Dancestors and Their Implications on Classpecting

For many of Homestuck's readers, the Dancestors aren't exactly fond memories. While there is a good chunk of the fanbase who loves them for what's under the surface, myself included, I would argue the majority of the fanbase sees the Dancestors as what they were likely intended to be: bad-faith mockeries of Tumblr and the Homestuck fanbase at the time.

They are not well-written characters, for the most part. Oh, there are glimpses of interesting characterization and deeper story for all of them, but none of them beyond perhaps Aranea and Meenah live up to their potential. Many of them are uncomfortable at best and downright harmful at worst.

I do not want to talk about their characterization directly here, though. No, I would instead like to discuss the impact that the Dancestors have on a far more widely beloved part of Homestuck: the classpect system.

As we all know, the classpect system has two parts: the Class, such as 'Heir', and the Aspect, such as 'Breath'. Every sburb and sgrub player has a defined classpect, and every player we see in the comic has their classpect revealed at some point in time.

For the humans, every human has a unique class and a unique aspect. There are only eight of them who play sburb, so it makes sense for each of them to get one of the twelve options, as a shorthand for character differentiation. The Strilondes may be ectobiologically related, but each of the four has their own unique class and aspect.

For the trolls, though, there's something a little different that happens. Because there are only twelve aspects and fourteen classes, and because the master classes are only seen in-comic with the cherubs, there has to be overlap between the core twelve trolls and their Dancestors. Every class and aspect is used twice, in different combinations so that every troll has their own title.

What's interesting about the Dancestors' classpects, though, is that every Dancestor's aspect lines up with their respective core troll. The Captors, for example, are both Doom players, while the Vantases are both Blood players. They have different classes, but their aspect stays the same between the two of them.

Where this gets even more interesting is in the way the relationship between Dancestor and core troll works. Troll genetics is... hard to understand at best, and complicated even further when ectobiology is pulled into the mix, but we know that they have a concept of ancestors who provide the majority of their genetic code. We also know that each of the Dancestors is ectobiologically the ancestor of their respective core troll. The Dancestor Aranea Serket, for example, is genetically the same as Alternia's Mindfang; much in the same way that Jane Crocker is genetically the same as Nanna.

While we cannot say that the ancestry rules are the same for the sgrub players as they are for the rest of Trollkind, I believe that it is more informative and interesting to read the text in that way, because when we do there is a clear and incredibly useful correlation to be found. Because we do not see the trolls' ectobiology in action, I think it is reasonable to make the assumption that ectobiology machines tend to reflect the genetic combination practices of the species playing, and so would create a mother grub-like condition for the trolls as opposed to the parent-like condition that Jegbert had.

Assuming this to be true, then, and that the Dancestors share a large part of their genetic code with their respective core trolls, let's look back at the aspect connection.

Why are their aspects the same, but their classes different?

I believe it is a matter of nature vs nurture, where aspects are determined by nature and classes are determined by nurture.

The biggest difference between the trolls and their Dancestors is the world they were brought up in. The Dancestors lived in a world much more similar to our own, with many social issues being bureaucratic and political in nature; where the core trolls grew up in a much more violent and war-focused world. This is very clear in the canon of Homestuck, and established regularly throughout openbound.

This would, inevitably, lead to the Dancestors being raised and nurtured to implement their aspects in different ways from the core trolls. In turn, this brings them to have different classes.

Let's also look at what the basic setup of classpecting: classes have verbs (eg: bards and princes destroy) and are either passive or active (eg: bards destroy [aspect] while princes are destroyed by [aspect]), and aspects are the elemental forces affected by those verbs. From the Expanded Zodiac, we can further interpret aspects as a person's core values, and extrapolate that classes are how they interact with those core values.

This, too, lines up with the nature vs nurture interpretation of the classpect system. Both Karkat and Kankri are Blood players, and we can see that at their core both of them very heavily value the bonds between people. Those bonds are, for the Vantases, the most important parts of their lives. What's different between them is how they act on that belief: Karkat, as a Knight, helps (or, more properly, serves) the people he's bonded with and make sure they're happy and prospering, and is regularly the guy any of them go to for emotional advice; where Kankri, as a Seer, knows the connections between people and knows how to work with those connections to try and minimize conflict.

Karkat grew up in a world where he was marked for death from the day he was hatched, and the only way he would survive would be to serve powerful people and hope to impress them. He was nurtured into a role where helping people he's grown a bond with was useful and practical to keep himself alive and moving forward in the world.

Kankri grew up in a world where he was effectively a highblood's pet, and the only way he could further his place in society was to understand the connections between people and the complexities of a political bureaucracy. He was nurtured into a role where understanding the bonds between people was useful and practical to keep himself moving forward in the world.

Both of them, though, are still Blood players at their core.

While it is clearest and easiest to see this connection in the Vantases, it is, to my knowledge, true for all of the troll pairs.

