RWBY Thread III: Time To Say Goodbye

kokuenDG · May 1, 2022

so gotta few things that need to be said real quick.
We get a lot of reports from this thread. A lot of it is just a series of people yelling at each other over arguments that have been rehashed hundreds of times since the end of the recent Volume. And I get that the last Volume - and RWBY in general, really - has some controversial moments that people will want to discuss, argue about, debate, etc.

That's fine. We're not going to stop people from doing that, because that's literally what the point of the thread is. However, there's just a point where it gets to be a bit too much, and arguments about whether or not Ironwood was morally justified in his actions in the recent Volume, or if RWBY and her team were in the right for withholding information from Ironwood out of distrust, or whatever flavor of argument of the day descend into insulting other posters, expressing a demeaning attitude towards other's opinions, and just being overall unpleasant. That tends to happen a lot in this thread. We want it to stop happening in this thread.

So! As of now the thread is in a higher state of moderation. What that means is that any future infractions will result in a weeklong boot from the thread, and repeated offenders will likely be permanently removed. So please, everyone endeavor to actually respect the other's arguments, and even if you strongly disagree with them please stay civil and mindful when it comes to responding to others.

In addition, users should refrain from talking about off-site users in the thread. Bear in mind that this does not mean that you cannot continue to post tumblr posts, for example, that add onto the discussion in the thread, with the caveat that it's related to RWBY of course. But any objections to offsite users in the thread should be handled via PM, or they'll be treated as thread violations and infracted as such.

Matrix Dragon · Mar 21, 2022

The thing is, the original post was referencing RWBYcritics being it's usual level of hateful, insisting that Salem having the staff was instant win for her, and any attempt by the writers to explain otherwise would be 'bad writing'. Because clearly, they never gave the matter any thought at all, and just gave the big bad an 'I win' button without giving any thought to later volumes </sarcasm>

Jakobstj said:
Ozpin lists them as things that are needed, and then that rule is completely ignored. Remember how Penny turning human involved just telling him to "get creative" to handle the issue of her soul being separated from her body? There was no detailed plans or reference materials for that part.

Not really? They left Ambrosis out of that part and left Penny's soul handle manifesting a body. Which is a major part of why I don't think her story's done yet.

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

Jakobstj said:
Ozpin lists them as things that are needed, and then that rule is completely ignored. Remember how Penny turning human involved just telling him to "get creative" to handle the issue of her soul being separated from her body? There was no detailed plans or reference materials for that part.

They were quite literally not ignored, they had to show him Penny's blue prints and then ask him to separate out the mechanical aspects of her.

Psyga315 said:
Because people like to play up Salem's intelligence and manipulation, but somehow when it comes to the staff suddenly she isn't smart enough for that?

Like, she was able to manipulate a god into doing what she wants, set up plans for terrorist attacks that all worked except for the one in Mistral, but that was due to two idiots not sticking to it, and is able to make Ruby and Ironwood crumble with just a few choice words.

The only solution would be if it's like the Lamp and she doesn't know how the Relic worked, since Cinder was the only person on her team to fully know how it works and I doubt she'd willy nilly give it away.

Also, we saw Jinn sell out the heroes to Cinder because she asked despite knowing her Ill intent, so I don't know where this idea of Ambrosious screwing over Salem is coming from.

Because manipulating people and technical know how are two entirely different things.

As to your last point, we saw Ambrosious liked them and their projects and he still proved an unreliable ally Ozpin was leery of tapping, why would he be more inclined to help Salem?

Jakobstj · Mar 21, 2022

Matrix Dragon said:
Not really? They left Ambrosis out of that part and left Penny's soul handle manifesting a body. Which is a major part of why I don't think her story's done yet.

No, they... they literally tell Ambrosius to "get creative" to solve that issue. Like, Ambrosius is the one who does the Flenny creation, he just handwaves it by saying it's partially her soul doing it, and he doesn't know how much of it is him.

Ambrosius: But a soul without a complete body, what would be left?

Ruby: I don't know. I guess you just have to... get creative.

Ambrosius: I suppose I could do a little... Oh, add a touch of... But if I do that, how much of the old Penny would be my work and how much would be her? Just coming up to the surface.

Tython82 · Mar 21, 2022

Psyga315 said:
Like, she was able to manipulate a god into doing what she wants,

Yes and No, she was only able to manipulate the GoD because he was desperate for willing followers, if he already had a bunch of willing followers prior to Salem asking him the favor of raising Ozma he would have likely denied Salem then and there due to his deal with his Brother.

