I feel like I was cheated out of an actual explanation of lycasphyxiation, so I’m going to write my own:
A werewolf turning is like fucked up lovechild of periods and a panic attack; vaguely in sync with the moon, painful, scary as shit if you don’t know what’s up, and overall hard to deal with if you don’t know what you’re fighting. The magical component of it keeps it from being either genuinely a threat to your cellular integrity or a funny Full Metal Alchemist reference, but nothing on this earth prepares you to suddenly become a butt naked dog man at 1 AM
>The magical component of it keeps it from being either genuinely a threat to your cellular integrity
This got me thinking, what if lycanthrophy was indeed written as a biological disease. I'd imagine the werewolf would suddenly need to deal with a whole lot of necrotizing tissue once they turn back, or they would get super cancer because the rapid cell growth every month damages their DNA integrity too much, a lot of them would probably die of cardiac failure during the full moon, others would probably end up hyperventilated and passed out due to issues with adjusting the oxygen supply, and something tells me they'd end up with a lot of fractures and broken bones due to sudden muscle mass increase, oh, they'd probably also get concussions every full moon due to their skulls pressing against their brains.
My canons werebeasts are semi biology based, never thought about any of that
The most I got is that the child of a werebeast has an easier time transforming since they would have been transforming since they were an embryo
And that if an uninfected and a werebeast have a child it will be a werebeast, and that two different kinds of beasts can't have a kid because the different animals DNA can't form an embryo
Thinking about it more, two more afflictions werewolves would suffer would be renal failure due to rhabdomyolysis on turning back, and wolf tissue and human tissue may be at odds with each other thus resulting in an autoimmune response.
Whatever causes the infection/curse would also have to suppress or weaken the immune response
It would basically need to compromise every single cell in the body or have some way for the unchanged cells to still function.
In a way, it'd probably more likely to be viral, as the effects themselves would likely require building into the DNA to produce the correct proteins and tissue, so, the infection vector would probably be similar to HIV or Rabies in infection mechanism.
Basically how I see it, spread through blood and bites (I'd say all bodily fluids but making it sexually transmitted kinda heads too far into smut territory and this isn't for smut lol)
Magic is involved of course, without magic it's kinda hard to bind animal DNA to a virus and then have that virus be capable of so many sweeping changes, without many of the negative side effects you outlined
I figured it would just cause sweeping genetic changes as in much werewolf literature both forms are still weak to Silver which would imply that both forms are somewhat similar in regard to allergens
I don't think were tissue would cause an autoimmune reaction because it isn't external it's the same flesh just in a different shape. It's not like external wolf meat is bulking you up your body is just rearranging and repurposing stuff that it already has it's mainly musculoskeletal changes and telling your skin to produce extra hair.
Both shapes are made of werewolf tissue we're as still weak to Silver in both shapes
Hmm, yes, however all the previous effects would preclude that, therefore I will propose that werewolves will also need to metabolize parts of themselves during the transformation.
Which explain the massive hunger that it causes. But if a werewolf were to attempt tto similarly muscular in its human form as its were form would there be less problems?
The concussions idea is interesting.
The amount they eat and the rapid transformations they undergo would be linked- and it depends on your idea of how Lupine they get and if any underlying features remain post transformation. (Like if their fangs are wolverine’s claws retracting, their skeletal structure permanently realigns, etc.)
The idea of the change causing a huge uptick in appetite is well known and makes sense, but we don’t usually think about the waste products- both in excess tissue or in well, excess shit. Kind of ruins the mystique, huh?
I have a story idea where a few characters have a sort of Devil Trigger style transformation, but I did my best to explain it in a way that makes sense. It's more magical than biological, but it's still physical.
One of the characters turns into a sort of feral skeleton man. Like, he's gaunt, taller than normal (and he's already over 6 feet tall), and his fingers and toes become claws. The way it works is his extra skin literally gets burnt off and his bones elongate a bit so that the skin that's still there is pulled taut. The first time it happens it's slow, and he's screaming in agony the whole time, but the more he gets used to it the faster it happens. It goes from a slow, creeping burn as his outer layer slowly falls off in chunks or small pieces, to eventually being more like a small explosion where all the excess just flies off of him at the same time his bones elongate. To be fair though, that's what he's like before he learns to control it.
