When Lightning Strikes (Patreon)

(Look! Another BIG post with Momentum details and lore! Go me! I even took the time to scan in the art, rather than cheap out and use the pic on my phone!)

Momentum was always a staging area/scratching post for creative exercises because I wasn't big on fantasy stuff - since, as soon as you drop the will to play along, everything falls apart. (See: Any realistic superhero story, which inevitably becomes a commentary on fascist and grim junk.) But Momentum in the *Precociousverse* is a video game franchise - and fun cartoon, a la Avatar: The Last Airbender, for all ages - and the thing about these formats is You Can Just Have Fun! It was freeing to me! Remember, while I have 25 years of good Momentum ideas in my brain, I also have 25 years of all the BAD ideas. It's all in that unorganized brain vault.

But now... oh hey, one thing I *love* to do as a creative exercise is try to figure out how to adapt my Momentum crew to various video game mechanics. The characters began as excuses to design Magic: The Gathering cards, or as an exercise to give a fighting game idea a plot. In the present, I challenge myself to design versions of them for Fire Emblem: Heroes. In the middle, I watched a friend play Tales of Symphonia - which really stuck with me as a format compatible with the Momentum crew. I imagined them as characters fighting in standard Final Fantasy RPG battle mode (that's where I am in my current Momentum RPG ideas) or as Final Fantasy Tactics units (this was my FIRST idea of the multi-storyline Momentum video game) - and I also stole a "support unit" format from a Steven Universe app game, which has become key to my imagined Precociousverse RPG. (I'll cover that more once I finally make that foretold stone bond megapost, cuz it's a key part of Nate's entry.)

This post is about broad strokes, and narrowing down the core aspect of each character. What game mechanics do I associate with each? How did their personalities and backstories convert into how I imagine the RPG (or franchise spinoffs) playing out? I sat down to write notes about that to myself, and realized THIS COULD LUMP INTO ANOTHER POST I WAS PLANNING! Rhenna is my big banner image gal, but she's my closer here. She's the reason for this post - but I am CRAMMING IN EXTRA LORE/MECHANICS CONTEMPLATION FIRST! The nature of contemplating these characters means I bounce between broad strokes in how they work in games, and specific quirks in specific formats/situations. It's clumsy, but also all gravy, and I'll take the indulgence. I hope you do the reading, cuz, if anything, it's a peek into my brain that gives you a glimpse of just how MUCH is constantly processing in there. And this is just the "keep me occupied while force-hiatus'd, so I don't go insane" stuff!

Aaron's the easiest character to start with, cuz he's one of the earliest, and emerged around a core concept that is fairly known. Aaron is an indigo made in Momentum's magic color system*, tho you will recognize indigo as a SIMILAR color in Final Fantasy's well-known color system. It's blue magic! It's stealing and using magic spells/enchantments from other sources! That has been Aaron's core mechanic from the start. EXTREMELY useful for a video game character - and really intriguing when he's a MAIN character, cuz there are versions (specifically, the Tales of Symphonia knockoff) where he absorbs enchantments and becomes a melee fighter with a spectral enchantment sword, and enhanced body durability, when he would normally be a tactical mage in the back row. Love it! But also hate it, cuz it's kinda messy when in a standard narrative. I've REALLY struggled with the mechanics of Aaron in Momentum's story/cartoon version. I'm narrowing how he'll function in it down, but I've basically given up, shrugged, and let it happen, cuz it's NOT A REAL PROJECT, and perfection is useless.