Psyga315 · Mar 21, 2022

Zam said:
As to your last point, we saw Ambrosious liked them and their projects and he still proved an unreliable ally Ozpin was leery of tapping,

Again, Jinn admired Ruby for her out of the box thinking in using the Relic to pause reality, but that didn't stop her from telling Cinder all she knew about her plans.

And she was also just as happy to lay out Oz's skeletons.

Given how Ambro is cut from the same cloth, a similar thing would happen

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

Jakobstj said:
No, they... they literally tell Ambrosius to "get creative" to solve that issue. Like, Ambrosius is the one who does the Flenny creation, he just handwaves it by saying it's partially her soul doing it, and he doesn't know how much of it is him.

As noted previously, that's blatantly false:

Ambrosius: There's something eating away at her. I'm guessing you think you have some clever plan to save her. Just know, I will give you exactly what you ask for and I don't want any complaining when it's not what you wanted.

Ruby and Weiss exchange meaningful looks, and the latter pulls out her scroll, projecting a hologram of Penny's blueprints for Ambrosius to see. The spirit is immediately engrossed in them.

Ruby: We brought her schematics. We want you to make a new version of her using her exact same robot parts.

Ambrosius frowns, peering over the hologram at Ruby.

Ambrosius: That was curiously worded, girl.

Ruby: An exact copy of her would include the virus. An exact copy of her without the virus would cease to exist the second you make something else, and we kinda wanna keep her around longer than that.

Ambrosius: (chuckling) You've done your homework.

Ruby: We want you to create a new version of her, using her existing robotic parts taking the virus with them.

Ambrosius forms a steeple with his fingers, deep in thought. He twirls in the air away from the girls to make a series of complex hand gestures, apparently doing some difficult calculations. Weiss stops projecting the hologram and Team RWBY looks at its leader, who can only shrug.

Ambrosius: Okay, but if I take the robot parts out of her, that would leave...

Blake: Penny. The girl who's always been there underneath it.

Ambrosius: Hmm...

Ruby: You can't destroy, it's against the rules. But you wouldn't be destroying her. Her soul is who she is.

Psyga315 said:
Again, Jinn admired Ruby for her out of the box thinking in using the Relic to pause reality, but that didn't stop her from telling Cinder all she knew about her plans.

And she was also just as happy to lay out Oz's skeletons.

Are you just like, intentionally ignoring my points regarding Ambrosius? Because it feels like that's what you're doing as literally none of this addresses my points.

mr_stibbons · Mar 21, 2022

Psyga315 said:
... What?

How... How does this make sense? This is basically "I'm not saying it's aliens, but it's aliens."

Needing A, B or C, is different from needing A, B and C. Blueprints are one possible solution, not the only possible solution. As shown by the multiple times people use the staff without providing blueprints. Real world examples and references are a vastly lower bar to clear to get the staff working than detailed technical explanations for everything you want to do. Especially if your goal is simply to cause havoc.

Zam said:
Yes because poison's are just floating around in easy access in her cobblestone Grimm castle that also totally work when dispersed. Also, that's awfully presumptions given Ambrosius had to be right in the middle of the city he was making fly/set on fire and that was already partially on fire and or had Gravity Dust woven into its base. The quick recovery time was a noted about Ambrosius screwing Salem's plan over, don't ignore the words I use in a bid to create counter examples to something I didn't say for a second time now. Also Ambrosius does require info given he understands he made a city fly, the place burn and portals open, so he's more than capable of being petty about it if he wants too and even Ozpin, who's a helluva a lot more experienced with these things than Salem is, was leery of dealing with him.

Complexity plays a part in things, given he did need Penny's schematics and wasn't even sure what the end result would be.

Sure! I'll just need coordinates and specs for each door, an explanation for bending space and time to account for the much greater traffic on one side, and the single point to the other.

Seriously, he is not that easy to use, let alone control.

See above. The original point that without an engineer the staff is virtually useless does not hold because the restrictions are not that strict.

Salem, who has been manipulating the biology of grimm for tens of thousands of years, can't synthesize some poison? Not buying it at all.

And for range limitations on the staff, we certainly haven't heard any mention of them. If it can create effects across an entire city without problem or any concerns being raised, it's bold to assume that is the limits of it's abilities.

