RWBYFanon v5
RPG Creations => AMA Section => Topic started by: Moth on April 02, 2019, 01:49:54 AM
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Interesting character tidbit inspired by the concept of losing limbs: are you characters right-handed or left-handed? How does it influence their fighting style? Can y’all tell I’m a bit bored?
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Now that the site’s fixed I can finally go back to typing my posts out on the site directly. (Thanks Vox). It’s actually quite rare, across the site and the spreadsheet recordings I haven’t come across many lefties at all.
My Graham was designed as a left-hander but the rest are all rights. Purely in combat there’s much that changes if you’re fighting a left-handed swordsman in melee, in the same way you’d play a leftie in racket sports. In theory it would completely throw another swordsman off balance, their training would normally be done against another person who’s right-handed so everything would feel different.
In normal lives you could find things to write about how literally everything’s designed for right-handed people. Door handles, mouses for computers (if they existed), handshakes, stuff like that.
Can you tell I want more left-handed people? And no, adding it as an afterthought doesnt’t really count, the character kinda needs to be designed with it in mind.
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Calen is left-handed but was socialised to use his right in most social situations as that is the 'proper' way. There is a fair bit of literature of left-handedness being an advantage in combat, primarily due to left-handedness being an uncommon condition and therefore the average right-handed person is going to have a lot less experience fighting left-handed people than the opposite. Also being in the mirror handedness is matched strong against strong and weak against weak rather than strong against weak and weak against strong this upsets a lot of the more finesse styles of swordsmanship which Calen partakes in, giving him the advantage there. There is also a historical story from Scotland which sealed the deal for Calen's handedness, Clan Kerr's Ferniehirst castle was designed with 'left-handed stairwells' in mind and the local lord forced his men to train to fight with their left hands meaning they could better defend against any English invaders. This sort of underhandedness was a quality I really wanted to reinforce with Calen and although it is a stereotype it is an effective enough one to play into.
Saffron is naturally ambidextrous which helps equally with her fighting and musical interests. Duel wielding, or quad-wielding as the case maybe takes a lot of coordination particularly when the weapons themselves are hatchets, shotguns and boomerangs. Initially, I wasn't sure about giving Saffron such a 'biological advantage' as in some ways it kind of goes against her character being designed as someone who has had to fight tooth and nail for every little bit of respect she has earnt but after decided to make her a Faunus these small 'biological advantages' started to make more sense. Saffron is physically, and hopefully eventually mentally, the perfect soldier but she isn't given many chances to show that given the society she grew up in.(Or at least that is the excuse I tell myself for not playing with her enough). It also adds some weaknesses to Saffron's position that the Faunus should fully integrate into Atlas society, beyond the obvious racism, as if she can barely do it with all these biological advantages then what chance does everyone else have?
Ramalia is right-handed plain and simple. A cannoneer and a brawler I don't think Ramalia's handedness plays a huge role in her combat style as both those massive power clawed hands are gripping the gun or driving at your face regardless. In a similar vein, Amarant is also right-handed, kind of fitting as the Specialists make up the right hand of Atlas. I had for a time thought about making him left-handed as a kind of mirror to Calen as well as the previously stated combat advantage but the end I felt that Amarant being more simple in one aspect didn't dimish the character and instead reinforced the rest.
Currently, in construction character Arian is probably right-handed but has learnt how to disguise any such tells or even look like he is left-handed. Dependant on how the spider limbs are going to be taken Arian is still probably going to have a lot of swords, just for Monster ;P, and having to learn to be ambidextrous will be one of the drills he first completes after decided he can't fed his mother forever by stealing scraps and hunting money is good money.
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Handedness of my chars in order of signature (unlinked or uncoloured names not counted):
L, R, L, R, R, A, R, L, R and finally Mark with R.
I've literally never thought about the combat implications until this moment but I can't really find anything it affects.
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This is something I haven't really thought about before, to be honest. Nut would probably be right handed and only really right handed, as he always just learned to fight the way he felt comfortable. This is especially noticeable when OTN goes into its larger forms, prompting him to wield the weapon with both hands, as his backswings are a clunkier than his regular ones.
Reggie is a bit like Calen in that he's a lefty having to go righty - Marvin is right-handed, and Solace with its transformation slider are built for someone whose main hand is their right. He's grown accustomed to using his right, but in the heat of melee he might actually switch to his left. This doesn't give enough of an advantage to make up for him being just kind of bad.