*In Momentum's magic color system, Aaron's uses manipulator magic (blue) to take the ethereal (magic stuff, whose color is white) and sometimes use that skill to work with life force (the life force element is yellow, and manipulating life force is green magic, cuz blue+yellow). That's a... mess of scattered magic colors, NONE of which add up to indigo! Shouldn't he be sky (blue+white)? Do I count the green element of his specific ability as part of him, making him aqua? (If the green aspect is unclear to you, it's because it was to ME. I wrote myself into a corner over it and panicked, before realizing IT'S MY SYSTEM, and nothing says his specific ability can't be a combo of three magic elements! I'm only now starting to find some coherence, and I can't expect you to follow what I barely can.) So, yeah... Why the heck is he INDIGO with that skill combo?!? Answer: Because of versatility! He moves magic, which means he technically has access to spells of all types! And when you break through the specific color power to go into wide access, that is elite PURPLE MAGIC territory! The cobbling of powers into a faux-purple skill means purple goes into the equation despite it not actually being purple magic. What would normally be sky gets a dollop of purple in its magic color term. Thus: Indigo! As I mention in that crazy post on the Precocious site, which I desperately want OFF the site and onto Patreon, my magic system is a ridiculous mess. I both love and loathe it for it's insanity. Again: *I* can barely work with it, so anyone else would be totally lost!

I'm lumping Phoebe and Jerrod together for one entry, as they're both our key melee fighters, and both have dynamic elements to their mechanics because they use Elishem weapons. Elishem is Jerrod's last name. His family got rich and famous because his grandfather/aunt/uncle(/etc?) use "exothermic" indigo magic to created powerful enchanted weapons. (Aaron's indigo skill has endothermic expression, if you were wondering, and I should note the terms are not literal, just helpful in classifying. My dumb system just has each color combo also having exo/endo versions, resulting in different expression of that magic. Confusing, but also neat! Anyway, endo indigo is the significantly WORSE version of that very special magic. Sorry, Aaron! No easy riches for you!) Elishem weapons are enchanted to hold various useful enchantments, such as spells that makes the weapons (or whatever object the Elishems craft) near-indestructible, and they mesh with their holder to be extra responsive when used. They adjust their weight so you can look masterful in flinging them about! When deeply bonded with a user, another elite perk that makes them cherished, they can even move on their own, such as spinning to the proper orientating when the holder releases their grip, aiming if they are hurled, and having limited recall ability after said hurling! But, of course, since these weapons are such great things and so special, the only people who have them are the rich and high-profile politicians. Almost no one FIGHTS with Elishem weapons! But Jerrod, the Elishem heir, who felt bad for not inheriting the crafting magic, ran off to make a life for himself instead of being a family parasite, so he USES his shield, axe and dagger  (well, technically, Jerrod doesn't use the dagger, as Aaron's indigo touch is what reveals the dagger's true function, so AARON takes the dagger) to protect his new community in the Epic Fantasy War that ended 16 years before Momentum's events. And Phoebe's Elishem spear has become a minor legend in the land, as she used its bond assistance and powers to strike down one of the BOSSES in a climactic battle. It made her a war hero, and started her on the path to politics, but resulted in the destruction of the spear. Now it sits in a tree, mangled, as a historic site that tourists visit. But Phoebe was great with that spear, so she gets a replacement - a gift from Jerrod's uncle, after he visit Jerrod and learned about her, which had been misplaced for years - at the start of Momentum! Yay!

Who's next? How about Kimban? Dude's a chubby jokester who is the fate-designated strategist. He's not supposed to be on the battlefield! I don't really have a mechanic to cover how Kimban fights in-game at the start yet, aside from the briefly-mentioned support unit slot, so let's assume his powers need to get fast-forwarded or have a workaround to work in a game setting. (Good thing this is all speculative, and my failure has no consequences!) Anyway, as the quest plays out, he (like everyone in the team) begins to evolve into a FATE MAKER final magic form. (The non-mages become mages, while Aaron's aforementioned messy indigo magic becomes ACTUALLY USEFUL!) Kimban's unlocked power is telekinesis, which he uses on various dolls he takes with him. As the designated supergenius, Kimban can carry multiple "conversations" in his head at once, so he does his thing, and in the back of his mind, he propels his dolls around too. The dolls do their entertaining background things, being cute and providing comedy - cuz he can forget the back of his mind stuff, and be surprised by his own dolls' actions! I love that quirk! Yay, dolls! (Er, puppets? Whatever. "Dolls" is the funnier word.)