Part of the reason Oz is leery of dealing with Ambrosius is that he cares about things like "Collateral damage" and "Dying". Ambro messing up a project that is supposed to protect people can't be redone if the people are dead A project designed to destroy can just be iterated until it works.

Jakobstj · Mar 21, 2022

Zam said:
As noted previously, that's blatantly false:

I was specifically referring to the creation of the Human Penny, which does break the rules. The soul-removal from the original Penny is the only thing they use the schematics for, then they just let him do whatever he wants to prevent her soul from being without a body.

Psyga315 · Mar 21, 2022

Zam said:
Are you just like, intentionally ignoring my points regarding Ambrosius? Because it feels like that's what you're doing as literally none of this addresses my points.

Ambrosious is like Jinn in that they were genies of Relics. Ambrosious liking RWBY's plans mean jack when Jinn liked them too but sold them out to Cinder all the same.

Their alliance depends on who is holding their Relic.

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

mr_stibbons said:
Needing A, B or C, is different from needing A, B and C. Blueprints are one possible solution, not the only possible solution.

Except all these thing are put on the same level as needing blue prints by the actual dialogue.

Jakobstj said:
I was specifically referring to the creation of the Human Penny, which does break the rules. The soul-removal from the original Penny is the only thing they use the schematics for, then they just let him do whatever he wants to prevent her soul from being without a body.

... Did you... Actually watch the show?

The dialogue explicitly outlines they want him to make a "new Penny", IE the robot version that faded away once he made the gates, out of Penny's pre-existing parts, while leaving the soul behind, that is explicitly the plan, as outlined by the characters, with their words.

mr_stibbons said:
See above. The original point that without an engineer the staff is virtually useless does not hold because the restrictions are not that strict.

Salem, who has been manipulating the biology of grimm for tens of thousands of years, can't synthesize some poison? Not buying it at all.

And for range limitations on the staff, we certainly haven't heard any mention of them. If it can create effects across an entire city without problem or any concerns being raised, it's bold to assume that is the limits of it's abilities.

Part of the reason Oz is leery of dealing with Ambrosius is that he cares about things like "Collateral damage" and "Dying". Ambro messing up a project that is supposed to protect people can't be redone if the people are dead A project designed to destroy can just be iterated until it works.

Except they do for all the reasons outlined, your arguments consisted entirely of ignoring what everyone says by repeating the "fire" argument, which as noted is largely useless for Salem's plans and incredibly unreliable given the source.

Because there's tons of crossover between willing Grimm into existence via pre-made magic pools and the science of Toxicology, which is a scientific discipline, overlapping with biology, chemistry, pharmacology, and medicine.

Its also bold to assume its limitless, given no one tried to say "Lock Salem in one of these pocket dimensions while she's in her palace and we're safe over here." But I'm sure you'll call that a plot hole, as opposed to an in universe design limitation.

Except Salem's plan is not "use a Relic to kill everyone", so your whole "She can just use it to kill people in Vacuo" thing is moot anyway, even ignoring Ambrosius's unreliability, along with the fact he can't destroy anyway meaning he was likely convinced to raise the hydrogen in Watt's room which had fires in it, over just "fire".

Tython82 · Mar 21, 2022

Psyga315 said:
Ambrosious is like Jinn in that they were genies of Relics. Ambrosious liking RWBY's plans mean jack when Jinn liked them too but sold them out to Cinder all the same.

This is becasue of how Jinn's abilites work, if she is summoned with the password and then asked a question she has to answer it to the best of her ability, for Ambrosis, yes he will do as you ask but if you are not very specific about what you want or how you want it i.e. have the Blueprints ready for him or an example of what you want made, he has more wiggleroom to screw you over due to your wording.

Psyga315 · Mar 21, 2022

Zam said:
even ignoring Ambrosius's unreliability, along with the fact he can't destroy anyway meaning he was likely convinced to raise the hydrogen in Watt's room which had fires in it, over just "fire".

That would assume Cinder can articulate "add hydrogen" instead of the simpler "add fire".

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

Tython82 said:
i.e. have the Blueprints ready for him or an example of what you want made, he has more wiggleroom to screw you over due to your wording.

And even when he does like you, the project and you give him plenty of example bases to work off, he still creates an infinite abyss and extremely unsafe travel mechanism and is incredibly literal, thus not allowing anyone back through.

Again, to anyone who wasn't paying attention, Ambrosis is notoriously difficult to work with.

