Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Canonically it was poison but that's from The Search which I would say the odds are on it being noncanon to the quest — most Azula writers ignore it, for pretty good reasons. That said, poison in general (rather than the specifics given in The Search, which are Not Great) just makes the most sense.
 
I wonder if a skilled firebender could burn poisons out of their body? It makes as much conceptual sense as the waterbender healing lol.
 
[X] A lightning bolt. With Mai and Ty Lee there to keep Zuko's second in check, for the first time you may well be able to have a genuine Agni Kai. Just you, and Zuko, and the flame. The way it really was meant to be. And when you win—well, he'll probably have the waterbender there to heal him, and then you can talk, once your claim is so secure even the Avatar can't dislodge it.

I think this is the best choice. Let the girl have her one victory over zuzu and than Azula can tell him how she's the best :V
 
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[X] A lightning bolt. With Mai and Ty Lee there to keep Zuko's second in check, for the first time you may well be able to have a genuine Agni Kai. Just you, and Zuko, and the flame. The way it really was meant to be. And when you win—well, he'll probably have the waterbender there to heal him, and then you can talk, once your claim is so secure even the Avatar can't dislodge it.

I think this is the best choice. Let the girl have her one victory over zuzu and than Azula can tell him how she's the best :V
The vote is closed.
 
I wonder if a skilled firebender could burn poisons out of their body? It makes as much conceptual sense as the waterbender healing lol.

1) Do you mean diseases, rather than poisons? I would say that it makes sense for firebenders to be mostly immune to a lot of conventional diseases, yeah.
2) The human body is 60% water by volume, how does it make as much conceptual sense? (Your vital organs significantly more so, that figure is dragged down by your bones only being like 30-40%.)
 
1) Do you mean diseases, rather than poisons? I would say that it makes sense for firebenders to be mostly immune to a lot of conventional diseases, yeah.
2) The human body is 60% water by volume, how does it make as much conceptual sense? (Your vital organs significantly more so, that figure is dragged down by your bones only being like 30-40%.)
I mean, bloodbending makes sense by that logic, but the very fact that healing is a thing with the glowing and all makes it rather different than the baseline -kinesis that other forms of bending are. Like, waterbending allowing healing is definitely well beyond what could be done with just moving water around. Firebending allowing burning out diseases is equally unlikely, but it might work with breath of fire if that can safely raise body temperature to the point where bacteria might have trouble.
 
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I mean, bloodbending makes sense by that logic, but the very fact that healing is a thing with the glowing and all makes it rather different than the baseline -kinesis that other forms of bending are. Like, waterbending allowing healing is definitely well beyond what could be done with just moving water around. Firebending allowing burning out poisons is equally unlikely, but it might work with breath of fire if that can safely raise body temperature to the point where bacteria might have trouble.

It makes just as much sense as the rest of bending. Bloodbending should just kill the target, firebenders should be either immune to fire entirely or frying themselves with their own moves, and airbending 'cushions' and similar shouldn't work. None of those 'shoulds' are true.

But, y'know, it's not hard scifi.

And bacteria aren't poisons. Poisons are chemicals. Diseases are bacteria (and also viruses!). But yes, I would say firebenders being resistant to most disease makes a lot of sense.
 
It makes just as much sense as the rest of bending. Bloodbending should just kill the target, firebenders should be either immune to fire entirely or frying themselves with their own moves, and airbending 'cushions' and similar shouldn't work. None of those 'shoulds' are true.

But, y'know, it's not hard scifi.

And bacteria aren't poisons. Poisons are chemicals. Diseases are bacteria (and also viruses!).
Sorry, my bad, used the wrong word, edited to specify I meant diseases being dealt with seems possible, if a pretty big stretch.

But I do think that there's a distinction between 'required secondary powers' and 'completely new power that's definitely tacked on'. Like, healing coming from waterbending is not a 'natural' thing, unlike 'pyrokinetics don't hurt themselves with their own flames but can still be burned.
 
Sorry, my bad, used the wrong word, edited to specify I meant diseases being dealt with seems possible, if a pretty big stretch.

