Decided to make an infiltration unit. I just want the Reavers as I designed them too much to cut away so much of their appearance to make them infiltrators, so I'm going to design a dedicated infiltration unit now.
Design: Ordinary Father Hugh-Mann
So you know the mimic octopus, that Earth cephalopod which alters its color, texture, and posture to replicate other Earth sea creatures? Well the Hugh-Manns(name subject to change) are those, but altered and improved for our purposes. Physically its a mimic octopus scaled up greatly, with an extra set of eyes on its head that match the position of human eyes when it is disguised, its tentacles all split into 3 smaller tentacles a few inches from the tip allowing it to form a facsimile of fingers, but they don't look convincing without gloves, it braids two tentacles around eachother to form each individual limb, so they don't look convincing when not covered either. It has several more key differences from the norm of mimic octopi.
First, it is somewhat more intelligent, equal to sectoids in general intelligence, but with extra enhancements dedicated to social interaction and language, it still struggles to manage "slang" however. Second, its changes are FAR more precise, it can pretty much perfectly mimic human skin and hair colors in addition to the normal ability to mimic the color of the ground around it, and can use its changes to replicate a human face quite accurately, though not as accurately as it can replicate an inanimate object, leaving it somewhat in the "uncanny valley" as humans call it, main problem is it can only do one expression at a time, bigger changes like for talking or going from open smile to large frown are beyond it, but the smaller, subtler ones are within its capacity. Third, it has vocal chords, and can speak relatively well, albeit rather monotone.
Its physical strength is above human levels, however its lack of bones make carrying heavy objects very hard(hauling along the ground works though). It can hold objects and is capable of precise manipulation on the level of any human.
In combat meanwhile, it can shed its disguise(basically just slipping out of its clothes), in such a state, it is effectively a giant mimic octopus with guns, it can technically hold and wield a gun with each tentacle, but needs to use two at a time to keep them steady for aiming and three at once to stop recoil, it can use its unarmed tentacles both for climbing with its suction cups and for using them to grab enemies in a tight grip and rip their weapons from their hands, and its camouflage lets it blend in effortlessly with the color and texture of its surroundings.
Typically wears a generic black suit outfit, and are equipped with a plasma pistol in addition to their primary weapon(even if said weapon is a plasma pistol)
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Topic: Ethereals : XCOM Arms Race (Read 65958 times)