Psyga315 said:
That would assume Cinder can articulate "add hydrogen" instead of the simpler "add fire".

That's assuming she can't, the point here is that Ambrosis can't destroy so it had to be more complicated than "Burn it".

mr_stibbons · Mar 21, 2022

Zam said:
Except all these thing are put on the same level as needing blue prints by the actual dialogue.

Except they do for all the reasons outlined, your arguments consisted entirely of ignoring what everyone says by repeating the "fire" argument, which as noted is largely useless for Salem's plans and incredibly unreliable given the source.

Because there's tons of crossover between willing Grimm into existence via pre-made magic pools and the science of Toxicology, which is a scientific discipline, overlapping with biology, chemistry, pharmacology, and medicine.

Its also bold to assume its limitless, given no one tried to say "Lock Salem in one of these pocket dimensions while she's in her palace and we're safe over here." But I'm sure you'll call that a plot hole, as opposed to an in universe design limitation.

Except Salem's plan is not "use a Relic to kill everyone", so your whole "She can just use it to kill people in Vacuo" thing is moot anyway, even ignoring Ambrosius's unreliability, along with the fact he can't destroy anyway meaning he was likely convinced to raise the hydrogen in Watt's room which had fires in it, over just "fire".

Blueprints, references, and examples are put on the same level in terms of the results, not in terms of the difficulty of getting your hands on them. So the fact that Salem doesn't have the equivalent of a toxicology degree (which is debatable) does not matter, because if she can present Ambrosius with a physical sample of the poison, she has satisfied his requirements. The fact that it was made by willing a grimm into existence does not matter.

And yeah, I do think the power levels of the staff creates plot holes, because it's hilariously powerful. Why on earth did Oz think the best use of if was to make part of a city fly, instead of any of the virtually limitless things it could do? It can teleport objects across continents, for crying out loud. Even a secret cross continental teleport network would be invaluable for the Ozluminati. Why couldn't you dump Salem in an extra-dimensional prison? I strongly suspect that the staffs powers were originally more limited, the "unlimited energy source" that it is described as in V7, and they quietly retconned it partway through V8 when they realized they had written themselves into a corner and needed a Deus ex Machina.

And no, giving Salem the ability to wipe a city of the map with a wave of the staff isn't trivial. It may not be an instant win button, but it should majorly increase Salem's already overwhelming power level.

And exactly what process Cinder used to burn Watts is secondary to the fact that the No Destruction rule is very easy to circumvent and the Villians are aware that it is very easy to circumvent.

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

mr_stibbons said:
Blueprints, references, and examples are put on the same level in terms of the results, not in terms of the difficulty of getting your hands on them. So the fact that Salem doesn't have the equivalent of a toxicology degree (which is debatable) does not matter, because if she can present Ambrosius with a physical sample of the poison, she has satisfied his requirements. The fact that it was made by willing a grimm into existence does not matter.

And yeah, I do think the power levels of the staff creates plot holes, because it's hilariously powerful. Why on earth did Oz think the best use of if was to make part of a city fly, instead of any of the virtually limitless things it could do? It can teleport objects across continents, for crying out loud. Even a secret cross continental teleport network would be invaluable for the Ozluminati. Why couldn't you dump Salem in an extra-dimensional prison? I strongly suspect that the staffs powers were originally more limited, the "unlimited energy source" that it is described as in V7, and they quietly retconned it partway through V8 when they realized they had written themselves into a corner and needed a Deus ex Machina.

And no, giving Salem the ability to wipe a city of the map with a wave of the staff isn't trivial. It may not be an instant win button, but it should majorly increase Salem's already overwhelming power level.

And exactly what process Cinder used to burn Watts is secondary to the fact that the No Destruction rule is very easy to circumvent and the Villians are aware that it is very easy to circumvent.

That's a rather charitable interpretation at best and one I find rather baseless; if anything it seems more like blue prints are ideal and everything following that is less effective. Except if that was true they would not have needed to present him with Penny's blue prints, your argument relies on ignoring what we see in canon and oversimplifying his abilities, just like the initial post pointed out. It rather does if she needs to explain how something is done.

So basically, rather than assuming you simply don't know how an item in a show you don't write for works, you instead assume you know the world building better than the creators and that something called "That staff of creation" was just an energy source. Is that about the size of it? Cos its not terribly compelling if so.

