It’s the Monday Mad Scientist break down this time dealing with shape-shifting.

A.)    You can change into anything with a similar mass.  Now, similar is open to interpretation, in this case, you could change into Shaquille O’Neal, especially since he’s a person, but not, say, an elephant.  Essentially you could turn into any person on Earth, a dog, a chair, etc, but not anything mechanical (“bombs have chemicals, moving parts”).  Also, if turn into someone bigger you’ll be stronger than you were because you’re growing newer, bigger muscles, or if you turn into something smaller, you’ll be quicker.  You also have access to selective shape-shifting.  You can change your legs but keep the rest of you the same, change your hair and nothing else, etc.

B.)    Chemical shifting.  Like the superhero Metamorpho, you are the periodic table.  You can turn into oxygen, hydrogen, iron, gold, etc.  You can form complex compounds like say, C4, but only if know what goes into it.  All the elemental powers are at your disposal, so if you think of H20 you can form water and shoot at people with the strength of a fire house.  If you come up with something combustible, you can throw fire.  You can form alloys, like steel and shoot knives at people or the use Holy Grail of little kid weapons, the knife arm.  You will look like you most of the time.

What’s it going to be?  A makes you a at best the world’s greatest secret agent and at worst, vain, but hey, you could look like a famous person and never wait in line again.  B is pretty powerful in the right hands, but there’s a lot of chemistry and metallurgy to remember.

Matt