The play may be over, but the show goes on

Thimble

Major Ideal: Political Awareness | Major Flaw: Hypocrisy

Thimble is a champion of political causes and has not spoken to her family or returned home since she and Thjazi left together after the war. She cut off her own family and shirked all comforts for her ideals and when the doors to Faerie closed, she stepped up in ways that led even the faeries she abandoned to ask Julien Davinos of all people if he would ask her to help them. But she doesn't recognize when she herself is complicit in the things she takes umbrage with, and at the end of the day she's going to have to address that. I've done posts on this specifically so leaving it at that.

Azune

Major Ideal: Self Sacrifice | Major Flaw: Lack of foresight

Azune will 100 times out of 10 put himself up on the chopping block for his ideals and I'm 1000000% confident that there is not a command Azune would give that he himself would not follow into death. It's just that if you are constantly walking into death, some day you're not gonna be able to get back, just like Thjazi and his plans to repeatedly travel into the Underworld. And we can see the fact that constant self sacrifice leads to burn out, and that metaphor is ever more poignant with him being a draconic sorcerer. And I like that he's taking sorcerer levels and not Paladin while Azune is unable to further dedicate himself to his cause because the fire is building in Azune and it's gonna use up all the oxygen soon and Azune's gonna crash and dedicate himself to something deeper. The memory of what makes Azune a person, his family and his love of interpersonal connection and his culture and his free will, and honouring each person's individual relationship with their version of those things.

Kattigan

Major Ideal: Understanding | Major Flaw: dependency

Kattigan consistently has been a character that pushes for people to be understood and it's often clear that comes from his own experiences with not being understood and being misrepresented, and there's very little flaw to his character that is not just him struggling with things out of his control, but what he can learn to do is make his psyche less dependent on alcohol and less dependent on the people around him to believe in him and his suffering to validate it for himself and make peace with what happened, even if there's not justice or healing to be had. Forcing himself to live in agony to prove they were killed and get vengeance is unnecessary, he can take care of himself and let himself grieve and not blame himself for accepting the trail was cold when he started looking and why it was even cold in the first place. No one was ever going to help him, and that is what his character ultimately has to come to terms and move forward with. And it is dependency as a flaw because Kattigan explicitly is incredibly self sufficient. Kattigan is not dependent in the way Bolaire is to exist, Kattigan almost solely afflicted by it in an unhealthy way that he can and must grow from to live a healthy independent life.

Thaisha

Major Ideal: Conviction | Major Flaw: Lack of doubt

I have a very almost contradictory opinion of her character in her high wisdom, and I'm fighting everything in me to not just make this about her being a double edged sword and making puns about being a Lloy Blade. Like, Thaisha is absolutely going to fall on the right side of history... if someone gives her all the information without leaving anything out before she's formed her opinion or with enough time to change it. When she sees something to give her a new conviction it holds and the idealistic perspective wants to see that only as a boon, but when Thaisha has acted out of self assurance and thought she was untouchable because she's a Lloy druid and no one will touch her, she has in fact in cases left paper trails for the people hunting her very much in danger party to followed without a second thought to whether that was a mistake. And her entire arc so far has kinda been realizing that she worked intuitively and it saved the world but if she had acted under her tenets that she hadn't doubted before, the world would've been destroyed, that's very explicitly her original flaw and in embracing anathema she is being encouraged to doubt her own way of thinking.

Bolaire

Major Ideal: Self Advocacy | Major Flaw: Self depreciation

So we all know how I feel about Bolaire, but in this format? As a weapon Bolaire is also funnily enough a double edged sword. Bolaire has a very base understanding of things like the golden rule of treat others how you would want to be treated, and through story and his creation he's always had a priority in freedom and autonomy, but in so passionately not believing himself capable of being more than a thing because of the abuses he's endured, he doesn't ask himself to examine his humanity or question himself when he kills out of what he feels is necessity. He's a weapon, not a person, so how can you judge him for killing to stay alive and not regretting it? You want him to be ashamed of the thing most out of his control and most in the control of his creators? Except Bolaire for 14 years has lived counterintuitive to the designs his creators had for him, and he doesn't realize that he's a person too. If he could imagine a greater future for himself with himself as a person, and I don't think that simply not being self deprecating anymore will fix it but, I genuinely think he would ask himself the list of questions I asked earlier in my ranting and find himself internally driven to address his morality in a different light and that itself would be the arc that leads to him changing his perspective on the host body situation he's been in and that he will then have to figure out how to live with the fact that he wasn't in a position to figure things out sooner and just do better for the rest of his probably immortal life, so self advocacy must remain and self degradation has to go away, because he can't literally punish himself forever for doing what he thought was his only option because of the abuses he faced.