Except as noted that's not how he works, given he literally can't destroy, needs plenty to work with, may in fact have limits on distance and function and is also notoriously unreliable. But sure, if you ignore all that, as well as the fact destroying a city doesn't help Salem get the other Relics, then I guess you have a point.

ArtFartCop · Mar 21, 2022

Listen I'm just gonna say that it's really weird how the fandom wanks Salem for years about how smart she is and how she's a master of manipulation who can play anyone like a fiddle, even to the point of turning two of Ozpin's closest allies against him, but suddenly she can't use the Staff because Watts is dead. Like, oh, suddenly, Salem has these arbitrary restrictions that would prevent her from making full use of the Staff? Just seems kinda sexist to throw her under the bus because she needs Watts for... what are very arbitrary reasons. Cinder too for that matter given she's clearly already shown she can just set the damn city on fire.

Or they could use Tyrian's poison and have Ambro mass-produce that/convert his poison into a gas form then have Cinder just carpet-bomb the city with biological warfare. Or recreate his poison and taint the water supplies. Or teleport into the Vacuo vault and steal the sword using the same portal network RWBY established. Or have Cinder find the Summer Maiden then use Ambro to open a teleport portal beneath her so that she can be isolated and picked off by Cinder and Salem. Or shit, just drop a giant rock on the city. No blueprints needed for that, just grab a pebble, ask Ambro to make one a few dozen times bigger right over Vacuo and drop that sucker. Rinse and repeat until Theo's giving you the Sword.

Either way, the Staff is still busted and stupidly overpowered, any explanation for why Salem doesn't carpet-bomb Vacuo is going to feel cheap. That's the bed the writers have made and I have little interest in sugarcoating my opinion on how they've written themselves into a corner. And I have even less interest in people coming up with fantastic headcanons that won't impact the show and all they serve to do is undermine a female villain through what is effectivelly a narrative band-aid of "Well Salem's just too stupid to use the Staff."

mr_stibbons · Mar 21, 2022

Zam said:
That's a rather charitable interpretation at best and one I find rather baseless; if anything it seems more like blue prints are ideal and everything following that is less effective. Except if that was true they would not have needed to present him with Penny's blue prints, your argument relies on ignoring what we see in canon and oversimplifying his abilities, just like the initial post pointed out. It rather does if she needs to explain how something is done.

So basically, rather than assuming you simply don't know how an item in a show you don't write for works, you instead assume you know the world building better than the creators and that something called "That staff of creation" was just an energy source. Is that about the size of it? Cos its not terribly compelling if so.

Except as noted that's not how he works, given he literally can't destroy, needs plenty to work with, may in fact have limits on distance and function and is also notoriously unreliable. But sure, if you ignore all that, as well as the fact destroying a city doesn't help Salem get the other Relics, then I guess you have a point.

As I have pointed out, in that same scene there are counterexamples- they needed Penny's blueprints, but did not need any blueprints for an extradimensional space. Pennys blueprints may have been overkill for all you know, they present the prints before he asks for anything. To go back to the poison example, it's not like poison is particularly complicated. Here is a chemical-create a metric ton of it, widely dispersed near RWBY. How does Ambro mess that up?

I'm capable of noticing when the worldbuilding changes abruptly. The fact that the description of the staff's functions changed between V7 and V8 is obvious. While we can't know for certain if this was a planned reveal or a retcon, but when the change conveniently gives the heroes a way out of an otherwise hopeless situation, I am not inclined to be charitable. If the plan was always to reveal they can staff teleport their way out of Atlas without establishing to the audience that mass teleportation was something the staff could do beforehand, it was a terrible plan.

The other issue with the staff is that it's not presented as some mysterious object that is not well understood. We are given extensive exposition on how it works from Ozpin in v8, who explicitly used the lamp to gain a complete understanding of all the relics. Ironwood being wrong can be explained away as Oz not telling him anything, but Oz explicitly knows the truth. At this point, one has to assume that the functions of the staff have been well explained to the audience. Assuming that there are additional restrictions on the staff, like range, goes against the clear presentation that Oz has told us everything we need to know about the staff. (Also, the staff manages to get people to another continent which makes the idea that it's range is limited to a city pretty suspect).

Ambro's rule of not destroying is, as you have admitted in this thread, incredibly easy to get around. If you're allowed to pour accelerant on a fire that will burn someone alive, what prevents you from creating heavy objects on top of people, or creating poison gas where they will breath it in, or creating explosives about to detonate while people are in the blast radius? As far as we can tell, putting any amount of cause and effect between the creation and the harm you are going to do, you're allowed to do it.

