Vegetable Monstrosities 2

Reading more botany books, I am starting to see how much of a short shift I have been giving plant mutants on even basic ideas like soil quality. Fortunately I already have the tools to make up for this- mutation modifiers. More specifically the environmental dependance and decidious modifiers. Here are some of the more common mutations (physical and plant) and how the modifiers might be applied:
　
Abnormal size. This mutation is effectively dwarfism and gigantism for plants and it should be applied to many more species than it is. Quality of soil and/or food, amount of sunlight, and even herbivory have major impacts on plant size. Though it affects more the size of shrubs and trees in the real world, in fantastic settings, including that of Mutant Future, abnormal size (ED) can result in grasses, weeds and moss that can be 1/10" to 50', all individuals of the same species. Decidous would mean a plant that changes sizes due to seasonal differences. Freaky but not impossible for fantasy.
　
Accumulated resistance. The plant can only start protecting itself after it is exposed to something, which may or may not be hazardous. Eh, the decidious version is a bit more useful as it means the plant changes to protect itself before the hazard arrives. Steam from a geyser a mile across that only comes in the spring and fall (a machine complex does this), the fiery winds that come out of the desert or radiation using swarms of insects are all possible.
　
Bud sport, animal limb or organ, flight and similar mutations and drawbacks. These mutations can be induced by changes in a plant's environment. If a field of crops is suddenly fertilized with manure from a new to the region species of livestock, the plants may take up different amounts of elements and compounds, causing them to warp and mutate. A farmer can never know what his crops are capable of because they will never be exposed to everything that might cause a change in form or behavior. This makes gathering much more popular... Decidious is actually easy to apply as it is based on trees- plants can drop and regrow bits of themselves while the seasons turn. It just gets weirder when the bits are fingers, wings, eyes or fur.
　
Chameleon metamorph. Ah, lycanthropy for plants. Instead of a full moon, a plant could change shape when the sun sets or it is exposed to too much salt in the soil (the change allows it to move elsewhere with better soil) or even when exposed to blood...
　
Echolocation. This is a weird one for plants as those that can't move have little need to detect objects near them. It can be used to affect characters with increased hearing, producing a sound only they can hear. For the decidious version, mutants with increased hearing could use these plants as guides, but only during certain times of the year.
　
Fragrance development. Plants making slaves when they are starving is pretty basic. A random trigger, using a chart like the one I posted for alter atomic composition a while ago in this blog, can make things much more interesting. Trees that suddenly draw slaves when exposed to cheese is weird- but isn't that a good thing? Decidious takes a lot of the suprise out of this but makes locations (more) deadly when the GM wants them to be.
　
Free movement and full senses. These two I treat as the sentience and sapience mutations (the difference is dependant on other mutations and GM fiat). If a farmer is about to harvest his fields and the crops suddenly beg for mercy, what does he, she or it do? Possibly starve or kill talking plants? For races, this means plants that effectively hibernate as objects rather than creatures.
　
Drawbacks with environmental dependance, decidious and damaging as well as mutations with crippled, damaging, disgusting and feralization are forms of maladaptation- plants that do poorly when exposed to the new environment. There aren't many physical drawbacks in Mutant Future that can be applied to plant creatures (that make sense)- albanism, epidermal susceptibility, frailty, poison susceptibility, prey scent and reduced immunity. All of them are very handy for designing plants that are maladapted to their location (like kelp in a desert), but their number is one reason that there is at least 25 drawbacks for plants in the upcoming mutation book.