AbsentInquiries Title Masterpost Part 5, Page 1: The Knight, Revisited
WR: Heheheh, I knew I’d be back here, but I didn’t expect to do so for this reason. Ladies and gentlemen, a wonderful fellow stopped by and provided me with some valuable information, which they’ve allowed me to put into the Title Index.
WR: As a preface, these will primarily be regarding difference in polarity and power definition from my own, as personality traits didn’t really come up in our discussion, but nevertheless, their input will prove invaluable for those seeking a more realistic interpretation of the Knight and the Page.
WR: So, to give a quick brush up of my own definition of the Knight powers, I claimed that they draw power from without - using implements, symbols, and artifacts imbued with the power of their Aspect to do their magical work, and that their polarity was Passive - “other-oriented”.
WR: Chernubs proposed instead that Knights are Active Classes, and rather than drawing power from tools or implements, they instead have fairly limited access to their Aspect, but exploit what they have, wringing every last advantage they can get from it.
WR: Their two major examples were those of the Knight of Time, Dave Strider, using time-travel to make the very most of a session with a limited amount of time, and the Knight of Blood, Karkat Vantas, barely managing to bring his session through despite the lack of cohesion or solid bonds.
WR: To quote specifically; “dave's ability to almost singlehandedly sustain his session purely through time hopping even with only 24 hours to work with or how karkat partially kept his session together through working what connections they had to benifit the group.”
WR: So, in summation, this definition of the powers of the Knight is that they lack a greater access to their powers (which seems to take the form of a fated imposition - a lack of time, a lack of cohesion, and so on), but can manipulate it to amazing ends.
WR: I hope I’m doing Chernubs’ take on Knights some justice! Keep an eye out in the next half-hour for Pages Revisited. .)
AbsentInquiries Title Masterpost Part 5, Page 2: The Page, Revisited
WR: Following up with the revisited Knight powers earlier, Chernubs’ take on the Page - the polar opposite to the Knight.
WR: So, this one, the Polarity of the Class remains the same - Passive, though in this case the Page is the counterpart to the Knight, not the Heir. My interpretation of their powers is that, while they initially start off weak and without any notable strengths, upon reaching the end of their quest, they gain access to unimaginable power, at the cost of the inability to direct it.
WR: A few days ago, Rose quoted me saying “Heirs are like an artist given a lump of clay and the tools to shape it” - likewise, my interpretation of Pages was akin to giving someone a lump of C4 and a hammer.
WR: However, Chernubs’ version of the Page paints them in a more subtle, less visible, but altogether just as powerful light - and their example was none other than the very Page I disregarded for that lack of visibility. The Page of Breath, Tavros Nitram.
WR: To quote; “tavros being the guiding force driving an army he formed purely through passive suggestion and being ‘the wind behind their backs’. Not only just when he had gathered the rather impressive army of ghosts despite having been dead for a long time and never truely showing any development, but he had even been able to convince the underlings inhabing his land to help him simply by asking to do so.”
WR: Notice that - Breath is a social aspect. Charisma, freedom, action - these are what define Breath. And Tavros - while not seeming to - displayed charisma and action in rallying an army /and/ persuading the Underlings on LOSAZ.
WR: Quoting Chernubs again; “Id have to say that when it comes to pages themselves with the application of the ‘exploit’ function, it would boil down to their actions passively leading to outcomes that serve to ultimately better them and how if left alone to truely work towards their goals they can pull off extreme feats related to their aspect almost subconsciously.”
WR: Tavros was left to his own devices in both cases - time spent dead, and time spent communicating with the Underlings, with no pressure from other players to show his strengths. It was all him.
WR: While that still does bring up questions about what exactly happened with Jake in that doomed session, it can still generally be understood that his powers there weren’t exactly his own, as he had been tampered with by Aranea.
WR: So, the powers of a Page are subtle, the passive manipulation of one’s Aspect to achieve their goals. Whether it’s the subtle rallying or persuasion of Breath, or the impeccable inspiration of Hope, the Page - left alone - can accomplish great things without even realizing it.
WR: Again, I hope I’m not misreading or misrepresenting this - if I am, Chernubs, please come by again and correct me. For those others reading this, I hope this alternate take on the powers of Pages is helpful, and thanks again to Chernubs for telling me about this and letting me add pages to the Index for it. ^_
WR: Well, in terms of new things, my recent chats with a fellow Title analyst have resulted in newer (and better) conceptualizations of Aspects - most notably of Light and Void.
WR: See, apparently, Aspects can be seen in a much greater scale than the simple domains that we subtract from their names. They encompass greater, larger concepts of reality than just core elements.
WR: To use the example of Light and Void, Void isn’t just obfuscation, lack, and so on - it’s the definitions of things - it’s how we interpret what we see. Whereas Light is the symbols themselves, it /is/ what we see, and the ability to combine those things into newer concepts.
WR: Which naturally feeds into a sort of balance. Things exist, and Void defines those things, while Light takes those definitions made by Void, and combines them into new existences, which Void then distills and defines, and so on.
WR: It...Sounds super crazy at first, but, holy hell does it make a lot of sense.
((This is a very valid possibility - and certainly one with good grounding, too. I may not ultimately change my definition of Knights, Pages, Heirs, and Witches (though I may revisit them a little bit to tweak the definitions where appropriate), but I still feel that this would be a valuable definition to work with for those who don’t particularly agree with my own.))
((That said - if you don’t mind keeping up the discussion, anyway - how do you suppose the exploitation of one’s Aspect would translate for Pages, who are renowned for obscene late-game power? While this does cross into the territory of wild supposition, the lack of information on the subject makes me honestly interested to hear any and all angles on the Page as possible.))
((Which, as an aside - many thanks for helping me refine my own definition a little, and providing a great alternative with more reasonable basis. ^_ ))
((I’m aware, and it’s kinda difficult for me to really understand it - whether through prior assumptions or current ones. That said though, it did get me thinking - perhaps I could be half-right?))
((Perhaps it could be a matter that they draw their powers from artifacts, but they don’t always need those artifacts to draw from. Or, in other words; Dave learned how to manipulate and travel through time through his use of the Timetables - objects which ostensibly were his initial source of Time powers, and later became irrelevant once Dave learned how to mimic their function?))
((But, again, I could be very, horribly wrong, but I suppose that’s really the best and worst part about theorizing about things. What do you think, might I ask?))
“Oh shoot, do you think an heir of rage could "hulk out" and go into...”
I would personally argue that the saying the rage aspect is purely about such negative things is in of itself a gross oversimplification. As those kinds of things described wouldnt exactly constitute any fundamental concept of reality on their own
literally everything i mentioned is straight from the canon definition of rage xcept for paranoia so uh, i dunno what to tell you there buddy
rage IS about negative things just like hope is about positive things. rage doesnt exist without something to tear down just like hope doesnt exist without something to prop up. all aspects are intertwined and dependent on each other and cannot exist without the others