I have not been going so far as to claim the staff means Salem automatically wins, but the fact that it gives her an immense increase in power should be obvious, and claiming it's nearly useless to her is absurd.

ArtFartCop · Mar 21, 2022

Even if Salem is actually as dumb as a bag of rocks and cannot create anything, she still has a portable time stop on command. Even if she can't create something, if she is ever under attack, she can just call on Ambro to stop time, prep attacks, and resume time.

Like, we see that the time stop range is basically whatever you need it to be. RWBY were able to lock Penny out of the time stop with a distance of only about five meters. Salem just needs to fly away, stop time and even if she can't just use Ambro to kill her enemies, she can still flash-fry them with her powers or prep her stun glyph things while time is frozen.

Psyga315 · Mar 21, 2022

ArtFartCop said:
Just seems kinda sexist to throw her under the bus because she needs Watts for... what are very arbitrary reasons. Cinder too for that matter given she's clearly already shown she can just set the damn city on fire.

Not to mention hypocritical since, again, there had been a lot of wank towards Salem but then they become very quiet when the conclusion is that she's smart enough to work the Staff.

It's something similar with how people justify RWBY distrusting Ironwood because of Lionheart and Ozpin yet suddenly when it comes to Theodore, they expect RWBY to trust them no questions asked despite now having Ironwood added to the list of Headmasters that burned them.

Tython82 · Mar 21, 2022

ArtFartCop said:
Even if Salem is actually as dumb as a bag of rocks and cannot create anything, she still has a portable time stop on command.

No so sure about that since Jinn no longer has any questions to use she has no reason to come out.

Zimmerwald1915 · Mar 21, 2022

Tython82 said:
No so sure about that since Jinn no longer has any questions to use she has no reason to come out.

The contention is that Ambro also stops time. And that he has no limit on successive (rather than concurrent) uses.

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

ArtFartCop said:
Listen I'm just gonna say that it's really weird how the fandom wanks Salem for years about how smart she is and how she's a master of manipulation who can play anyone like a fiddle, even to the point of turning two of Ozpin's closest allies against him, but suddenly she can't use the Staff because Watts is dead. Like, oh, suddenly, Salem has these arbitrary restrictions that would prevent her from making full use of the Staff? Just seems kinda sexist to throw her under the bus because she needs Watts for... what are very arbitrary reasons. Cinder too for that matter given she's clearly already shown she can just set the damn city on fire.

Or they could use Tyrian's poison and have Ambro mass-produce that/convert his poison into a gas form then have Cinder just carpet-bomb the city with biological warfare. Or recreate his poison and taint the water supplies. Or teleport into the Vacuo vault and steal the sword using the same portal network RWBY established. Or have Cinder find the Summer Maiden then use Ambro to open a teleport portal beneath her so that she can be isolated and picked off by Cinder and Salem. Or shit, just drop a giant rock on the city. No blueprints needed for that, just grab a pebble, ask Ambro to make one a few dozen times bigger right over Vacuo and drop that sucker. Rinse and repeat until Theo's giving you the Sword.

Either way, the Staff is still busted and stupidly overpowered, any explanation for why Salem doesn't carpet-bomb Vacuo is going to feel cheap. That's the bed the writers have made and I have little interest in sugarcoating my opinion on how they've written themselves into a corner. And I have even less interest in people coming up with fantastic headcanons that won't impact the show and all they serve to do is undermine a female villain through what is effectivelly a narrative band-aid of "Well Salem's just too stupid to use the Staff."

Saying its arbitrary when its literally "Salem is good at manipulating people, that's not the same thing as being able to draw up blue prints for a device that would help her accomplish her goals" isn't much of an argument.

Issues with all of this were covered either in the discourse or the initial post, not addressing an argument doesn't erase it from existence.

Except as noted its not, for all the reasons outlined, none of which you bother to address.

You might be disappointed by my blunt responses but if you want anyone to actually engage with you on a topic you need to offer explanations that haven't already been jossed by canon or provide actual counter arguments to points presented over just ignoring them at your leisure.

mr_stibbons said:
As I have pointed out, in that same scene there are counterexamples- they needed Penny's blueprints, but did not need any blueprints for an extradimensional space. Pennys blueprints may have been overkill for all you know, they present the prints before he asks for anything. To go back to the poison example, it's not like poison is particularly complicated. Here is a chemical-create a metric ton of it, widely dispersed near RWBY. How does Ambro mess that up?