This interpretation of classpecting, where classes are determined by nurture and aspects are determined by nature, may seem somewhat less than useful on the surface, but I believe that it is actually a GREATLY useful reference point for writing and developing characters, both in AUs and in original works.

Let's say you wanted to write a high school AU, but you were struggling to keep Karkat in character because of his more aggressive tendancies. Knowing that his Blood aspect is determined by nature would help to identify exactly what core values should be carried over, where having Knight be determined by nurture would help identify what might change or shift in this new version. Perhaps he's still a Knight, and he was still raised in a situation that led him to be knight-like, but it now takes the form of Karkat demanding that his friends have study groups together and ensuring that they're all ready for tests and quizzes.

It's flexible, of course, and should never be used as the single point of a character's personality, but I think that using the classpecting system to identify how a character's environments affect how they interact with their core belief is a really interesting and useful usage of the system.

TL;DR: I believe that the Dancestors' aspects being the same as their core troll counterparts while their classes differ indicates that classpecting is determined, in part, by the nature and nurture factors on a person's personality. Aspects are determined by nature and genetics, where classes are determined by nurture and environment. I think that this interpretation of the classpecting system is particularly interesting when creating characters and useful in analyzing characters both within and outside of Homestuck, as a way to identify how the way a character is raised leads them to interact with their core beliefs and values.

hi !! can i ask for an analysis of the thief of doom? it happens to be my assigned classpect and i want to understand it more slash get outside perspectives. Thanks!! (๑˃̵ᴗ˂̵)

first of all, its been almost a month since my last classpect analysis!! i got into this period of huge demotivation for writing and im trying to get back into it, sorry ^_^;

but a thief of doom seems soo cool.... doom is a fun aspect to look at in general!

the thief

"the active stealing class, thieves are the players that “steal their aspect/steal through their aspect for their own benefit”. they often feel the need to hoard parts of their aspect and be very proficient with it, and this makes their challenge learning to share their aspect with others. they are often selfish, impulsive people, but thieves are usually witty enough to use this to their own benefit with their aggressive power. more emphasis on the sharing, this would lead to the thief learning to further trust others in the areas of their aspect!"

a good example of a thief is vriska, thief of light. light elements include luck, knowledge, and sometimes the spotlight. throughout the comic, vriska "steals" luck from various sources to use herself! not to mention how shes literally inserted herself into every major plot point in the comic as much as she can, in order to secure the spotlight and be as relevant as possible!

her imperial condescension is also a thief of life! this is shown in the way she dictates alternia as a violent society, that in turn "takes/steals" life. most of alternia in itself is centered around the condesce, and she herself is very selfish. she also knows how to share life with others when needed, shown when she lengthens the psiioniic's lifespan so he may power her ship for longer. this hoarding of life is also represented through her extremely lengthy lifespan!

note: none of these thieves really got to complete their class-centered challenge of learning to share their aspect... but thats alright, as speculation really isnt anything new in classpecting!

doom

doom is a lot of literal but figurative things! such as decay, inevitability, rules, caution, etc. doom players often take easy comfort in the inevitable, whether its bad or not. theyll leave the end to fate! as said in the extended zodiac, heroes of doom are more like comforters of your problems than problem-solvers. they might be very cautious, rule-abiding, and/or mentally/physically dreadful.

a tragic example is sollux, mage of doom. mages know the ins and outs of their aspect, having lived with and through it for a good deal of time! sollux, as a mage, lives through and knows the doom of psiioniic powers and mood swings, at times being either uncontrollable or very stubborn/clear-cut. he also knew a lot about sgrub, a game that would later be the "doom" of the trolls! he acted on his knowledge of doom, helping his friends getting into the game. but later, after being KOd, sollux became very passive and simply accepted the decay of doom, later using a "h0ll0wed 0ut" typing quirk and not caring for much of reality. i believe this passiveness was his failure, as sollux gave up on the mage's challenge of becoming in control of their aspect with their knowledge.

then there is mituna, heir of doom. heirs completely embody their aspect, basically "inheriting" it. this is obvious in the instance where he sacrifices himself to keep his friends and their universe intact! the outcome is mituna in a decayed/frayed state, physically and mentally embodying doom.

the thief of doom

a thief of doom is interesting to think of! in my opinion, they would steal doom-related elements such as caution, decay, etc.

to the thief, caution and knowledge of the inevitable is comforting, no matter what happens in the end. this thief dislikes uncertainty, and with uncertainty is unpredictability. thats why they also steal the caution from the people around them! this leads to the thief's allies to be left with a bigger sense of risk-taking and unpredictability. their session becomes more unstable and people start to take more rash decisions! meanwhile the thief sits in their private corner, hoarding their comfort.

but there are, of course, pros to the extreme!! think of a thief of doom stealing your bad ending, like taking a hit for you in battle, or taking away your negative feelings through careful comfort. this thief can be hard on themselves sometimes, especially inadvertently. thats why its especially important they have good friends to help ease their feelings of decay!

but a thief should also share their great deal of their aspect when they want/need to! think of the thief planting bad consequences in enemy lines, or giving an ally doom, but conveniently on their god-tiering bed! the thief of doom absolutely shouldnt be afraid to get creative!

conclusion

thieves are great! they correlate with their aspect in such an intense but deep way, like its something impossible to separate them from.

overall, i hope this is a reasonable blog post!! i always love talking about classpects but im never sure how others find it as a source of info.. as always, appreciate the feedback, and tysm <3!!!