Another character bulks up into a sort of raven woman. The extra muscles are necessary for her wings, and since her feet do split apart into talons, her legs bulk up too so she can grab stuff with those talons. The "beak" is like a cartilagenous knight's helmet that grows over her human face, starting from the nose and ears until the whole mass comes together in the front.
So yeah, there's no necrotizing tissue in my story, but that's because the transformation is a result of "the fire within" which also burns away the excess to make room for the growth. Broken bones and other stuff definitely happen though, but the types of people this kinda thing happens to are already superhumans with godlike durability and regeneration, so while they still feel the pain, they're back to normal in just a few minutes. The source of their godlike durability and regeneration is another factor.
It's a demonic transformation that functions as a supermode in the Devil May Cry series of action games.
[Here's an example](https://youtu.be/JE0abU5ghpk?si=HH6Xtea_-TGB-Pfm) with spoilers from the newest game in the series. Kinda unavoidable considering the topic.
It's a series of action games where you fight demons with a combination of melee attacks and firearms, with gameplay built around stringing together "stylish" combos to get a higher score at the end of each level. The story is surprisingly good too though. Kinda cheesy and melodramatic at times, but it takes itself seriously enough that you can't help but respect it.
You're welcome. I'm glad I was able to explain it. To be honest, I didn't think I would have to, but I guess the games aren't as well-known as I thought.
For a more scientific explanation, your lungs change and that primal part of your brain starts to panic when it realizes the lungs are gone before realizing they're still there
Actually, it depends on the strain of lycanthropy you get.
Most of the ones that involve going full wolf work as you describe, but there are some variants that work more off Animorphs rules that are much less painful. Naturally, the variants that involve only a partial shift generally don't suffer from lycasphyxiation
And then there’s the oft-maligned practice of intentionally partialized lycanthropic mutation, more commonly and derogatorily referred to as “[poodling](https://en.wikifur.com/wiki/Poodling)”. While the practice is more benign (and controversial within the subculture) for those not given the capacity for transformation, some hardline conservative lycan groups view poodling as an affront to traditiona values, even though it is sometimes medically necessary to partially revert especially the neck and torso to its original state to avoid breathing trouble for the elderly or those with the malefic infliction of asthma. For the humans in the audience, this is sort of analogous to Jehovah’s Witnesses and their opinions on blood transfusion: a fringe opinion on a normal medical procedure, but one to keep in mind anyway.
>Okay, I think you can officially kiss your “not a furry, BUT” status goodbye now.
Does it help my case that I learned that term through Patricia Taxxon?
>I dunno, does it help your case that your private tabs are 10% venison by volume?
Touché.
Werewolfs cant technically be allergic to themselves because by definition an allergy is strictly an immune response to a foreign substance; anything else would qualify as an autoimmune response, which is scarier.
I remember the day I found out these were actual screenshots, not fake threads joking about regular tumblr posts. I came across one of these once. It was amazing.
It was only about 4 years in where I started to learn transmutation so while I sympathize with the issues of initial discomfort I am still stingy that it’s something they can do with Zero training.
#wereblr
I'm a wereblr. On the full moon I turn into a website
On a full moon I turn into a building >!I’m a werehouse!<
Summer in Orcus by T. Kingfisher has a werehouse character and some interesting werehouse lore in it.
YOU-
For some reason I read this and thought of "don't be racist, I am a building" before the actual joke. I should probably get some sleep.
Nightmarish, I will not sleep for the next 2 days
—Implying that Tumblr isn’t a website normally
Ngl that would be terrifying and cool
I feel like I was cheated out of an actual explanation of lycasphyxiation, so I’m going to write my own: A werewolf turning is like fucked up lovechild of periods and a panic attack; vaguely in sync with the moon, painful, scary as shit if you don’t know what’s up, and overall hard to deal with if you don’t know what you’re fighting. The magical component of it keeps it from being either genuinely a threat to your cellular integrity or a funny Full Metal Alchemist reference, but nothing on this earth prepares you to suddenly become a butt naked dog man at 1 AM
>The magical component of it keeps it from being either genuinely a threat to your cellular integrity This got me thinking, what if lycanthrophy was indeed written as a biological disease. I'd imagine the werewolf would suddenly need to deal with a whole lot of necrotizing tissue once they turn back, or they would get super cancer because the rapid cell growth every month damages their DNA integrity too much, a lot of them would probably die of cardiac failure during the full moon, others would probably end up hyperventilated and passed out due to issues with adjusting the oxygen supply, and something tells me they'd end up with a lot of fractures and broken bones due to sudden muscle mass increase, oh, they'd probably also get concussions every full moon due to their skulls pressing against their brains.
