#martyr classes

[2claspect4this]

hello! i was wondering if you could do a comparison between mage of mind and knight of light, and perhaps even knight of mind if it's not too much, as i've gotten all three over a period of several months when taking the classpect quiz by rlabs. thanks!

Knights and Mages are fairly similar, particularly when you’re looking at them from the perspective of someone who’s trying to figure out which one applies to them. The core difference is basically that, in a vacuum (and when not talking about Blood) Knights work well when they have something that they can fight about, while Mages deliberately try to avoid or end conflicts by giving up things that mean less to them than not having to waste time fighting people. “Fight” here can mean literally punching someone, but more often than not it means correcting someone’s insensitive language or confronting a roommate about the dangers raised by their poor dental hygiene.

Conversely, Mages are much more ready to do seemingly self-destructive things for either their own sake or the sake of another party, making them seem braver in terms of actually getting things done. A Knight would have to force themselves to actually do half of the things that come as second nature to a Mage. If you find yourself beating yourself up over feeling scared and chickening out on something, you’re probably more on the Knight side of the spectrum.

EDIT: Oh, and I forgot to mention that I wouldn’t put too much stock in rlabs’ quiz-- it doesn’t incorporate much personality wise. The other quiz out there (Land of Celebration and Bells, I think), is actually tied to a personality archetype system, but I think it’s a little dated* and doesn’t necessarily attach classes to archetypes that actually correspond to them.

*As in, the test was created before we even heard that Princes and Bards are destroyer classes, or that active and passive classes are a thing. It might have been updated since then?

[2claspect4this]

Hey how are also I know my aspect is hope but for my class that's what I'm torn between knight and heir mind helping explain

 Because of deep-rooted insecurities about interacting with other people and being vulnerable, Knights tend to sustain “strong” personas that resemble exaggerated caricatures of their aspect’s values. For Hope, these values are things like being able to understand and explain things, “higher” passions like art and science (as opposed to sex and drugs), and self-restraint. A Knight of Hope would make an effort to appear as a sort of enlightened figure, while an Heir would just kind of be one if he was doing well, and be more like a jerk with no self-control if he wasn’t.

Knights in general like to have control over situations, and force themselves to do things that they don’t really want to do in order to grow up properly. They sort of have to beat themselves into shape, and become actually cool as a result. Heirs are more lackadaisical. The focus with them is more on having to accept the responsibility to resolve situations that don’t really have anything to do with them. (One marker of being a Knight is being unable to accept responsibility for a situation that actually did transpire because of you… and one marker of being an Heir is thinking that it was all your fault that something bad happened to one of your friends, even when it was outside of your control. Perception is fun, and self-diagnosis is hard.)

[2claspect4this]

Hi, new to your blog. But I've been thinking, so I think I would be a hero of time, but I'm torn between rogue of time and heir of time. What are the main differences between the two? Thanks :)

Aight, it’s been a while, but here we are. Thanks for bearing with me!

Rogues and Heirs both accomplish similar kinds of goals, but are expected to take very different paths to get there. Heirs are asked to be chaste, fair and honest rulers, and tend to be bestowed with information and power that allows them to help solve the problems of other people. As a personality type, Heirs rarely initiate action for their own sake, but are quick to move if somebody else needs something done. In terms of morality, there is the question of who (or what) they should place their trust in. Examples of Heirs in popular media include Harry Potter, Steven Universe, Aang (from Avatar: The Last Airbender), and Gunnerkrigg Court’s Smitty.

Rogues, on the other hand, are much more active as people. If we look at the world in terms of imbalances, Heirs are the kind of people who will give things up (and inspire others to give things up) if they’re shown an imbalance, and otherwise kind of dick around with whatever’s around them. Rogues have an imbalance coded into their personality. On one end is a sense of greed, a desire for something that they don’t currently have. This doesn’t have to be a material object– some Rogues want to have love, or vengeance on some enemy.

The other half of the imbalance here is a corresponding sense that they don’t actually deserve whatever it is that they want. (This is part of what separates Rogues from Thieves.) Rogues tend to have this idea that being a good person and taking what you want are mutually exclusive, and can therefore come to see denying themselves of what they want as a positive thing. While noble-sounding in theory, it practically never works out that way for them. Rogues are already keyed to prefer giving to taking, which is half of what being a “good person” is. What they should be much more worried about is who they’re giving things to, and what they’re actually giving away. Examples of Rogues in popular media include Toph Bei Fong (from A:TLA) and Disney’s Mulan.

[2claspect4this]

would mage of time fit well for homura akemi?