About Classpect Research in Canon Homestuck

Homestuck has a lot of power systems for a single piece of media. Honestly it's probably a record if you counted them out... but one of them stands out much more than the rest: Classpects. You could say it's because it's the least fully explained of any of homestuck's systems that leads so many people over the years to try and figure out the hidden definitions that guide these characters and may define ourselves. It could also be the very personal nature in which classpect relates to each player in sburb, a game that is by definition filled with hyper flexible mythology based on every player involved.

You could call the fact we don't know much absolutely certain information about the classpect system a double edged sword. On one hand it allows tons of different interpretations and discussion about such things, but on the other it also means a lot of energy is sunk into trying to interpret and agree on what a particular class or aspect means where that energy could be used on discussion of what those definitions mean for those it defines. I see merit in both the mystery, as well as ending it so we can discuss classpect in a much different way, but that is only the introduction of my real purpose in this analysis.

I'm here to talk about numbers, context, and research.

Note that this is meant more to describe the situation of covering classpects through canon examples and isn't meant as criticism to how Hussie implemented it in his story. There may be a time and place to examine that side of things but this specific write up is more focused on how it pertains to trying to figure the system out as a fan base. It is also not meant as an excuse for mistakes for myself or others in the classpect community when it comes to figuring out classpects but rather a healthy dose of context I haven't seen anyone bring up about the amount of information we actually have at our disposal.

Note also: Spoilers for most of the length of homestuck in the below.

So if we are to research the classes and aspects of homestuck, how do we go about starting that process? Listing them and the number of subjects we can analyze is an important step if we're being objective and not working off of any other fan theories.

Classes: Heir, Witch, Seer, Mage, Knight, Page, Thief, Rogue, Sylph, Maid, Bard, Prince, Lord, Muse Aspects: Space, Time, Life, Doom, Mind, Heart, Breath, Blood, Light, Void, Hope, Rage Sburb Players: John, Rose, Dave, Jade, Aradia, Tavros, Sollux, Karkat, Nepeta, Kanaya, Terezi, Vriska, Equius, Gamzee, Eridan, Feferi, Jane, Jake, Roxy, Dirk, Damara, Rufioh, Mituna, Kankri, Meulin, Porrim, Latula, Aranea, Horuss, Kurloz, Cronus, Meenah, Calliope, Caliborn

So by the numbers that's 14 Classes, 12 Aspects, and about 34 Sburb Players. That means we only have 34 characters with certain classpects to describe 14 classes and 12 aspects. Looking at this scientifically.... that's a very small sample size. You need quite a large selection of people in order to separate individual quirks from the quirks that define a class or aspect. In terms of narrative it's actually a LOT of characters and that's only counting ones with absolute classpects, plenty more characters around.

Before moving onto further context, I will address the 'ancestor' issue and why I'm only mathematically counting the 34 for the classpect research numbers. While there is implication for the 'ancestor' version of a character sharing a similar if not exact classpect with the 'player' version of that character it is in no way confirm-able. The only exception to that is the trolls in which the extended zodiac gives us proof that a troll of the same sign will genetically always have the same dream moon and aspect.  The class is still up for debate though, and in scientific terms the alternian ancestors are completely tainted. Even if they are the same class as their original 'player', Doc Scratch's plans force some or all of them to act in some way more like the alternian trolls than their actual beforus doubles in terms of class. So it's possible to gleam more about the aspects if you really wanted to but the classes are even less trust-able. If the classes of trolls, and class/aspects of humans are based on experiences then, can we fully trust that the narrative of homestuck is making them exact enough to be a good base? Even if you do take the 'ancestor' versions of players to count as viable data, that only raises the count to 54 characters, not that substantial of a number raise even if you're assuming these more undefined characters are their counterpart's classpect. Yes, only 20 more, since the Beforus versions of the alternian trolls are almost entirely unknown except for maybe Feferi in the most passing way possible, as well as the cherubs not having scratch version alternatives.

With 34-54 to describe a 12x14 system we push forward and find that context plays a heavy role in what those numbers can do for us. This context of course is a double edged sword in that some of it is very helpful in giving us plenty of information! But then some of the context basically removes some of those numbers from the equation entirely.