Nasha is next for having a fun mechanic. Well... kinda. Give me another strike for messy application here. His game mechanic is ALSO based on special abilities, which is (again) somewhat cheating on the already-shaky premise of this post. But I don't have a better idea for a default character aspect for him yet, so let's cheat! So, yeah, I'm taking the shine away from his stone bond entry here. Sorry! His stone is the barrier stone, which becomes super cool and fun when he uses it to make barrier constructs, and turn the quarterstaff he attaches the stone to into a MULTIWEAPON! It can form a shield, a hammer, a hook, a pole, whatever! He's not a natural fighter, but this versatility gives him game usefulness! (ESPECIALLY in the Metroidvania-style spinoff game!)

I'm gonna lump Nate in with Nasha, too, as I should save her entry for the stone bond post. Nate's mechanic is brewing potions from herbs, which is pretty cool, but... separate from the game flow? Like, you take a break, look at your items, craft potions, and use them when needed. In the game flow, since you don't always need a healer every round, I let her use the light stone she bonds with to also have a proactive combat role by making illusions. Also, in FATE MAKER magic form, Nate carries the video game staple "auto potion" skill for everyone! (Seriously, the delays in finishing the stone bond post is really screwing up all my other planned posts, since the info is supposed to already out there! Look, I'm clearly producing stuff at a faster rate now, which I hope is a sign of recovery, and if that keeps up then typing in chunks will be a more-regular event for me - as opposed to me randomly blacking out and then waking up to find I've written stuff like... well, THIS POST! Cuz, again, all of this writing was NOT planned! It fell out of me in a stoke of... luck? Doom for you? *shrug*)

Now the simple ones: Meret's mechanic is to be team thief. (With, yes, another stone bond element folks may remember me often write about, but that's more for TV show narrative. Game-wise, she's the thief!) That's all we need for her. And Tijo is our sharpshooter, so his mechanic is an increase in critical hit rate. Look, an EASY ONE!

Aaaaannnnd I do believe I've now touched on all eight of our chosen questers. But a ninth character is in the group, on the edges, even when she SHOULDN'T be!

So here we are, reaching Rhenna, THE SUBJECT OF THE POST! EVERYTHING ABOVE IS "BONUS" RAMBLING! (Woe to those reading this. Please tell me it was interesting.) Rhenna's whole deal has a few parts. I wasn't kidding. It's an entire other post that I meant to write! But the Rhenna struggle is about how thinking in game mechanics FINALLY fixed the problem with her magic design, so folding in everyone else's game mechanics, with some of the thinking behind why I chose them, made sense.

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(While editing this post, after needing several hours to recover from the surprise writing burst that produced it, I had a panic moment when I was supposed to see Rhenna's part of the post, but saw the "Welcome to the stone bond megapost!" opener instead, and had a heart attack that all I wrote had somehow disappeared. Nope! Turns out I wrote the mechanics part of the post before the intro, since this is actually the Stone Bond post draft document - again, this post was NOT planned, and just fell out of me, ONTO THE WRONG DOCUMENT - and I accidentally put part two BELOW the opener of the post-I-should-have-been-writing. PHEW! Uh... hope you enjoyed this editing note as the post's halftime show.)

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Soooo... notice how I repeatedly mentioned frustration with Aaron being a mage above? Same goes for Rhenna. Both were created for video game reasons, but story narratives say mages should be rather regulated, with stronger mages abusing their skill having CONSEQUENCES - *especially* when it comes to purple and purple-adjacent magic! This means Aaron and/or Rhenna potentially would be killed by elite mages who are enforcing balance, under order of the demigod-ish leader, the Battle Judge. (We'll talk about that stuff in ANOTHER post.) This is... a view into my hangups about fantasy crap. And that thinking makes everything less fun. So the video game and all-ages cartoon, with the focus on FUN, means I better let go of my hangups! Hooray! Who knew a story was supposed to be FUN?!?! (Yet another reason Momentum was never meant to be a real story, huh?)

