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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives

 Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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 Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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ShapeDiesShifterSurvives
 Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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Some people can shapeshift. Usually this is voluntary, but not always. Sometimes people die. And sometimes, people die while shapeshifted. What happens next depends on the logic of the shapeshifting ability — in the case of this trope, it's only the shapeshifted body that dies, and the shapeshifter is simply forced back to normal. The setting may contain ways to get around this.
If they can't change back, it's also Shapeshifter Mode Lock.
Can be the result of a Transferred Transformation. Related to Multiple Life Bars, Body Armor As Hitpoints and Clipped-Wing Angel. For unwillingly transformed people, Beat the Curse Out of Him often applies. Contrast This Was His True Form, where dying entirely reverts a shapeshifted body. Compare Shapeshifting Heals Wounds.
 Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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2023-11-26T09:46:26Z
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2023-11-26T09:46:26Z
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In Ben 10: Protector of Earth if Ben suffers too much damage in alien form, he will revert to human form and must dodge enemy blows while waiting for the Omnitrix to recharge.
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In Nethack, running out of HP while polymorphed will force you back into your natural form... unless you're wearing an amulet of unchanging, in which case you're stuck and you die. Dying any other way will also kill you for real.
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The Headhunter in Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow transforms by putting on heads from its collection on the walls. Should Soma deal enough damage to kill its current body, it simply grabs another head and transforms again (gaining a new set of abilities in the process), up until Soma kills it in a reptilian form (which may have been its natural state).
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Ladybug & Cat Noir: The Movie: The gargoyle villain that serves as the first villain Ladybug and Cat Noir fight ends up deakumatizing after being run over by a train. Once the smoke dissipates, the man who was the base of the gargoyle is shown to be unharmed, if a little bit disoriented.
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In HeartCatch Pretty Cure! and HappinessCharge Pretty Cure!, the Precures' Transformation Sequence begins with an intermediate form which has their civilian appearance, but unbound hair and a simple gown made out of light. If they take severe damage while transformed, they will revert to this state rather than completely detransforming.
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In Alien Force, Chromastone is shattered by Vilgax, but the Omnitrix regenerates Diamondhead out of itself to save Ben's life.
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Ayakashi Triangle: Matsuri seemingly dies when Sosuke eats away his Life Energy. With appropriate timing, Matsuri returns to the fight, and has changed from his female form to his original male one. Shirogane explains the technique displaces Matsuri's energy with his own to maintain the transformation. Sosuke actually ate Shirogane's energy, temporarily reverting the transformation, and letting Matsuri's energy return and revive him shortly after. (This presumably wouldn't provide any protection from a regular injury.)
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In Cave Story, defeating Balrog when he has been transformed into Balfrog by Misery simply returns him to his natural form.
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This causes some embarrassment in Campaign Three when the City Guards Fearne is spying on in rat form step on her, causing her to revert in front of them.
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In Breath of Fire III, if Ryu drops to 0 HP in one of his dragon forms, he returns to however much HP he had before entering it.
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Dragons in Elcenia that die while shapeshifted lose access to that form and immediately shift back to dragon shape. This forced shift can be dangerous in itself, if their location is inconvenient — Kaylo's parents died when a scoot killed their assumed form while they were standing under a stone bridge. Death by starvation, channeling sting, or a spell that explicitly kills its target will also permanently kill a dragon without even changing them back.
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In Cassette Beasts, humans fight the monsters of New Wirral by using cassette tapes to record and assume monster forms. Reducing a tape to 0 HP forces its user to revert to their natural form, but they can switch to a new tape after the current turn, and broken tapes can later be fixed. However, any excess damage that wasn't absorbed by the tape carries over — it's possible to defeat human opponents outright (or be knocked out yourself) by dealing enough overkill damage.
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Kid Chameleon reverts to his normal, powerless self if he runs out of HP while wearing a helmet.
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Ben 10: The Omnitrix has a feature that allows Ben to survive by rapidly changing to a different form if he's killed while in alien form. As a rule, Ben loses access to the form he was killed in until he gets a new DNA sample to restore it.
In Alien Force, Chromastone is shattered by Vilgax, but the Omnitrix regenerates Diamondhead out of itself to save Ben's life.
In Ultimate Alien, Ben as Way Big gets hit by a blast of accelerated time from Eon. Way Big rapidly ages into a pile of dust, with Ben sitting unharmed in the center. Shortly afterward, Ultimate Swampfire gets killed in the same way.
