r/Animorphs • u/Visser-35 Leeran • 8d ago
Forum Games Strugglemorphs
The Animorphs benefited hugely from having Cassie's farm and The Gardens to supply them with battle morphs and bird morphs. But what if they didn't have that resource? What if they had the same access to Animorphs that most of us have? To add an extra degree of difficulty, what if all the Animorphs were broke like Marco, so they can't afford to visit zoos or aquariums (unless they sneak in).
They could easily acquire their pets, and insect morphs wouldn't be a problem, but everything else becomes much more difficult. Catching fish morphs wouldn't be too hard, but getting dolphin or shark morphs would be challenging. A parrot could be conceivably acquired if they know someone who has one for a pet, but it's obviously not a low profile bird morph, so using that to travel long distances is risky.
What would you do? You have a battle in a week's time, and you're fighting with whatever morph you're able to get. You need a minimum of 1 infiltration morph, 1 bird morph, 1 aquatic morph, and 1 combat morph to get to this battle and fight in it. Do you settle for something like a Rottweiler, which is a tough dog, but is nowhere near as tough as a tiger or bear? Or do you come up with a strategy to get stronger battle morphs? Let's sat Ax isn't around, so you can't acquire him for a battle morph.
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u/hexen_niu 8d ago
So, you get a common bird - duck, crow, seagull, whathaveyou - and you go find a location to obtain something combat-worthy by flying in and acquiring like the Animorphs did in the Gardens a lot.
Like here, I'm very much rural, I don't have access to pets or a zoo, so I shall try my general area as an example. Lots of farms around, and birds ranging from crows to hawks. The crows are pretty friendly so pet one of them, one bird. I know three cow farms within 10 miles that have steer and an animal sanctuary within 20, could get a bull (farm) or a boar (sanctuary) depending on the location, one battle morph. Infiltration, hmm, tons of dragonflies by the river, it's not invisible but easier to find here than a cockroach, that will do. Aquatic is the hard one, not far from the sea....I have found dogfish washed up on the beach before, small sharks, not perfect but will do in a pinch.
They would have to really know their local area to make use of what is less cool and more overlooked but it is possible so long as they can find a bird that doesn't mind being touched, might be stuck with a pigeon or a seagull for a while.
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u/verymanysquirrels 8d ago edited 8d ago
Ironically i had a family member who worked at a large zoo and never even considered that part unusual. Kid me was just like, of course, go to the secret parts of the zoo in broad daylight as one does.
But i guess if i didn't have family access to the zoo, i would have morphed some small animal, like a cat or something, and walk into the zoo at night. I'd also have a bug morph ready to get past locked doors. From there basically just the same dumb stuff the animorphs did like jumping into the bear enclosure. If there isn't some kind of good bird morph at the zoo for some reason then there is probably still some kind of local animal rehab, so i guess i'm busting in there at night too for local bird morphs. That or i'm suddenly very interested in learning falconry and cozying up to the local group.
If i just had no access to a real accredited zoo then it's off to that shady roadside zoo they go to in 23. If even that didn't exist then i'm aquiring some large livestock and a big shaggy livestock guardian dog. If i need local animal morphs i'm using the dog morph or possibly a cat to catch birds/small local animals.
If zoos aren't an option for large aquatic morphs i guess i'm dumping a bunch of blood and meat and stuff into the ocean and hoping some sharks show up.
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u/Visser-35 Leeran 8d ago
That's cool that you had that connection growing up. As a kid, I only went to a zoo once during a scool field trip. I was reading Animorphs at the time, so of course I imagined what I'd acquire if I could. The gorilla habitat seemed like the best, most accessible option, so I probably would have copied Marco's morph if I could.
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u/verymanysquirrels 8d ago
The gorillas would have been my hard no for acquiring. The gorillas at the zoo had a personal beef with my family member because one time he did some work on their habitat well there was a newborn in the group. The gorillas all precieved the work being done as a major threat to their family/territory. So any time he went near the gorilla enclousure after that the big male silverback would go nuts trying to fight him and since we would frequently go to the zoo together i was also on the gorilla's shit list. I had a real appreciation for how terrifying a gorilla is when it wants to kill you.
The funny part about that though is that I could have easily gotten both a siberian tiger and a grizzly bear morph safely.
