Color-Coded Elements



A common trope, especially in video games that feature Elemental Powers, is that every element will have a color associated with it. This way, you know that anything red is related to fire, blue to water, etc.

This can manifest in many ways. Some common ones are enemies being the color of their element, element-resistant armor having that element's color, and elemental spells being color coded in menus.

A few common examples of this trope follow. There are occasions where other colors are used for these elements, and these are by no means the only elements that get color coded.
 * Fire: Almost exclusively red or orange.
 * Water: Almost exclusively blue. See also Water Is Blue.
 * Wind: Usually green (mostly in Asian works, see also Wind Is Green) or yellow, sometimes white, rarely blue.
 * Earth: Yellow, brown, and orange are all common. Green if nature is not separate.
 * Ice: In settings where water and ice are distinct, water will tend to be a darker blue, while ice tends toward lighter blues or even white.
 * Lightning: When Lightning is treated as a separate element (sometimes, it gets lumped with air/weather), it's pretty much always yellow. In the rare cases it isn't yellow, it will be electric blue, purple (thunder clouds), or white.
 * Wood/Plants/Nature: Usually green, perhaps with other earth tones. If dealing specifically with flowers, it will usually be pink.
 * Metal/Steel: When treated as a distinct element (rather than a subset of earth), metal is usually a metallic gray, silver, or white.
 * Light: Usually white or a bright yellow.
 * Dark: Usually black, though dark purple is also very common.

Related to Color-Coded Wizardry, which is about the wizards themselves being color coded. Subtrope of Colour-Coded for Your Convenience. Supertrope to Elemental Hair and Elemental Eye Colors.

Anime & Manga

 * In Magic Knight Rayearth, fire powers are red, water powers are blue, and wind powers are green. Note that the three main characters were already colour-coded red, blue, and green before getting magic, and then got the associated element.
 * Used in Ronin Warriors: Red=Fire, Cyan=Water, Green=Light, Blue=Air, Orange=Earth.
 * Sailor Moon follows almost all of these rules. Sailor Mars has a red fuku, Sailor Mercury has ice and water based powers and a blue fuku (Sailor Neptune has both blue hair and a blue fuku and controls the sea); Sailor Jupiter has lightning, wind, and Green Thumb powers, with a green fuku and pink accents.
 * Directly used in Rune Soldier Louie. Although the world doesn't particularly focus on elemental colors, at one point, Louie directly invokes this trope when he has to place five colored orbs in place to represent the five elements. The tricky part is, as this page shows, there's no universally accepted set of colors, so he has some trouble, mostly over if blue represents air or water.
 * Heartcatch Pretty Cure has: Cure Blossom sunlight) = yellow; Cure Moonlight (well, just look at her name) = purple.

Fan Fiction

 * In Keepers of the Elements, each Energy Keeper wears silver, Water Keepers wear blue, Fire Keepers wear red and orange, Earth Keepers wear green, and Air Keepers wear white.
 * In Clouded Sky, there are temples dedicated to each Pokémon type, and the acolytes of the temples dress in colors that correspond with the type their temple represents (Fire Temple = Red, Water Temple = Blue, etc.).

Literature

 * Mercedes Lackey's Elemental Masters series: red = fire, blue = air, yellow = earth, green = water.
 * Codex Alera has a color associated with the element involved in each of the six types of furycrafting: fire is red, water is blue, earth is green, air is also green, metal is gray, and wood is brown. Each element also has its own symbol, which is on the covers of some editions of the books.