First we'll look at the imbalance of classes and aspects. Using the sburb player count to be the most accurate.

Classes: Heir(3), Witch(3), Seer(3), Mage(2), Knight(3), Page(3), Thief(2), Rogue(3), Sylph(2), Maid(3), Bard(2), Prince(3), Lord(1), Muse(1) Aspects: Space(4), Time(4), Life(3), Doom(2), Mind(2), Heart(3), Breath(3), Blood(2), Light(3), Void(3), Hope(3), Rage(2)

Aspects are the best off, space and timing having the most since both troll sessions have two of each, and the human and cherub sessions both have at least one pair of this aspect. Basically from that point on, every aspect has at least two players with every human covered aspect having three. Classes are a bit more of an issue, the cherub master classes only having a single character each (and their alternative time selves which most characters have anyway) to set an example. The rest of the classes are the two for troll only and three for human included ones like we seen with the non-central aspects.

So seperating the 34 Characters up into each segment contextualizes the small sample size for the entire system as being even smaller for each part of the system. Even if we have a lot of data on each character individually that means only the 3-4 player class or aspects can be considered to have enough of a sample size to try and define them in a more broad sense that isn't overly attached to the character. Including the 'ancestor' variations might help slightly but only raises those numbers a tiny bit in exchange for information that is HIGHLY tainted by both Doc Scratch and the questionable side of nature vs nurture when it comes to human classpects in homestuck, and the master classes are still where they were left off since those don't have scratch ancestor doubles.

We've talked largely just about the numbers so far and as important as that is to understand approaching classpecting another important factor is amount of information per character. Honestly just going over that could be a significantly HUGE post on it's own when talking about how much or how little each character has so I'm going to do my best to go over it in the broadest terms here since I've already gone on for quite a while.

The human classes and aspects are naturally the best well off, each human character alone has plenty of time focused on them and story around their actions. Sure none of the humans have any overlap so without the trolls there's very little to go on for separating their non-classpect personality quirks from their classpect based ones, but the sheer amount of story focused on them gives any of the 8 aspects and 8 classes that the humans cover given much more information than the remaining ones. There's still an inequality that exists on how well each of any of these classpects are covered but that perhaps is for a more detailed post/sequel post.

The alternian trolls are a little more imbalanced. Both due to our actual experience in their session being more of a slide-show of specific moments and that both during the session and after the session some trolls get TONS of coverage while others are sadly treated narratively as filler. (Ok that wasn't objective but it's hard to stay 100% ok?). Even with there being in between and some characters getting a good chunk of screen time that screen time isn't always filled with great examples of what their classpect might particularly mean. Some characters that even get a lot of screen time seem to have a lot of their bigger accomplishments off screen and with very little coverage. This makes sense when you look at homestuck as being already a huge and long series, but it also means that the sample size is even more heavily effected by a smaller data pool per character. This is important not only for the four troll session exclusive classes and aspects in the comic's narrative, but also when we include the next segment of characters.

The beforus trolls. Oh boy. Talking about filler characters! While I'll revisit some of them in just a little bit, in general only two of these trolls have any prominent role in the comic. BOTH of these trolls have aspects that are already covered by humans as well, and one of them is another Serket and you know how much time she got on screen already. The majority of the ten other beforus trolls basically have two to five paragraphs each on any significant backstory before not showing up again, sometimes having almost NO relevant information on them at all. If the Alternian trolls were a case of imbalanced data per sample size, Beforus gives us an almost non-existent amount of new information when they're added to the sample size.

The cherubs are both in the highest count for aspect, and lowest count for classes in terms of comparability. Both helping creating the most fleshed out aspect to research as well as being the only examples of their own classes.

All of this extra context means some classpects are very well understandable with canon information and interpretation while others take a lot more filling in the spaces and personal interpretation. While I do think classpects SHOULD be flexible due to their personal nature and reflection of a character, there are some fundamental things that people continue to disagree about for some things, more over with classes than aspects since aspects were always the more fluid part of the equation. Luckily we do have some solid information, in cases of Rogue and Thief, and Prince and Bard descriptions from Calliope in what is clearly a exposition dump. But that leaves 10 classes much more uncertain, and while the descriptions of the classes seem on point, some of her information on the system is arguably also in the realm of homestuck's consistent trait of unreliable narrators, her skewed understanding of gender by her species being one of the more obvious points.

