Creature Themes

In Niche, there are so many creature combinations that it is impossible to list them all. This page lists strategic combinations as well as cosmetic/speculation combinations.

## **Grassland Themes**

These sets are tailored toward grassland creatures, but many of them are universal strategies (Adaptations for each biome are listed separately). All grassland sets have brown fur unless stated otherwise, and all universal sets will have ram horns/antlers except the mountains.

### **The Statuser**

Consists of Spiky Body/Toxic Body, Poison Fangs, and Runner Leg. (scorpion tail)

Usage: This set is a universal strategy, this is the core concept for defensive players. You attack a predator and then run away. This set is usable with hunting sets or fishing sets, and any environmental set. Spiky Body adds +1 in strength and hurts predators when attacking but hurts packmates when licking wounds and disables tail genes, and Toxic Body deters predators in the first place and poisons predators that do take the chance but disables the effects of camouflage and does not help with any other stats.

### **The Hunter**

Consists of Claw, Velvet Paw, and Lean Body.

Usage: While most grassland sets are base sets, this set is an adaptation of the mountain equivalent, The Attacker. You should use it if you think that hunting should be your strategy. This works because your strongest creatures have +5 in attack and +2 in stealth, and your stealthiest creatures have +3 in attack and +8 in stealth. You will not be too slow either.

### **The Gatherer**

Consists of Big Nose, Nimble Fingers, and Digger Paw.

Usage: You will need your Big Nose to smell food, and also to smell predators since you will most likely not have sufficient strength to fight the predator. You will probably have so much food within days of settling anywhere that you can focus on other things, like breeding, expanding territory, and island hopping. This set works anywhere but the mountains, as there is nothing to collect there.

## **Mountain Themes**

This is what most creatures living in snow biomes would look like. All snow themes consist of either white fur or albinism with no pattern and megaloceros horns.

### **The Prehistoric Creature**

Consists of double Mammoth Paw, Megaloceros Horns, Hammer Tail, Armored Body, and Sabertooth Fangs or Digging Trunk.

Usage: This is not meant to be used through normal gameplay. This is most likely what the prehistoric creature looked like. A possible theory is that prehistoric creatures went extinct because they were too slow because none of the genes added speed.

### **The Attacker**

Consists of Big Body, Runner Leg, Hammer Tail, Megaloceros Horns, and Sabertooth.

Usage: This type is the recommended type for most situations in the mountains, and it works by giving as much power as is practical to attack, with +7 in attack power. The runner legs are there to prevent slowness.

### **The Defensive**

Consists of Armored Body, Runner Leg, Fluffy Tail, Megaloceros Horns, and Poison Fangs.

Usage: For more defensive players who would rather status a predator and run away, this set is a combination of The Statuser and The Attacker.

### **Sky Terror**

Consists of Beak, Megaloceros Horns, Big body/heat body, Hammer tail/Scorpion tail and Winged paw, preferably with bearyena hind legs

Usage: This set maximizes mobility and attack while enabling easy escape routes via flying and lookouts in trees, this set also enables the gathering of roots and nesting material and maximizes safety by flying out of the way of danger and the infamous fly and attack

## **Jungle Themes**

These sets are for living in the jungle. Camouflage is black fur with spots unless stated otherwise, and all sets here have Ram Horns/Antlers.

### **The Deterrent**

Consists of Bearyena Snout, Stinky Tail, Lean Body, Velvet Paws, and Claws.

Usage: The Bearyena Snout is there to deter sight-based predators, mainly the Seeing Ape and Carnivores. It also gives you the ability to growl to deter enemies. You don't need camouflage, so you are free to use any cosmetic fur color you want. You have the Stinky Tail to deter the Smelling Ape. To keep yourself from getting too slow, you should use Lean Body, and adding Velvet Paw gives you extra stealth. Having the setup also gives your stealthy creatures +2 in collecting and your strongest creatures +5 in attack, this is for dealing with carnivores. Your food source will be hunting-based, with some collecting. Overall, this set works anywhere but the water biome, albeit with adaptations.