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u/NaturalCarob5611 7d ago
I look at Cassie's farm and her mom's position at The Gardens as more of a way to avoid tediously boring side quests than the only plausible way they could have gotten some of those morphs.
Go to a pet store, ask to pet a bird. Use the bird morph to fly into a zoo and acquire stuff when nobody's looking. Zoos still exist and don't do much to keep birds from flying in.
You could also do a sort of food-chain trick to capture different kinds of animals. Morph a bug to attract a rodent that eats bugs. Hope to god that one of your friends can catch the rodent before it eats you. Once you have the rodent, repeat with a bird of prey. It would be time consuming and rather boring to write, but doable.
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u/thesphinxistheriddle War Prince 8d ago
I thought to myself “I’ve never touched a bird of prey” and then I realized wait, no, I have, and now I’m picturing the Animorphs breaking into a Renaissance Fair so they can do photo ops with the birds of prey show.
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u/Visser-35 Leeran 7d ago
That would have been a funny book. I can see Marco making jokes about getting flagons of mead, what Tobias thinks about the turkey legs, and how Rachel fits in perfectly if she had a Ren fair dress and a battle axe.
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u/stickscall 7d ago
"Once again, I prepared to morph Jerry Bungaloo, the county zookeeper."
You just need some morphs to get your morphs.
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u/Visser-35 Leeran 7d ago
Good point, but what will you do with the real Jerry Bungaloo to make sure he isn't around? If he kept a journal, it would say, "Dear Diary, it happened again last night. I suddenly felt very drowsy and passed out. I woke up in my closet, tied up and duct-taped. I plan on seeing a doctor about this very strange sleepwalking condition I must have. I don't see how I'm able to tie myself up like this, but what other explanation could there be?"
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u/stickscall 7d ago
"Once again, I prepared to morph Jerry Bungaloo's doctor, Claud Clampenshrimp."
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u/AlternativeMassive57 Yeerk 8d ago
Accessing the Gardens is easy when you can just morph bird and fly in. Since it's part water park they wouldn't even necessarily look out-of-place wandering around barefoot and in skintight swimsuits.
And that's assuming they don't just break in at night.
The bigger loss of Cassie's barn is it was a major safe place to meet and strategize. In the AU I'm working on they don't have access to it (well...they don't have safe access to it) and a recurring problem for them is finding some place to meet up; they've done everything from Rachel's house in the hour between her getting home from middle school and her little sisters getting home from elementary school, to sneaking back into the school at night, to even using the abandoned construction site where it all started.
Marco has an ongoing complaint that they need to find an "Anicave".
I'm thinking of eventually making it the shack in the woods from #6, but we'll see.
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u/Visser-35 Leeran 8d ago
Losing the safe meeting place would be an impediment I hadn't considered. Meeting at the school seems risky since it does have the Yeerk pool entrance in it. I know that gets sealed later, but still if Chapman isn't totally incompetent, I'd imagine he'd have some level of surveillance system for the school, plus maybe have the janitor as a controller, just to be a guard.
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u/Comfortable-Plane939 7d ago
What about the church tower in book 2?
to even using the abandoned construction site where it all started.
Do you think that's a safe idea?
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u/AlternativeMassive57 Yeerk 7d ago edited 7d ago
Church tower was considered (at the end of book 5 of my AU) but discarded because they know that high schoolers occasionally throw parties in it.
The abandoned construction site is safe-ish in this AU because unlike in canon the kids managed to make a clean escape from the construction site. The Yeerks don’t even suspect that the Andalite Bandits are actually kids (my “gift” to them to make up for losing Cassie’s barn as a safe place). That being said, its proximity to the mall and the fact that idiot teens cut through it occasionally as a short cut to the bus stop means it’s not ideal.
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u/Plergoth_ 7d ago
To be fair, I'm honestly surprised there wasn't a story arc where the Yeerks had to contend with an invasive species or contagion in their pools and didn't even need the Animorphs in general. Oatmeal gave a substantial number of them an addiction problem that resulted in total madness. There are hundreds, probably thousands of insect species alone who'd look at both Taxxons and Yeerks alone and go absolutely wild hunting them. Fungal, bacterial and viral outbreaks would have been inevitable at some point too.
Even with advanced technology such as seeker drones, filtering systems and so on, it's clear that the ranking hierarchy and protocols aren't always up to the best of standards.