But I STILL didn't like what I had with Rhenna. Her power was designed as flashing lightning stuff! But... that's... deadly. Being able to zap a room to death with a thought is REALLY unbalanced. It ONLY works if I make her an elemental mage for a video game fighting system. Which is not what she was meant to be, cuz elemental spectrum magic is PURPLE in the Momentumverse, and the rarest and most powerful magic, so... no. It does not work. The electric zappy visuals functioning as deadly lightning zappery is bad. There's something very wrong with the zappy zappy. And I've ruined Rhenna. Oh no! If only I had an alternative angle to take! Hmm, let's review what makes Rhenna tick, with the part of her character/story that have been around since her 1995 origin, and see how it works with her powers...

1) RHENNA IS A SILVERED MAGE:

- Silvering is byproduct of having magic that affects some mages in the Momentumverse, and it IT DOES NOT WORK when the story uses anthro animal Precociousverse people designs, dang it! We... just gotta ignore that issue. In Momentum's world, the genetic code for magic is on the gene that works with hair color. (I'm certain that's not how genetics really works, but it also doesn't matter, cuz fantasy.) Silvering means a mages hair pigmentation is silver/gray/white in certain patches, or over all their body. Rhenna is a full-silver mage. It's all of her! I adapted it here as her being a red fox, but now in grayscale. Her last name is Cherrycoat, to drive the point home that our silver fox should have red fox locks! Ridiculous trivia: One of 15yo Chrispy's first tries at giving her a surname was "DiCherico" - but it sounded too Italian for a character who is meant to be super pale, and genetically FORCED to be a redhead - thus making Rhenna Norwegian, Irish and/or Scottish. So I turned DiCherico into something that sounded more like a British isles surname: Cherrycoat! Here's the kicker: IT TOOK ME SEVERAL GODDAMNED *YEARS* BEFORE I REALIZED I HAD ACCIDENTALLY GIVEN HER THAT EXTREMELY HEAVY-HANDED "she's supposed to be a RED fox" NAME! IT WAS A TOTAL ACCIDENT, BASED ON PHONETICS! My clueless self accidentally got it right! Which is, hahahaha, FORESHADOWING, as I continue the list of her traits now...

2) BEING A FULL-SILVER MEANS SOMETHING:

- Silvering in a person means you DEFINITELY have magic in you somewhere, but it's not a guarantee you have USEFUL magic in you. You can be silvered, and end up a white mage. White mages are people who have detectable magic in them, but at such a low level that it hasn't formed into any real expression. White is passive magic, and does nothing except set of mage detectors. Young mages all start as white, and then one day their power begins to form, starting to register as a color when given a magic evaluation. These evaluations are done with a sheet of stones that are attuned to the various forms of magic. the bigger the sheet, the more accurate it is in diagnosing the type of mage a person is, and what focus is best for them, cuz there are many variants of expression within a color. (A link to that magic chart post goes here, unless I'm too lazy/scared to face my in-ruins website. EDITING PASS TWEAK: FINE, HERE IT IS AGAIN.) Being partially-silvered and still being a white mage is very annoying, cuz people expect more of you, but it happens sometimes. It *never* happens with FULL silvers, however. Full silvers are gonna be functional mages at minimum - they're often booked into mage academy programs for their high school years during childhood, cuz everyone KNOWS a mage is gonna emerge eventually - but young Rhenna had ISSUES! Magic issues. (Also: Many other issues.) Rhenna's magic initially developed a bit slower than most silvers. To spoil what was going on: Since her power was both uncommon in expression, and had a lot of... quirky interference at this early stage, the slowed development it caused meant she got her reading too early, but no one knew that, so the sheet's results didn't give an accurate response...