There are some Classes, and even a few aspects that I feel like are largely under-represented or misrepresented in the narrative that I'd like to mention now that I've covered so much of the generals so far. Troll only classes are big pains, such as Mages where Sollux is moderately shown during the troll session but barely after and Meulin is covered basically only in one of the Beforus walk around games. Bards are also just generally confusing since again, with a Befiller troll being one half of that sample size we're left with Gamzee as one of the only examples, arguably a great example but people seem to get confused by his clown nature when examining him. Even some human crossover classes like Page are a huge pain, while Jake and Tavros have a decent number of scenes the Beforus troll here is a page of void and thus as non-existent to the narrative or any backstory as any character can get. It doesn't help that everyone in the entire narrative of homestuck don't seem to understand what a page even does, to the point of Vriska saying it's a throwaway class and no one arguing  with her because no one present has any better idea about it than her. This doesn't mean that a Page doesn't have a specific purpose, and they could be even very useful and understandable, but the narrative of homestuck itself almost tries to bury it under a mountain of character misunderstanding and even huge amounts of abuse from character to character even further obscuring it.

Aspects as flexible and fluid as they are in comparison to classes being the funnel to shape them don't' get away from these issues either. Three out of the Four troll only aspects have big issues of how they're portrayed in order to get a proper understanding too, Blood, Doom, and Rage. Mind is fairly well defined via Terezi's story at least, even if it is another issue of practically single character sample size. Blood is one of the aspects that seem to NEVER be shown being used in a 'classpect power' way, so the extent that side of things is applicable to the aspect is unknown, but at least the mental and metaphorical side is a little more clear. Doom is very understandable as a physical aspect but it's effect as a mental personality trait can be seen as less clear when the only two characters who embody it are Sollux (shown mostly in the troll session and kind of disappears the rest of the comic), and Mituna who we only see after his mind has been doomed, but not really the before side of things in his story. Rage is honestly the most confusing aspect in terms of comic explanation, to the point where I remember it being one of the most discord-ish parts of the extended zodiac aspect explanations since people totally saw Gamzee another way. The HUGE problem with rage is that it was an aspect shown only through destruction classes. Classes who sought to destroy the aspect, or if forced to hold that aspect see it as only something to destroy. On top of us barely seeing Kurloz, this means anything we see done with the rage players requires us to ask "is this them trying to act in the opposite of rage, or acting within rage?", so we can get the opposite impression of what it really means if we mess that puzzle up. Hope almost has the same problem with a prince and bard being the main two examples of it but it has the added Jake English... which only slightly improves things since if we're so confused on what Pages do, and some think Pages barely use their aspect properly, how much better can we understand hope if that's the case?

Even with all these problems in figuring out the system of personality and elemental powers, so many people are drawn to it. Classpecting is still a sub-fandom of homestuck of a size and spirit that's comparable to other full series fandoms. It's enjoyable to be a part of, and I still stand by the research I've done to come to my current classpect understandings. Even my understanding is a bit fluid, some classes could be switched entirely and it'd work for them, and aspects are always almost based more on the individual than something solid. All in all, I hope this gave people who haven't tried to research classpects a better understanding of the issues we have to research around, even maybe giving some people who have classpected some context to what they've already dug into even if they didn't realize some parts of it.

NOW. i know sol isn’t mine like i don’t go here but he’s got the most notable examples of yellowblood/mutant powers in canon, and in order to talk about mituna’s psionics i have to draw from him! let’s get into it.

VOICES OF THE DOOMED. 

sollux hears voices of the recently deceased and they tell him that alternia is doomed. it’s important to note that this happens before the trolls begin to play sgrub -- this is very specifically part of sollux’s mutation, and not something he achieves through being the mage of doom. similarly, mituna, being a yellowblood mutant, experiences premonitions (frequently brushed off by others as paranoia and gut feelings) about other trolls, and the danger they pose to both mituna himself and the party at large (noteable examples are meenah, who he hates not only because he just doesn’t like her but because she gives him intense visions and migraines) and damara (who he knows to be extremely deadly). mituna, while not as academically-minded as sollux, is pretty genre-savvy, and he’s able to differentiate his mutant-visions from the classpect-visions he gets later on. 

MIND HONEY.

mind honey, as we see in canon, merely enhances existing psionics. it’s incredibly unhealthy for yellowbloods, as it’s addictive and acts almost like sopor slime, in a way -- it makes sollux’s lusus dimwitted and satiated, and loosens any inhibitions and ability to think rationally, do anything requiring fine motor skills and, most importantly, prevents a mutated yellowblood from keeping their powers at bay. as we see in canon, both captors keep their eyes covered (mituna, even pre canon, wears his hair thick and over his eyes, as he constructs his helmet with his alchemiser once he enters sgrub) -- this is because, should their eyes go uncovered, it’s much easier for psionics to fire out ad-hoc should they feel any intense emotions. seen as mituna’s psionics, post-accident, are broken, mind honey doesn’t power them up anymore, but it DOES soothe the almost constant chronic pain he’s in (migraines, muscle aches, pain in his eyes), and so his lusus feeds it to him in order to balm him, just a little.

