THE CLASS SYSTEMS' THIRD AXIS: MAGIC.
Okay so. I've been losing my mind.
Hussie dropped this in the official Homestuck discord.
Pictured above is the class active/passive alignment chart, along with which classes are paired. As far as which classes are ADJACENT to each other(helpfully numbered 1 through 7), this is about what I had expected! Which ones are considered MORE or LESS active or passive through me for a bit of a loop, but honestly I can roll with those punches! TBH, having Witch be second most active to LORD is SUPER recontextualizing and pretty badass!
But like. you see the wrinkle here, right? Homestuck does love its symmetrical asymmetry, and as you can see Witch IS NOT paired with Heir(6) and Maid IS NOT paired with Sylph(1).
Maid / Heir, which is cool. My take is something sort of similar to my "embodyment" class thoughts from years back, with maybe a common theme of having their aspect thrust upon them in different ways. Idk I'm still figuring them out!
and Sylph / Witch, the reconstruction classes. called it ;P
Back in the old days, before I found a certain Youtubers videos and changed all my classpecting theories forever, I paired Witch and Sylph together, and genuinely my MAIN source of evidence was this one line.
yes jade thats soooo awesome its true
Now, Kanaya later calls this a joke. Which is fair, its pretty silly, but it was said with those classes being a pair in mind!
So was this said to mean something deeper? I suppose it could be pointing towards something between "the more passive a class is the more magical or w/e" and "this is just a complete joke and only tells us that they are a pair" but neither of those spark joy for me. Why would she number the classes from most to least passive/active, starting in *the middle*, being entirely linear? You're telling me the deconstruction and reconstruction classes aren't *in dichotomy with each other or anything?* Why? Just to fuck with me specifically? perhaps
I could post a bunch of evidence. but honestly, the only real evidence is compiled in this shitpost i made based on Hussies words in the official Homestuck discord.
Homestuck has this ongoing gag based on how real or fake any given character finds magic, the earliest example of this being an extremely one sided feud between Eridan(5) and Rose(2). Homestuck ALSO likes to play with fake things becoming real things, so like. there's a lot going on there.
I might bring up some circumstantial evidence here and there, but The more interesting thing to do here I think is just paint a compelling picture of what this would even MEAN.
So. What is magic, or magicality? Especially in a world with gods and witches, where the world itself is predicated both on GAME logic, as well as a meta awareness of the ACTUAL medium it's in, a NARRATIVE WEBCOMIC? What's the difference, in a world like that, between a spell and a line of code?
So, in order for this to make any damn sense at all, I'm going to have to solidify some language for this post. POWERS =\= MAGIC. obviously, a Lord and a Muse(7) have some pretty crazy powers! the abilities provided to a Witch and Heir(6), the penultimate Most Active and Post Passive classes, clearly have some insane abilities over their aspect once they ascend to the god tiers.
The Witch and Heir classes are super interesting, because, while unpaired TECHNICALLY, their adjacency actually says a lot about the classes and how they interact with their aspect. We see this really early on with John and Jade, as our first two examples! While Johns affinity for being a MAGICIAN and the *name* of the WITCH class suggests magicality, neither of them really are very magically minded. the both of them are incredibly SCIENTIFICALLY minded, in contrast! Jade I probably don't need to do much convincing with, but the way John solves problems, like his game faq writing on the alchemy system, is very scientific method!
While Rose summons power from within to wreak havoc on her problems from arcane sources, John and Jade(6) are solving their problems by changing variables and learning what they can from them. Their knowledge comes from a very different place than Terezi or Sollux(2).
So that enforces that Eridan vs Rose Science vs Magic thing. The difference isn't having powers or not, its in approach and relationship.
Jade, the Witch(6) of Space, studies and works within the confines of her aspect, while to Kanaya, the Sylph(1) of Space, The aspect is a mythical thing, something that provides vague guidance and purpose. To John, Breath is wind, and he can change how the wind moves and change INTO wind, but to Jane, the Maid(1) of Life, her aspect is more an odd force that haunts her. When empowered by trickster mode, flowers uncontrollably sprout from the ground, and she has her own personal Life Devil haunting her existence in the form of the Condesce. To Aradia, the Maid of Time, Time is a force of nature which follows her, bringing death and voices of those long past... To Damara, Witch of Time, Time is an evil man. Which it is!
I think part of why this separation of Magic and Power even exists is because this world is made by Caliborn. Or at least, to his liking. The alpha timeline exists to prop up the existence of Lord English and to empower him to the point where Caliborn himself barely has to even do anything. He's already here!
When Caliborn and Alt!Calliope exert command of their aspect, they are acting as writers and artists, and in a comic, that's science! That is the actual structure of your actual world. Nothing magic about it!
Going down the list we can point out different example of this "magical thinking vs scientific thinking" as well as how the more magical classes have relationships with their aspects that seem more mythical and spooky, but that's my basic premise, and I've probably already used too many words to get to this point already!
However, you can kinda see a sliding scale between John and Jade, who use their aspects like blunt instruments at times, to how Pages and Knights(3) weaponize their aspects with a bit more finesse, to Mages and Seers(2)… well, they're fucking magic!!!! Their aspects speak to them in tongues and they devine meaning and power from them through the arcane.
And so THAT is how the sylph is a more magical witch. To a witch, remaking Space is velocity and mass, to a Sylph, Space is creation itself, and so remaking space has a lot more to do with preparing the universe for a new generation, and it has a lot more "devine purpose" stuff going on. Interesting, contrasting that with how pointless and empty Alt!Calliope describes being bound to the Space aspect, something that resonated with Jade a lot.
But yeah, I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to hear other peoples thoughts on this! is magic real? is magic theory real? im calling this magic theory that seems just about as good a name as anything else. THANKS FOR READING!!!!!!! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!
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