The next Beast / Elemental / Giant / Shapechanger type switch?


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


Back in the days :P, we had the Beast, Elemental, Giant and Shapechanger types. Beast-typed creatures became either Animals or Magical Beasts, Elemental-typed creatures became Outsiders, Giant-typed creatures became Humanoids and Shapechanger-typed creatures became... pretty much any type the base creature would be. These changes actually made sense, without any problem from my part. For instance, a Giant is a TALL "human", just like an Elemental comes from another plane.

That got me thinking: what type(s) should be switched in a later revision?

Y'know, the Animal and Vermin types really got me confused. Let me explain: most vermins are invertebrates, like insects and crustaceans. However, cephalopds (octopi and squids) are classified as Animals, which regroup the usual 5 vertebrate categories (mammals, birds, fishes, reptiles and amphibians); cephalopods are molluscs, part of the invertebrate group. This could easily be merged into one Animal type, but be divided into "vertebrate" and "invertebrate" subtypes. Beside, aren't you a bit tired that vermins get left out in favor of animals :P ? By combining them, everything wins XD.

On another note, the Aberration type... is weird... What is making them this unique to have its own type? An aboleth or naga could be a Magical Beast, a drider or sinspawn could a Monstrous Humanoid and several others could be typed as Outsiders, if the Far Realms are mentioned. According to the Bestiary, "An aberration has a bizarre anatomy, strange abilities, an alien mindset, or any combination of the three." That's... pretty vague for a typing, don't you think? Doesn't a Blink Dog (Magical Beast) count as having "strange abilities" or doesn't a Gray (Humanoid) count as having "an alien mindset"? So yeah, I feel like the Aberration type could be easily replaced by other typings AND a subtype (Aberration).

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