IDE/Theory 27: This thread is over, bro. I told you dog. I told you about #28!

[Unclever title]

Welcome to the IDE/Theories thread, iteration the 27th! This is where all your Homestuck theories and predictions whether reasonable or ridiculous are posted discussed. Participation is free as always so come on in, step on up to the mic and make your mad posts, bros.

Here are some of the things that the previous 26 threads have more or less established:
(HINT: you should probably read this list before posting!)

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-Lord English/Skipper Plumbthroat comparisons have been pointed out a million times before.

-The Hemospectrum is an arbitrary caste system, and the alien equivalent of racism. It is recognized only by Alternian culture, and few of the troll Sgrub players put any stock in it. Neither Sburb (nor Sgrub) acknowledge its existence, that would be the same thing as separating human players based on their skin color. This is also why gray, not red, is Karkat's associated color. (Also, he's technically below the bottom of their caste system. His blood color does not "wrap around" to become the highest.)

-Terezi's dream self is blind because she wants to be blind, as she prefers her smellovision to normal sight. If staring into Skaia could blind you then half the characters would be blind.

-Humans do not have Troll Relationships! Any sane person would see a relationship based on hatred as pretty bad (if you did not realize this, you are a shipper and should seek help immediately).

-It is never said that First Guardians serve Lord English. More likely Doc Scratch is a special case.

-Bro =/= Any anime characters

-Jade's land doesn't reference anime either.

-GCat's existence was not hinted at during the Jack: Ascend flash. GCat is named for the initials of the four nucleotides of DNA, and thus is just continuing the theme.

-There are probably no special methods to reach God Tier besides the two we've seen so far. Also, the Quest Crypt works for either remaining life and thus Jake can still God Tier at this time.

-The A1 trolls were created in the A2 session, and the B2 kids were created in the B1 session. The Scratch changes when the meteors land.

- Jujus have special powers and rules regarding the use of said powers, most of the jujus we've seen (belonging to various members of the Felt) are related to time manipulation of some sort.

- There can only be one of each individual juju in paradox space, using time traveler terms this would be the alpha juju but on a much broader scale than individual timelines. All other copies of a juju are either illusory, bearing the image but not the power of the juju or doomed to be destroyed like the average beta timeline/time traveler.

Notes on the reliability of in comic information sources:

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-Doc Scratch always told the literal truth, but often lied by omission. He also wasn't particularly interested in giving out game information. He's dead now, too, and may not have been able to see past his death.
-Sprites are very interested in their player staying on a certain script (build the house, go through the gates, do your quest, face your denizen, make a frog, endgame), and really have no idea how the game reacts when they go off of that script.
-The trolls are players just like the kids. Initially, they had more knowledge of the game because they had finished their session. The kids rapidly caught up and in some cases may have surpassed them.
-Calliope's info appears to be rooted in Rose's info, all of which was supplied by the meteor. It is probably the most reliable stuff we have, but it may not be totally perfect or exhaustive. Also remember that, when it appears in a log, it is filtered through Calliope, who has biases all her own.

My thanks to unbeliever536 and the previous IDE thread starters for the above info (to which I made minor edits).

Also, "IDE" is just "Idea" capitalized minus the "A." People thought it was funny so it stuck. I still think it's funny so it stays

Now that that's done with add your theories! Now!

[Dragonstorm]

IDE to start us off!

A1 Nitram is actually Hoifur Nitram (rufioh spelled backwards) (Haha heifer)
A1 Zahhak is Chiron Zahhak (after the immortal centaur)

[Sightedjt]

Zahhak will be completely off the deep end. He has entered the sciencedark throes.
IDE- Zahhak is a spark.

[Druplesnubb]

Rufioh is actually the name of A1 Tavros, A2 summoner will be called something completely different.

[Bones96]

Zahhak's first name will be Dhanus, after the Sanskrit name of Sagittarius.
(Someone else has probably already said this but I am too lazy to check.)

[Woe Kitten]

The legendary treasure Vriska's looking for isn't a weapon at all - it's the ring that John and Tavros are fighting over, the very same ring that Vriska punched out of Hussie's hand.

[Qmark]

IDE: The legendary treasure needed to defeat English is the most elusive object in existence- a pumpkin.