Live-Action TV

 * Super Sentai teams/Power Rangers teams (who already are Color Coded for Your Convenience) that feature elemental powers use these in different ways:
 * Seijuu Sentai Gingaman: Red uses fire, Green uses wind, Blue uses water, Yellow uses lightning, and Pink uses...flowers. (Power Rangers Lost Galaxy lacks the powers but still keeps bits of the elemental motifs.)
 * Seen in the theme of the mecha of Rescue Sentai Go Go Five/Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue: (Using the Rangers names:) Haz Rescue is yellow and a mining truck (Earth), Aero Rescue is green and a helicopter (Air), Pyro Rescue is Red and a fire truck (Fire), Aqua Rescue is blue and a truck with water cannons (Water), Med Rescue is Pink and an ambulance (Life). The Max Solarzord is silver and light blue (Light).
 * Ninpuu Sentai Hurricaneger/Power Rangers Ninja Storm : Red uses wind, Blue uses water, Yellow uses earth, Crimson and Navy (dark red and dark blue) use thunder.
 * Mahou Sentai Magiranger/Power Rangers Mystic Force : Red and their/his father, also in red armor post Heel Face Turn, uses fire, Yellow uses lightning, Blue uses water, Pink uses wind, and Green uses earth/nature. Their gold-armored mentor uses light and their/the Red Ranger's white-clad mother uses ice.
 * Samurai Sentai Shinkenger/Power Rangers Samurai : Red uses fire, Blue uses water (see a pattern?), Pink uses wind, Green uses nature, Yellow uses earth, and Gold uses light.
 * Tensou Sentai Goseiger: Red and Pink use Air, Yellow and Black use Earth/Nature, and Blue and Green use Water. The metallic-colored Sixth Ranger can use any element, but it's implied that his original element was Earth.
 * Kamen Rider OOO has shades of this trope with the Core Medals: Green is Lightning, Yellow is Light, Gray is Earth, Red is Fire, Blue is Water, and Purple is Ice/Void.

Tabletop Games

 * Each of the five elements in Exalted is associated with a colour of Jade - the standard Red for Fire and Green for Wood, but a slightly more unusual matchup of White for Earth, Blue for Air, and Black for Water.
 * In Warhammer, elemental magic comes in winds of different colours. Light powers come from the White wind, metal powers come from the Yellow wind, life powers come from the Green wind, sky powers come from the Blue wind, darkness powers come from the Gray wind, death powers come from the Purple wind, fire powers come from the Red wind, and animal based powers come from the Brown wind.
 * When these winds are in their unrefined form, all mixed up, it's Black Magic, while when they are refined to their maximum potential, they become High Magic (manifesting as either silver or as a rainbow).
 * Magic the Gathering is all about this; the entire resource system is based around mana coming in five different colors, each associated with a different land feature and set of elements: white for plains, law, order, and (the literal sense of) light; b for islands, water, wind, and intellect; black for swamps, death, (again, the literal sense of) darkness, and ambition; r for mountains, chaos, fire, and lightning; and g for forests, life, growth, and wildness. There are also colorless artifacts (and occasionally other things) with more generic abilities.
 * The six elements in The Dark Eye are coded (at least by human standards) mostly this way with a few exceptions: fire is red, wind is yellow or colorless, ice is purple or light blue, water is blue, rock/stone is orange and humus(earth and plants as well as all living things) is represented by earthen colors, but usually by green.

Toys

 * This trope is one of the main aspects in LEGO's Bionicle and its related lines, Slizers, Robo Riders, and, to an extent, Hero Factory. Especially in Bionicle, there are confusingly many combinations and exceptions, but generally, red (sometimes with yellow or black) means fire, blue (sometimes with added white) is water, green is air or jungle, white (may be part-blue or gray) is ice, black (sometimes with gray, red, orange, tan, or purple) is earth or rock, brown or yellow (at times with gray, orange, or tan) is stone or sand. Some elements can change their colors, and numerous colorful characters don't even have elements, making the whole thing even more difficult. Then, there are secondary elements that use the pre-established colors of main elements as either their main or secondary colors! And this is just Bionicle!