But I do think that there's a distinction between 'required secondary powers' and 'completely new power that's definitely tacked on'. Like, healing coming from waterbending is not a 'natural' thing, unlike 'pyrokinetics don't hurt themselves with their own flames but can still be burned.

I guess? All the bending disciplines (except earth, oddly enough) have that, though: lightning generation for fire, healing for water, weightlessness and astral projection for airbending.
 
I guess? All the bending disciplines (except earth, oddly enough) have that, though: lightning generation for fire, healing for water, weightlessness and astral projection for airbending.
A lot of these secondary powers seem to fall into the category of "thing which are culturally considered associated with elements" rather than being only about the matter itself. Thus, healing would make sense with the general connotations of water being tied to life.
 
I guess? All the bending disciplines (except earth, oddly enough) have that, though: lightning generation for fire, healing for water, weightlessness and astral projection for airbending.
Oh of course, yeah. But healing is not really related in a meaningful sense to how much water is in the human body, it's purely about cultural associations as @Limabot mentioned. That's all I was trying to say.
 
A lot of these secondary powers seem to fall into the category of "thing which are culturally considered associated with elements" rather than being only about the matter itself. Thus, healing would make sense with the general connotations of water being tied to life.
That makes sense though lightning being associated with fire is a real oddity. Usually it's lightning and water or lightning and air. Lightning and fire are only connected in that if a bolt of lightning hits dry grass it can start a fire. Well that and "both fire and lightning can kill you real good."
 
That makes sense though lightning being associated with fire is a real oddity. Usually it's lightning and water or lightning and air. Lightning and fire are only connected in that if a bolt of lightning hits dry grass it can start a fire. Well that and "both fire and lightning can kill you real good."
Lightning is culturally associated with fire though
Lightning is bright, it's destructive, it burns things
It's like fire in other words
It's not all that uncommon for lightning to be juxtaposed with fire in media

And it wasn't uncommon for lightning to be thought of as literally fire from the sky
Take the Hindu God of Fire, Agni, for example, who embodies what was thought of as three forms of fire
Fire, lightning and the sun
All three of those were conceptualized as different manifestations of the same thing in Vedic religion
 
I guess? All the bending disciplines (except earth, oddly enough) have that, though: lightning generation for fire, healing for water, weightlessness and astral projection for airbending.
Is Astral projection an airbender thing or an avatar/spiritualism thing?

Honestly, for Earth I imagine the secondary ability would be something about helping plants grow or something. Which would not really show up in combat, but would help explain Ba Sing Se's ability to feed their population.
 
Is Astral projection an airbender thing or an avatar/spiritualism thing?

Honestly, for Earth I imagine the secondary ability would be something about helping plants grow or something. Which would not really show up in combat, but would help explain Ba Sing Se's ability to feed their population.
It's only used by airbenders. I'm not sure it's ever used by an Avatar as opposed to normal airbenders, actually.
 
Weird, I watched all of LoK but I don't even remember people astral projecting aside from the walks in the spirit realm which looks very different from that.
 
Isn't Jinora some special starchild style spirit-whisperer? Most of the establishing lore for that is season 2 and you could not pay me to rewatch it.
 
Isn't Jinora some special starchild style spirit-whisperer? Most of the establishing lore for that is season 2 and you could not pay me to rewatch it.
Correct. Rewatched Season 2 a couple months ago, and it's not aaaas bad as I remembered it being, but yeah, you're not missing out on too much. Jinora's definitely one of its redeeming qualities though.
 
According to creator commentary this is a different thing done through energybending, apparently! I'm as surprised as you.
God, energybending is so dumb, just completely undercut all of Aang's multi season tension over what to do about Ozai with a magic turtle out of nowhere.

Huh, Azula probably doesn't know about the energybending, does she? I wonder how she'll react? I'm pretty sure the threat of Aang taking away her bending, something that she utterly defines herself with, would be brutal.
 
God, energybending is so dumb, just completely undercut all of Aang's multi season tension over what to do about Ozai with a magic turtle out of nowhere.

Huh, Azula probably doesn't know about the energybending, does she? I wonder how she'll react? I'm pretty sure the threat of Aang taking away her bending, something that she utterly defines herself with, would be brutal.
Oh im not looking forward to that day
 
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