This is a general exploration of what becoming a titan shifter does to someone, careful if you're squirmish since there's a bit of the horror of having your body changed sprinkled in
Disclaimer: do not copy, repost, take or feed to AI or NFTs anything I post
Masterlist SnK Masterlist
Physical changes
Eren's ears got pointy like his titan form after his first proper transformation, he also now has bunny teeth, front teeth being a bit lower than the rest
and his torso grew weirdly longer, giving him his infamous eight pack
Annie, Armin and Burrito have sunken eye bags
Armin and Bert struggle keeping their weight up, burning through calories really fast
Annie's skin callouses really easily, kinda like a off brand titan hardening, her hands and shins are so tough she doesn't need to fear getting hurt during hand to hand fights
but if she doesn't use them for a while they peel off in bloody chunks, like the whole piece of skin falls off
I don't want to say the jaw titan inheritors are able to purr even in human form, but the parasites in me force me to admit that every jaw titan purrs like cats
Ymir's canines and strangely her molars gotten sharper, there's been many times she accidentally bit her own tongue w them
Reiner's skin is really tough, it's really thick like bear skin takes a pretty sharp knife or things like that to cut it
because of that he's the one to go through thorn bushes when needed
Zeke's really hairy, like uncomfortably so
since inheriting the beast titan he kind of gave up on having a clean shave
Pieck's legs struggle to hold her weight after spending so long in titan form, she has to re build the muscles to be able to walk properly
Due to his titan form Marcel had all his human teeth become pointy and sharp like his titan, while Porco's mostly look normal except his canines and premolars that got long and sharp
his hands and fingers are calloused now and his nails sharper than a normal human's, he has to be careful touching other people because of it and files them regularly
both Porco and Marcel have developed dimples since inheriting the jaw titan
Body heat
Bertold and Armin always run the hottest, during winter one can see their body heat around their body due to the difference in temperature
but because their temperature is so high they struggle during the hot months
Zeke and Porco and the next ones, always way too warm
they're the type to be able to walk around in shorts during winter
Zeke won't because it's unbecoming of him while Porco will if he's on his day off
summer for sure isn't their favorite season but they really just struggle during heatwaves, other than that a hand fan and some cold drinks keeps them pretty comfortable
due to that Porco developed the habit of chewing ice to cool down
Next comes Reiner, he's always perfectly comfortable during winter and on the worst nights he'll just need a coat to be fine
hot days don't bother him much either, he might complain now and again but can function like a normal person that runs hot
Ymir and Pieck are just perfect temperature year round
Ymir will use that to steal some cuddles during cold nights while Pieck is so adaptable she's able to consciously regulate her body temperature
Annie and Eren fall at the end of the scale, with Eren being last
normally they just seem like those people whose hands are always warm even during the cold months
they never have the risk of suffering cold bite but that doesn't mean they won't also suffer from the cold
Eren specially feels the cold wind like a blade cutting through his skin, so even though they can forego their winter clothes without freezing they are more comfortable wearing it
Eating habits
Bert and Armin having the most inefficient titan have to eat triple and double of what normal people eat, and the amount doubles after a transformation
due to size and heat the colossal produces both Armin and Bertold burn through calories like butter in a hot pan, even in their human form they're metabolizing a lot
Armin was honestly scared with how insatiably hungry he got after inheriting the colossal
Jaw holders come next, with Porco being the clear winner within them
due to their titan's size and speed they burn through a lot quickly, metabolizing a whole meal with generous seconds in only one transformation
Porco specially feels a bit oozy if he doesn't eat regularly
Pieck may have the most efficient and longest lasting transformation, but because of that she has to load up on calories to support her multiple transformations, time as a titan and her healing factor
But in general the smaller titan forms have a quicker metabolism, requiring that the shifters eat more and more frequently, the colossal just being an outlier
Getting to the taller titans Reiner comes next, his armor demanding more energy than other titan forms his height
not to mention his human form also needs a lot of sustenance, him being so tall and muscular
which ironically helps him hide his secret better, making it seem like he's just eating a bit more than someone his size would