Vaelus

Major Ideal: Remembrance | Major Flaw: Traditionalism

This feels like one would think of Azune first, but I think rememberance and traditionalism are neither and both ideals and flaws in Azune, but Vaelus in her remembrance of her family and the souls that have been lost in the time since the shapers fell has dedicated herself to punishing wrongdoings mercilessly and fight injustice and aid those who were harmed by injustice. But because of her reliance on the traditions of her family to feel close to them instead of these memories she has of her family's little acts of rebellious nature, and her actual mom's appreciation for those moment as well, she's set herself up to remain isolated in her grief. The second she speaks to an elf with another opinion a total of 3 times, she breaks and she admits she doesn't feel loved by Sylandri but she's going through the motions because she relies on traditions to keep her going. It's very much bringing to mind Fiddler on the Roof, and like Papa, she's gotta let go of the traditions that mean she judges people for not following her own beliefs that she doesn't have a real reason to even believe in in the first place.

(Link is to opening song which is 7m 35s but worth it. My grandma showed me the full movie when I was 14 and it was great. Haven't seen the full since but from memory would recommend)

Julien

Major Ideal: Duty | Major Flaw: Refusal to explain himself

I almost went distrust here but the thing that I find most interesting about his character is that he isn't actually the type to look down on or distrust you because of your station and it's not like you can't earn his trust, he simply will not explain himself to people who are not truly solely seeking to understand him and who have proven such. He will marry for duty, and he will put his life on the line for his family and even new friends because he is a knight and he is a knight because he defied his family to defend them as he thought he had to because no one else would step up, meanwhile he was a child. And for that he thinks he shouldn't have to explain himself. He should get to cope how he wants with who he wants and fuck everyone who judges him for it. They don't get to know him. He will go cry alone in his room instead of reaching out if it means explaining his inner thoughts after so long of being punished for upholding his family's honour as a child soldier because no one else would. And because no one will get to hear his explanations, he refuses to hear theirs, because why should he hear them out when they wouldn't hear him out even if he gave them a chance? And it doesn't matter that they would until they prove it, but he never gives them opportunities to prove it. He's gotta learn to choose to trust more.

Tyranny

Major Ideal: There are reasons for pain to exist | Major Flaw: A full and broad lack of morals

Now this one I read and I'm like "wow okay make sure we don't sound insane after this" because Tyranny is kinda clearly one of my higher ranking pcs in terms of how much I defend her but please bear in mind I have a chronic nerve issue that will literally and has tried to *make me puke to death from sheer pain if untreated* when I say this. Look at Occtis and what Brennan said about Occtis not resting? Pain is an indicator of damage. Of harm. That people feel pain is not a bad thing, even though it is always an indication of some form of destruction, whether that be of ideals or relationships or organic material. Pain must exist and punishment psychologically can be both positive and negative, and postive punishments can be negative conditioning and negative punishments can be positive conditioning. Like Tyranny knife's now explicitly stated purpose is to positively punish wrongdoers as to negatively condition the world of Aramán to not hurt the people they love by killing people who are irredeemable, and Tyranny's kindness and understanding is clearly there to negatively punish those who make amends and positively condition them into rehabilitation by not having Tyranny be a ruthless killer who sees forgiveness as worth jack shit. But my gods she's been alive for 6 months and has been raised by the church, and literally what are morals when you're definitionally a being made to represent contradiction and destruction? She's receptive to instruction though so give my girl Tyranny a metaethics crash course STAT.

