Hybrid Overkill Avoidance: Difference between revisions
→Tabletop RPG
(→Web Comics: clean up) |
|||
(11 intermediate revisions by 6 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
{{trope}}
[[File:
{{quote|''"For years, we've been trying to combine the bloodlines
Everyone likes a [[Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot]], which is why making a [[Hybrid Monster]] that combines two fantastic creatures into one, like a cyborg-centaur or a demon-elf, is popular in fiction. However, like most good things, it can be a bit overdone; while cyborg-demons are awesome, a [[Our Werewolves Are Different|were-wolf]] / [[Fish People|fish man]]? Not so much.
Line 9:
This is especially true when an author wants to conserve as much [[Willing Suspension of Disbelief]] as possible, believe it or not, readers might have trouble swallowing a half [[Elemental Embodiment|fire elemental]] / half [[Our Vampires Are Different|vampire]].
In a game setting, this trope is used to avoid the presence of [[Ninja Zombie Pirate Robot]] [[Game Breaker|throwing]] [[Competitive Balance]] [[Game Breaker|right out the window]] when you can, within the rules, get any power listed on [[Five Races|any species]]' charts with limited or no [[Necessary Drawback
Inside the story, this is usually [[Justified Trope|justified]] (or at least given a half decent [[Hand Wave]]) by having one supernatural/technological/biological "monster" or race be naturally [[The Immune|immune]] (or [[Made of Explodium|violently]] [[Weaksauce Weakness|allergic]]) to being hybridized with another. For example, a character who's been [[Viral Transformation|changed]] into a werewolf can't be [[Mutant|mutated]] with [[The Virus]] since their [[Healing Factor]] protects them further mutation. Robots won't become [[Our Ghosts Are Different|ghosts]] because, y'know, no [[Soul]].<ref>([[Virtual Ghost
Sometimes, the "immunity" is due to the idea that the character can't be changed from one type of their common category to another, such as zombies and vampires, which are different types of their common category of [[The Undead|undead.]] And sometimes the offspring only inherits one of their parents types, or a few, but not all, of either's traits.
Line 18:
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* In ''[[Tokimeki Tonight]]'', protagonist Ranze's father is a vampire and her mother is a werewolf. She's apparently normal, with no traits of either, until she develops retractable fangs and turns into anything she bites with them.
* Normally ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]]'' allows just about any two summoned monsters to be fused together; however there is one interesting case where it's played disturbingly literally in the first tournament. Yugi defeats Kaiba's Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon by fusing his Mammoth Graveyard (an undead type) into it... which, because both are incompatible types, was slowly weakening the resulting fusion and would cause its eventual death. After this, [[New Rules
Line 34:
== Film ==
* The ''[[Underworld (
Line 43:
== [[Live Action Television]] ==
* In ''[[The Vampire Diaries]]'' {{spoiler|this has been imposed on Klaus, who is a werewolf vampire. Because the resulting hybrid would be too powerful, witches cursed him to suppress his werewolf side, preventing him from transforming at the full moon. His goal is to break the curse, allowing him to create his own master race.}}
* Vampires in [[Being Human (UK)]] are unable to feed on and, by extension, turn werewolves because werewolf blood is toxic to them. Werewolves who attack vampires while transformed are more inclined to kill them outright rather than turn them. No explanation has so far been offered as to why vampires and werewolves don't become ghosts, although one ghost has dismissed the idea of werewolf-ghosts as 'ridiculous' without further explanation.
* In ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'', the
== Tabletop RPG ==
* ''[[
** ''[[
*** [[Vampire: The Requiem|Vampires]] are dead humans resurrected to unlife by an as yet unexplained but likely magical force. [[Changeling: The Lost
*** Likewise the reverse is true. Only an ordinary mortal human with a human soul can become a Vampire. Even attempting to feed off a supernatural creature, a necessity for the Embrace, will most likely lead to the Vampire getting torn to pieces, magically fried to a cinder, or worse. Like being more prone to raging and giving into the Beast (Werewolf Blood), Having a bad Acid Trip (Fey Blood, effects may wary) or other effects.
*** Werewolves are spirits of the hunt / of rage / of protection / of death who were forced to take on human forms by way of a curse laid down on their ancestors / god(s). Depends on your interpretation of the "scriptures," really, but the fact is they are physical spirits. They don't die; they ethereally recycle, so to speak. This means they can't be embraced as vampires, nor can they make the bargain to become geists. They are natural occurances, not created beings like the Prometheans. They are not human, so they can't become mages, nor can they be altered by a spirit realm like Arcadia, which their supernatural "biology" is already adjusted too (to say nothing of their psychologies, which may be less resilient). And again, no human desperation equals no vigil.
*** Vampires, werewolves, Prometheans, changelings and ghosts can't Awaken as mages because they're not human and/or not alive. Mages who become vampires or ghosts lose their mage-ness in the process.
*** Technically, you ''can'' make a Promethean out of anything's ''corpse'' (if it wasn't a straight-up human, though, it's kind of tricky). But that's exactly what you get
*** Prometheans who complete the Pilgrimage can theoretically become vampires or mages. The books advise that you only do this for a ''very good''
**** This is quite a good way to add on a bittersweet ending, a Promethean becomes a human again? Oh, but wait...he's cursed to live among the undead for the rest of his days. Its the sort of thing that should only really be used for the most grimdark of chronicles.