Anza, Silica and Janna are all right-handed. Anza and Silica aren't much affected by this, Anza having armor on her left arm as that's the hand that'll be stretched out when firing her bow and Silica just not being much of a fighter. Janna, meanwhile, will often go for a cannon in her left hand and a sword in her right when having to combine melee attacks with ranged.
Razzy is ambidextrous, which comes in handy ([Seinfeld theme]) when having to rely on his wits to get out of a messy situation. He doesn't often switch his hands around per se, but he can usually fight with his right while his left does something sneaky, such as pulling out a dust cartridge or the like.
Rufus is left handed, but it largely doesn't impact him - his left hook might be better than his right, but he's practiced fighting with both enough for it to not be too notable. When wielding his usual weapons, the dominance of his left hand is seen a bit more.
Finally, Tiber is also right handed - his throws are much more accurate with his right than they are with his left.
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Being a lefty IRL and having done some swordsmanship I have felt the advantage (and disadvantage when the other guy is too) first hand. It’s not huge until shields come into play (at least in my experience) I never specified handedism on my characters though I think in writing them some became lefties because I often do a motion in an effort to describe it better and since IRL me does it lefty. So does the character when I write it down. That said, Gray is ambidextrous and Sandy at the very least kickboxes lefty as I did say he fights in a southpaw stance. I think during the Vital festival I specified that Ceramite had Ultio in his left hand as well. Basically all of my characters are lefty in my head due to me being a lefty and how I tend to write.
Edit.
Correction. Gray WAS ambidextrous before he was shot at the Vytal festival. After the shooting he became right handed as he never got his full strength back in his left arm.
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I never really specified handedness in my characters either, but I guess it's something to think about.
Smokey's almost definitely right-handed, though I'd argue it doesn't really matter much in his case. Matchstick isn't exactly a precision weapon, and his simple fighting style doesn't require any excessive amounts of finesse, so he could probably get away with switching hands on the fly pretty easily.
Aurelia's also right-handed, and she's probably my only character where it really matters, as she uses both sword and shield. Although, if she's on her unicorn, and I'm pretty sure she can overcome any disadvantage a southpaw would present with Noble Steed's raw power.
Toast is an acrobatic freak of nature who grew up in a circus as an only child with a lot of time on his hands. Also, his father and mother were an acrobat and a magician, respectively. Naturally, he learned to be ambidextrous, as evidenced by his dual-wielding fighting style. In fact, in one iteration, he had a third sword that he'd juggle with in combat, but I ultimately scrapped that idea because there were too many ways for that to bite him in the ass.
Lucas, as the closest thing to a self-insert I'll ever do, is left-handed. However, also like me, his dominant eye is his right eye, and thus shoots from his right side. In fact, his handedness hardly comes into combat at all, since the only thing he'd do in melee is try to clock his opponent in the face with his lantern or blast them back with dust.
It also doesn't really matter for Clara, either, as she also doesn't really do melee combat. So I flipped a coin, and I arbitrarily decided she's also left-handed. Who knows, maybe I'll give her some melee options after she's been through a few threads.
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Oooh I always love these, cheers Moth :D I haven't actually given it any thought up until now so this is essentially
a retcon further development.
Bas is a bit of a rebel without a cause so to that end I would picture her as a righty. She sees herself as far more of an outcast than she really is.
I've gone back and forth on Diana but have landed on her being a righty, that has learned to be ambidextrous. The logic here is that part of Diana's design is for there to be consequences of her upbringing, being malnourished for most her life she is supposed to be physically weak. However she is still an excellent student and strong willed, so I see her learning to use both hands to give her a slight advantage to help make up for her physical limitations.
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For the sake of answering my own question, since I'm very tired of studying:
Prism's ambidextrous. She probably started as right-handed but forced herself to become ambidextrous for the sake of being able to switch if necessary in battle - she's enough of a paranoid perfectionist to do so.
Jima's left-handed for the sake of her alternative thematic.
Chantou's right handed in everyday life, but due her fighting method being primarily duel-wielding she fights just as well with her left hand as her right hand.
Azre is left-handed while Erza's right, that's how I've always imagined them anyways.