Hal

Major Ideal: Knowledge should be shared | Major Flaw: Complacency

Murray

Hal is very much the type of person who will say "those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it" and then not wait for anyone before he repeats it anyway. His life's work is about story and sharing history and studying the history to make sure the source is accurately represented, and he had dedicated himself entirely to never forgetting what the orcs won for themselves and the world when Azgra fell. Hal's biggest problem is that he thinks the fight should've already been over when in fact his civilian calling is continuing the fight but non violently, like a sword turned ploughshare himself. He thinks there is a point to hang up his sword because he's put in enough effort, and now it's on to civilian life and recording the history. And so when something in his life isn't what it seemed to be, including if that's a person with their own right to not disclose their past, it angers him. He feels suddenly unsafe. He was happy with the very comfortable life he had and even with Bolaire being different than he thought because Bolaire was being threatened, Hal still blames Bolaire for not risking his life to tell him anyway. And maybe a degree of betrayal in Hal comes from the fact that Hal and Bolaire have discussed things like this and were in agreement that they were content with their lives as is, but is that fair? Is the issue he's actually taking that Hal doesn't like Bolaire's inherent nature or is it that he didn't get told and so was unknowingly complacent in it? and is that anger at unknowing complacency really a problem because of his brother indulging Hal's wishes to stay out of the Falconers Rebellion? or is it what I think, and it's really ultimately at himself that the people in his life told all these lies because Hal asked to be kept out of it so he could keep being complacent in the political situation around him, even as an artist who is now thrown into it because of the weight of propaganda and subversive art in the face of censorship? Hal has to face that he literally asked to be left out until now and that he knew the kinds of things his brother would do to ensure he stayed out of things, and yet never wanted Thjazi or the people involved with Thjazi cut out from his life, or Thjazi wouldn't have let Bolaire stay in Hal's life at all.

Major Ideal: Vision for the future | Major Flaw: reluctance to compromise

Now I don't think there's a repeat Brennan story here because CCOD went reaaaaally into this concept but there's a very common pitfall that a lot of activists, especially young activists, fall into wherein they refuse to do coalition work with any organization that is less than perfect in their eyes, and so divide and conquer keeps minorities out of power and keeps the kinds of politicians they would want to vote for out of office. There has to be some sort of compromise and rehabilitation allowance re the oppressors for any oppressed minority to no longer be oppressed, that's just how the numbers of it break down in a democracy. Murray is very much not averse to getting her hands dirty for skulls for her magic, but one of her first real personality exemplifying scenes is the boiling frogs scene. She doesn't want Azune manipulating the Houses because that's their game, but Azune is doing it anyway, and that is both confusing and immediately concerning to her. Not that it shouldn't ever be, she's right that distrust keeps people alive, but it also keeps them isolated and weak. Brennan has said before something along the lines of "Don't question why we started when we did once things are moving, question when they're not moving" and there was extended context about people saying "'we should've done this 10 years ago' but we didn't", and that sentence is something I think Murray needs to internalize as the basis of the necessary compromises she'll have to make. Questioning why parts get left behind will always remain important, but if the sum total of why things aren't moving is she isn't willing to do things one step at a time, she's gonna have to compromise.

Wick

Major Ideal: Idealism | Major Flaw: Entitlement

Occtis

Wick is very interesting because he's very much blatantly the "good Christian" archetype, and there are Christians in my life that have made me defend the basis of Christianity to hell and back. I have scripture lists in my google keep notes so that I can use the bible against bigoted Christians, and I feel like this is the vibe Wick was created to have, but also there remains the very obvious stopping block of 'there is still a basic level of entitlement to privilege and power in Wick' that can't be ignored, and the Creed was specifically created to give Wick and his family power. Can Wick actually use the Creed in a subversive way if that's true? I don't think so. Definitely not with the basis of "well this is the tool my family created for me to wield and so I'm going to use it how I see fit". I think he can do something more akin to the hospitals and have a net positive impact, but I don't see that as a subversion and I want it to be a subversion of the Creed not just a new cult of it, and I think Wick wants that too as he literally said he didn't want it to be a cult.

Major Ideal: Examining Hypocrisy | Major Flaw: Ignorance

Teor

Occtis is a big thinker. He's got a lot of stopping blocks though that make him sorta give up on a line of thinking. Could or Would is a big example of this. If you could, would you? is two questions to Occtis because he is so focused on what he can and can't do and whether what he does choose to do because of that aligns with his personal morals, because he's never been allowed to have the same opinion of himself as his family and that has always been because of what is essentially disability, and so he has had to be able to recognize what the concept family means to him vs his dad and brothers vs Thimble, Thaisha and Hal and co. He has to examine the idea that truth isn't necessarily universal in the sense that contradictions and coincidence exist naturally within the world without necessarily having meaning to them, and he's almost nihilistic in the way that he lives under the understanding that meaning is ascribed to action and concept based on opinion and experience that differ from person to person, and so he accepts when he doesn't have the perspective or experience to know something. Except that acceptance doesn't always come with self education. He just doesn't think he needs to know or understand everything to be kind, and he doesn't, but that drive of accepting that which you cannot change coming from growing up in the Tachonis household as an outlier leaves Occtis with a lot of implicit biases that he still needs to correct.

Major Ideal: Consistency in foundation | Major Flaw: Self Sacrifice