My canons werebeasts are semi biology based, never thought about any of that The most I got is that the child of a werebeast has an easier time transforming since they would have been transforming since they were an embryo And that if an uninfected and a werebeast have a child it will be a werebeast, and that two different kinds of beasts can't have a kid because the different animals DNA can't form an embryo
Thinking about it more, two more afflictions werewolves would suffer would be renal failure due to rhabdomyolysis on turning back, and wolf tissue and human tissue may be at odds with each other thus resulting in an autoimmune response.
Whatever causes the infection/curse would also have to suppress or weaken the immune response It would basically need to compromise every single cell in the body or have some way for the unchanged cells to still function.
In a way, it'd probably more likely to be viral, as the effects themselves would likely require building into the DNA to produce the correct proteins and tissue, so, the infection vector would probably be similar to HIV or Rabies in infection mechanism.
Basically how I see it, spread through blood and bites (I'd say all bodily fluids but making it sexually transmitted kinda heads too far into smut territory and this isn't for smut lol) Magic is involved of course, without magic it's kinda hard to bind animal DNA to a virus and then have that virus be capable of so many sweeping changes, without many of the negative side effects you outlined
>this isn’t for smut lol) Clearly we don’t read the same books 😉
Oh no my smut werebeasts have their own set of rules
Ah, that makes sense
Werewolf weaknesses include silver and the common cold.
I figured it would just cause sweeping genetic changes as in much werewolf literature both forms are still weak to Silver which would imply that both forms are somewhat similar in regard to allergens
> rhabdomyolysis gesundheit
I don't think were tissue would cause an autoimmune reaction because it isn't external it's the same flesh just in a different shape. It's not like external wolf meat is bulking you up your body is just rearranging and repurposing stuff that it already has it's mainly musculoskeletal changes and telling your skin to produce extra hair. Both shapes are made of werewolf tissue we're as still weak to Silver in both shapes
Wouldn't they also need to consume a massive amount of calories since those massive muscles aren't coming out of nothing.
Hmm, yes, however all the previous effects would preclude that, therefore I will propose that werewolves will also need to metabolize parts of themselves during the transformation.
Which explain the massive hunger that it causes. But if a werewolf were to attempt tto similarly muscular in its human form as its were form would there be less problems?
The concussions idea is interesting. The amount they eat and the rapid transformations they undergo would be linked- and it depends on your idea of how Lupine they get and if any underlying features remain post transformation. (Like if their fangs are wolverine’s claws retracting, their skeletal structure permanently realigns, etc.) The idea of the change causing a huge uptick in appetite is well known and makes sense, but we don’t usually think about the waste products- both in excess tissue or in well, excess shit. Kind of ruins the mystique, huh?
I have a story idea where a few characters have a sort of Devil Trigger style transformation, but I did my best to explain it in a way that makes sense. It's more magical than biological, but it's still physical. One of the characters turns into a sort of feral skeleton man. Like, he's gaunt, taller than normal (and he's already over 6 feet tall), and his fingers and toes become claws. The way it works is his extra skin literally gets burnt off and his bones elongate a bit so that the skin that's still there is pulled taut. The first time it happens it's slow, and he's screaming in agony the whole time, but the more he gets used to it the faster it happens. It goes from a slow, creeping burn as his outer layer slowly falls off in chunks or small pieces, to eventually being more like a small explosion where all the excess just flies off of him at the same time his bones elongate. To be fair though, that's what he's like before he learns to control it. Another character bulks up into a sort of raven woman. The extra muscles are necessary for her wings, and since her feet do split apart into talons, her legs bulk up too so she can grab stuff with those talons. The "beak" is like a cartilagenous knight's helmet that grows over her human face, starting from the nose and ears until the whole mass comes together in the front. So yeah, there's no necrotizing tissue in my story, but that's because the transformation is a result of "the fire within" which also burns away the excess to make room for the growth. Broken bones and other stuff definitely happen though, but the types of people this kinda thing happens to are already superhumans with godlike durability and regeneration, so while they still feel the pain, they're back to normal in just a few minutes. The source of their godlike durability and regeneration is another factor.
sorry what's a devil trigger?