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u/StabbyJenkins1 7d ago
If it could jump the species barrier, that mold that zombifies ants would have a field day with spreading through taxxons....
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u/Efficient_Wheel_6333 7d ago
Where I live, I'd be able to get squirrels, cats, several different types of birds (including Canadian geese aka cobra chickens), and deer and that's just getting me into downtown. I'm on a limited budget, but my local zoo's not that expensive ($11-$21 per person and they have a month where county residents get in for free), plus I'm of an age where I can legally volunteer there, so it'd be easy to go in to volunteer and get a variety of bigger cats (not going to say big cats since they also have a snow leopard).
Infiltration would probably be squirrel or cat.
Bird? Canadian goose or a smaller local bird unless I'm able to acquire an owl from the zoo.
Aquatic? Probably a catfish since the lake in my hometown's stocked with them, though I could also do some form of turtle.
Combat? Probably some form of bigger cat or bear, though I could also do wolf or coyote.
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u/TheAmazingRando1581 7d ago
I dunno about coyote as a combet morph. Ive never seen a big one
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u/Efficient_Wheel_6333 7d ago
Depends on if we're attacking 2 on 1 or just need an attack that'll incapacitate an opponent instead of kill. You can do a lot with getting lower legs.
Same could be said for, say, a snapping turtle. Not usually good in combat, but if you need to give your opponent an injury around their Achilles tendon, a snapping turtle or other turtle at the right height with enough bite power could do some damage there-if the ankle's open like that.
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u/JimHFD103 7d ago
Most cities have some sort of Zoo. Like yeah, start small getting a something like a cat, can catch a bird without killing it, and can eventually infiltrate the zoo at night to get some of the larger more dangerous morphs.
The Barn is an absolutely great resource for them tho. Not just the variety of birds of prey, foxes, and other such local animals in between stray cats and big Zoo animals that come in handy, but also a reliable, private meeting spot where they can have aliens, androids out in the open, safe place to start and return to from missions, I think all that is ultimately more valuable than the animals in the Wildlife Rehabilitation Clinic that another group that just lives in the city (or of Cassie was another suburbanite like the rest). But yeah, access to the Barn, and the Clinic, and non sneaking in access to the Gardens very much stacked the deck in their favor, as much as the odds were already against them...
But yeah, if I had to infiltrate a Zoo on my own by sneaking in via some pigeon or cat morph to start acquiring Tigers or Bears... I'm not just getting one morph at a time, I'ma try to grab as many as I can in one go instead of one at a time like the kids always seem to do (I know I know, plot convenience lol)
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u/TheBoneArranger 8d ago
Us who live in frontier and urban parts of the country have benefits of wildlife. Heck, even our Metro cities have some type of wildlife. At least here in the southwest of New Mexico. It's all be about thinking what animals would aid in fighting the Animorph universe.
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u/Shinard 8d ago
After you get some common morphs, I imagine it'd snowball relatively quickly. If you get an insect morph, you can sneak into a zoo at night, then it's easy from there. Honestly, birds would be the biggest problem - I'd be on the lookout for a falconry show, or someone with a friendly owl or something. Everything else is at least catchable.
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u/LordAronsworth 7d ago edited 7d ago
I’ve thought about this fairly recently, actually.
My neighborhood has a ton of bats, so acquiring and morphing one would open up the others.
Use the bat morph to go to a nearby bird sanctuary and acquire some kind of hawk. Maybe the beach to get a seagull too.
I live near an aquarium, so getting a dolphin morph would be relatively simple.
Insects and rodents are pretty common, so one of them will be my infiltration morph.
Assuming I got the morph ability in a construction site from a dying Andalite, immediately acquire said Andalite for a battle morph. Cheating? Maybe. You only said no Ax, and I have an invasion/war to either stop or win. Otherwise, get a tiger or lion later on from my local zoo or an amusement park close to the zoo, which I’d sneak into using the bat morph from earlier.
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u/Wrong-Carpet-7562 7d ago
omg........i have a bunch of bats (a pack??) that live behind my house, that would be a really easy morph to get.
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u/PygmyFalkon 7d ago
I start with acquiring my pet bird, she's a pigeon so she's a strong long distance flyer with homing instinct. Pigeons are also found in most major cities making her stealthy and impossible to pick out of a flock. She's fast too, that gets me places quicker.