PSIONICS.

now. this is the good part. as we see just before sollux gets ko’d by eridan (’ready, prince?’), sollux’s psionics are under his control -- he either powers them up himself, charging them before he has to use them in a fight, or they’re tied to his emotions. i like to think it’s a little bit of both, and that’s why mituna is so unsteady once his psionics are broken -- a very real and very major part of his mind has just shattered completely, and he can’t regulate nearly anything (memory, feeling, social cues, etc) in the same way as he could before. 

a lot can be learned about psionics from the eridan and sollux duel, in fact: when sollux uses his psionics to levitate himself, his glasses come up onto his head, thus solidifying that keeping a captor’s eyes covered nullifies their powers somewhat, sollux is clearly less Present in the battle than eridan is (which is to say, sollux is stationary and channelling all of his energy into his psionics, where eridan is able to react and move and cast his Science Spells with more autonomy), all of the force of the pisonics does in fact stem from a captor’s eyes, etc. i believe that not only was it eridan’s hope (or more accurately lack thereof) was just... stronger than sollux’s psionics in the moment, but also the massive strain sollux underwent trying to beat eridan that lead to him getting knocked unconscious. psionics are hard work. using them a little leads to drowsiness, using them a lot leads to exhaustion, and using them too much leads to death, as we see when sollux dies after piloting the meteor. mituna burned himself out in such a way that he almost died (reminiscent of sollux’s half-death). i wouldn’t call him lucky, but it was a close call, for sure.

SPECIFIC TO MITUNA.

‘eli,’ i hear you saying, ‘you literally do not write sollux’. to this i say I KNOW but their powers are BALANCED BY EACH OTHER just stick with me here!! so. i don’t by any means want to discredit sollux -- he is immensely powerful, after all -- but mituna, being older and more relaxed (tbh just in general) in terms of his status as a mutant and his powers (which he actively practised using from a young age) is... more so, when it comes to psionics. i’m also very confident in saying mituna would be incredibly average at programming and such, which is where the balance comes in, yk? two sides of the same coin with different expertise. 

mituna was an incredibly powerful psionic to boot. his powers went beyond that of just powering spaceships, telekinesis, levitation, etc -- if used correctly (or, rather, correctly by evil), mituna could have been an incredibly deadly and horrific doomsday weapon. he also had vision twofold, two dreamselves, and,of course, his preminitions about the future, which he tried time and time again to warn others about, to no avail. the trouble is with mituna being who he is (loud, obnoxious bordering on abrasive, mischievous, snarky and cynical by nature but most always up for a bit of fun, essentially a wildcard), it was very easy to not take him seriously, call him biased and move on. mituna assumed that he, as the sole prophet and one of two believers (the other being kurloz, natch) was to be the one to take out the threat he predicted was going to wipe out his friends and doom their session. unfortunately, this was a case of wrong genre savvy -- mituna, being heir of doom, WAS the threat (or, more specifically, his psionics were), and the best outcome of him going to neutralise said threat was always going to be the accident that rendered him changed for good.

however. i am by no means saying that it wasn’t GREATLY thanks to kurloz’ chuckevoodoo and his input that mituna is As Bad As He Is. kurloz was there, accompanied him to this great overexertion and his mind control had some hand in ruining mituna. of course, we have no idea what happened (other than mituna burned himself out heroically, saving everybody only for meenah, who he’d prophesied about all along, to kill them all anyway), but i refuse to believe that kurloz being there doesn’t have some greater bearing on what went down.

now. as for him not knowing if he’s god tier or not: my gut instinct would be no. however. i think his confusion on the matter lends itself to the idea that he may have been close to going god tier -- perhaps getting halfway there (keeping with the two theme) or intending to at least before he burned himself out. as heir is someone who either becomes (literal) or is changed by/inspires change by their aspect (metaphorical), and doom as a class represents sacrifice (metaphorical) and control over death and destruction (literal), i’m okay with saying that god tier mituna would be absolutely formidable, as long as he was his coherent self.

mituna uses his psionics before sgrub, and once he enters the game and crafts his helmet, his specubus becomes ‘helmetkind’ (later ‘hemletkind’, naturally). he can go longer using them than sollux can (and most yellowbloods, actually), but that itself is dangerous, as he can often drain himself without even realising he’s about to do so. not having the psionics is very distressing for him later on, especially as the incident is so fragmented that he doesn’t exactly understand what he did to break his powers so thoroughly. the psionics are not a separate part of mituna -- they are tied so closely to his brain that each affects the other, and destroying his psionics only lead to him being the way he is now, with no way to recover. 

Classes: Mage and Seer, Heir and Page

Alright, here we go again! I feel that this one is a harder sell then the last, so I've put a lot of thought into why i feel this is the most likely connection! That being said, get ready for a looooooooooong post 0u0. Also, if you want to read my post on the Thief, Rogue, Knight, and Maid classes, here’s a link!! 