Either that or what Woe said.

[Drillgorg]

This has probably been stated, but the Treasure is probably actually the thing that turns gives Caliborn his Lord English powers. I'm guessing Vriska uncovers it but it falls into Caliborn's hands. That theory of course assumes that Caliborn is LE.

ALSO. I think the OP could use a sentence or two about Jujus and how they work.

[Unclever title]

ALSO. I think the OP could use a sentence or two about Jujus and how they work.

Remind me about how those work again? I want to be sure we have it right or at least in consensus.

What I have gathered about them is:
- All confirmed jujus have some sort of impact to the flow of time even if that impact is unnoticeable under ordinary situations.
- Each of the Felt's special time altering objects is a juju.
- Cal is most likely a juju which would imply that he has some sort of as yet unknown impact to the flow of time.
- Jujus are related to cherubs and (probably by extension) Lord English.
- There can only be one per universe (scratches don't seem to reset this). As a result they cannot be truly copied but they can be sent, if one were copied the copy would retain the juju powers while the original would lose those powers or soon be destroyed (becomes doomed) OR the copy would become doomed and the original would retain its juju abilities.
- You can have multiple of the same juju at the same time but it is a trick of causality, one of the jujus will eventually go back in time to become the other one
- Basically jujus follow time traveller rules when it comes to cloning. Whichever is the alpha juju remains/retains its powers. This may also explain why jujus keep showing up in the dreambubbles perhaps those were all doomed beta jujus.

Have I missed anything? Gotten something blatantly wrong? I'll probably pare this down to the least redundant statements later.

[GhotsyTrickester88]

Remind me about how those work again? I want to be sure we have it right or at least in consensus.

What I have gathered about them is:
- All confirmed jujus have some sort of impact to the flow of time even if that impact is unnoticeable under ordinary situations.
- Each of the Felt's special time altering objects is a juju.
- Cal is most likely a juju which would imply that he has some sort of as yet unknown impact to the flow of time.
- Jujus are related to cherubs and (probably by extension) Lord English.
- There can only be one per universe (scratches don't seem to reset this). As a result they cannot be truly copied but they can be sent, if one were copied the copy would retain the juju powers while the original would lose those powers or soon be destroyed (becomes doomed) OR the copy would become doomed and the original would retain its juju abilities.
- You can have multiple of the same juju at the same time but it is a trick of causality, one of the jujus will eventually go back in time to become the other one
- Basically jujus follow time traveller rules when it comes to cloning. Whichever is the alpha juju remains/retains its powers. This may also explain why jujus keep showing up in the dreambubbles perhaps those were all doomed beta jujus.

Have I missed anything? Gotten something blatantly wrong? I'll probably pare this down to the least redundant statements later.

How the Stitch JuJu's affect the time? I don't see any time-involving here.

[Griffington]

Remind me about how those work again? I want to be sure we have it right or at least in consensus.

What I have gathered about them is:
- All confirmed jujus have some sort of impact to the flow of time even if that impact is unnoticeable under ordinary situations.
- Each of the Felt's special time altering objects is a juju.
- Cal is most likely a juju which would imply that he has some sort of as yet unknown impact to the flow of time.
- Jujus are related to cherubs and (probably by extension) Lord English.
- There can only be one per universe (scratches don't seem to reset this). As a result they cannot be truly copied but they can be sent, if one were copied the copy would retain the juju powers while the original would lose those powers or soon be destroyed (becomes doomed) OR the copy would become doomed and the original would retain its juju abilities.
- You can have multiple of the same juju at the same time but it is a trick of causality, one of the jujus will eventually go back in time to become the other one
- Basically jujus follow time traveller rules when it comes to cloning. Whichever is the alpha juju remains/retains its powers. This may also explain why jujus keep showing up in the dreambubbles perhaps those were all doomed beta jujus.

Have I missed anything? Gotten something blatantly wrong? I'll probably pare this down to the least redundant statements later.

I'm not entirely sure about the second point, specifically regarding Crowbar's crowbar. It's a juju breaker, but are juju breakers also jujus themselves (and if this is true, can juju breakers break other juju breakers*)? I can't remember whether it's described as a juju in canon.


*oh god this is getting ridiculous

[MegaRock35]

Caliborn explicitly called Cal a juju, so he is confirmed as one and the thing about them all being time artifacts is debatable.

