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starlit1daydream · 24 days ago

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Knights & Pages: Deficiency and Exploitation

Well, then... here we are.

A day in delay, I'm aware; but I'm afraid I can't always be accounting for extraneous real-life factors. My apologies.

The Knight:Page class dichotomy embodies deficiency, exploitation and arguably compensation as well. They imbue their Aspect into their fighting prowess, utilise it both as a weapon and a tool, and often use it to constitute a shield as well. (Literally and metaphorically).

The presence of either (or both) of these classes also functions as a signal; as by their very nature, they exist to compensate for a deficiency in their Aspect within their session proper.

Canonical Knight players are Dave Strider (Knight of Time), Karkat Vantas (Knight of Blood) and Latula Pyrope (Knight of Mind).

Canonical Page players are Jake English (Page of Hope), Tavros Nitram (Page of Breath) and Horuss Zahhak (Page of Void).

So, Point A. The narrative function of the Knight.

Narratively speaking, the Knight is one who defends their Aspect; and uses it as a defense in turn. They are defined by maintaining a rigid facade, born of their Aspect and used to hide a perceived deficiency in it. Their Aspect is their sword and their shield, and this oft manifests as a deep-seated insecurity.

Dave's insecurity is with his masculinity, mortality and conception of 'heroism'. Karkat's insecurity is with the colour of his blood, his fear of ostracisation and social exile. Latula's insecurity is less clear-cut, but the most prevalent theory is that the injury that rendered her anosmic also left her with brain damage.

Thus, we see here that their fear comes from lacking in their Aspect. Dave lacks confidence in his ability to face closure & his projections of masculinity (something he misconstrues with heroism). Dave doesn't want a great destiny; he wants to be a normal guy who lives a normal life and dies a normal death. He's essentially a tutorial NPC thrust into plot bullshit after plot bullshit.

Karkat lacks confidence in his sense of self caused by his mutant blood and his persistent fear of social ostracisation and subsequent death should his status be exposed. One could also argue it is a disillusionment with the Alternian social order that he does not fit into by design, but feels he must follow anyways (hence his ass-kissing dreams of threschecutioner greatness).

(Here's where the conjecture comes in...)

Latula lacks confidence in her capacity for rational thought and ability to use logic for her own (and others') defense. If we're going with the TBI narrative for her, she feels as if she lacks intelligence as a result. Tying into Latula's commentary on the misogyny in online gaming circles and we get a girl who is deeply, deeply terrified of rising above her station and displaying an intellect.

So, Dave pretends to be a self-assured, chauvinistic 'cool kid'.

Karkat pretends to be a bossy, self-righteous 'perfect leader'.

Latula pretends to be an air-headed, radical 'gamer chick'.

All of them deny themselves depth and identity for the explicit purpose of denying people the right to know them on a deeper level.

Let's simplify this - Knights feel they lack their Aspect and compensate for it. End of.

Here's where the dramatic irony comes in; Knights are the only people in their session who are proficient with their Aspect at all. Dave is the only Beta Kid concerned with Time management, Karkat is the only Beta Troll concerned with maintaining social order and collaboration, Latula is the only Alpha Troll concerned with logical thought and logical argument.

Because the Beta Kids lack Time on their side, the Beta Trolls lack Blood to bind them together, and the Alpha Trolls lack Mind to... well, to be totally blunt, to use their fucking brains.

(The Beta Kids' lack of Time being tied moreso to the nature of their Game as opposed to the nature of themselves is absolutely a matter of Lunar Sway, by the way).

That's what they need to learn, and subsequently use their Aspect to defend. Dave defending his co-players from certain death and entropy, Karkat defending his co-players from turning on eachother and descending into conflict, Latula defending Mituna from disbelief and abuse through logical counterargument.

Here, we're dovetailing directly into Point B - practical function.

We're all caught up in flowery metaphors and abstract conceptions, but how does this translate to a literal function within SBURB?

Simple. The Knight imbues, exploits and weaponises their Aspect. They don't generate it or control it in any way - that's the caveat of their function. Knights must exploit an already existing well of their Aspect and use that minimal supply to the best of their abilities.

It's the literal manifestation of their abilities for compensation! They have to merely 'make do' with what's available. After all - if there was an influx of their Aspect to work with, there wouldn't be a deficiency to combat.

This journey ties into their narrative function as learning to use it and defend through it also comes with dropping the mask and putting down your sword every once in a while. We don't ever get to see this fully with Latula, unfortunately, but we see Dave and Karkat (through means of eachother, actually) learn to relax in eachothers' presence and drop some of their unhealthy preconceptions.