The Knowing Classes, Mage and Seer!

This pairing is probably the most popular theory for where Mages belong, and since we know very little about Mages, we don’t have much to go on!! 

Here we can see Sollux, Mage of Doom, claim that in order for him to be a true Prophet of Doom, he must lose his sense of sight. This suggests, supported by  Meulin, Mage of Heart, who is deaf, that part of a Mages journey is losing a sense, but it ALSO suggests that Mages are prophets, much like the abilities we see Seers like Rose, Seer of Light, have! Along with all this and the fact that we see both Mages and Seers act as authorities of knowledge when it comes to their aspect, I think they are a perfect fit! Additionally, only Mages and Seers have been able to vividly hear Exiles and separate the exiles words from their own thoughts!

Mages, being the Active class, have/gain a lot of knowledge about their Aspect! Mages are known to be incredibly accurate when they make predictions about their Aspect! Although we only hear of this through Aranea, Meulin is told to have incredibly accurate ships! Additionally, we actually can see Sollux’s predictive abilities in the pester log I linked earlier! Strange how we only HEAR about Meulins abilities and actually SEE Solluxs... It’s hard to say what kind of abilities Mages gain with their classpect but the abilities the cannon Mages show suggest that they may gain some insight as to how their aspect works, or how their aspect may effect them/their group. Mages use their knowledge, in a best case scenario, to take the best course of action!

Seers, being the Passive class, gain knowledge of the future! Specifically futures that have to do with their Aspect. Rose, Seer of Light, gained knowledge of futures with fortuitous outcomes, as she explained on the meteor and explicitly stated, HERE, “My powers let me see fortuitous outcomes...”. End-quote. Terezi, Seer of Mind, gained the ability to see the future outcomes of specific choices! Although it’s a little difficult to decipher what exactly happened in [S] Terezi: Remem8er. but it could be interpreted as her gaining sight into a timeline where she made different choices! In Kankri, the Seer of Blood, we can see his post-scratch version see a timeline with a lot more interconnection in his races society! Doc Scratch said HERE, “But if I was a Seer, such [timeline ]offshoots would be fully within my domain. And if I was a Seer of Mind in particular, synaptic causality would be my specialty.” Synaptic Causality translating in layman's terms to the effects of peoples brains, or, more appropriately in this context, the effects of peoples choices! Although this is a less sound theory, its possible that Seers also see futures WITH their Aspect, Roses magic cue-ball acting as a representation of clarity. I personally am not quite sure about that one, but it’s a possibility! Seers have been known to often send people on quests as well, as seen with Rose devising the plan for their sessions scratch, and Terezi sending John to retcon the Timeline! Seers use their knowledge, in the best case scenario, to give advice and direct others through the best course of action!

With The Knowing Classes, we can see in both the characters and their abilities, that they care more about the metaphorical side of their Aspect then the Flashy Powers. Seers and Mages are ingrained in the deeper meanings of their Aspect! Their powers are knowledge based, and they dont really get sick flashy powers like everyone else does! Rose never cared about being lucky, but cared instead about Lights themes like Clarity and Fortune(fortune as in good stuff, not luck)! In order to find their opposites, we need to find a pair of classes that don’t care nearly as much about the deeper meanings, and more about the flashy powers and the raw feelings and surface level meanings of their Aspects! 

The Utilization/Embodiment Classes, Heir and Page!

I reaaaaally tried to settle on one name, but I just couldn’t, they fit in different ways.

Just like Knights and Maids, this is a good group to compare!! Except this time we have TWO pairs with the same Aspect, as well as an Inversion!! Once again, i’m sure this seems like an odd pair, but please hear me out! 

Heirs, being the Active class, gain, and even become their aspect! We can see this best with our Protagonist John, Heir of Breath! I call these the Utilization classes because you can see John use wind and manipulate it! BUT, I call them the Embodiment Classes because upon ascending to God Tier, John eventually gains the ability to literally become air! These names will make sense for Pages too when I get to them 0u0. You can see John gain more and more freedom throughout his adventure, starting with the ability to enter his dads room, then hold just about as many items as he wants, then hold as BIG of items as he wants, literally inheriting his wallet from his father, and then gaining freedom from the timeline itself!! John doing the retcon shenanigans could even be seen as him totally embodying the concept of Freedom! Equius, Heir of Void, gained irrelevance as he was killed and used as half of Arquius and then one fourth of Doc Scratch/Lord English, only being a source of strength for them. You could also see Equius’s blood being used to hide information about Gamzee and Lord English as him literally becoming the obscuring of information!  Additionally, although we know vary little about Mituna, Heir of Doom, and his story, you could say he gained a lot of death, even becoming, in an informal sense, brain dead before actually dying. And then staying that way even after death.

