, his suit top usually gets torn up, and his pants are frequently tattered, so he tries to stay out of that form unless it is absolutely needed. Later on in life he develops the classical 'jackalope' look. This was suppressed in all young jackalopes in order to avoid complications such as accidental shifting and form mix-ups.
Now, here's something fun about taking
shapeshifting as a natural ability. Shapeshifting will allow your character to transform into their other form without needing to remove the pin. Your character won't be able to shapeshift in some areas like hallways, but it saves needing to remember where you put your skullpin/accidentally misplacing it/etc.
biggrin You
do want to be careful where you shapeshift though... Detention isn't exactly a fun place to be (unless you really want to inflict some suffering on your student then hey by all means go for it/hit up a GM I won't stop you!)
All right, I have one very important question for you:
what was Bart born as? Was he born as an actual jackalope?
Was he born looking like a human but had traces of a jackalope, like antlers/ears?
With Bart's race as "jackalope," I imagine that he was born as an actual jackalope. If this is the case, his shapeshifting would let him turn into an actual jackalope. And you know what? Looking "too cute" IS a valid reason to be sent off to Amityville Academy!
biggrin Over time he could totes become more scary, as we do have several students attending Amityville for that very reason.
Now, if he's a
werejackalope, that makes me think he was born looking very humanoid but he had his rabbit ears and antlers. I also imagine he'd be covered in fur and possibly have digitigrade legs (y'know, legs that looked more like an animal's vers humanoid. Here's
Merope's Y2 form; check out his feet!). With a were-jackalope, being able to shift from his forced humanoid smooth-skin'd form into a
I AM GOING TO TEAR YOUR FACE OFF (
oh hey cool a pumpkin stencil!) werejackalope would then make sense.
SO! What is Bart? Given his history and that his dad's a mafia boss, I'm assuming he's a werejackalope, as a were would have the strength and intimidation to subdue their subordinates into submission. That and he eats meat. The mental image of a jackalope nibbling on a leg of some fresh carcass like a rabbit noms on lettuce is more amusing then it should be imo.
Once you've figured out what he naturally looks like without his skullpin, then you can choose what sort of form you'd like him to have for shapeshifting. c:
So why does a werejackalope work in TiH?To get nerdy on everyone reading this post, "were" is latin for "man." Any "were"-creatures are treated as creatures that can shapeshift between a humanoid form and a more monsterous form. As
This is Halloween, I feel that restricting "were" creatures to IRL animals is a bit silly. I'm open to seeing different creatures, and before you ask yes I do think "weredragon" is silly when you can go full-on dragon
why you do this.So long as there's justification, imo go for it.
biggrin Also I realize I just built you a HUUUUGE wall of text and I apologize in advance, but since I'm here (and I'm usually the person who gives a final look-over to students before stamping them for RP approval, unless it's liz or zoob since they do this sort of things too hi nice to meet you I should have introduced myself sooner; I'm sorry). Let's take a quick look at his FEAR.
FEAR abilities are basically awesome "special attacks"/limit breaks your character can do with our battle system. This is just a nit-pick of mine:
Quote:
FEAR Ability: Mob boss' magic- Jackalopes naturally have a strong connection to earth and, in ancient times, could use strong earth-magic. Today, even with his powerful lineage, Bart can only use a small piece of that magic. However, he may be able to tap in and use it to raise a shield for either himself or a friend. The shield is simply a light layer of the earth that raises between himself and his opponent. (The barrier, defensive)
The name of it is related to the Mafioso, but the ability itself is concerning with raising some earth to create a shield. Monsters here in TiH are more physical when compared to the other races, and as a whole the Monster race is really, really,
really bad at magic.
That's totes okay though! As Bart progresses through the years, you can say "eff the stereotypes" and have him become better and better at magic.
Or you could have him gain the ability to shift between a pure jackalope form AND a wereform.
Or you could have him learn magic enough to summon a mafioso subordinate to take the bullet for him/attack/etc etc. Whateves!
Ultimately the choice is up to you.
biggrin I realize that this is a TONNNN of information to take in. If you have any questions please feel free to let me know and I'll be more than happy to help you out! Your artist can't wait to start drawing Bart, and we all look forward to seeing him in RP! o/
- Marushii, TiH Admin and the person who usually does all the enrollybits.