Video Games

 * In Tales of Symphonia, the color of the magic circle that appears when an ally or enemy is casting a spell changes depending on the element. Red for fire, blue for water, green for wind, bright blue for ice, brown-orange for earth, black for dark, white for light, and purple for lightning.
 * In Fire Emblem, the color of a spellbook is determined by what element it is. Bright yellow for light, black for dark, red/orange for fire, green for wind (though the more ice-ish are blue), and yellow for thunder. The last three are lumped as "anima" in the GBA games, making them quite multicolor compared to light and dark.
 * In Mega Man Battle Network and Mega Man Star Force, Fire Heat is associated with Red, Water Aqua is associated with Blue, Electric Elec is associated with Yellow, and Nature Wood is associated with Green.
 * In Mega Man Zero and Mega Man ZX, Fire is associated with Red, Water/Ice is associated with Blue, Electric/Wind is associated with both Green and Yellow, and Non-elemental is associated with Purple.
 * In Lords of Magic, each element is associated with a faith, which fills the role of races or civilizations in other games. Each faith's units have color schemes that fit the above trends.
 * Legend of Dragoon colour-coded the party members, Dart is the Fire Dragoon and wears red, Rose is the Darkness Dragoon and wears black, etc.
 * Zan Zarah's Table of Effectiveness lists Nature as green, Stone as grayish brown, Water as blue, Fire as orange, Air as white, Light as yellow, Darkness as purple, Chaos as burgundy red, Ice as whitish-bluish-cyanish-something, Energy as violet/bright purple, Psi as cyan, and Metal as steely gray.
 * Pokémon generally follows a skin color scheme based on the element of the Pokémon: Fire pokémon having lots of red or orange, Water pokémon having lots of blue and so on...at least, in the first couple of games. The later generations also featured color-coded icons for each type, though many of them have two colors (e.g., the Dragon-type is half-red, half-blue). Later games updated the icons to all be single-colored (so Dragon is now royal blue).
 * In Secret of Mana, all the spells of a given school, which are element-based, have the same color scheme.
 * World of Warcraft has Fire as red/orange, Ice/water as blue, Holy as yellow, Shadow as black/purple, Nature as green and Arcane as pink/purple.
 * In The Legend of Zelda the Minish Cap, the colors of the elements come from the colors of the Links in Four Swords. Wind is green, Fire is red, and Water is blue, as usual, but Earth is purple.
 * Chrono Cross skips naming the elements directly and just uses colors for elemental affinities. Red represented fire, blue was water and ice, green was both air and nature, yellow was earth and electricity, black was shadow, and white was light.
 * More specifically, each color represented two elements. Fire was Flames and Heat, Blue was Ice and Water, Green was Wind and Nature, Yellow was Earth and Lightning, Black was Death and Gravity, and White was Light and Celestial Bodies.
 * Skies of Arcadia does something similar, although the colors are different: Green is nature, Purple is ice, Blue is both wind and water, Red is fire, Yellow is electricity, and Silver is both life and death. Each of these color-elements is governed by an appropriately colored Weird Moon.
 * Played straight in Distorted Travesty with Fire, Earth, Wind, and Water for elemental techniques.
 * The six elements in Warriors of Might and Magic: Fire is red, Water is navy blue, Earth is green, Air is light blue, Light is pure white, and Darkness is black.
 * Onimusha in all its four (and more) games has shown: L, F, W, I, E, L and A. The D element appears, but as an alternative name for Lightning.
 * Bomberman 64: The Second Attack has different elements for different bomb upgrades you can get. You start out with F, the traditional bomb with a cross shaped explosion, and can upgrade to I, W, L, E, which is more of a magma bomb, L, and D. Each enemy takes damage differently from each bomb; for example, metallic enemies aren't harmed at all by the L bomb, aquatic enemies are fine with I, etc.
 * In the Dept Heaven games, we have F, I, L, D, and L (sometimes referred to as S instead).

Webcomics

 * Homestuck has a bunch of color coded elements. So far, there's:
 * B (Blow You Away), L (Luck Manipulation), T (Time Manipulation), Space (Reality Warping), M (Limited Omniscience), H, L, V (Immune to Fate), H, D, B, and R.

Web Original

 * The Questport Chronicles has the elemental essences: F, W, A, E,.

Western Animation

 * In Avatar: The Last Airbender, clothing is color-coded by nation and the wielders of Elemental Powers therein. Air Nomads wear oranges and yellows, Earth Kingdom citizens wear greens and browns, Fire Nation citizens wear reds and blacks, and members of the Southern and Northern Water Tribes wear blues, whites, and purples. This also extends to the colors of Team Avatar's members, since they're essentially an in-universe Five-Token Band. There are some exceptions; for instance, The Order of the White Lotus consists of citizens from all the different Nations, and they have one type of uniform which, while dark-blue like some Water Tribe clothing, is distinct from any one Nation's style shown in the series.
 * Sequel Series The Legend of Korra, on the other hand, is less distinct in separating people by clothing color. The bulk of the series takes place in Republic City, a multicultural metropolis where most people are of mixed heritage and outfit colors hold less importance then they did seventy years ago. Though its people seem to gravitate to elemental colors, they're often Downplayed Trope, pale or accent colors. People that live in their countries of origin (like Korra and her parents) and people who are deeply involved in their culture and history (like Tenzin and his family, the last airbenders) still play this straight, however.
 * In Captain Planet, the Planeteers' rings have different colors based on the element the ring's power represents.

Other

 * The colours of the five Chinese elements (Wu Xing) are assigned as follows: W (green/blue), F (red), E (yellow), M (white), W (black).