[Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Horizontal and Semi-Upright

[Plane]

A worthy mention for this thread could be "Restricted Manipulators" from page 81 of GURPS Dragons, since that is forbidden to Horizontal or Semi-Upright creatures. Can't find it in Dungeon Fantasy Monsters 4: Dragons.

[Vaevictis Asmadi]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

That's probably specific to the character. Elephants have an arm and the disad (both in Bio-Tech and in Basic Set), as do dragons and sphinxes (though with Bad Grip). Conversely, centaurs with their torsos being positioned as high as a rider, lack the Horizontal trait.

I'm certain that the elephant is wrong. C31R07 is a standard centauroid, except for the shapeshifting. An elephant is actually a one-armed centauroid, but that isn't obvious to every writer. The authors probably just put Horizontal or Quadruped on them without realizing it doesn't belong.

In the original context, in Uplift, centauroid and horizontal are explicitly different postures. Horizontal and semi-upright creatures have to be genetically engineered to change their posture, before they can use their hands efficiently. Centauroid creatures don't need any changes to posture, because their hands are never used as feet.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Vaevictis Asmadi

I'm certain that the elephant is wrong. C31R07 is a standard centauroid, except for the shapeshifting. An elephant is actually a one-armed centauroid, but that isn't obvious to every writer. The authors probably just put Horizontal or Quadruped on them without realizing it doesn't belong.

In the original context, in Uplift, centauroid and horizontal are explicitly different postures. Horizontal and semi-upright creatures have to be genetically engineered to change their posture, before they can use their hands efficiently. Centauroid creatures don't need any changes to posture, because their hands are never used as feet.

I wouldn't call an elephant centauroid - it has a very horizontal posture where the head is level with the torso, while centaur heads are placed on the very top of a vertical torso, and the arms of a centaur are also attached to the top half of the vertical part of the torso.

[Vaevictis Asmadi]

Elephants are shaped like a Horizontal animal, yes, but the point of Horizontal isn't that you're roughly dog-shaped. It's meant to be generic enough to handle bizarre space aliens.

The point of Horizontal, the actual mechanical effect, is that your closest equivalent to hands are actually your front feet, and you have nothing better as manipulators. That isn't accurate for elephants, any more than for centaurs and C31R07. An elephant easily uses its trunk while walking or running, which isn't allowed for a Horizontal animal.


Suppose that a dog, a chimp, and an elephant each had hand(s) as dextrous as an average human's. Suppose you gave each one a sword shaped for their grip.

The dog, Horizontal, has to sit up uncomfortably on its haunches to use the sword.
The chimp, Semi-Upright, can walk slowly and awkwardly while using the sword.
The elephant simply runs at you with a sword, at its full speed, unimpeded. It doesn't have to sacrifice a leg to use its hand.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Also elephants front feet would make very bad manipulators.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Vaevictis Asmadi

Elephants are shaped like a Horizontal animal, yes, but the point of Horizontal isn't that you're roughly dog-shaped. It's meant to be generic enough to handle bizarre space aliens.

The point of Horizontal, the actual mechanical effect, is that your closest equivalent to hands are actually your front feet, and you have nothing better as manipulators. That isn't accurate for elephants, any more than for centaurs and C31R07. An elephant easily uses its trunk while walking or running, which is in't allowed for a Horizontal animal.

Horizontal seems to be allowed for both creatures with and without hands (i.e. No Fine Manipulators):

Originally Posted by B139

You can use one hand
(if you have hands) while standing on
your other limbs

An elephant in fact has one 'hand' and can use it while standing on its other limbs, and can carry an item in it while walking. It suffers a penalty to kicks unless its feet get modified with claws. It takes up approximately twice the hexes its SM would indicate. It probably can't stand on its hind legs at all (except maybe a minority trick-trained circus performers), and definitely can't use its normal Move without using the Extra Legs.

Originally Posted by Vaevictis Asmadi

Suppose that a dog, a chimp, and an elephant each had hand(s) as dextrous as an average human's. Suppose you gave each one a sword shaped for their grip.

The dog, Horizontal, has to sit up uncomfortably on its haunches to use the sword.
The chimp, Semi-Upright, can walk slowly and awkwardly while using the sword.
The elephant simply runs at you with a sword, at its full speed, unimpeded. It doesn't have to sacrifice a leg to use its hand.