Now, let's go on to the Pages!

Point C - narrative function.

Pages function in much the same way as Knights on a base level - existing to cover for an existing deficit in their session by virtue of compensation. The difference, obviously, comes in their passivity - and their different manifestation of their Aspect which more directly feels to be a shield as opposed to a sword.

Pages turn the Knights' overcompensation on its' head. Like Knights, they too believe their lack their Aspect, and thus project an image of possessing an influx of it. The difference is that Pages... actually do have that deficiency.

Jake lacks Hope. He lacks faith in himself, lacks the belief in his own capacity to bring a better future and finds it difficult to hold onto his convictions when the going gets tough.

Tavros lacks Breath. He lacks a direction or an objective to follow, lacks freedom by virtue of his disability and Vriska's control of his life. He prefers to avoid things and run away from problems.

Horuss lacks Void. He lacks the ability to cope with imperfection and the fact he doesn't know things. He can't deal with being absent or bereft of purpose.

And, likewise, their sessions lack their Aspect as well in equal measure!

The Alpha Kids lack Hope in the same manner - they don't have the motivation to keep going and find themselves falling into depression and passivity. Dirk even lampshades this!

The Beta Trolls lack Breath - none of them have freedom to choose their own destinies due to oppressive Alternian society and thus fall into the trappings of the roles laid out before them.

The Alpha Trolls lack Void - the teenage echo chamber of drama and gossip denies anybody the right to secrecy or privacy, and their presence in the dreambubbles forces them into proximity and furthers this absence.

Now, it's a common conception that this absence means a Page is weak by default, or outright useless. I absolutely abhor this notion. A Page is not the 'weakling' class - they merely rely upon guidance.

For Jake, it's his fantasies. His masks. His projections of heroism and adventure - and Brain Ghost Dirk is the literal manifestation.

For Tavros, it's his false confidence. It's his assurance that he can stand up for himself and fly to safety should the going get tough - and Rufio is the literal manifestation.

For Horuss, it's his 'renaissance man' projection. It's his showcase of absolute perfection and ideal highblooded taste - and his alters and therian identity are the literal manifestation. (However poorly executed it was, and oh boy was it poorly executed and oh boy was it ableist.)

For this, they're prone to subsequently use their Aspect as a defense mechanism in a more passive manner than the acerbic Knights who prefer to fight with it.

Jake hides behind his fantasies, Tavros runs away from everything he can't face and Horuss pretends he can't hear the sound of Rufioh breaking up with him.

And, of course, as everyone will tell you - this comes with a vast well of potential. Pages are not uniquely powerful or the 'strongest class' like some people would have you believe, but it is true that upon undergoing development, they become incredibly confident in that Aspect. It just happens to be a long journey that no Page fully completes on-screen.

It is learning to accept their own lack of proficiency with their Aspect, drop the mask and begin forging a more genuine relationship with it. Knights must learn to relax, Pages must learn to stop relaxing. It's almost like a little inversion of their active:passive roles, if you want to see it like that!

Point D. Practical function.

Pages... yeah, this is really fucking obvious. Look at Jake. Look at that thing he does. You know? The gigantic shield of pure Hope energy he generates when his full potential is tapped into.

That's what a Page does. They tap into the well of their Aspect to use it as a great shield, making their defense of themselves through their Aspect literal. And, yeah, that's pretty goddamn powerful!

It's like they're meant to embody the little 'sidekick' role in shonen. Koichi Hirose. Koichi Hirose is a Page.

So, there we have it. The classes of compensation. I'll be putting out individual analyses of all of these class combinations soon-ish once the main seven posts are out, so be looking forward to that! I'll be back with you soon wiht the second part of this: Mages and Seers.

And that should be fun, 'cause I am one.

Take care.

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into-the-fraymotif · 4 months ago

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Witch of Breath + Life Fraymotifs

Expiring Vivace

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Witch of Life [one who manipulates and manipulates through life, growth, and progression] (Feferi Peixes)

Expiring (from Ex, meaning outward, and spiration, or breathing. Also to reach the end of your lifespan.) + Vivace (meaning lively, louder, faster, brightly)

Okay this is the first of the lot and we're already getting silly. Generally, when two Heroes of the same Class work together, their abilities resonate off each other, compounding them into something more powerful than with an unrelated Classpect. The Witch of Life overloads the target with Life energy, causing them to become completely saturated with it; then the Witch of Breath would free the trapped life energy, which would drag the Target's life force with it as it rapidly escapes. Nothing like living to death, I suppose.