-"uu: THERE'S ONLY ONE REASON FOR THOSE TO EXIST.
uu: IT IS TO TuRN THE LIFE OF EVERYONE WHO OCCuPIES THE SAME uNIVERSE WITH IT. INTO A NIGHTMARE."

-
"UU: it is my jUjU. it is very dear to me.
GG: Your juju?
UU: a talisman of sorts, with many cUrioUs properties and rUles for implementation."
[...]
"UU: it was an heirloom, yoU coUld say. passed on from ancestors. i have always had it.
UU: jUjUs are said to have origins which are impossible to Understand or trace. some say they emerge spontaneoUsly from the void."

That's everything you missed, I think.

[thephilluminati]

Hey, I love the IDE theory thread, but generally I find most of the theories in here are pretty short-term. Just looking at this new thread most of the stuff is pretty much pre-scratch troll stuff we'll know by next update. I guess I want to use this thread to start a discussion of what really captured my attention about Homestuck in the first place, what the wiki refers to as "weird plot shit", the elements that by definition fall outside our abilities to theorize or conceive of accurately.
What the comic has done so far is a fairly good job of lampshading these elements by overwhelming the reader in a wealth of small details that answer some of the questions raised while actually raising more questions than they answer. The wiki's weird plot shit page is woefully out of date, but now that the Homestuck kickstarter has begun and ended, it's a pretty safe bet that the elements going into Homestuck are no longer as open a book as they were beforehand. We're in the homestretch, where no more kids are going to enter the game but I bet a whole bunch will exit it before we are through.
And of course, on top of all that we know from Hussie that the ending, most likely whatever act 7 will be, was known and prepared before the comic even started. So where are we all headed? I'd really like to hear some of the forum community's ideas on what "season 2" of act 6 and act 7 hold for us.

So with that out of the way I think the "Red Herrings" swimming through Caliborn's veins aren't that he isn't Lord English, but that Lord English himself is a red herring distracting away from the larger ingame goals the characters and even the comic itself has been delaying getting to. Whereas the recent intermission specifically but act 6 in general have been posing English as the big bad, the plot of Homestuck in general isn't about good vs. evil. Recent updates have pretty much acknowledged this, since in the nature of homestuck's alpha timeline all acts of violence, beauty, hilarity, romance etc are all part of the same set of events that as a whole paradoxically cause themselves to happen. While it's been pretty obvious from even the start that the comic would end up in some self-fulfilling clusterfuck, and especially so since act 4, the nature of that clusterfuck has remained mysterious, and honestly the list of key players only makes it moreso. For the sake of a list and also to make a bit of a point, the following are all key plot elements/characters in homestuck whose motives and/or origins are pretty much unknown:
- Lord English
- Skaia(net)
- The Denizens
- Lil' Cal
- Callioporn
- The Condesce (specifically the grown up one in the B2 session and not Meenah)
- GCat and to a slightly lesser extent Bec (and to a larger extent whatever the first guardian of Beforus was if it even had one)
- The Horrorterrors
- Dad/Colonel Sassacre
- The Con Air Bunny
- Gamzee
- The Pre-Scratch Guardians
- The Tumor
- Whole Bunch of Other Stuff that Falls Under the Umbrella of "Circumstantial Simultaneity".
- Andrew Hussie
Couldn't make that list exhaustive, but these are all things vaguely tied to the "Ultimate Riddle" at the center of all this. That's a lot, though, and Hussie's repeatedly said Act 6 will be shorter than Act 5, but with 11/11 around the corner, it's very quickly approaching the year mark while still only being halfway done (unless the second half has no intermissions). Points for silliness go to the theory that can integrate all of the above as quickly as possible, you don't need points if you're gonna take something on individually.