3) RHENNA'S INITIAL MAGIC DIAGNOSIS WAS ONLY PARTIAL, LEADING TO MUCH FRUSTRATION:

- Young Rhenna's initial detailed reading (you gotta pay for the GOOD readings, with the detailed stone sheets) indicated that she would become a HEALER, and so she began training in those skills! But, whoops, she didn't take to it well! She struggled! (Not only did she not take to the techniques they said she should, but she was still slowly blooming as a mage, meaning she was errant in training AND doomed to be behind the curve initially anyway.) Rhenna is a... uh... not someone who'd take that scenario well. She's a brash, sharp-tongued, willful, and vicious beast - and young Rhenna was also impatient and spoiled by privilege! (Dad was a surgeon at a big hospital. Mom was a party planner for the capital city elites. And the parents were divorced, for extra tension! Even if the divorce was amicable, based on how both parent was focused on their careers. Oh, wait, that double barrel angle isn't good on a slow-bloomer Rhenna, is it?) Rhenna's fiery nature was not seen as a healer mentality. Initially folks assumed it was her ATTITUDE that was wrong. (To be fair, we can see her attitude was pretty brutal, so controlling it was indeed needed - they just incorrectly thought correlation was also causation.) To get her focused, young teen Rhenna was put to work helping out in her father's hospital, shadowing doctors/healers, and doing tasks that teens would be trusted to do. They hoped the responsible adults would influence her, and taking on the doctor compassion, plus learning actual medical/triage moves would cause her brain to click into healer mode and help her learn her skills better. One day, a patient Rhenna was escorting had a heart attack. Sure, she called for help, but willful teen she was, she tried to heal him. I mean, the alternative is a dude potentially dying in your very young arms, so it's an ethics violation - but wouldn't *you* make it too? Rhenna... didn't really do healing magic??? SHE FRIGGIN ZAPPED HIM. Which... is exactly what a dude with cardiac arrest needs! Hmm. Another piece to the puzzle! Rhenna can help, but she wasn't helping softly and sweetly. She was helping with violent, zaptacular flashiness! What could that mean?????

4) WHAT DO YOU CALL HEALING-ORIENTED ZAPPING????

- Just like with the dang Cherrycoat thing, IT TOOK ME YEARS TO FIGURE THE OBVIOUS OUT. Heck, it took DECADES, because Momentum went on the backburner once I hit my 20's. It was only during the crazy tragedy that resulted in the re-emergence of Momentum in my brain, to occupy me after Precocious went on forced-hiatus, that I finally had the context I needed for a lightning-like magic tosser who was supposed to heal. Rhenna. Is. A. Refresher. Mage. (Thank you, Fire Emblem: Heroes, for reintroducing me with the concept.) Rhenna's power is to energize an ally - giving them a boost in alertness, like they've had a nice night of sleep - or a zap in energy, like a super cup of coffee make of caffeinated electricit. In video game terms, she grants an ally an extra action! Ta-da! But Rhenna is also a brutal thing, so she doesn't merely zap for good. She can zap to harm! She disrupts! Ally gets actions. Foes get hindered - and, in video game terms, LOSE an action. Look at that! It all makes sense! I FINALLY FIGURED RHENNA OUT! And, folks, I haven't even given you the complete picture. It's even MORE obvious in hindsight how her magic should be expressed when you look at this next part...