The beast titan depends on the animal but they usually would eat just a bit more than a normal person, Zeke on the other hand has a weirdly big titan, forcing him to eat a alarmingly more than one would expect from a guy that looks like he does
Eren and Annie together again, their titan forms don't usually have anything extra that would require more energy
from an outsider's perspective they just seem like those lucky people that can eat a lot without gaining weight
Healing
Pieck monstrous healing rate and times she can heal from near fatal wounds
can regrow half her body in a matter of minutes and still transform once more
Zeke heals scarily quick from severe wounds, I think that's part of the reason Levi wasn't scared at all about putting that thunderspear in him
it may take hours, but with the help of Ymir Fritz (and plot armor) he can heal from almost anything
The fire within and determination of Eren makes him heal faster than most other Attack titan holders
and as time went on Eren grew more skilled with his healing, learning how to prioritize important body parts like eyes and brain
Annie has great control over her healing, being able to choose where she'll put her energy towards from an early age
what hinders her is only her healing speed
Ymir isn't all that quick at regenerating lost limbs, but she knows to put her energy towards stopping hemorrhages and focusing on fixing up vital organs
For Reiner it really depends on his will to live
he can close up his wounds preventing him from bleeding out pretty quickly, but struggles with rebuilding bones
may go under a comma for a few days to properly heal
Porco is impulsive and may sometimes forget to save up energy for healing in an emergency
from the warriors he's one of the worst at healing and may end up with scars from severe wounds as a result
It isn't that Bert is bad at healing, it's just that he takes so long to heal properly
depending on the wound he might even need to eat a bit while doing it
Armin is hands down the worst at healing, too slow, panics from the pain and he might even pass out momentarily while doing it
Habits they took up because of their titan form
Every shifter has the urge to lay under the sun like cats
Of course there's Pieck laying down curled up like a cat and preferring to crawl instead of walk
but she also feels weird if there's nothing on her back, so she'll often carry a backpack full of whatever she had at hand for the pressure
she will also struggle falling asleep outside of the cart, finding her bed too big, cold and quiet
since they started being assigned missions together Pieck and Porco started sharing a bed, her finding his heartbeat and naturally hot body temp comforting
Due to her incredible control over healing Pieck learned how to make her period last only a couple hours instead of days
Ymir really likes to be perched on the sides of buildings, it makes her feel safe in a strange way
she's also a bitter, when Historia is too cute Ymir gets cuteness aggression and bites her shoulder
Reiner will sometimes move his consciousness around his body when he's bored, that's how he got so skilled with this ability
sometimes he forgets normal people don't have tough skin like he does and he'll just grab broken glass with his bare hands
he was also the champion of "I have five fingers" amongst the cadets, not having to worry about the knife nicking him
When angry Porco instead of his fists he'll use his nails as weapons in fights and the scary thing is that it works, there were people that had to get stitches after fighting him
Eren sometimes gets so angry he just yells at the top of his lungs like in his titan form
Zeke constantly forgets how long his arms are, no matter which form he's in
if he didn't heal fast he'd always have bruises on his arms and knuckles
Annie will sometimes forget she can't harden in human form and punch something much harder than she should've making her bleed everywhere
Remember in the beginning of AoT, Eren had trouble controlling his titan, leading him to attack Mikasa and try to eat Titan Annie making us to believe his titan form was a different entity Eren had to overcome. Only to be later revealed that's not how titan shifting works and Eren was just genuinely tweaking.
i am coming for you with a new sad aot headcanon about the warriors, pieck especially.
we know that after 13 years titan shifters’ life comes to an end but we don’t exactly know what happens to their body.
i picture them slowly loosing vital functions such as strength, like some sort of degenerative disease. also i picture each warrior developing some “side effects” from the titan’s powers as years passed by.
that’s when pieck comes to my mind.
we see her using crutches, and yes, i know that’s because she spends a lot of time in her titan, i feel like her ability to get used to walk again got worse and worse during the years to a point where she couldn’t stand alone herself sometimes. her muscles were getting weaker and weaker.
this made her extremely scared because she thought marley would just give her cart to someone else, so she tried to pretend everything was okay.
