Board Thread:Speculation House/@comment-36446807-20180803045826/@comment-14909251-20180808234713

73.Anon.52 wrote:

It also seems like a lot of assumptions are being made about the requirements such magic would require of him to encode doors with keys.

Keep in mind that the maidens powers are 4 parts of his original magic, which itself could be owed to the power of the relics themselves, it seems entirely feasible therefor that encoding the first door(or even all 4 at once with the co-operation of 3 others) he could have used the relics power to recognize the power of the maidens without requiring they be present in person.

It is also quite possible that before he sealed them away he always kept one on his person at all times and that this increased his power dramatically, which would itself mean that when he sealed them it drastically reduced his power. Also worth noting he did not say what proportion of his magic was gifted to the Maidens, just that it was a great deal. He has been around hundreds of years, so it is entirely possible he gifted varying amounts of his magical power over the years. The power he gifted to Qrow and Raven would have been a couple decades ago, so he could have easily gifted more power since the conclusion of the Great War. In fact, I imagine it is very likely in that period where his influence over the world was greatest that he might gift more of his power to subordinates than he did in the past to random strangers. We also don't know how much of that power remains. Not knowing exactly how his previous body died fighting Cinder, it is hard to say how capable he is now relative to the past, but it is at least fair to say that he is more capable than the average person.