#if you did read it in the first place
Random thought (when are they planned?), but a hybrid of a Galvanic Mechamorph and a Cybertronian would probably be immensely powerful, at least in terms of tech. You know what? Let’s talk about it a bit more than I think I would’ve.
Think about it, Mechamorphs are a solid collective of nanites that can shift and flow like liquid, can upgrade and essentially manipulate any tech they touch and not looking at the times that ben grabbed hold of a non-electrical machine and upgraded it and are already so advanced as a species that has only been around for like maybe a thousand at most but probably only a few hundred years.
Combine that with Cybertronians, who’s protoforms begin as liquid metal (in certain continuities) which make them able to accept and receive data or CNA to mold into, walk around with electro-mechanical limbs and technological minds and are inherently made to transform! Give a Mechamorph some free natural tech to shape in whatever damn way they please and give a Cybertronian no limits to their form and frame, you get one-mech warmachine. Give the lad tech of any kind and, for example, thanks to that extra natural armour there’s a little boost to the upgrade.
I mean, at this point (from this unplanned thought that had no more research put into it other than my second-hand knowledge of Galavanic Mechamorph and Cybertronian biology), they only particularly get nerfed by probably needing a whole lot more energon need and also by proxy of having a spark that really would not like to get zapped in the freeform solid nanites it’s protected in. And probably a whole lot of other organs too, even if they can shift around a whole lot (doctors hate them).
Cybertronian Anodites though… magic and tech notoriously don’t get along-
I will say though, the funniest thing about Cybertronians is that they literally have an actual, literal, physical soul, and it’s partly the reason why I didn’t say ‘mana’ as part of the tech issues. Now imagine that you - an energy being - so deeply bonded with mana that it is in it’s entirety your body, your existence, find out there in the grand cosmos a machine, a technological being, that produces it’s own well of mana - one that they may not be aware of IS mana, but is very much the most solid evidence for what they constitute as life - after living eras of no such thing before.
Wouldn’t you too be suddenly so smitten with the idea, I know a lot of folk in the TF Fandom don’t need to be an energy being to thirst over them, or linger over the fact that ‘yep, these bots are alive’.
An Anodite Cybertronian hybrid however would be extremely disadvantaged, their existence only possible because of those faint shreds of mana in a technological spark. Unlike a Cybertronian Mechamorph (which ironically would fit as a hybrid name, no thanks in part because Galvanic in Ben 10 context is just ‘something of Galvan make’) who could in fact be a perfect fusion of two biomechanical beings, magic - an inherent subsection of mana and further mana manipulation as is common with Anodites - is nerfed severely in the presence of inorganic life, whilst technology and mechanisms have taken a number of debilitating hits from the magic in Ben 10 (maybe if there’s magic in Transformers it works a little different).
In both cases, the protoform is replaced by the hybrid species, the Cybertronian Mechamorph having that nanite rich body and the Anodite Cybertronian replacing the metals with solidified, sturdy mana. For Transformers fans and Ben 10 fans not in the know, there have been Anodite headcanons spiraling around that say that they CAN shapeshift, but unlike Galvanic Mechamorphs who can do as they wish with technology (and Celestialsapiens who are mortal Gods and can just look like literally anything) the caveat for Anodite shapeshifting is that they must take the form of a living species. This would in fact mean that - most likely - they will be a monoformer instead, the ace to the Cybertronian Mechamorph’s pan they should make a show about that :).
But, not being completely tech, a lot of tech in turn doesn’t do a whole lot against them, if anything at all. An EMP will not shut them down, a shock of an electric prod between seams may instead empower them, and rust - though an inconvenience to replace plating - will not reach their spark stored away and hidden within pure mana. And with that, though they cannot cast magic or manipulate mana when they are covered helm to pede in tech, one must simply shed that armour and allow themselves the freedom of an Anodite, seams glowing and magic pouring out like a supernova, the act in of itself causing an EMP with themselves fairly immune.
There are limitations of course, inherently by their nature and the technological spark in their chest weakens the dexterity and gentle control of more experienced magic users - to the point where there is a cap on their skills - having what is essentially a personal pocket of energy inside more energy, they can really pack a punch. Just like your standard Human Anodite hybrid - or an Anodite shedding a disguise - remnants of the physical body lay discarded on the floor, which unfortunately falls into pieces without a skin to hold the amour together. A hybrid walks around like a protoform stripped naked and bare of armour, of hydraulics and joints on full display and on vent openings clear and unbidden with armour, of a spark shining an entirely visible through the suddenly not quite as opaque mana body, a mane of vibrant glowing mana trailing from their head like hair seeming to be out of place on such a bare mechnical frame. An Anodite in disguise would simply appear as a shadow of a Cybertronian, perhaps keeping the structural form of the armour or otherwise forming an outline of what they assume a protoform looks like, spark non-existant.
An Anodite Cybertronian now has access to all their magic and mana abilities, but now lacks the endurance to take a hit and even last against fighting, their one way of fueling their spark now taken away and every moment of mana manipulations eating at the energy of their Cybertronian half’s soul. And if they were to ever try and go beyond their life as a Cybertronian, to perhaps hide away and fall in love with another species, their spark is still very much their own and cannot be tossed aside like a rusted panel, and it’s size limits how much smaller they could become to be this other species.
I feel like this has run away from me or has to abruptly come to a stop that I can’t further add onto other than ‘wow! i talked more about anodite cybertronians than i talked about cybertronian mechamorphs’ and I can’t really help that. Both are - talking about this from a Ben 10 perspective - now hindered by the Cybertronian need and requirement to refuel, recharge and otherwise ‘not overheat your systems’, but a Cybetronian Mechamorph hybrid in general has greatly taken the strength of both Cybertronians and Galvanic Mechamorphs and combined them, where the weaknesses of Anodites and Cybertronians conflate with one another and can’t even get together long enough for those weaknesses to work out in an Anodite Cybertronian’s favour.
Essentially what brought this up was just thinking about two characters in my brain which don’t go much further than ‘Cybertronian Mechamorph who freaks out Cybertronians because of that one time they ate a nest of scraplets and now has easy access scraplet buzzsaws’ and ‘yeah, my parent is a Cybertonian silhouette, what about it?’ and I suppose I just needed to put these thoughts of the general headcanon down.
even if i don’t actually do anything with those characters and just rotate them in my microwave (brain)
