#rin tohsakah

[razieltwelve]

While I look forward to the match between Rin and Weiss, I have a feeling that the latter is going to be crushed in the battle. After all, at only one semester in Beacon I doubt she has the proficiency to keep a quick and determined melee specialist away long enough to gain the upper hand.

Why do we fall? So we can learn how to pick ourselves back up.

One of the disadvantages of Weiss's upbringing is that she was never 'crushed' in battle.

It's something that most of the cast have experienced. Diana and Averia got to experience it every day when despite their best efforts they could basically do nothing against their parents even when Lightning and Fang weren't really trying. It's why neither of them are arrogant about their strength. They know exactly what it's like to face someone who feels completely invincible.

Likewise, most of the others were taught similar lessons by their own parents. Pyrrha wasn't, but she did learn when she got to spar against powerful hunters (e.g., she has already faced all of the members of Team STRQ by the time she arrives at Beacon, and she's lost to each of them).

Weiss's parents (in the conventional timeline) aren't hunters, and Winter didn't want to spend the little time she and Weiss had free of other distractions on fighting since she could tell how desperately Weiss needed the social interaction.

Now, obviously, Weiss has had her ass kicked by Yang in sparring, but at this point in the timeline, she and Blake are still a bit wary of each other, and Ruby is way too nice to just start spamming super speed and scythe slashes everywhere. And Yang isn't just some random. She is one of the most skilled and powerful melee specialists in their year. This version of Yang (with a fully functional family and training from her father, mother, Raven, Qrow, not to mention her extended family as well) is far more skilled and powerful than canon Yang. Losing to her can easily be brushed off with 'It's Yang Xiao Long, so it doesn't really count'.

Her spar against Rin will be the first time there are real stakes and pride on the line against an opponent who really is out to get her and who isn't the scion of some legendary hunters.

Incidentally, it's why the match is being properly reffed by a professor (in this case Lightning) since there is a chance it might get out of hand. If Lightning calls an end to the match, it's ending. Originally, Vanille was slotted to ref matches on that day, but they realised it probably wasn't a good idea since she might make it worse and probably has money on it too.

Fun fact: Ruby isn't completely hopeless in hand-to-hand combat in Final Rose when she starts attending Beacon. Since her family is intact and she has a larger extended family, she's actually solidly average in hand-to-hand combat. She's not going to beat Yang in a fistfight, but against most opponents, she can survive long enough to either get her weapon back or for help to come. Ruby also carries a survival knife similar to the one Lightning has. It's for those close encounters, and she's very good with it.

[madillhethen]

You know Zouken said Tokiomi knew about the Matou Holy Grail and I’m going to call bs on that. I don’t think that’s true. I mean—maybe it is when FSN was first written…. And maybe they just changed it later.

I’m going to have to look at—God, I can’t even remember. It’s either in the character materials or the Limited Edition Heaven’s Feel animation materials, but I thought there was an interview with Nasu where he states that if Sakura was the chosen heir of the Tohsakas, she still would’ve been adopted out due to Tokiomi not knowing how to handle her Imaginary Magecraft (I think that’s the idea where she’s adopted into the Edelfelt’s? I could be wrong here.)

In Zero, Tokiomi stated to Kariya that he wanted both his girls to be magi, for their full potential not go to waste. I mean that’s already a prick move in itself but I was under the impression the Matous, Einzberns, and Tohsakahs stopped collaborating years ago? Since each of them was cheating in different wars so it seems weird for Tokiomi to go out and participate in the 4th Grail War, with the expectation that he could die (that’s the impression I got from him in FSN Prologue where he was talking to little Rin. It felt like he was saying goodbye because there was no actual certainty he’d win even though he was cheating), but if Zouken had told him that he was going to create an experiment of a Grail, I feel like Tokiomi would’ve tried to help more with the cultivation of Sakura as a grail than participate in the War maybe? Since the Tohsakas are the only family left who even cared about getting the Grail for the Root.

I could be entirely wrong, and maybe Tokiomi is just that much of a prick of a dad to Sakura...I guess I’ve always had conflicting feelings about him because he seems to be a good father to Rin--not a great father since he prized the magus side but still. Sakura is given to be about, if not more powerful than Rin, right? I know she’s second-born so that means Rin had already been the successor a year before her, but I had always assumed Tokiomi chose Rin as heir out of great love and pride in her (though I guess one could argue, her 5 Elementals are like his own powers iirc...).