HOUSETRAPPED - Classpecting Basics

transientAcatalepsy

What is classpects

【ＳＫＡＩＡ】 11-Jan-22 06:53 PM

transientAcatalepsy 11-Jan-22 06:53 PM

oh god

2

【ＳＫＡＩＡ】 11-Jan-22 06:54 PM

Classpects are Andrew Hussie's vibe-based way of creating superpowers.

Basically, where Worm is hard magic, things being defined by rules and solid mechanics, Homestuck mostly operates off of soft magic, tied to storytelling logic.

While classpects are presented as a joke overcomplicated version of DnD classes or elemental affinities, they're actually an incredibly powerful tool for figuring out the shape of a character arc.

There are twelve aspects, and twelve classes. I'll talk about aspects first.

Each of the twelve aspects has a direct "inverse" pairing, and these six pairs are all strong elements that tie into ways to tell a story, as well as their own thematic resonances.

Think [Determination.] from Undertale -- It means a whole lot of different things at once.

It's literally the Watsonian reason you have the power to save your game, but it also represents Frisk's character motivation, it represents the players' urge to Finish The Story. It's a great and terrible thing, literally liquid that can be injected and also something inextricable from Frisk's soul.

The aspects are a lot like that. Each have their own strong symbolic meaning, and all twelve together make up The Story.

Some are more fundamental, like Time and Space. Some are a little more obscure, like Life and Doom, or Hope and Rage.

But they're all utterly fascinating.

You'll also have to keep in mind that they're also very funny.

Jan and I meme the hell out of the aspects

Hope and Heart and Life and Light especially

But honestly those are ALSO kinda key to our interpretations lol

I'll get to specifics on what each are later, probably in a diff thread for organizational clarity (edited)

This is just what is classpecting as a concept

The other part is Class

and this is where shit gets interesting.

Class is primarily a modifier for aspects (edited)

Think Link from Zelda -- His various incarnations are Hero of Time, Hero of Wind, Hero of Twilight, Hero of Sky etc

Time, Wind, Twilight and Sky would be his aspect

(And in fact some of those Literally Are aspects one to one, because hussie likes video games, but we'll get there)

And Hero is kind of his class.

Each aspect is mostly defined by a singular verb

And while the twelve classes are paired off with their inverses, they're also paired off by their "verb pair"

For example, we can look at the Heir class. Its verb, shared by the Witch class, is "Change."

But within each verb pair, one class is "active" and one is "passive"

Heir, the passive class, is "to be changed" where as Witch, the active class, is "to change" (edited)

And like I said, you usually use each class as a modifier

To passively change [aspect] and to passively be changed by [aspect]

Is heir

To actively change [aspect] and to actively be changed by [aspect] is Witch

There are ofc specifics

But I'll get to those later.

With 12 aspects and 12 classes, there are 144 classpects in all!! And that's scary shit to look at.

But the key is

You really only need to know, like, very few

I do this shit for fun all the time and I constantly look up the class pairings

And I always forget literally half the classes and aspects

9 times out of ten you only need to know

Your own classpect, and those who are playing with you

And like, even then, classpects are mostly a storytelling guideline.

I very often find that they're an incredibly useful storytelling guideline

But they're made out of like 70-80% metaphor

And that's very important

Heir for example -- a character who is literally the heir to something might get that class, or, one time I assigned heir to a character because of their hair matching an heir (and also it fit them in other ways) (edited)

Like, this shit is downright Seussian

Just have fun with it

transientAcatalepsy 11-Jan-22 07:10 PM

Hm

So aspects are, to use a very weird metaphor powered water, whereas the class is the container that gives that water a specific shape (edited)

【ＳＫＡＩＡ】 11-Jan-22 07:12 PM

Exactly

They guide the aspect

transientAcatalepsy 11-Jan-22 07:12 PM

Shall i look up a list of both, then?

【ＳＫＡＩＡ】 11-Jan-22 07:12 PM

I will provide!

New thread

OH there's one more mechanic I forgot

Well, two

Aspects are also tied to, like, superpower shit, but that's game mechanics

Rn I'm sticking w the storytelling applications

Bc I know thats more interesting

And the big thing I forgot was inversion

Aspects and Classes both have inverts

And usually a characters' struggle involves "ghosting" their inverted classpect

Rose from canon, for example, inverts her Seer of Light classpect (Passive Knowledge of Light) into Witch of Void (Active Change of Void)

This was tied to her depression and like (edited)

emotional Hard Times

But expressed thru SUPERPOWERS!!!!

which is very cool

Changed the channel name.

grr

anyway

yeah

That stuff is gonna be in the lookup tables

Inversion means passive becomes active and vice versa, and linked verbs switch for class, and linked aspects switch within pairs for aspect

Overcomplicated explanation (edited)

But it makes sense

【ＳＫＡＩＡ】 11-Jan-22 08:06 PM

ALL CLASSES HAVE A SPECIFIC OUTFIT AND ALL ASPECTS HAVE A SPECIFIC COLOR SCHEME + LOGO

FROGOT

【ＳＫＡＩＡ】 11-Jan-22 10:47 PM

the thing abt classpecting

is that like

your, like, holistic sense of an aspect

is 1000% the correct way to view it

if u see the light<->chess connection in kingdom hearts and then choose to associate light with pointless pedantry

because of kingdom hearts

you are 100% correct in that interpretation

if you think rage and then think The Hulk, and remember that they recast the guy, and like, what? huh?

that's 100% part of rage

@transientAcatalepsy ask here!

yep