### **The Invisible**

Consists of Lean Body and Velvet Paw.

Usage: You need to be careful if you intend to use this strategy to clean up after picking Smelly Fruit, because you rely on your +4 in scentless to stay away from the smelling ape, which can smell you from only two blocks away. You are impossible to hear now. You are free to use most strategies combined with this, because you only have two genes to worry about.

### **The Toxic**

Consists of Toxic Body, Poison Fangs, and Runner Leg. (scorpion tail)

Usage: A jungle adaptation of The Statuser. You can now ignore most predators, because most are sight-based. The Hearing Ape and Smelling Ape will still be a danger, though, so you will need to be cautious and watch out for them. Your food source will not be specialized, as you can both collect (with runner leg) and hunt (with antlers/ram horns), and you are free to put whatever tail genes you want.

## **Water Themes**

These sets are for aquatic and semi-aquatic creatures. All sets have webbed hind legs unless specified otherwise, and camouflage is beige.

### **The Escapee**

Consists of, Gills and Big Ears (tail fin)

Usage: This is what most players would call a scout in the grand scheme of things, but in jungles or other tough islands, this set may save your life. Big Ears are used to sense predators before they appear, then the gills are used to survive easily without the need to stay in very shallow water. Using this formula, this set is usable on most islands due to large bodies of water. It will not work on Burning Savanna or Overgrown Jungle, however.

### **The Slasher/Shark**

Consists of: Water Body, Tail Fin, Claw

Usage: Creatures of these variations should live in the Islands where there is a lot of ocean, rivers, lakes, or where fish are abundant and predators can easily be slashed to death.

However, this would be bad on certain islands, such as the Home Island, Mountain Island (if you don't stay closely packed), Burning Savanna, and on certain jungle islands due to climate, predators or the absence of water.

### **Aquatic Gatherer**

Consists of: platypus beak, claw, nimble fingers, water body, fishing tail

Usage: You can easily gather worms, clams and fish

This set is very useful on the archipeligo as there is a lot of ocean on the island.

### **Ocean Fisher**

Consists of: Cracker Jaw, Claw, Water Body, Tailfin

Usage: The cracker jaw is there to crack clams and coconuts. You'll need the claw in order to catch fish and attack crabs, double claw should be enough to catch razorhanas. The tailfin boosts your speed, giving you a six in speed. This set is great for the oasis, as the main food is fishies.

## **Savannah Themes**

Camouflage in the savanna is red-brown, yellow, or beige fur with stripes. All sets have big ears, lean body and ram horns unless stated otherwise.

### **Savannah Gatherer**

Consists of Big Nose, Scorpion Tail, Nimble Fingers

Usage: You will often find yourself with food shortages, and because berry bushes are likely to be your main source of food, the best way to look for food is by smell -this is where the Big Nose comes in. Nimble Fingers allows you to get food as quickly as possible, giving you time to run from fires and preventing wanderers/bunnies from stealing all the food. Because the only source of strength in this set is the ram horns, the poison from the Scorpion Tail can be used to wear down bearyenas until they die.

## **Miscellaneous Themes**

All these sets can have any body type or fur colour unless stated otherwise.

### **Versatile Cat...?**

Consists of Purr Snout, Digger Paw, Fishing Tail and Savannah Horns

Usage: This set is a unique but helpful one. Although it will be difficult to attain all these genes on a single Nicheling in story mode, you can get them easily in sandbox mode. The Purr Snout will be used to heal other Nichelings, if you don't already have a healer. The Digger Paws are used so that you can dig in the ground and look for food without having to switch characters and the Fishing Tail is good if you need a Nicheling that has the fishing ability.
The Savannah Horns are used just so a Nicheling with this set can do *some* damage.