>>17869364
>Most of my ancestors, including myself, were not entitled to arms.
In many countries such as the US you can adopt a coat of arms freely, and in countries with an official registry (for example, the College of Arms for the UK sans Scotland) they will often register arms for people who are willing to pay I think it was around £9000. Supposedly they are willing to do this for US citizens who will pay the fee upfront and allow them the right to change the final design if necessary. Beyond that, the only supposed requirements are that the person can proof of descent from a British subject and is not someone of bad repute. This may be similar for some other official authorities as well. Trump was able to register the coat of arms of his golf course officially in Scotland for example, and his version had birds with golf balls in their claws.

>>17869758
There's no official limit that I've seen. One guy called George Nugent-Temple-Grenville had a compound coat of arms with over 700 different parts to it.

>>17869851
I think griffin is almost as kino as lion and eagle, and has lots of decent-looking poses but hardly anyone used it unless their name was Griffin.