In another Ultimate Alien example, one of Charmcaster's magic rituals overloads Chromastone ability to absorb it, and he promptly disintegrates. Ben falls to the floor as a human... and then Charmcaster steals his soul.
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In Ultimate Alien, Ben as Way Big gets hit by a blast of accelerated time from Eon. Way Big rapidly ages into a pile of dust, with Ben sitting unharmed in the center. Shortly afterward, Ultimate Swampfire gets killed in the same way.
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Super Sentai, and its American adaptation Power Rangers: Normally, a Sentai/Ranger who takes overwhelming damage will detransform back to their civilian identity. However, there will sometimes be climactic fights where a character manages to stay in their transformed form through Heroic Willpower, instead suffering helmet damage which exposes part of their face. Holds true for sister franchise Kamen Rider as well.
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Critical Role: As a Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition Actual Play, polymorph magic provides a new pool of Hit Points for the new form; lethal damage ends the spell and any extra damage rolls over to the original form.
Exploited in Campaign Two when a Wild Magic surge transforms Caleb into a sheep. While the others are mulling over what to do, Caduceus kills the sheep with a blow from his quarterstaff, restoring Caleb.
This causes some embarrassment in Campaign Three when the City Guards Fearne is spying on in rat form step on her, causing her to revert in front of them.
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The Nekropolis Archives: Darklord Amon is a shapeshifter with powers far beyond any of the other Lykes in the city, not only allowing him mastery of enough shapes to make him Perpetually Protean in conversation, but virtual invincibility: killing him only results in his current shape being cast off like snakeskin and turning to dust. As such, when Matt and Devona find themselves being stalked by Amon across the Wildwood, they initially think that they're being attacked by multiple Lykes until they notice the uncharacteristic disintegration, and quickly realize that Amon's doing this just so he can exhaust Matt's supply of silver bullets before moving in for the kill.
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Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition: Polymorph spells and Druids' Animorphism give the target the Hit Points of their new form; they revert if dropped to zero HP, but any extra damage is transferred to their original form (known as the "onion" strategy in fanspeak). A few instant-death effects, like the spell Disintegrate, kill a polymorphed target outright.
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To Prevent World Peace: Magical girls who die while transformed revert to normal and lose their transformation powers permanently. Born mages view this as cheating.
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Wild Cards: Captain Tripps is an ace who's power is that he transforms into someone with different powers based on which drugs he takes. In a fight with aliens, the form that he'd taken got killed (meaning he could never again become that particular form), which sent him into a deep depression until one of his friends forcibly shot him up with something to transform him into another one of his personas who was able to talk himself into wanting to live again.
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In Teen Wolf, Ethan and Aiden are alpha twin werewolves with a "merged" form that makes them into one exceptionally large and powerful werewolf. The true Big Bad of Season 3 snaps their neck in their combined form, but both twins survive this, losing their Alpha and "merging" powers in the process.
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Magician Lord: Elta gains a second HP meter when he takes on one of his alternate forms; emptying this one will revert him to his base shape.
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Prey: While Morgan is damaged normally using the basic Mimic Matter ability, if they use the advanced versions to mimic a turret or an Operator, they are rendered immune to direct damage while transformed, instead being forced out of their transformation when their machine form takes enough hits.
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The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom: The Bubbul Frogs found in the various caves can be attacked and defeated for their Bubbul Gems. Rather than dying, though, the Bubbul Frogs will instead abandon that form (along with the Gems) and revert into the smaller Blupees.
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Super Smash Bros.: Due to a bug in Brawl and For 3DS/Wii U's Stamina matches, characters with a transformation for a Final Smash who run out of HP in that state will revert back to normal and be able to keep fighting, though they'll be defeated for real if they touch even a non-damaging hitbox in this state. Pictured here.
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The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

 Pretty Cure / int_881136a1
type
Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Kamen Rider (Franchise) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Super Sentai (Franchise) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Ayakashi Triangle (Manga) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition (Tabletop Game) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Cassette Beasts (Video Game) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Pokémon Unbound (Video Game) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Warcraft (Video Game) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Critical Role: Campaign Three (Web Video) / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives
 Ladybug & Cat Noir: The Movie / int_881136a1
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Shape Dies, Shifter Survives