Leapfrog

Boing.

Leapfrog allows mutants to leap up and down climbs and across distances at speed, and move at higher speed in general.

Leapfrog is a movement mutation. Its upgrade is Flight, and taking Leapfrog will bar characters from taking Phaser, Clairvoyance and their associated upgrades.

Location

Located in the aerie near the summit of Mt. Fisty. If you can land a plane on Fisty, the mutation is at the same level as that landing spot. Fisty itself is inhabited with dangerous thunderbirds, however, and the Skydock's flak guards the Ashen Valley sky tile just before Fisty, so pilots must be quick to outrun the cannons.

Effects

Leapfrog has the following effects:

   Passive: +1 dodge
   Passive: -30 arm/hand/nose/jaw break resistance
   Passive: +80 broken leg resistance
   Passive: -1-1 beat soak
   Passive: Increased movement speed
   leap command: leap up/down climbs, or multiple tiles in any direction.
   Leaper legs can be butchered from corpse (a tasty snack)

Advantages

• Bypass most climbs. Leapfrogs can just leap over most climbs, which is much faster than climbing, and is especially useful for builds that don't naturally have good climb skill. Technically it's possible to do this with crafted aperture boots, but those are rare and require atomicells.
• +1 Dodge. Dodge is an extremely powerful skill, so this is a high-value buff. This also means that Leapfrog is the only movement mutation in the game that buffs a non-focus combat stat.
• Faster movement speed. The bonus is significant, and helps with both evading and chasing in PvP, while speeding up all ground movement in general.
• Ability to leap over several tiles. Leaping in any direction will very quickly move over several tiles, giving mobs and hunters no time to aggro the leaping mutant (much like a skateboard).
• Stupid leap tricks. Leaping in a direction also entirely bypasses travelling tiles and obstructive NPCs; this is usually faster than dealing with either of these, as long as one is willing to accept the damage from the inevitable bonk afterwards.
• Requires no focus. Every other movement mutation in the game requires at least a little focus. Leapfrog requires only Reflexes, which most builds have loads of, and the Flight upgrade also requires no focus. This makes Leapfrog a great choice for any build that has naturally poor focus.
• Soda safeword. If a soda machine falls on top of a particularly inept Leapfrog mutant, they have the ability of leaping out from under it.
• Broken leg resistance. Legs are generally the worst limb to break; Leapfrog almost ensures this will not happen.

Disadvantages

• Causes each leap. Lower cool and having lots of implants can quickly multiply this small stress gain into an unmanageable amount. Like all stress gains this penalty is eliminated if you're a hideous freak.
• Dangerous failures. Failing phase or clairvoyance is not costly, but failing the reflexes roll for a leap can be dangerous and life-threatening, especially on long climbs. The longer the climb, the harder the roll. The Stormfront Island and borehole climbs, for instance, are an instant death if you try to leap down them.
• Not idiot-proof. If a leapfrog mutant tries to do something dumb, like leap in a direction that doesn't exist on their tile, they will take great damage to the head.
• Negative beat soak. -1-1 beat isn't huge, but it's still significant against mobs or players who rely on beat damage. High Density or Yeti Fur cancel this out, and the latter synergizes well with Leapfrog's upgrade mutation, Flight.
• Negative broken bone resistances. The only one of these that actually matters is broken arm, but -30% is still problematic against beat-wielding opponents.
• Can't take Lithodermis.
• Doesn't buff focus, unlike Clairvoyance, Medium and Phaser. A less helpful choice for focus-heavy builds.

Leap

Movement buff
In HellMOO, when moving, leapfrogs had a flat 15% chance to move instantly due to rounding errors. This was fixed in SamsaraMOO - now they simply walk from exit to exit 20% faster.

Use of leap can take either a climb or a direction as an argument. Either leap requires a reflexes roll for success, and costs a small amount of stress.

When leaping a climb, the caster's reflexes is rolled against a difficulty based on the height of the climb; the higher the climb, the harder the roll. On succeeding, the caster will alight safely at the other side of the climb; on failure, depending on the severity of the failure and the height of the climb, the caster will suffer beat damage (which can be fatal).

When leaping a direction, reflexes is used for success, and then brawn is used to calculate the distance of the leap. At low brawn, leaps will only travel two or three tiles; at high brawn, they can reach much more. Unfortunately, this leap is extremely unpredictable; it might travel two tiles, or it might travel six. Leaping only goes in one direction until the leap finishes, and if the leap ever encounters a direction that is not a valid exit, the caster will suffer beat damage to the head and immediately come to a stop. The severity of this damage is based on the caster's brawn, which makes high-brawn leap failures very painful. On the plus side, leaping in this manner is so fast as to be almost a teleport, and will bypass the aggro of anything that would normally attempt to attack the caster while they are midair.

Mutations
Racial Mutations	Abomination • Chud • Hideous Freak • Vampire • Zombie
Focus Mutations	Carrie • Chiller • Fuck Machine • Salamander • Screech • Writhing Smoke • Empath
Movement Mutations	Leapfrog • Phaser • Clairvoyance
	Flight • Blink • Medium
Soak Mutations	High Density • Firewalker • Rubberskin • Snakeskin • Yeti Skin
	Lithodermis • Solar Sponge • Silicone Skin • Eelskin • Yeti Fur
Miscellaneous Mutations	Billygoat • Bleeder • Bloodhound • Brainslug • Brute Strength • Camelfat • Enigma • Fibrocartilage • Hooligan • Hyperimmune • Iron Liver • Junkrat • Mule • Nimble Fingers • Plant Whisperer • Stench • Twitchy Nerves • Superclot • Xray Vision • Cat Ears
Ripperlikes	Carcinocudgel • Horrorspike • Ripper • Tendrils
Joke Mutations	Third Nipple
Defunct Mutations	Jammer