The rest under the cut

Progression Ostinato

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Sylph of Life [one who heals and heals through life, growth, and progression]

Progression (like growth and as in chord progression) + Ostinato (when a phrase or motif is persistently repeated)

Kinda boring for the name, but amazing for a healer build. The Witch detaches the Sylph's healing powers from them and allows it to move around the battle as a moving passive healing source, also granting their allies increased agility so that the Sylph is not defenseless or powerless.

Jewelweed Jamboree

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Knight of Life [one who protects and protects through life, growth, and progression]

Jewelweed (a type of flower that uses explosions for seed dispersal. Yes, this is a real thing) + Jamboree (a large celebration or party, typically a lavish and boisterous one)

The Knight will encase their allies in a perfect shield of vines and wood, which will then explode outward with a blast of air from the Witch, the shrapnel repaying any damage it sustained to the opponents in full.

Shucks Bluster

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Maid of Life [one who serves and serves through life, growth, and progression] (Jane Crocker)

Shucks(, Buster) + Bluster (relating to strong winds)

The Maid maintains the life force of their allies while the Witch summons a hurricane to consume the entire battlefield. Simple but effective.

Sforzando Tempest

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Page of Life [one who becomes and becomes fully realized through life, growth, and progression]

Sforzando (suddenly, full, all at once) + Tempest (an incredibly violent windstorm)

Pages are kind of limited due to them naturally having the slowest progression and growth. This is doubly so for the Page of Life who has yet to come into their own as a Hero of growth and progress. The Witch of Breath can only temporarily unlock the barrier keeping the Page down, but when they do, the Page would immediately and automatically use their Life powers to rapidly progress, growing in sheer power exponentially. With their command over Life unbound, the Witch acts as a beacon of freedom through which the Page can command Life and growth further than even a Sylph of Life or Maid of Life could. This requires great focus from the Witch due to how intrinsic that limiter is to the Page Class, and Sforzando Tempest does not last forever.

Now, if the Page was further along in development, then they would naturally progress faster than Pages of different Aspects, and the Witch would have to focus less to initiate this rapid onset character progression. Then, most of the Witch's abilities would instead of being used for removing the limits of the Page's Class, be put to removing the limits of the Page's Aspect. I honestly don't think anyone around the Page during Sforzando Tempest would be able to die. Just, they don't have the ability to die anymore, for a bit. Not to mention a huge stat boost across the board.

This is a different kind of potential reaching than Aranea with Jake “Tally Ho” English, as this is more of a "removing the game mechanic holding them back" instead of the "healing the personal block keeping you from fully realizing your potential" we see in the comic. That and this combo is a Fraymotif instead of a plain use of God-tier abilities, so this is on another level entirely on top of functionally being a special attack.

Epic of Bouzygai’s Movement

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Heir of Life [one who inherits and ascends through life, growth, and progression]

Epic (a long story, tale, and/or song) + Bouzygai (Character from Greek Myth credited with many agricultural inventions) + Movement (a self-contained musical form; like the song equivalent of a chapter)

The path of ascension is far smoother for an Heir than a Page, and doubly so for an Heir of Life. The Witch would free the Heir from their conditionally immortal form, causing the Heir to literally become their Aspect for a time, and the Aspect would act and function to the will of the Heir, who's motives naturally align with said will anyway. All healing, growth, desire, progress, and potential within the scope of the Fraymotif would be at the behest of the Heir for a time.

Holly Habanera

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Mage of Life [one who understands and understands through life, growth, and progression]

Holly (a berry plant with thorns on its leaves) + Habanera (a style of dance music popular in the 18th century)

The Mage summons sharp or thorny vines to grow across the whole battlefield, that the Witch detaches from the ground and cyclone around the enemies razor-leaf style. The Mage's magic powers cause them to continuously grow while air-borne, tangling the enemies in the damaging plantlife.

Sottea Leaf Voce

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Seer of Life [one who knows and knows through life, growth, and progression]

Tea Leaf (as in reading tea leaves as a form of divining the future) + Sotto Voce (With hushed voicing; in a hushed manner)

The Seer detects all life sources in the vicinity, then determines how the health of their allies will change in the imminent future. The Witch uses their abilities to detach the favored parties from the events that would lead up to that.