To finish this off, some slightly unrelated theories about the thief class:

We have two thieves in the comic, both Troll Girls in fairly prominent positions in their own groups. The first I'll talk about is Vriska because she's more established so far so her part is more "fact" than theory. Vriska's role as Thief of Light is pretty much literal in the comic - once she emerges she basically entirely takes over the role of the other hero of light in the comic. Despite Rose and Vriska never talking ever as far as I know, the two share a lot of qualities in common. This ranges from the explicit parallels Doc Scratch draws between them as heroes of light, to more silly stuff like sharing major ships (John and Kanaya though Vriska has Tavros all to herself). The relationship with John is pretty important, because remember in the very very beginning of the comic, John and Rose were basically the entire comic. They're the only characters named and introduced in Act 1, back when the God Tier symbol for light was basically the logo for the whole comic. In turn, as Rose became less visible of a character, Vriska became a more visible one, all the parallels climaxing in that scene at the end of act 5 where as John reads Vriska's messages she left before dying while reviving Rose's corpse with a kiss.
I don't know how that thread will conclude since recent comics and ones stretching back to act 1 suggest that those parallels that are something that will be answered by the ultimate riddle. I talked about that to try and understand Meenah, the Thief of Life a bit better.
Now, I don't really know what the deal is with guardians/ancestors and their ability to access the class/aspect powers that they'd have as a kid. We do know the condesce kept the helmsman alive with her own life powers, though, and we know that Meenah definitely god tiered before dying. We also know from watching alttimeline God Tier Feferi healing WV that a ghost can use their god tier powers while they're ghosts.
Now, my guess is that Meenah (and maybe the other pre-scratch trolls) will double die by Lord English's hand at the end of act, seemingly killing off a new main character right after they're introduced. The twist will be that she uses her thief of life powers to take the condesce's life and work her efforts against lord english as part of the condesce's weird dance of antagonism/subservience/subordination.

[InvertedVoid]

http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=006438
http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=006418
Two Cals. Since Cal is a juju (assuming Caliborn isn't lying about that), they either have to get by on dead-eyes-not-real-juju-cal or both originate from the Cal Gamzee brought on the meteor (goes back with frog temple, gcat gives to baby dirk, falls in ocean, lil' seb grabs from ocean floor and brings to baby dream dirk somehow???), or there can indeed be more than one (as seen in Highlander 2, where there are, you guessed it, only two.).

The chess set is a confirmed juju which, as of yet, appears to have no impact on the timeline other than that of a chess set. It could do the oven thing and advance the players through time at one second per second, but I doubt it.

Quarters's quarters and Cans's calendars have not been confirmed or denied as jujus. Cans's calendars were probably just a story device joke thing, but the quarters are a mystery. Especially since they change space, not time.


There can be only one copy of a given juju, even across multiple universes, not per universe.

I think that's all I have to say about jujus at the moment?


Question: Would Biscuits's oven block Aradia's time-freezing powers??? I guess not, because it doesn't block the egg timer.

[Unclever title]

How the Stitch JuJu's affect the time? I don't see any time-involving here.

Damage received retroactively in any timeline (necessary to keep up with The Felt) is slapped onto these effigies, allowing Stitch to heal them by repairing the effigies. It seems this works both ways, as Stitch tries to set Slick on fire by putting his hat on an effigy and setting it on fire. In Act 6 Intermission 3, these are revealed to be a kind of Juju which is tied to the vitality of a character depending on the hat it wears.

From here.

Key words in bold. If it were merely about healing or damage then it could not heal trans-timeline damage or wounds that had occurred before the effigy was built as the effigy would need to be damaged first before it could be repaired.

Edit: Dang that's a bunch more posts.

[FFWF]

It's not necessarily true that all apparent juju copies will become themselves. Refer to Caliborn's dialogue here. "uu: IF TWO APPEAR TO EXIST. SuCH AS ONE IN REALITY AND ONE IN YOuR DREAMS. uu: IT IS ONLY AN ILLuSION. EITHER NEVER TRuE. OR SOON TO BE CORRECTED." I think Dirk's Cal, as a dead juju, is one of the kinds that is "never true"; the Scratch duplicated its image but not its history or essence. Why that would make it dangerous - shrug.

Also, Calliope's lines quoted above about her juju being an heirloom passed on by ancestors makes me realise it's probably something we already know about subsequently empowered - something on the meteor, probably, but not necessarily.

[Delenance]

Weird IDE: The Felt are all deformed and lost souls of time players, with their jujus being former time artifacts. Clover is the only exception to this, being a former Light player.

[Vanymstorm]

From here.