*** Also theoretically averted in a sense by any supernaturals who could turn into [[Hunter: The Vigil
** The ''[[
*** Only humans have avatars, so only humans can Awaken to become Mages. Becoming undead of any kind gets rid of the avatar, nixing that option. Shapeshifters were born as shapeshifters, even if they resemble humans or animals at birth, so they lack avatars. When they die they can't go to the same afterlife as human dead, so they can't become wraiths, zombies, or [[Kindred of the East]].
*** One exception is a [[Vampire: The Masquerade
*** Several other Changing-Breeds either can't be embraced, or can't stay that way for long afterwards. Kitsune were-foxes explode in fire if embraced as kind of a [[Take That]] to players' obsession with making abominations. [[Ravens and Crows|Corax were-ravens?]] They explode come dawn no matter WHERE they are. [[Dragons Are Dinosaurs|Mokolé were-dinosaurs?]] They go BALLISTIC the second the embrace starts, and their war form? A dragon/dinosaur which may very well breathe fire and/or glow with sunlight. ''Then'' they die. Rokea were-sharks? No vampire has been dumb enough to try it (they also are mostly aquatic, making it hard for vampires to even know they EXIST, much less find and capture one). Bastet werecats can be embraced but immediately start losing their Gnosis stat, which cripples their supernatural abilities.
*** The one accepted hybrid is anyone except an [[Hunter: The Reckoning|imbued hunter]] can drink a vampire's blood and become their ghoul, which is generally a bad thing since it makes them the vampire's bitch (or for the handful of independent ghouls that bleed and kill vampires to drink their blood bond free, renders them essentially a junkie serial killer). For a Mage the blood addiction slowly kills their avatar and ability to do magic along with it. There's mention the Rafastio family of Revenants <ref>ghouls bred with other ghouls (and possibly magically mutated) so much the offspring are born ghouls with their own vitae production.</ref> has some members that are also mages.
*** Also averted by the infamous [[Canon Sue|Canon]] [[Villain Sue]] Samuel Haight who was a ghoul-werewolf-true mage. Until he died, became a ghost, and was soulforged into an ashtray.
* Some templates in the 3rd Edition [[Dungeons and Dragons
** Only living things can become undead, so no [[Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot]] (flesh golems are constructs, not undead).
** Constructs cannot breed, and thus cannot be half-dragons or any other inherited type.
** Undead are immune to disease, and thus cannot become lycanthropes. You ''can'' make an undead from a lycanthrope, but it tends to be pretty pointless since they revert to their human form upon death and none of the bonuses they get from being an untransformed lycanthrope are maintained by the transformation into typical undead. The result is just a human.
** Undead flesh may not retain all the natural abilities it had in life, and skeletons have no flesh at all.
** Lycanthropes and vampires can only convert humanoids, not animals, constructs, [[Eldritch Abomination|abberations]], [[The Fair Folk|fey]] or any variety of dragon (draconic or mind flayer vampires use a different template).
Line 72:
*** It is therefore possible to create a vampire werewolf, but only if you apply the templates in the right order.
** Dragons, celestials, and fiends can breed with just about anything, but only if it's living, and the results of such breeding may not convert well into useful undead.
*** Only one crossbreed half-dragons is known to have occurred in [[Eberron]], and she considered an abomination worth destroying her entire bloodline over. Half-dragon as a template is applied exclusively to fiends "blessed" by Tiamat.
** It is possible to graft construct parts onto a living creature, but the result becomes a construct and thus no longer counts as living, which restricts the ability to apply other templates, and they do not breed true, if they can breed at all.
*** This makes possible the [[Game Breaker|Half-black-dragon, half-iron-golem troll]], which is immune to damn near everything, but would require a black dragon (acid-breathing) to breed with a troll (vulnerable only to fire and acid), and the offspring to be converted to a half-golem at great difficulty and expense, probably against its will. Neither the victim nor its parents are likely to be pleased. Also the trollbane item makes what it's applied to bypasses regeneration regardless of damage type.
** For player characters, the main mitigator is Level Adjustment, a virtual inflation of the character's effective level imposed by most beneficial templates. For example, a half-dragon has an effective level adjustment of +3.
* ''[[
== Video Games ==
* Averted in ''[[
* Becoming a werewolf in ''[[Skyrim]]'' will cure you of vampirism, and give you an immunity to disease that will stop you catching it again.
* In ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'' interactions that turn a creature into werebeast, vampire or "disturbed dead" all are made explicitly unappliable to the targets already afflicted by any of them, as well as a few broader classes.
== Web Comics ==
* The vampires in ''[http://lastblood.keenspot.com/ Last Blood]'' are immune to zombie bites, making them unlikely defenders of the remnants of humanity. Of course, that has to do with {{spoiler|zombies being created from a starved vampire's bite}}.
* ''[[Rusty and Co
** Everything is weirder with... [http://rustyandco.com/comic/critical-missives-
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Index of Fictional Creatures]]
[[Category:Tabletop
[[Category:Hybrid Overkill Avoidance]]
|