Spirattacca

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Thief of Life [one who steals and steals through life, growth, and progression] (Meenah Peixes)

Spir- (aspirate, to breathe; spirit, or life force) + Attacca (attached to)

The Witch allows the Thief's powers to flow through and permeate a crowd, setting in leeching seeds that will drain the afflicted targets of their life force. The Witch can then forcibly expel them from the target, turning the sprouts into projectiles similar to a frag grenade.

Piacavole Sigh

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Rogue of Life [one who redistributes and redistributes through life, growth, and progression]

Piacavole (pleasant, agreeable) + Sigh (sigh)

The Rogue guide the Witch's wind powers to draw out some of the Life of the target through the target's exhalation. The breath, carrying the Life energy of the target, is spread across the Witch's allies, invigorating them with a fraction of the target's vitality and powers

Respiro Finale

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Prince of Life [one who destroys and destroys through life, growth, and progression]

Respiro (Italian for Breath) + Finale (Ending, conclusion, final)

The Witch directs the Prince's life-destroying abilities to accelerate the death of the target through asphyxiation, while the Witch floods the target's lungs with air, but prevents any air from leaving.

Soprano Spores

Witch of Breath [one who manipulates and manipulates through freedom, detachment, and wind] + Bard of Life [one who allows the destruction of and invites destruction through life, growth, and progression]

Soprano (the highest voice in a chorus) + Spores (reproductive cells of plants, fungi, and some bacteria)

This one's honestly more brutal than Respiro Finale; The Witch directs the winds to carry the Bard's powers in the form of plant spores to the target, to which the Bard and Witch work together to unlock the upper bounds of the plant spore's limit of growth, causing the target to have plants and mushrooms and vines destroy their body from the inside, leaving an overgrown corpse.

#homestuck #fraymotif #12 drop #witch of breath #life aspect #witch of life #sylph of life #knight of life #maid of life #page of life #heir of life #mage of life #seer of life #thief of life #rogue of life #prince of life #bard of life

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aortaobservatory · 1 year ago

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Hello! If it's ok could you analyze Derse Page of Life? I hope you're having a good day!

Sure, here you go! As a note, I do not analyze classpects in conjunction with Lunar Sway, because the Lunar Sways are so vaguely defined and have many components within them, and pairing one with a classpect can have a lot of variation even just within that one classpect. I leave it up to you to decide what influence your Lunar Sway has on your classpect.

The analysis written below is my own writing, analysis, and thoughts. The statements are my own analysis, but they may function as a “fill in the blank” statement for you to create your own interpretation of the classpect as you please.

-aortaObservatory

Page of [Life]:

Utilize - Too Little Skill with Life

A player who starts unskilled in [Growth and Empathy], but gradually learns to use all of [Perseverance and Healing] over an extended period of time

A Page of Life is a beginner when it comes to empathy and growing in the ways they need to, but they repeatedly strive to master it using their perseverance and allowing themself to heal.

Pages start unskilled in their aspect, learning how it works and how to use it to its full potential over time. In their many attempts to master their aspect, they teach others the value of their aspect, becoming an unintentional source of inspiration. Their challenge is to keep at it, learn from failure, and eventually master their aspect, being able to confidently provide their aspect to others.

Inverse Classpect Analysis of Page

Page of Life: Life (Growth, Perseverance, Empathetic, Healing) is passive and lacking. Too little skill with aspect causes lack of utilization of it.

Inverse: Thief of Doom

Doom (Acceptance, Compliance, Wisdom, Sympathy) is actively taken from the Page as they learn how to utilize Life (Growth, Perseverance, Empathetic, Healing) from its passive presence.

Doom (Acceptance, Compliance, Wisdom, Sympathy) values the Page, but is taken away by Life (Growth, Perseverance, Empathetic, Healing) as they learn to utilize Life (Growth, Perseverance, Empathetic, Healing).

#page of life #classpecting #classpect analysis #homestuck #page classpects #life classpects #ao classpecting #of 144

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mageofmindfr · 1 year ago

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Could you analyze page of life? Thank you and have a good day!

Haha, sorry for the long wait, life happened (haha, life). Uhm. Yeah I usually think up some sort of intro to the posts but now I’m just coming up blank, so, let’s just get to it?

Anyways, what do we know about the Page class, to begin with?

Pages are a class centered around self-growth. A lot of sburb/sgrub is based on allowing the players to grow more as people, but Pages have a lot to achieve in the span of the game, and as such we barely see a glimpse of what a fully realized Page can do in the source material at all, except that they are considered one of the most powerful classes out there.