Key words in bold. If it were merely about healing or damage then it could not heal trans-timeline damage or wounds that had occurred before the effigy was built as the effigy would need to be damaged first before it could be repaired.

Edit: Dang that's a bunch more posts.

I have no fucking clue what they even mean by that. Well, I can think of one possibility, but that would require them to have badly misread something.

Oh right, it's the MSPA wiki, there you go.

[Raptarion]

IDE- Cals juju powers involve speeding up time for a given person so long as they only interact with cal while sped up, either to weaponize him, or to fist bump him.
Explains why dirk only moves so fast while interacting with cal.
Alt IDE- Cals juju power is being pure evil.

[WackoMcGoose]

IDE- Cals juju powers involve speeding up time for a given person so long as they only interact with cal while sped up, either to weaponize him, or to fist bump him.
Explains why dirk only moves so fast while interacting with cal.
Alt IDE- Cals juju power is being pure evil.

I guess that's the Strider family secret then. Oh:

IDE - Cal is Caliborn's juju. Once he goes LE, he drops him (or the idea of him) into the Troll universe, which Gamzee spreads to the Human universe, and somehow he gets into the Hussieverse while leaving a juju "ghost image" behind for the Scratch to give to Dirk, hence Post-Scratch Cal being all "dead-looking".

IDE++ - LE will be defeated by using Crowbar's Crowbar to beat the stuffing out of the Cal in Hussie's office. The temporal shockwave will echo out through the Yellow Yard Panes into B1 and B2 (and by using the wall Hussie jumped through in the [o]termission, into A2 as well), and the feedback of all that timeline snopping will be the pile of paradoxes that does not keep from getting taller until it falls on LE.

[amiableTemplar]

IDE: The weapon is Caliborn's juju. The two jujus, his and his sister's, are a matched set (a "mated pair"! Har har) and therefore only work if they remain in proximity to one another. Since Calliope's juju has passed (or will pass) to Jane, Caliborn's will become useless, and he ditches it in Paradox Space. When the two jujus are brought together again and owned by one person, rather than two people sharing a body, they will be powerful enough to seriously threaten Lord English.

Specifically, they'll enable the prophesied-by-explanation exploitable "glitches in spacetime" that are needed for someone to defeat him. The presence of two different God Tier'd Heroes of Time is essential for this, presumably each one manipulating/operating one juju apiece, and Jake striking the decisive blow.

[Delenance]

I guess that's the Strider family secret then. Oh:

IDE - Cal is Caliborn's juju. Once he goes LE, he drops him (or the idea of him) into the Troll universe, which Gamzee spreads to the Human universe, and somehow he gets into the Hussieverse while leaving a juju "ghost image" behind for the Scratch to give to Dirk, hence Post-Scratch Cal being all "dead-looking".

We already know how Cal got into the trolls universe: He was carried in by a doomed Aradiabot after she fought Jack.

[Delenance]

IDE: Calliope's juju is the chest itself

IDE2: They will find Calliope in the dream bubbles, but then she gets killed and it's okay because SHE'S A MINOR CHARACTER

[InvertedVoid]

I think Calliope's juju is pretty definitively stated to be contained inside of the chest and not actually the chest.

Although the space inside of the chest is the important part, so you could get by on that? They could put Lord English into the box.



In the Homestuck Adventure Game, you will find and open a box at at least one point, I do believe I can almost guarantee that. Bear the above in mind each time you open a box.

IDE: Calliope's juju is a purple-eyed Trickster Mode Cal, complete with head-lollipop, and it's where she got the idea for drawing Trickster Mode Roxy. (speaking of which, has anyone found any trickster mode in Meenah's Interactive Quest Across The Afterlife, or is that no longer a thing?)

IDE: Caliborn and Calliope's jujus are a ring and a sceptre, respectively. The sceptre, which glows bright green, is Lord English's cane and is in Calliope's chest (because I still think maybe Calliope is Lord English). The ring doesn't glow a particular color and is currently on John's finger, and protects the wearer from doubledeath, cancelling out LE's bark/brakka/whatever. It is also the treasure which they are seeking.

[Appleorangeblue]

IDE: Lord English will find and kill Calliope's ghost. However, Calliope actually has two ghosts (one for her normalself and one for her dreamself) and the dreamself ghost will assist the heroes in defeating Lord English.