I'm capable of noticing when the worldbuilding changes abruptly. The fact that the description of the staff's functions changed between V7 and V8 is obvious. While we can't know for certain if this was a planned reveal or a retcon, but when the change conveniently gives the heroes a way out of an otherwise hopeless situation, I am not inclined to be charitable. If the plan was always to reveal they can staff teleport their way out of Atlas without establishing to the audience that mass teleportation was something the staff could do beforehand, it was a terrible plan.

The other issue with the staff is that it's not presented as some mysterious object that is not well understood. We are given extensive exposition on how it works from Ozpin in v8, who explicitly used the lamp to gain a complete understanding of all the relics. Ironwood being wrong can be explained away as Oz not telling him anything, but Oz explicitly knows the truth. At this point, one has to assume that the functions of the staff have been well explained to the audience. Assuming that there are additional restrictions on the staff, like range, goes against the clear presentation that Oz has told us everything we need to know about the staff. (Also, the staff manages to get people to another continent which makes the idea that it's range is limited to a city pretty suspect).

Ambro's rule of not destroying is, as you have admitted in this thread, incredibly easy to get around. If you're allowed to pour accelerant on a fire that will burn someone alive, what prevents you from creating heavy objects on top of people, or creating poison gas where they will breath it in, or creating explosives about to detonate while people are in the blast radius? As far as we can tell, putting any amount of cause and effect between the creation and the harm you are going to do, you're allowed to do it.

I have not been going so far as to claim the staff means Salem automatically wins, but the fact that it gives her an immense increase in power should be obvious, and claiming it's nearly useless to her is absurd.

Again, you ignore the whole "There were a metric ton of flaws in the resulting gateway design that helped fumble the entire operation" as well as the "If the staff worked like that Salem would have been put in a magic prison, but Ambrosius needs more info than 'do thing' thing on people, no I don't know where they are, or how far, or how it gets there, or how its dispersed, or how this doesn't count as destruction, ETC."

It is literally called the Staff of Creation, the only one who describes it as an infinite energy source is Ironwood, who has never used it and is an idiot. You seem to view "Thing that was unexpectedly beneficial to both heroes and villains when using it and living up to its name" as a retcon, over just how stories work.

The range thing was tossed out adhoc, I admit, though as noted above, he needs stuff like a location, and an explanation to work with, and to not decide to fuck with it for fun, and also for "Kill Vacuo" not to somehow counter his prime directive, and as I continually note and you perpetually ignore, this needs to actually help Salem's plan which it does not.

I never said it was easy? Probably because the object itself is the thing doing the destroying, thus its him doing the destroying. Also, again, you're presuming to know how it works when we didn't see Cinder use it, so again, assuming you know better than the writers who actually created it and are, you know, paid to do this for a living over some rando on the internet who keeps ignoring the things other people say.

No one said it was nearly useless?

EDIT: Also assumptions on the distance thing, that may well have been an artifact of the room he used as a basis, he can't create more than one thing at a time, IE, he can't create toxin and delivery system at the same time, he needs one or the other.

Zimmerwald1915 said:
The contention is that Ambro also stops time. And that he has no limit on successive (rather than concurrent) uses.

That's a helluva lot of presumptions about how any of that works, especially seeing as we know the relics will just leave if they aren't being used for something. Jinn stuck around because she thought Ruby was clever and because Neo was hanging around the room and might use her, not because she can't go back in the lamp without permission.

Tython82 · Mar 21, 2022

Zimmerwald1915 said:
The contention is that Ambro also stops time. And that he has no limit on successive (rather than concurrent) uses.

Does he though? Because we saw no indication that he was stopping time like Jinn did at all.

Psyga315 · Mar 21, 2022

Tython82 said:
Does he though? Because we saw no indication that he was stopping time like Jinn did at all.

That was the entire point of the Penny thing, since otherwise Penny would have self destructed.

Zam · Mar 21, 2022

Tython82 said:
Does he though? Because we saw no indication that he was stopping time like Jinn did at all.

He does but as noted its meaningless because if the relics aren't being used they just go back in their relics unless they like the individual in question.

RWBY Thread III: Time To Say Goodbye

Good Civ Inspector

Revolutionary Defeatist