Talk:Dust/@comment-67.140.221.145-20160921190854/@comment-4010415-20160922155416

It seems like the thing with Dust is, it's a mineral that contains a certain type of energy within it, and once you activate that Dust and make the energy come out of it, the Dust allows you to control that energy. It lets you control whatever manifests from it. Though, most likely, this only really applies to when someone uses their Aura to activate raw Dust, rather than when someone triggers a release of energy from Dust through an impact, such as the firing mechanism in a gun or a bullet striking a Dust crystal.

Ruby shooting ice Dust to freeze Nadir in place was an uncontrolled release of energy from Dust. Her bullet struck it, causing energy to be released and manifest the ice that was inside, and the resulting ice was pretty messy. Same with Ruby sneezing on powder Dust in volume 1. It was a messy release of fire, ice, and lightning energy. Whenever Ruby fires a gravity Dust bullet, it's just a burst of gravity energy, but it still helps her.

When Weiss releases energy from Dust, she's able to get it to do what she wants because, most of the time, she's pulling a trigger on Myrtenaster to let the Dust come out of its vial and then using her Aura to activate it. She was able to direct a tornado toward Flynt. She has been able to make ice spread outward in a thin, flat sheet.

Granted, she seems to still be learning how to manipulate Dust with her Aura, since she tends to depend on her glyphs for making curved walls of ice. She didn't need a glyph to make the straight ice wall that caught the Nevermore's tail, but she needed glyphs to make a curved wall to catch the Death Stalker's stinger and to make a dome to protect Team RWBY from the train's crash in No Brakes. She also needed a glyph to make a more precise shape out of ice: a giant sword. But the simpler stuff like a thin sheet or a straight wall, she can use her Aura for.

Amber was able to use her staff to point the red crystal at Mercury and create a steady stream of fire aimed directly at him. She also pointed the white crystal at Emerald twice to create gusts of wind in her direction and also stirred up a bit of wind while spinning her staff.

Whatever Dust Mercury fires, he can control the manifestation fairly well, though he seems to use his legs as a way to focus his control over it (much like how Glynda uses her crop and Weiss uses Myrtenaster to focus their Semblances). He was able to decide when those manifestations would all stop flying in circles and come crashing down into a central point on Yang.