#hybrid evolution

What is Hybrid Evolution?

Well if you want the textbook definition, let’s inspect the Digimon Wiki page on the subject:

Hybrid (ハイブリッド体 Haiburiddo-tai?, lit. "Hybrid Form") is a special level which is related to the Spirits of the Legendary Warriors; by merging with one or more of the Spirits, someone can turn into a special Digimon of this level.

Human Hybrid is a form that transforms a human or digimon into a human-like Digimon, whose power rivals that of a Champion. To attain this, one requires the H Spirit of one of the Ten Legendary Warriors. Human Hybrids were treated as equivalent to Champions in Digital Monster Card Game and became Champions inDigital Monster Card Game α.

Beast Hybrid is a form that transforms a human or digimon into a more bestial-looking Digimon, whose power rivals that of a Ultimate's. To attain this, one requires the B Spirit of one of the Ten Legendary Warriors. Beast Hybrids were treated as equivalent to Ultimates in Digital Monster Card Game and became Ultimates inDigital Monster Card Game α.

Fusion Hybrid, also known as Fusion Form (融合形態 Yuugoukeitai?), is a powerful form, achieved using both an H-Spirit and B-Spirit. Fusion Hybrids were treated as equivalent to Megas in Digital Monster Card Game and became Megas in Digital Monster Card Game α.

Unified Hybrid, also known as Transcend Form (超越形態 Chouetsukeitai?), uses five H-Spirits and five B-Spirits, combining to give a human or digimon an incredibly advanced and powerful form. Unified Hybrids were treated as equivalent to Megas in Digital Monster Card Game and became Megas in Digital Monster Card Game α.

Now, that’s a fair bit to swallow, I won’t deny that. And the canon definition involves collecting Legendary Spirits, but at the same time that’s a fairly limiting qualification, and it also limits the total number of options to use to about 20 Digimon ... with what’s 100% canon for the method.

For DDA’s purposes, consider a Digimon whose Evolution is achieved by simply combining Human and Digimon DNA, to be a Hybrid Evolution. This not only opens up the options to quite literally the entire selection of Digimon, but keeps it far simpler and open to different types of plots to have revolve around the method. For example, instead of being limited to Aldamon for your “Champion” Stage, you could easily take FlaWizardmon or Meramon if you wanted something fire-based. This is of course, in the end, a GM decision,  be sure to respect their setting.

Ideas for Plots Revolving around Hybrid Evolution

The Power of the Chosen Children will repair the Digital World (Frontier Method): For one reason or another, the Party is brought to the Digital World and are granted, or simply find, the powers they need to perform Hybrid Evolution. A simple, straightforward, progression-based game, interesting session ideas to mix things up might be something along the lines of using their Hybrid forms to infiltrate a villainous Digimon’s lair undetected (humans may be a rare sight in the Digital World), or struggling to stop their inner demons from becoming their outer demons (maybe if the Digidestined aren’t careful, the Hybrid Evolution will overtake them and they’ll become rabid, berserking beasts). Just be sure to make the final boss memorable, and to NOT make one of Frontier’s mistakes of having more than half of the characters become glorified cheerleaders by removing their ability to Evolve.

Masked Riders: The Party each, for one reason or another, finds themselves holding some type of device which allows them to utilize Hybrid Evolution (a belt or a watch seem likely candidates), and soon find out that they have to use their powers to stop a sudden invasion of Digimon into the Human World! Quite literally Digimon Kamen Rider (or at least some series), you now have two series to get inspiration from for your Campaign. This campaign may revolve a bit more around intrigue: why are these strange beings invading the Human World? How did the Party get chosen to wield these devices? And what if there are more enemies who use the same technology? What does the local authorities (or even national or international authorities if things blow up too badly) think of the situation? How is the Party balancing their home lives and their secret crime-fighting lives at the same time?

Together We are Strong: This time the Party each has a normal Partner Digimon as if it were a basic Campaign. But over the course of the game, they have no methods of evolving to Ultimate or Mega, just Champion! In order to hit those higher levels, both sides have to be in synch, similar to DNA Evolution, only with a Human and Digimon. Whether it starts in the Human or Digital World is up to the GM, but once more it has some potential to mix and match concepts! Maybe due to their dual nature, the Hybrids can swap between worlds, handling threats from both sides at once. Maybe the Party even finds out that there are vile imitators of their technique employed by a villainous sect, similar to the Bio Hybrids from Savers. Maybe to go even further, perhaps the antagonists from both the Digital World and Human World are working together to take the team down!

A Mixing of Worlds: In the far future, Digimon and Humans have learned to get along just fine and Hybrids are a common sight to see, particularly coming out of couples where both Human individuals have a Digimon Partner, something about the presence of a Digimon creating a greater likelihood of the strange mutation that allows for Hybrid Digimon to happen. These natural-born Hybrids live life like any other Human; they go to school, they play, they work (many Digimon do too, but due to the wide variety of Digimon, some do, some don’t, it all depends on the intellect and personality of the individual). Some of them are good, others are bad, although they face a special sort of discrimination, intentional or not. Full Digimon do not see them as Digimon, their scent and auras are strange to them, and Humans quite obviously do not see beings who barely look human to begin with as one of their own. As such they can often end up feeling isolated and alone.

Note: the last one is more of a raw Setting than an actual plot or campaign start, but honestly I felt there was at least a little to work with there for something small.

Mechanical Details on Hybrid Evolution (ripped from Page 28 of the Handbook) for Clarification

When a Tamer and a Digimon combine forms into something that’s neither Human nor is it fully a Digimon, some type of in-between state, it’s called a Hybrid. Hybrid isn’t a Stage so much as it is a classification. Hybrid Digivolving can occur either due to Humans obtaining a power themselves to transform, or by combining their body and soul with their partner Digimon. No matter the method, Hybrid Digimon have an Equivalent Stage, agreed upon with the GM, but the bonus they have over other Digimon of the same Stage is that they have an additional Simple Action to utilize each round. That means a Hybrid-class Digimon could perform either a Complex and a Simple Action in a round, or perform three Simple Actions. A Hybrid Digimon retains the Tamer’s Aspects, Attributes, Skills, and Torments, while also obtaining a Digimon’s access to Qualities and raw Stats. 

Note: do not use the Tamer’s Derived Combat Stats when calculating things like Dodge, Accuracy, or Armor. A Hybrid Digimon is the best of both worlds: the Utility of a Tamer with the raw power and combat potential of a Digimon. Still use the Digimon sheet’s Derived Brains, Body, and Agility Stats for Area Attacks, Clashing, and Initiative Respectively.

This makes Hybrid Evolution a raw tactical advantage over normal Digimon and Combat Tamers, so be very very careful if you try to mix and match Hybrid Evolution and normal Tamer styles in the same campaign, one will generally outperform the other!

But what does this mean for my build if I’m in a Hybrid Evolution oriented Campaign?

Well first and foremost it means that bar Armor and Wound Boxes, there’s essentially no need to make your Tamer’s Base Form a Combat Tamer. They have their Digimon form for that! Instead focus on more specialized Skills such as Computer Knowledge, Perception, or Survival. Other than that, frankly the short answer is: not much.