5) RHENNA + AARON = RHENNA x AARON

- Why did I mention Rhenna and Aaron as potentially deserving of a death sentence for magic abuse? Because they ABUSED THE HECK OUT OF THEIR MAGIC once they got together. Here's a version of how the description of these two could be written, which was in place from the very beginning: "They've worked closely together for so long, and ONLY worked together for so long, they act like one being when around each other. And it's not even like they are two halves of a whole - they MULTIPLY each other's aspects. This is great, cuz they are an immense and clever intellect when together, and it's WHY they were the only ones who figured out the great quest for the stones/fate maker deal was coming. They are an amazing team. But, while the good in them is amplified, the BAD amplifies too. If these two weren't protagonists, their negative trains when they get going means they could be VILLAINS - and, indeed, they are the villains in the story of many former classmates. They get absorbed in each other, disregarding the others around them, and can be awfully rude about any obstacles hit when they fixate on a problem. The emotional walls they put up to hide any vulnerability can be treated and broken down when they're separate, but when together they're at east with each other, and may no longer feel the need for personal growth in other categories. They're hard to deal with - especially if you can't keep pace with their mental gymnastics. (Which, in Momentum, is only Kimban... and Phoebe, but this gets overlooked cuz Kimban is the DESIGNATED genius, while Aaron/Rhenna are often in conflict with Phoebe, with their enhanced selfishness overlooking the reason WHY. AS for Phoebe, knowing the score means she has no desire to deal with their attitudes.) If you're not an "equal," you'd better be there to help them work. (That's Tijo, who is usually adopted as Aaron and/or Rhenna's assistant, depending on which character's storyline we're in.) Despite dwelling on the negative, these two are pretty darn amazing to watch. And, since this ISN'T a story where they're villains, they do eventually figure it out. (Spoiler: Nate and Tijo provide reasons for them to stop focusing on each other, and focus on a new person whose influence makes them notably BETTER!)"

5.5) THE FEEDBACK LOOP

- Part 2 of the previous point, I guess: I wrote them up as all dramatic, and mostly negative, because I'm focusing on the outward expression of their pairing. What I ignored with the summary is, well, the inward? The WHY. The HOW! The M A G I C between the two!!! Aaron is an indigo, who can manipulate magic ability, moving it between people. Rhenna is a life force energizer, meaning her magic can get into your nooks and crannies! Give Aaron access to that, and you have a FEEDBACK LOOP. They get into the nuances of their abilities, and can kinda REFINE how they work... at least with a compatible target. And these two are compatible across the board! These two have been partners since they met as advanced first year college students, spending the last 6 years essentially merging their dang souls together with their partnership. This soul merge thing was part of their character from the very beginning. But it, again, took DECADES for me to look back and figure out how the mechanics for what I wanted them to be were always there! Durr! How is Rhenna part of the quest, when only one person chosen to be the quest's "interpreter," and the nature of the quest means those involved must be isolated, in order to gain the skills to shape fate themselves? There is literally a CURSE that makes bad things happen to people who spent too much time around the questers - but Rhenna inserts herself into the mission in every storyline! It's because of the feedback loop! Aaron and Rhenna are essentially one soul after years of magic experiments on each other, and that's the loophole! (Along with some other stuff that... we'll discuss in another post.)

IN CONCLUSION, the circumstances for me revisiting this story are utterly tragic, but they did help me solve a lot of old issues! It all makes so much sense now! I have hated how these two functioned magically in the story for so long, and all it took was jotting down all the known aspects of Rhenna/Aaron, then reviewing it with the fresh context that my seasoned 40yo brain had. (Turns out the 15yo who thought this up was SHOCKINGLY advanced, when you apply hindsight, but still way too immature and inexperienced to know what the heck he was doing.)

I tend not to go back and do much editing on these posts, since they are written in a fugue state autopilot burst, and stopping to FOCUS on details will *always* trigger a migraine, so I really hope I put enough points down to properly illustrate my goal in this post. (Note after I have reviewed this text: I still don't know if I successfully got my point across in these 10,000 words.) Anyway, Rhenna is one of my more fascinating characters, because she's a force of nature. While Aaron has the charm to be an inclusive leader (it's why HE was the one of the pair chosen for the quest), Rhenna more represents the teeth and raw power of the pairing. (They actually have very similar skill sets, due to years training and learning together, and she can be a professional charmer too, but it's a partnership thing. Aaron is the good cop, Rhenna is the bad cop.) I loved the core elements of these two. I loved a lot of what they could do. I HATED how it worked out for the longest time... but I finally got it to snap into place.

And I stopped worrying about silliness, and learned to embrace the fun video game indulgence. How... refreshing!