Pages generally adapt traits of their Aspect into their personality, and grow more into themselves as they do so. There’s a lot of work in being a Page, and not everyone is built for it, because you need the ability to learn to look at yourself in a non-judgemental way and think of ways to improve yourself that are feasible and not just “I want to be better”. And that’s hard to do.

As Pages need to learn more about themselves and their aspect (and sometimes just the world at large), they’re very receptive to new ideas and concepts, and can have very flexible mindsets when it comes to certain things (and yet, unfortunately, usually not themselves). Pages can be very earnest and genuine people, which can lead them to accidentally learn things harmful to both themselves and the people around them, and they have to work very hard to unlearn such things on their journey.

So Pages need to learn to embrace their aspect in order to become the best versions of themselves they can be. What about the aspect, then?

Life is… an interesting aspect, in that all the Life players we meet in homestuck are members of the Peixes family. So all Life players are very confident in themselves, at least by the time we meet them at first. And also Life as an aspect tends to push people towards leadership positions? Like, Meenah didn’t particularly want to be an important princess and ran away over that. Feferi wants to take over Alternia and make the world a better place. And Jane is also a princess kinda. Idk Jane gives me a headache in terms of what exactly she’s considered an heir of. Too many timeline intersections to decide whether her being the heir to the crocker brand (or. whatever?) has any impact on how much power she actually holds. I’m so confused about that.

Anyways. Life players like to be in charge. They know their plans and listen to their teammates. A good Life player is someone to look up to and trust with ideas and plans, and a formidable enemy should you be the opponent instead of an ally. They might not be as heartfelt as Heart players or as creative as Space players, but a Life player on your side is pretty much always a good thing? Unless they’re a thief or a destroyer class, in which case. Maybe not so much.

Life players are usually very headstrong about stuff; they know a lot about the way the universe works, not in the way space and time players do, but simply in the way where they understand how some things can have some outcomes and sometimes refuse to hear otherwise, especially if it doesn’t fit with what they already decided upon.

So, with all that (very little rambling) in mind, what would a Page of Life be like?

There’s a lot to consider in this combination, which makes it feel very volatile. I think this is a classpect where lunar sway has a lot more importance than, say, a Sylph’s or a Heart player’s situation.

A Page of Life is someone who is both very confident in their choices, while also constantly doubting their positions as leaders. But it’s not like they can just choose to relegate, because nobody else would volunteer to pick up the role otherwise. In a session where someone else has more charm or energy for leadership, the Page might simply sit tight and watch the other leader learn nothing from their mistakes, but nobody would want them as the leader, not even them. They might grow in that quiet corner enough to stand up and say enough is enough and take charge anyways, but you can never be certain.

A Page of Life can also go the exact opposite direction, and be a person who really wants to lead but has no idea how. In which case they can simply lean away every time they make a mistake. This Page would need to learn that some times you fuck up, and that’s ok, but you should learn from it and admit you’re not perfect before your team gets sick of your blaming everyone else’s plans. Listen to the other members of your group, let them voice ideas, and don’t be hasty when pointing fingers.

Either way, a Page of Life needs to learn to learn from their mistakes. That’s how people grow, even if facing your fuck ups is usually the most mortifying thing to do. The Page won’t let go of their leadership position once they have it, even if they don’t like being a leader, because nobody else would step up, or at least nobody they would trust with these people.

I think a Prospit dreaming Page of Life would be too headstrong and would need to learn to listen to others on their team, learn to let go and also understand that pointing fingers won’t help anyone. They need to learn to be proud of their position on the team, even if they make mistakes, because then the others will see you as dependable and confident, which you absolutely can be.

Alternatively, a Derse dreaming Page would lean too far into “what-if”s, would focus on all that they haven’t done rather than what they did, and there would be their downfall. Focus on the future, learn from the past, and do your best to remember that the present is still the future’s past and you can always learn more, about your team and your goal and yourself.

A grown Page of Life can be a really good leader, someone who the group trusts and depends on and comes to with ideas and problems because they know you can solve it. Don’t let the past’s mistakes take your future away from you.

Anyways, sorry for the long wait (and also sorry to everyone else sending asks and getting ignored, I promise I’m working on it. Just. Very slowly) and also sorry this is not at all edited whatsoever, I don’t have energy to make sure I don’t repeat myself too often. Just. I hope this is coherent enough for you to learn something? Maybe? Or just to have fun, if that’s what you’re looking for…

#classpect #classpect analysis #homestuck #homestuck classpect #life aspect #page class #page of life #honestly pages of life out there yall great people I'd probably want one of yalls on my sburb team

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