Without spoiling things too much for those of you who haven’t yet watched Puella Magi Madoka Magica (you should), Homura Akemi is pretty solidly a Mage. She’s brusque and antisocial, but aids and protects others when she can, and has no compunctions about throwing herself into serious danger for the sake of others when she has to. Inevitability is the oppressive and overbearing presence in her life, so I’m inclined to agree with Time too.

Mage of Time sounds like an excellent title for her!

[2claspect4this]

So, I took a quiz and found out that I'm a Mage of Void, but I have very little to base both parts of the title on and was hoping you could go over some of the powers and drawbacks this would come with?

that-killer-chic asked:

Could you perhaps explain Mage of Void?

Mage of Void

Mages are best described as “one who sacrifices.” Their quests tend to be grueling, tragic affairs that (when successfully completed) end in a flavour of victory that is less victorious and more… tolerable. Rather than triumphing over all obstacles and achieving their core aim, a Mage must learn their limits and learn to redefine what their aims really are. In many ways, a Mage’s quest is more about learning what really matters in life than any other class.

The Void aspect governs, as I’m sure you’ve heard, nothingness. It occupies a niche in world of philosophy that is concerned with what we, as individual and free-thinking agents, ought to do if we are presented with absolute moral freedom. Unlike most systems of ethics, the Void aspect’s belief in the importance of an individual’s own unique volition makes it unsuited to providing its adherents with a code of conduct. In fact, you could say that this inability is the whole point of Void.

There’s this idea that tends to be promoted very heavily in fiction, intentionally or not, that you need to succeed in accomplishing your dreams in order to be happy. Success in your ambitions is conflated with success in life itself, and that can be a dangerous view to take. The growing Mage of Void starts out with this kind of approach to happiness, buying into the narrative of a savvy self-made entrepreneur or artist or scientist who, through a combination of cunning and hard work, manages to achieve greatness.

Unfortunately, this process will be singularly unfulfilling for them, especially if they start straying towards methods that they find kind of unsavoury but feel compelled to use in order to secure their victory or establish how serious they are about what they want. If they manage to succeed in living out their dreams, expect them to have no idea to do next– and no idea why they feel like they have more to do.

So-- what works for a Mage of Void?

It’s absolutely a question of introspection, here-- they have to consciously see that they’ve been taking the cues that other people have offered them and meditate on what it is that they personally want out of life. Then they need to act on that meditation. If you’ve ever thought, “Why the hell am I doing this anyway?”, that’s like a low-order version of a Mage of Void’s ultimate epiphany. The sense of relief when you finally put your foot down and stop going through the motions is kind of what a Mage of Void is meant to feel all the time, once they make their big self-discovery.

[2claspect4this]

Could you perhaps analyze the Mage of Light? ' o`

Indeed I can!

Mage of Light

The Mage class is largely governed by the axis of greed versus generosity. Despite its position as an active class, Mages are required by their arcs to deprive themselves in order to help others, with the twist being that their act of sacrifice will prove to help them or their cause far more than whatever it was that they wound up needing to give away. A conflict between what they want and what they need is par for the course when it comes to this class.

The Light aspect governs significance on a cosmic scale. Its conception of a god is as one who defines objective meaning across the universe, and they see this definitive purpose as reflected in all events, words and deeds. As people, they are frequently ambitious, and they can be quite self-important; they see the world in terms of stories, and of course they would be the Chosen One.

Mages in general shift from idealistic, “can-do” attitudes to a much more cynical (or at least helpless) view of the world. Part of this is just standard maturation-- the result of experiencing more and more of the world’s shittiness as time goes on-- but there also often external forces that kick Mages in the teeth, especially other characters with less than scrupulous motives (see: Kurloz, Aradia). I’ve talked before about how this can lead them to perceive the default state of humanity as greedy, envious fuckheads, or the default state of reality as terrible and annoying, so this time let’s talk about how what a Mage is supposed to do if they have this perception.

Copying the world and acting like a dick back at it is certainly a tempting option for Mages, but it begins a vicious cycle of sorts. There’s a reason why Mages tend to be associated with the “mystic guide” archetype in fiction, and it’s less to do with the fact that they know things than it is to do with the substance of that knowledge. Much as a Knight learns the lesson that doing your duty is more than just acting like you’re doing it, a Mage learns a lesson about how holding onto shit you don’t need is bad. The thing that they hold on to can be a tangible object, like money, or it can be an emotion, like anger or sadness; and the spiritual nature of putting it aside and accepting suffering is where the “enlightened” trait associated with Mages often comes in. Some are better at it than others.

On to Light!

