limitations on Biomancer Armor recipients

[Axelmania]

So I am in "minion overlord" mindset mode and taking a look at the Wood/Chitin armors on page 69 of WB6 (South America) and wondering just how flexible the "recipient" category of this could be.

For example, could I put this on a dolphin? A horse? A dog? A pet gerbil?

Obviously it is bonded to fit a single recipient and can't be transferred between others, but are there possibly things you can't give this to?

The closest thing to an implication of a restriction that I can see is a parenthesized "more for larger humanoids" which might be taken to mean that you need to be "humanoid" in shape to use this stuff. Otherwise you'd think it'd say "larger beings" who would need more than either 1 large or several medium trees.

"Himself or another character" ... I believe that includes NPCs but then I wonder, do animals always count as NPCs?

"To put the armor back on, its owner picks it up and it flows back on" does beg the question, can all creatures pick it up? Does it have to be with your hands, or could you pick it up with your mouth or your hooves/paws?

What if something like a gerbil was too weak to lift it? I don't even know how much the "thorny mound" would actually weigh. I don't know what Chitin armor would turn into... there's actually no note about being able to remove it on the end of its description (pg 70) so maybe you can't take off chitin armor like you can wood armor?

The chitin armor also mentions that thrashing around or fleeing while the spell is in progress ruines the spell and wastes the PPE, preventing it from being used unless you can relax (or perhaps knock unconscious) an animal companion you want to benefit from it.

The wood armor doesn't actually mention that, though "those with claustrophobia cannot endure the ritual" sort of implies it would be similarly vulnerable to disruption... although you're only blind/oblivious for 1-4 minutes rather than 20 minutes, so perhaps if you made a HF roll like with chitin it should be less than 10? That or roll 10 once per minute the ritual takes?

[Orin J.]

off the top of my head i'd assume that the armor requires a willingness to accept the armor, which requires awareness. that lets most animals out of getting it. i'd assume it also has to be at least man-sized, since your gerbil wouldn't be getting a 70 MDC armor for its half a pound body so much as a tiny biomanced biorobot at that point. by the same stick, i take it that if the ritual can be failed by panicking, any non-sentient being will fail it automatically as it can't understand why it's getting swarmed and will invariably defend itself

human shaped is kind f harder for me to nail down here. how human-shaped does it need to be? could i give the TMNT some radical tree armor for a special mission into dinosaur world? an unusually self-aware golem? Mr. peanut? (there's a crossover i don't think we need but still).

putting the armor on is at least a bit easier for me to accept. it's a living magical armor that flows on/off and is bonded to a single person, and the norm for that situation is the magical gear can sense what its owner wants to a limited aspect through the bond so you just have to touch it and will the armor to hop on. it's implied, but not stated outright that's the deal so i don't see any reason to get pedantic over it. by the same margin, i assume you can ALSO will the chitin armor off, although it might not fall into a heap so much as open and then fold in on itself like a pile of plate armor that isn't being held up properly.
(Edit: misspelled some things critically)

[kaid]

It should be also noted that they actually do have bio barding for the various warmounts which is basically a slightly more simple version of the other bio armors.

[Axelmania]

off the top of my head i'd assume that the armor requires a willingness to accept the armor, which requires awareness. that lets most animals out of getting it.

How would you define awareness? Anyway I don't see where it requires willingness. Apparently struggling wrecks the ritual but I can't see anything preventing you from using Induce Sleep on some coward and then ritualling them while they're snoring.

i'd assume it also has to be at least man-sized, since your gerbil wouldn't be getting a 70 MDC armor for its half a pound body so much as a tiny biomanced biorobot at that point.

It's not like the bigger armors get more MDC though, so why should the smaller ones get less? Whether it's a 4ft dwarf or 7ft elf or 11ft ogre doesn't seem to influence that (or seaweed armor from Underseas)

by the same stick, i take it that if the ritual can be failed by panicking, any non-sentient being will fail it automatically as it can't understand why it's getting swarmed and will invariably defend itself

You can train animals to be calmed and reassured though, and some animals might have higher HF bonuses than some humans.

i assume you can ALSO will the chitin armor off

The idea that it can't be taken off is also kind of cool though. If remoable though... should it take much longer to don though, much like it takes longer to create?

[VR Dragon]

heh check out the Lemuria book , crab armor, put that on a Zembahk. Fun earthworm jim.