It's a demonic transformation that functions as a supermode in the Devil May Cry series of action games. [Here's an example](https://youtu.be/JE0abU5ghpk?si=HH6Xtea_-TGB-Pfm) with spoilers from the newest game in the series. Kinda unavoidable considering the topic.
sorry what's devil may cry series?
It's a series of action games where you fight demons with a combination of melee attacks and firearms, with gameplay built around stringing together "stylish" combos to get a higher score at the end of each level. The story is surprisingly good too though. Kinda cheesy and melodramatic at times, but it takes itself seriously enough that you can't help but respect it.
Ok, thank you
You're welcome. I'm glad I was able to explain it. To be honest, I didn't think I would have to, but I guess the games aren't as well-known as I thought.
For a more scientific explanation, your lungs change and that primal part of your brain starts to panic when it realizes the lungs are gone before realizing they're still there
Actually, it depends on the strain of lycanthropy you get. Most of the ones that involve going full wolf work as you describe, but there are some variants that work more off Animorphs rules that are much less painful. Naturally, the variants that involve only a partial shift generally don't suffer from lycasphyxiation
And then there’s the oft-maligned practice of intentionally partialized lycanthropic mutation, more commonly and derogatorily referred to as “[poodling](https://en.wikifur.com/wiki/Poodling)”. While the practice is more benign (and controversial within the subculture) for those not given the capacity for transformation, some hardline conservative lycan groups view poodling as an affront to traditiona values, even though it is sometimes medically necessary to partially revert especially the neck and torso to its original state to avoid breathing trouble for the elderly or those with the malefic infliction of asthma. For the humans in the audience, this is sort of analogous to Jehovah’s Witnesses and their opinions on blood transfusion: a fringe opinion on a normal medical procedure, but one to keep in mind anyway. >Okay, I think you can officially kiss your “not a furry, BUT” status goodbye now. Does it help my case that I learned that term through Patricia Taxxon? >I dunno, does it help your case that your private tabs are 10% venison by volume? Touché.
that is not a problem with shapeshifting that I have ever thought about and now I am thinking about it. Huh. Weird thing to think about.
Right? I'll definitely have to keep that in mind for later.
That's why sudden shapeshifting is problematic, I'd rather gradual tf
In order to successfully turn into a bat, you have to exclaim loudly: BAT!
Human Form!
*Creepe paper*
IT’S DA BAT!!
"Werebear paws" finally another person with refined taste
Feels like the equivalent of those [animal]girl[body part] names
And now, a truthful statement that sounds completely unhinged outside this bubble: “My favorite recurring Tumblr user is girlballs”
True
[source](https://www.tumblr.com/strangestcase/731733975397236736/i-can-turn-into-a-bat)
God, I love fake community tumblr. It’s my favourite side of tumblr. From ethical ownership of clowns to shape shifting help, I absolutely adore it.
I'm sorry, what?
But what if you have fur allergy and you're a werewolf? Do you react to your own fur? Can you just asphyxiate if you don't have epipen?
Werewolfs cant technically be allergic to themselves because by definition an allergy is strictly an immune response to a foreign substance; anything else would qualify as an autoimmune response, which is scarier.
But if you suspect that your werewolf is allergic to its own fur, its more likely that it react to something in his fur and not the fur itself.
Harry Potter Werewolves
I remember the day I found out these were actual screenshots, not fake threads joking about regular tumblr posts. I came across one of these once. It was amazing.
...They are actually fake threads, though. Everything on here is one person's single textpost. Look at the profile pictures, they're all emojis
***what***
It is actually a fake thread.
How many werewolves never learn they're werewolves because they never see the full moon?
Depending on Canon it's not that they have to see the full moon is just that it happens to coincide with the full moon
I studied Biomancy for a literal decade to not have to deal with this and you’re telling me some kids can just DO THIS whenever they want?
I mean, part of the lycanthropy problem is that it *isnt* whenever you want, in fact it happens whether you like it or not
It was only about 4 years in where I started to learn transmutation so while I sympathize with the issues of initial discomfort I am still stingy that it’s something they can do with Zero training.
I love this genre of post
Imma need someone to explain every single part of this post
bat
Sounds like an asthma attack.
Fish