There's a problem with comparing those builds: in addition to Horizontal, you describe differences that come from other traits, notably Foot Manipulators for your hand-given dog, and your chimp doesn't have Extra Legs. So you're not comparing having and lacking Horizontal, you're comparing having Horizontal and those other traits, where the latter carry the brunt of the manipulative differences.

[Vaevictis Asmadi]

No, I am reading the text of Horizontal: "You can use one hand (if you have hands) while standing on your other limbs, or two hands while sitting on your haunches; in both cases, your ground Move is 0 while doing so. You can carry but not use an object in one hand if moving at half Move."

Likewise the text of Semi-Upright restricts Move to 60% while using any forelimbs like hands.

Foot manipulators is a modifier for Extra Arms, not Extra Legs. Chimps and elephants don't have Extra Arms.


An elephant is not reduced to half Move or Move 0 while using its trunk. It is not unable to use items held in its trunk. Its trunk is not a leg.


Horizontal is 4 separate effects bundled together.

1. You can't use your hands/forepaws at all without lowering your move to 1/2 or 0. (Regardless of how dextrous they are.)
2. You kick weakly (unless you have non-hoof Claws)
3. You take up 2 hexes at SM 0
4. You use quadruped hit locations

2-4 are true for elephants, but 1 isn't. Taking up hexes seems like a feature by itself, however, since even SM itself is a feature. Hit locations also should be a feature. The kicking thing is separate and does probably apply to elephants.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Vaevictis Asmadi

An elephant is not reduced to half Move or Move 0 while using its trunk. It is not unable to use items held in its trunk. Its trunk is not a leg.


Horizontal is 4 separate effects bundled together.

1. You can't use your hands/forepaws at all without lowering your move to 1/2 or 0. (Regardless of how dextrous they are.)
2. You kick weakly (unless you have non-hoof Claws)
3. You take up 2 hexes at SM 0
4. You use quadruped hit locations

2-4 are true for elephants, but 1 isn't. Taking up hexes seems like a feature by itself, however, since even SM itself is a feature. Hit locations also should be a feature. The kicking thing is separate and does probably apply to elephants.

Point is more nuanced. You're right that it isn't a perfect match.

• "You can use one hand (if you have hands) while standing on your other limbs" - an elephant has a hand and can use it while standing on other limbs, so this is true.
• " or two hands while sitting on your haunches" - an elephant only has one hand, so there's no contradiction; in fact most elephants probably can't sit on haunches at all.
• "You have a horizontal posture, like a cat" - it is so.
• "You can stand on your hind legs for short periods, but find this very uncomfortable" - probably true.
• "in both cases, your ground Move is 0 while doing so" and "You can carry but not use an object in one hand if moving at half Move." - I suppose an elephant can use an item held in hand while walking at half move; probably can't do so while running at full Move. Probably should be able to carry while running at full Move. So yeah, this is the only spot with serious mismatches, and even those are only a small subset of things Horizontal does.

Originally Posted by Vaevictis Asmadi

Foot manipulators is a modifier for Extra Arms, not Extra Legs. Chimps and elephants don't have Extra Arms.

Originally Posted by B53

Modifying Beings With
One or Two Arms
Beings with one or two arms can
use the special modifiers above. Point
cost is equal to 1/10 the percentile
modifier per affected arm. Thus,
enhancements become advantages
and limitations become disadvan-
tages.

I was referring of applying the Foot Manipulators limitation to a creature's existing arms, not to Extra Arms.

[roguebfl]

The animals that come to mind for me are Racoons and Otters.

[Vaevictis Asmadi]

Elephants are not at all limited in how fast they can move while using their trunks. Their trunks are not legs. They are not categorically unable to use objects held in their trunks. It's inappropriate to give them a disadvantage whose primary effect is completely inapplicable, just to give them a hex size that counts as nothing more than a feature by itself. They should just have a feature (takes up X hexes). That feature is not worth -10 points.

Weak kicking is also not worth -10 points by itself. Cannot Kick is only -5. An elephant that gets -1 damage per kick die should have at most a -3 to -4 point disadvantage Weak Kick. A ST 45 elephant would kick with 5d thr, so that's -5 points of damage. Since it's not as bad as Cannot Kick, it should not be worth more than -4 points.




Foot Manipulators on a chimp is double-dipping. They're already Semi-Upright. Foot Manipulators are appropriate for animals like ravens, which are fully upright.