how would you change sophie's canon abilities?
okay okay okay I love this question!! I won't focus on the inflicting in this answer because I already talking about it in this post (which I'm assuming is what prompted you to ask), which leaves her telepathy, polyglot abilities, enhancing, and teleporting. I've talked about some possibilities for things she could do with her telepathy in this post. it's not exactly how i would change her abilities, but it is relevant!
because we don't see them as much, I'm going to focus on her other three abilities for this one, but if you'd like to talk about the others just send another ask!!!
(this is like three posts in one so it got long)
Okay, so Sophie can give other people energy to increase their power and efficiency/capabilities with their own abilities. She's a boost. that's nice, but I think it's incredibly underutilized and just a convenient solution to a few other problems at times, not really like an ability in the way she uses it. Oh, she gives Dex a boost and then he can technopath a solution to something they've been dealing with for a while. Oh, she can boost Biana and that helps them decide how to get into Nightfall and whose going. To me it feels...underwhelming. If we're giving her five abilities they better be worth it, you know?
So I'd change it's use, make Sophie learn what every person in her friend group can do when they're given a boost from her, and then structure their fights and plans around that instead of using it as a Plan B when everything goes wrong. When enhancing Tam he was able to discover he could travel through shadows (in Lodestar). When enhancing Grady he was able to control an animal, a very angry mutated one at that. When enhancing Biana three people could be undercover at once. When enhancing Linh she held back the ocean. Those are big advantages that have only been used when they were discovered!!
I don't think the ability itself is bad, but I think it has untapped potential that's going to waste. We know the measure of power Linh can use while being enhanced, and we know it can be replicated. So the next step in their training could be everyone figuring out what they can do when being enhanced, and learning to control it. Right now it just...happens. But with practice it could become much more valuable of an asset and something to rely on instead of a Plan B when other things go wrong.
As an addition, I want it to have more of an impact on Sophie. We know that it drains her, that she's giving other people energy. But I think it could be more impactful. I want her to have trouble concentrating after she's drained, i want her other abilities to be impacted. She gave all her energy enhancing someone else? Well now she doesn't have enough left to inflict, to transmit to someone. that is a reason I could understand for her using her enhancing at the rate she has been so far, if it had a serious draw back that prevented her from being able to do other things. Right now I think she should be using it more than just when they have a problem they can't solve with something else
I think it'd be interesting as well if she was able to overload someone with energy, give them too much and send them out of control. She gives all her energy to Lady Gisela and her polyglotism starts malfunctioning, her thoughts in incomprehensible languages and grammars and makes it impossible for her to think. Or overloading Fintan and his flames spiral out of control. Something like that, I think you get the point.
Okay one of my biggest questions when it comes to her being a polyglot is what counts as a language. We know that spoken languages work, and that she can understand any language she hears. But sign languages are languages, so can she understand them even though they aren't auditory? Can she understand methods of communication that aren't languages like morse code? What are the limits of her ability?
This is another one that's use is more passive. She can talk to anyone, but what does that mean? It's a simple enough ability that changing it doesn't really have any appeal (to me) but instead what she can do with it. Sophie Foster has no language barriers except when it comes to the elven language--which is another thing that annoys me that she just accepts that. Like, even if it isn't instinctual she is still capable of learning another language. But I digress.
So I propose that she uses her polyglotism to become well versed in the parts of history that are inaccessible to the rest of us. Reading studies and texts in the native language to truly grasp it exactly as the author intended--for example, reading ogre reports in ogrish on different amoebas and bacterias. Or reading on dwarvish accounts of materials. She can acquaint herself with all the intelligent species cultures through her ability to connect with their language (language is a pretty big part of a lot of cultures!!), and from there using her notoriety, I think she could get some pretty powerful allies in various species. If she knows her shit, can talk to them appropriately, she could become dangerous for her political influence in more than just the elven world.
Knowledge is power, and she has a tremendous advantage when it comes to acquiring knowledge. i want her to use it.
Okay so if you've read the wings au, you know that I've kinda altered Sophie's teleporting in it, so I'll use some of those ideas in this post. In the wings au Sophie does something that I named glitching, and it's essentially small, instantaneous leaps, teleporting place to place without the build up, but not as far.
With Legacy, we've introduced a change in Sophie's teleporting where it doesn't require as dramatic an event (falling off a cliff) to do it. And I want to lean into that idea of more accessible teleporting. Not necessarily what I did in the wings au with instantaneous movement, but that it happens quicker, both physically and emotionally. With jumping off a cliff there was a lot of mental preparation to jump, the whole build up in her mind.
I think it'd be interesting if she had a source of energy to draw from similar to her inflicting, something she can access whenever she needs to because it's instinct and not something that appears when she starts to teleport. Maybe psyching herself up and preparing can give her a larger reserve, but I think there should be something kind of stored for easy access. That easy access energy could be used for short distances, for manuvering around a battlefield, for getting away from people, for moving other people.
Maybe the Neverseen ambushes the crew and has the advantage of planning and a formation. Sophie could use that reserve of energy and teleport forward and move someone, break a hole in their front. Maybe she can't teleport through the ground, but in a cave she can teleport around within it.
Essentially for her teleporting I want her to think more creatively with it and to use it more often in less dramatic ways. Teleporting doesn't need to be this huge ordeal where she psyches herself up to go a huge distance, and the small things she can do could make a big difference. Shannon's started to go closer to this by making it so she doesn't need to jump off a cliff, so I'm curious to see what's next for her teleporting abilities!!
