Miraculous Make No Sense
so I changed how they work.
I love me a well-thought-out and deliberate magic system. I love seeing the different rules and properties of how magic works and I love seeing how the author expands and works around those rules. Limitations are placed, followed, and then explored.
Miraculous Ladybug doesn't do this.
The powers are unbalanced and unrestrained. Miraculous can do whatever the writers want them to whenever they need it to happen. There are no limitations to the powers and the powers don't balance one another out.
This was the first issue I tackled in my rewrite.
Miraculous Overview
I decided that there are two "categories" for miraculous. They are either first or second-ring miraculous. (This is taking inspiration from the miracle box featured in the show and how the miraculous are organized into different rings).
What ring a miraculous belongs to determines how "powerful" it is. All miraculous, regardless of what ring or miracle box they belong to, have the following features:
It is a piece of jewelry
It is connected to and contain imagery of an animal
When a miraculous is worn by a person, the person will be granted, regardless of what ring or miracle box the miraculous belongs to, the following items:
They will now be able to see all Kwamis (regardless of miracle box or ring affiliation)
A unique phrase that will allow them to transform between civilian attire and hero attire
If a person is transformed, they will:
Get a magic girl costume and a magical girl transformation! The costume combines elements of the wearer's personal tastes and the animal associated with the miraculous
Have general enhancements (i.e. they are faster, stronger, have quicker reflexes, etc. but mental capabilities remain unchanged; if they’re dumb as fuck they stay dumb as fuck)
Have a magic weapon/object unique to the miraculous that serves at the housing unit of their special ability
One power unique to their miraculous
All miraculous have the attributes featured above, however, a first-ring miraculous grants the wearer 2 additional special abilities that a second-ring miraculous doesn't.
Special Abilities
In the rewrite, the special ability unique to the miraculous is how I am classifying the powers of each character. Cataclysm, Lucky Charm, Mirage, Venom, etc. are all the special abilities of each miraculous.
Second-ring miraculous have temporary special abilities. If the fox miraculous wearer casts Mirage and then detransforms, Mirage deactivates the illusion dissipates. However, first-ring special abilities are permanent (with one exception, more on that later). So when a ladybug wearer uses Restoration ("Restoration" being the new name for the "Miraculous Ladybug" power seen in the show) and then detransforms, all the damage they just repaired stays repaired.
Powers are also draining to the wearer. The bigger or more precise the use of the power is, the more physically draining it is. It takes a lot of strength, both physically and mentally, as well as a deep connection with the miraculous/kwami to use it for a wider range of uses. It is pretty easy for a black cat wearer to activate cataclysm and let it do whatever it wants, but it is more difficult to control that damage to a certain area or to destroy tougher materials. This adds more restrictions to the powers and gives the characters something to work on.
First-Ring vs. Second-Ring
For second-ring miraculous, there is only one special ability, hence why the fox miraculous only has mirage, but first-ring miraculous have multiple (why the ladybug miraculous has lucky charm and miraculous ladybug and de-evilize/deakumatization and-). This is because first-ring miraculous are more powerful.
I think of each miraculous wearer as having spell slots. For second-ring wearers, they only have 1 spell slot and 1 spell in that slot they can use. For first-ring wearers, they have 3 spell slots with 2 spells that are permanently stuck there.
To use an example from the show:
Any wearer of the ladybug miraculous, regardless of any differentiating factors, will always be able to use "Lucky Charm" and "Restoration".
However, that third spell slot can be switched out to fit the situation. This third slot is there to be able to counteract and balance out other miraculous. So if a wearer of the ladybug miraculous thinks the wearer of the butterfly miraculous is using akumatization for nefarious reasons, that third "slot" would acquire a "spell" that directly combats akumatization, which is where the de-evilize ability in the show comes in.
This third ability only exists to combat other miraculous. If, for instance, a ladybug wearer is fighting in a war, the third ability won't make them bullet proof or something because guns are not a product or feature of a miraculous. The third ability only develops to counteract other miraculous.
In addition to that, this third ability only develops as a result of intense emotion. If a ladybug wearer just dislikes another wearer, the third ability isn't going to manifest, but if the ladybug wearer truly believes with every fiber of their being that another miraculous is being used for evil, then the ability will form.
So in the show, Marinette doesn't gain the ability to de-evilize right away. Only when she gets deeply and emotionally invested in the battle does that third ability form.
The final bit about the third power is that you can only use one third power at at a time. Going back to the spell slot analogy, you can have multiple spells you know how to use, but because there is only one slot available, you can only "equip" one spell at a time. When a spell is replaced with another, its effects disappear. Since two of the spell slots are permanently taken up, there is only one "customizable" spell slot.
Final Notes
Miraculous are all about balance. All miracle boxes have 2 rings, and the first ring only ever have 2 miraculous. These miraculous are always opposites and balance each other.
Which is why it makes no sense that Ladybug has so many fancy ass powers and Chat Noir only has cataclysm. Like what??????? So I ended up severely limiting Ladybug's powers and adding more restrictions and clarification. I also wrote in a new power for Chat Noir but this is already long enough so I'll save those details for a different post. :)
50 notes
·
View notes