Welcome to Gaia! ::

Thank you so much Ebony! I'm just going to break this up into little sections here to respond...

-Soul: I absolutely love weeping willows, they're my absolute favorite so I figured "why not?" I'm glad you say it's different from the others, I was afraid of not being original in my ideas.

-Never Ending Ripple: Now that you say that, I see that you're right about it not fully taking away a reflection. I'll try to work on it a little bit more, but that's really helpful. To tell truth, I wrote the food sources for both at 2am this morning, so I wasn't fully thinking everything through, especially something like that. n.n; I'm awake now I assure you!

-Dull Opal: This was actually my first idea, it stemmed from my love of opals and the fact that the Guardian is a jeweler. I know it's shorter in description from the Ripple, but again 2am and I wasn't thinking every thing through. I'm definitely going to work on this one as well, especially expanding on its definition.

Your critiques were very helpful Ebony, thank you again! I'll be sure to look back on this and all critique I get and use that to help bring this more along.

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To Nikiana: Again, going to break it up into sections!

-Ripple/Willow: Coupled with what Ebony said, I'll rework the Essence more, and change it up to distortion of the reflection. That's really helpful, thank you! And yes, a vain Raevan would be really irritated! XD

-Opal/Willow: Now I'm wishing I had Pocahontas on DVD! But I'm gonna have to agree with Ebony about the color power, it would be fading rather than mixing and that might conflict with Shushida's Raevan. I'm gonna do some more research on opals, hopefully that would help jog a power out.

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To do so far:
-Rework the Never Ending Ripple Essence, taking distortion of the image instead of complete removal of it into high consideration. Done!
-Research more on opals.
-Look into waves for Ripple Essence power creation.
-Buy Pocahontas on DVD.

It probably will, but the search is always fun, so that's a pretty even trade I think. n.n

XD Yay I got a laugh out of that!

I like the new feeding source for the ripple, it seems to fit the essence more. Though... I'm not sure about the effects. I like the being able to see a perfect reflection in another mirror. But the other effects I'm not as sure on. I'm sure the hungrier the Raevan, the more distorted the image would get... but causing all reflections to be distorted? Not as sure on that one.

I do like the two passive powers, though. *nods*

All right, we're getting somewhere, but let's take a look at how Raevans feed. Some Raevans seem to draw power from things that are similar to their essences without having any direct effect on those objects. Like Rivener needs a clear night sky to gain energy or "feed" if you will, yet his feeding doesn't seem to change the sky or anything. Other Raevans, like Eiry or Gage, actually absorb energy from certain objects and cause a side effect to occur due to that feeding. Eiry eating death from plants causes those plants to spring back to life while Gage seems to feed off their life causing them to die. So you see, there are two ways your Raevan could possibly feed.

With that out of the way, let's look back at your essence. You seem to be wanting to force an ability onto it that doesn't quite fit. To me, your essence is more about the ripples and the distortion it causes rather than the water and reflection. So I propose maybe concentrating on the distortion side of things rather than reflection. Like instead of having the Raevan feed off just ripples in things that are reflective, how about having it feed or absorb energy from distortions in other instances too? To me ripples are distortions, yet they can occur in more places than just water, etc. Like if you are listening to the radio and you come to a station with some static, I think of that as a distortion or "ripple" in the radio waves.

After that's decided you can think about whether your Raevan's feeding will have a side effect or not. ^_^

No problem! It's shaping up to be a very interesting essence. Keep working on it and/or thinking of others too. Can't have too many ideas at this point, lol.

March 3rd, 2009
-New Soul idea added; Amanita muscaria, the Fly Agaric mushroom. Raevan form coming momentarily, but I am aligning it with Dull Opal. Form added!
-Questions added for Opal/Mushroom

>w< Firstly, thank you for the crit Mouse!

Souls: That makes me so happy to know! I've been thinking a lot about how Aminata Muscaria would look and I keep seeing a good looking red-head with mushrooms growing out of his scalp. XD I'm probably jumping the gun, but I can't help it.

Ripple: I'm going to try and tweak this one a bit with what you, Ebony, and Nikiana have said. It's actually not my favorite of the two, but I'll work with it and see what comes to the surface. I never did think of the actual ripple motion for anything but water, but your mini earthquake idea jogged my interest in that.

Opal: That's quite alright if you can't! This one is my favorite of the two, I really like the pictures I get when I think of either Soul with this Essence, especially Aminata Muscaria/Dull Opal. When I was talking with Snoof through MSN I came up with a funny picture of what could happen when the Muscaria/Opal Raevan spored (one of the two questions I have for the pairing), so that's only strengthened my like of it.

Thank you once again for the crit Mouse, I'll put what you said to mind when I work with these ideas. <3

Arana: Thank you for the critique and sorry for the long wait to get back to you on it. n.n; I was told about the mushroom Soul, so I am watching out for it, just to be safe. If I am stepping on toes, I'll gladly remove it and find something else.

March 20th, 2009

-Pretty big change today, I removed Cecil Ballard as the Guardian and instead replaced him with my character Zeke Farris. My reasoning behind this is I realize Cecil wouldn't fully be right for taking care of a Raevan as he's a self-gratifying a*****e who only truly cares for himself and his needs. I feel Zeke would be better as he's a real sweetheart and always has other people's best interests at heart plus he'd make a great caretaker; very patient, laid back, willing to teach and learn, flexible and open to change, truly a go-getter and 'Dad' material. Plus there's the fact I can actually get a writing sample done with him as my muse rather than Cecil. I hope you all enjoy him, he's a swell guy.
-Oh, and I finally came up with a title for the thread. I think it's pretty snazzy.

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March 21st, 2009

Couple of updates today, listed below in no particular order...

-I decided to get rid of the Never Ending Ripple Essence, no new ideas were coming to me for it and I've always had a soft spot for my Dull Opal idea.
-New Soul! Raskovnik is a mythical Slavic plant said to be grass-like in appearance, though no one truly knows what it looks like. This explains the lack of picture as well. Wikipedia doesn't have much information on it, but I will be trying to locate more for a detailed read.