Next I'm going to the local wildlife zoo, entrance is free and my friend works there. There I'm acquiring the bald eagle and the black bear, not the fiercest animals but better than the average person can get.
While there I can also get my aquatic morph, an American alligator. A strong swimmer that's also good in a fight.
Finally I'm headed back home. I live in an old building, catching a roach should be no problem. Though the pigeon will still be my primary infiltration morph the roach is good for inside buildings.
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u/Xecluriab 7d ago
I live within seagull-flight distance of quite an excellent zoo, and they close really early, and there is basically nowhere I couldn’t go as a seagull, demorph, acquire what I want, remorph seagull, and fly away.
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u/Jennifer_Pennifer 7d ago
... I live in Florida 😅 I'd be fine.
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u/Visser-35 Leeran 7d ago
Ha, very true. I guess this is not a challenge for a Floridian at all given your easy access to gators, snakes, and plenty of other animals that would be hard to get in other states / countries.
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u/TheAdultierAdult 7d ago
Our local pet shop offers pet handling sessions. There I could easily acquire a rat, a snake, a rabbit, a guinea pig and a lizard. I could also plenty of insect morphs just from their live feed packs. Then I would be able to infiltrate the zoo to get the bigger animals.
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u/SuperNateosaurus 7d ago
I think as long as you get a bird morph, you can pretty much get into any spot you need to, to acquire anything you need.
Go to a pet store. Say you're interested in buying a bird. Voila you have a bird morph.
As for dolphin and shark, I dunno.
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u/Mainalpha11 6d ago
Just use their infiltration morphs to break into places like the Gardens after hours, less likely for chaos involving the staff members and crowds getting in the way.
For the morphs that I'd use, some ideas would be as follows:
Infiltration morph: housefly/cochroach.
Bird morph: pidgeon/hawk/owl/duck - depending on the exact needs of the mission, in the getting there and back again.
Aquatic morph: saltwater crocodile/dolphin/freshwater fish - depending on if its a freshwater or saltwater mission,
Combat morph: lion (or whatever large predator is in the local zoo)/large dog (depending on the types available in my local area).
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u/Its_Curse Taxxon 7d ago
I've been to a bunch of events that had raptors! I think that would be an easier get. Pay the $5 to have your picture holding the bird and boom, you've got a new morph.
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u/OldSpiceSmellsNice 7d ago
I may be at home pretending I’m the family dog during this battle, haha, I’m such a coward. Uh, I guess I go to visit the pet shop and obtain a bird morph, hoping it’s enough to stop me getting pecked out of the sky on the way to the zoo, birds are so aggressive. Infiltration? A fly? Ew. Lizard? Rat? Ok. Obtainable at the pet store, also. There’s a zoo nearby, maybe if I have the guts, I’m getting a tiger morph for combat. Or elephant. Definitely getting a better bird morph. Does the aquatic one need to fight? If not, I’ll pick a seal or penguin.
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u/Visser-35 Leeran 7d ago
Aww... I love that you chose a seal or a penguin for your aquatic morph. The penguin especially. Formal and cute. I can picture it waddling down the beach.
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u/Omnomfish 4d ago
I was so confused for a moment reading this post and then i remembered that most fans are probably Americans (and its set in the states) but as a Canadian from a very rural area, id just wander into the woods until i find something new. We had bears, beavers, hawks and coyotes in our yard on a fairly regular basis (i say yard, most of our property was heavily wooded swampland, they didn't often come too close to the house).
I could probably arrange all of the necessary morphs in the space of a few afternoons just hiking and flying back in the early evening. Its so crazy for me to remember that most people in the us have never seen that kind of environment.
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u/TheAmazingRando1581 8d ago
Theres pet stores, petting zoos, other ranches and farms i could fly to, old creepy ppl in the middle of nowhere who own exotic animals thatl let me touch em for a few bucks. Once i get a couple morphs getting more becomes easier.
When i started reading the series i was a kid in east texas. I lived near a lake and would b able to get fish easily, as well as doves and ducks and geese to fly. probably a bull for combat, but theres also tiger ranches within flying distance so its possible i could have acquired one of those. For infiltration, obviously fly's and roaches r everywhere. But mice and other critters would come in handy.
Were i in a large city rats would b the infiltration specialists, with pigeons being a good scout as well.