Pages, being the Passive class, gain, then exude massive amounts of their Aspect! Pages are told to have hypothetically infinite amounts of potential when it comes to their Aspect. Along with this being told to Jake, Page of Hope by Aranea and Ghost Brain Dirk many times, it was even hinted at by Aradia in reference to Tavros, Page of Breath, and his Flarp class, Boy Skylark. She says HERE, “n0ne 0f the really useful c0mbat abilities c0me int0 play until y0u reach a very high level. but i supp0se it will be rewarding when y0u get there.” We don’t have very much information about Horuss, Page of Void, but he did use to have a deficit of Void, having many useful skills, yet ended up, in a sense, gaining irrelevance. Aranea said it best during Openbound, “The Page of Void was a self taught master of mechanics, an avid patron of the fine arts, a passionate 8ody 8uilder, archer, am8rosia collector and steamwright. A poet, a scholar, a warrior, a lover, he was all that his caste demanded and more. A true troll Renaissance man. Yet in spite of all he worked to make something of himself, he amounted to very little. Responsi8le for neither great feats of heroism nor acts of villainy, he was just another game piece to 8e moved a8out the 8oard.” The only time we get to see the abilities of a Page is when Aranea takes over Jake's mind and releases his potential. During this, he LITERALLY exudes a massive ball of hope energy out of his body, causing mass destruction! I feel like I should say, when I say “exudes Aspect” I do not mean other people gain their Aspect from them just being around. I mean it in a less literal sense, as pages, after realization, have a lot of their Aspect, and by a lot, I mean a LOT!

If you want to understand Jake's lack of hope, then eventual growth into becoming a (literal) Hope God, I highly suggest checking out @punkcandy s Analysis of Jake's Arc. It specifically about his Sexual Objectification, but I think the whole thing, especially the last two paragraphs, do a fantastic job of summarizing his arc as a Page of Hope!! Go ahead and read it HERE!! Also, follow punkcandy wile you’re at it because they’re dope.

Now the big part...

Why these Pairs?

As I said, we have two examples of a Page and Heir of the same Aspect. These are John and Tavros, Heir and Page of Breath, and Equius and Horuss, Heir and Page of Void. First, Breath. We can see John and Tavros have massive amounts of their Aspect by the end of their journey. John has it in the form of pure unrestrained freedom, but Tavros does in a different sense. The Breath Aspect (as well as the Blood Aspect in a different way) represents leadership abilities, specifically being able to drive people to a goal! Tavros definitely has this ability (and a lot of it) as he gathers the BILLIONS of ghosts for his army through friendship alone! Now, Void. Now, we know VERY little about Void. This is no surprise because an entire part of Void is the obscuring of information, but in addition to this, the first and ONLY Void player to delve into the concepts of Void or what it represents is Roxy! Equius and Horuss never gave much thought as to their Aspects deeper symbolic meanings. The only other players who have never been shown to give any real thought into what their Aspects mean include John, Mituna, Tavros, and Jake. The Heirs and Pages. Although we don’t know much about Mituna, John never really thought much about what breath represents or anything like that, he just followed his quest and became a badass hero! Tavros and Jake's Aspects are very important to their quests, so they do talk about their Aspects, but never to a degree more in depth then “Hope is when you believe in something” and “Gosh I wish I could get around without my wheelchair.” Although they care about their Aspects, they only really cared about the literal stuff about it, Like believing and flying. They didn't grow by thinking deeply about their Aspect and what it means to them, they grew by USING IT (Hey, that’s why I used the word Utilization) to kick ass. Although their personal growth had to do with their Aspects, they never gave it more thought then, “I have a rad life now instead of feeling sorry for myself” and “Look at my badass army (Suck it Vriska)”

THIS IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF HOW SEERS AND MAGES ARE.

To quote myself from earlier in this post, “Their powers are knowledge based, and they dont really get sick flashy powers like everyone else does! Rose never cared about being lucky, but cared instead about Lights themes like Clarity and Fortune(fortune as in good stuff, not luck)! “ 

Additionally, we can see the inversions in cannon!! John inverts to one who knows bonds when he acts as the lead authority of Friendship to Karkat! Rose inverts to one who embodies the Void when she goes Grimdark! Sollux inverts to one who utilizes Life when he uses his many dreamselves to keep himself active, as well as his half ghost! Horuss even inverts to one who gains a lot of Knowledge before his entering, being a well educated “Renaissance Troll”.

Although this post is made to give my reasons for why I think my theory is correct, not fight off other possibilities, I feel it is important to say this. Thematically, Rose and Jade inverting to each others classes makes a lot of sense. But with how the Classes actually work, it doesn't as much. It’s an entirely valid theory, and I dont think points towards it are necessarily wrong. I will be going into what exactly I think of Witch's in my next post, which will probably take longer to write then my other two combined.

Mage inverts with Page

Seer inverts with Heir

Again, feel free to message me about any of this!! I’m always down to discuss!!