Board Thread:Off Topic/@comment-24993958-20160711184711/@comment-25936766-20160809003820

SpiritedDreaming wrote:

1-The first problem I see is how does the user know that the recipient will actually do anything about the message.

2-The second problem I see is that it's only a minute in the past.

3-The third thing is more of a question; how long can the message be?

4-the semblance is a unique manifestation of the soul shaped by the users mindset and personality. The soul would not seek to hurt itself, because to do so would reduce it's base functions upon unlocking; defense. Aura is used for defense first and foremost..... but I cannot see a soul going against its base function of protecting the user to hurt said user. 1-They don't. Though it's not the point. If you send someone a text message, how will you know if that person will actually do anything about the message, or even read it? You don't, you just send the message.

2-I thought of making it about 5 minutes into the past, but a voice in my head told me it would be considered pretty OP or at least too useful by the others if I did that.

3-1 sentence long, so, if you want an example of how long it can be more or less, well, about this long, more or less.

And yes, if the message, say, takes 5 seconds to finish, and it's sent 1 min into the past, then it would be received, heard for those 5 seconds, so yeah, about 55 seconds to react.

4-But here's the thing: The mind, the personality, influences the body, and in this case the Soul/Aura, as it is derived from the first 2.

Did you know that when a person is very depressed and/or suicidal, their body's defenses actually weaken? It's like that. Even though such a thing would, logically, hinder the body when protecting itself, it still happens.

So if someone was like that, very depressed and with suicidal thoughts, wanting to die and all, their Aura would, logically, be weaker than normal, either unconsciously or through the user consciously not using it to it's full extent for protection.

Semblances reflect, like you said, the user's personality and mindset, so if a person is suicidal, it would also make sense for their Semblance to be a double-edged sword of some sort, either one that affects negatively the user, or a "taking you with me" effect, or similar. For a suicidal person's Semblance to not have anything like that, would contradict that fact.

And of course, if someone actually likes getting hurt, it only makes sense for their Semblance to involve them suffering pain, even if without any actual damage. Otherwise, it would not reflect their personality, and thus contradict that fact about Semblances.

After all, you say "the Soul would not seek to hurt itself", but what if the Soul does want to hurt itself? Even removing the Soul part, it's no different from reality. Most people avoid doing things that are dangerous or painful because they don't want to hurt themselves, but what if they do want to hurt themselves?

So in the end, it depends on whether you believe a Semblance of that kind should reflect the user's personality and thus hurt or hinder them, or if it should not hurt/hinder the user at all even if then it would not reflect their personality, thus contradicting that aspect of Semblances.

(Also, thank you for using a much better argument than just "we haven't seen that in the show").