In a lot of ways, a Light player’s conception of themselves as the “Chosen One” is actually pretty accurate. Light players have a thing for being selected to complete tasks that only they can do. Issues begin to arise when they lose sight of their mission, whether it’s because they misinterpret the signs and believe that they’re meant to do something that isn’t actually in the cards (see: Aranea), or because they get fed up with what appears to be an impossible task and try to make up their own victory condition. It seems to me that the class arc of a Mage can incorporate these templates on multiple levels; they might sacrifice everything that they have in order to fulfill their destiny, or on a deeper level sacrifice what they believe is their destiny in order to help some dude fulfill his, which will then turn out to have been their destiny all along.

From a more psychological standpoint, a Mage of Light’s quest is nothing to be made (pardon the pun) light of. They have to accept that importance is suffering, despite wanting it more than anything, and either ruin themselves in order to keep it or throw it out the window and run away. Part of a Mage of Light’s deal is the idea of losing your purpose in life, and not ever really being able to replace it, but finding peace in spite of-- or perhaps because of-- it!

[2claspect4this]

Really? Why heir of breath???

(Note: the above question was in response to my recent suggestion that Jesus was an Heir of Breath.)

The Airy Kid

I see Heir as the passive martyr class; what this means is that, not only does the Heir sacrifice things for the good of others, but his acts of sacrifice themselves inspire and allow others to make sacrifices of their own.

This might not have come across in previous posts, but I consider it absolutely valid when classes perform their verbs in a far more metaphorical sense. For instance, you could call forfeiting a football match an act of sacrifice, or betraying someone’s trust an act of destruction.

The real meat of Jesus’ teachings, to me, is stuff like “turn the other cheek”. He wanted people to avoid conflict, to seek compromise, and to find pleasure in friendship rather than bloodlust. At this point, I suppose that calling him an Heir of Life could work as well; I vaguely recall that he was one for spiritual asceticism and belief in the goodness of every person’s soul, but I’m not totally sure.

Basically, if he was all about trusting in God and following the rules of common decency that He wrote, then it’s Breath; but if he focused more on getting people to ignore religious quandaries so that they could focus all their energy on just being happy, then his ideology is more Life-like.

Coming back to the Heir class, I’ve heard that at one point Jesus threw a tantrum at some merchants in a temple, or something? My understanding is that he got pissed off by the insolence of selling stuff in a place of worship, and really laid into those guys. That reminds me strongly of John’s flip out on the boat (the one where he started attacking the flaws of Con Air)— and both instances are interesting when looked at as parts of an Heir’s character arc.

See, Heirs have this deal with being given power, but then being expected to use it conscientiously. What this means is that they’ve got to use it to help people out, and avoid (at all costs) turning into mean jerks. For the most part, both John and Jesus are very successful at this— Jesus using the “power” of being God’s son to actually give people spiritual guidance and fish and parables about faith— but, as I’ve said above, they’ve both had their lapses.

(In contrast, Equius was pretty much this huge sweaty asshole from start to finish. When he was finally outright challenged to embrace Void and relinquish his externally-enforced moral code, he chose to do nothing and got murdered. Mituna seems to have been on the right track prior to melting his brain— he “had a lot to say” about the impending catastrophes— but, as you can see from his current behavior, he’s sort of lost the thread since then.)

Anyway, yeah, that’s my rationale here. Heir is the passive martyr class; Jesus died to free humanity from sin.

[crisesofsanity]

hi i'm back again and i have another thing for you to look at. so i took that post you made... a while ago? i couldn't find it but it was the one about how dirk saw roxy as unpredictable and dangerous or something i.e. like a bard, and i wondered if that was applicable to any of the other classes and yeah it totally is: dl,dropboxusercontent,com/u/10565471/class%20views.txt (the only one i'm confused on is mage? but i find heirs kind of hard to understand too so yeah i could use some help there)

Sup! This is a neat-o compilation you've got here.

In my opinion, part of being an Heir is proving yourself worthy of receiving all those sacrifices; I imagine that a Mage would see other people as deserving/needing concessions on their part. Sollux was always a crusty asshole on the outside, but deep down he had a very giving spirit; and Meulin is very transparent when it comes to her care for others.

As a corollary (been wanting to use that word all week :b), I'm inclined to reword Heir as something like "they view others as mysterious benefactors who keep on giving even when they're down on luck". The unnecessary baggage thing is definitely accurate, it's just that this heightens the parallels between the two classes.

Oh, and about Lord and Muse: there's also this big deal with dominion and rulership within these two classes. Lords tend to believe that people should, or want to, follow their orders. Meanwhile, Muses reckon that others are sources of these orders and demands. The bit where Lords see people as inferior (and Muses see people as superior) probably feeds into these assessments as well.