>>9905
>>9907
>>9915
Upgrades: Semblances
I think Critter doesn't understand the mechanics of Semblances. They're not the same as trained skills but inherent abilities awakened by a person, inherent to their aura/soul. Training would be more using it effectively and at length and maybe evolving the semblance. The real issue is how semblances have lost potency in use overall. It's not comparable to Demon Slayer or DBZ. JJK on the other hand is a different story, that Yuji example is a good one, but it's a bit closer to aura control than semblance control. A semblance would be more like a Domain Expansion, but those aren't trained either.
>Oscar still doesn't have a Semblance, across his five volumes of being part of the show.
I mean not every character HAS a semblance. Roman Torchwick and Watt's are confirmed to lack one and we never see Ozpin, Illia, Cordovin, Junior, Malachite Twins, Albain Brothers or Sienna have one.
Ironwood and Maria may as well not have had a semblance at all.
As for the speedpoke, Ozpin is merging with Oscar, meaning his muscle-memory is inherited, literally. Ozpin is also shown to guide Oscar's movements so that is definitely NOT an example of lacking training.
>Aura Amp
<Jaune unlocks his Semblance, for the end result of not actually healing. Why is it this way?
He was never stated to be healing, V5 outright has him say it's not; it's amplifying aura, including it's ability to heal. Nora's injuries were already scar tissue, not fresh wounds. As for why; themes about support a la White Mage.
<he may as well have just waited till the script said it's time for him to save the day
While your DnD analogy is correct, I disagree here, Jaune's semblance was part of his soul, he's always wanted to HELP and part of his character journey is shedding delusions of what heroism is. Heroics aren't just those that fight, but those that save and support and do their best for others.
>in the Haven battle, did not do much relevant at all before his Semblance unlocked
He literally fights Cinder what? Also yeah obviously he's not going to do much, that's the point. He's just another fighter, which doesn't change anything really, it's why they initially are losing against the enemy side, because they're all just trying to fight without any teamwork, without any plan. Jaune literally goes rushing in and achieves nothing meaningful. That's the point.
>Burn
Yang's semblance almost visibly does nothing anymore. Even the visual changes are almost nonexistent and just "red eyes" instead of the whole super saiyan thing it was (which fits Critter's point about inconsistency in portrayal with their example of Vegeta's Galick Gun). It is a straight downgrade. Similar actually to Korra's use of the Avatar State, where it goes from a trump card that multiplies power, into something that gets used constantly and casually but loses any semblance of power. She uses it against Salem for example... when detonating the explosives on her... but what was the point of using the semblance there when it's a physical berserker boost meant for melee combat.
>Literally every time Yang ends a fight is with a Semblance Punch. After nine volumes, it's just not noteworthy anymore, let alone impressive.
The true problem with this is that in V4 this was a point of criticism from Taiyang that Yang acknowledges, similar to her supposed inability to keep a cool head, yet this is forgotten in later Volumes.
>Glyphs
If anything Critter should have focused on this. It is the peak example of downgrading and is probably a result of budget-cuts and laziness. We stop seeing the usage of anything other than standard glyphs and summons and the former is done with less versatility. Time Dilation? Forgotten. That aura shield technique (Banesaw fight) forgotten. Her ability to bind targets with Glyphs (White Trailer) also forgotten.
>Weiss truly unlocking Summoning wasn't done in a definitive high-states action scene. It... just happened when she was practicing in her room one day.
That's a bit unfair, we see her start practicing in V3 and that she has an excellent mastery of other Glyph abilities. So in V3's finale during a moment of high stress, she achieves a partial summoning. From there learning to do it fully on her own in training is plausible.
>Ruby going in a Petal Burst circle with Harriet
You already know I criticized how much the writers misunderstand the potency of Petal Burst, so you know I'm critical of it's poor use. That being said, I think Ruby's circling was meant to be her learning to use full petal disassembly for prolonged times rather than bursts of movement we see prior. Also Petal Burst didn't gain the ability to separate and reform at will, we saw that as early as V4's character short if not earlier. The real crux is that Petal Burst is reclassified from speed into matter manipulation.
>Blake got an infinite projectile glitch by way of shadow-cloning a throwing star or a Dust grenade.
That's just shadow-shuriken-clone jutsu from Naruto. Not that this is a bad thing but it isn't how her shadow-clones work. Unless she infuses them with dust, they're essentially the same as the Naruto Clone Jutsu; convincing illusions that can absorb a hit. She should definitely use them more but it's not that simple.
>For the most part, Semblances are just glowy hand movements... they just aren't that creative.
Most semblances aren't that at all though. Nora's is literally powering up from electricity. Suns are aura clones, etc. Then there's Flynt's Quartet, Polarity, Emerald's illusions, etc. Creativity is not the issue here, it's usage and consistency.
As a criticism, some of Critter's examples don't quite work or are confusing or outright bad, Korra's airbending I already took apart.
>Gohan's Special Beam Cannon
He used it once in canon and it was just pulled out of his ass and never used again. A better DBZ example would be the Kaioken.
>Bolin Lavabending
This is actually worse than RWBY as well; Bolin does no training or even tries to figure it out prior, he just does it and how he does it makes no sense because of how earth-bending and fire-bending work. They're not JUST inherent abilities, they involve using specific movements. It's why Aang had difficulty with earth-bending, because it's completely at odds with air-bending style of movement; holding firm vs evasion and moving with things. Lava may be fire and earth but moves closer to water (fluid) yet Bolin just does... something and it works. There's even an easy way to have had him figure it out by learning from water-benders (like Iroh did when creating lightning redirection) but they don't.
>Goku is training constantly, and begging to always be training.
The problem here is DBZ does power-levels, so 'training' is basically just grinding physical exercise to get higher stats with essentially no limit. A better example would be Naruto and how he trains chakra manipulation.
>Tanjuro
An excellent example but you can't train for an unknown semblance that isn't awakened. Jaune trains his semblance as he goes along, the aura boosting goes from a slow process in V5 to near instantaneous in V6 when he uses it to save Nora from the Mech.
[Expand Post]
>A lot of the inconsistency in this show is due to plot contrivances.
This is absolutely true.
>they're allergic to anything that isn't character fluff and make up whatever to make whatever happen.
Also true
>RT was haemorraging money
Can anyone spell "Money Laundering". Nevermind the Gen:Lock fiasco.
>lack of creativity, when the ability to do something dropped into their hands.
I would argue it's less a lack of creativity and more a lack of commitment and consistency with the creativity. RWBY gets plenty creative at times, it just fails to capitalize on it more often than not.
>If they leaned into Aura scaling on Willpower and made it consistent, they wouldn't need much effort to come up with visual cues to show increasing or decreasing power.
I 100% agree with this. You really hit it out of the park with this idea.
>Penny is strong enough to handle the whole Ace Ops on her own and chop down airships... she proceeds to struggle against Cinder alone, while everyone else offers backup
I already pointed this out >>9913 The Ace Ops nearly beat Maiden Penny through teamwork, even if they're not close-knit as Ren says. Ren's words about them are inconsistent with what we see too. Cinder meantime has been demonstrated to be very powerful from the beginning and consistently so. She clearly bested Ozpin's magic shield, which later let Oscar survive terminal impact falling from Atlas to Mantle. She was more than a match in CQC for Penny and Winter prior to the Maiden Powers getting involved. Cinder also tanks alot; Frozen alive, having boulders the size of bullheads drop on her (then slashing them to pieces), being pummeled by tons of metal. The Hound was killed by less and was more than a threat despite being weaker.
Edited last time by An0nym00se on 11/17/2025 (Mon) 16:34:34.