Homestuck/Characters/Kids

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

"There will come a day where you will be thrust into another world. A realm where four will gather: the Heir of Breath and the Seer of Light, the Knight of Time and the Witch of Space, and together they will Ascend."


"They wait for he who would extinguish candles whilst fanning a fire.

They wait for she who would thaw solid flesh and resolve it into a dew.

They wait for she who would breed lilacs out of the dead land.

They wait for he who would drop it like it's hot whilst the pimp's in the crib."


The kids in general

  • Action Survivor
  • Anime Hair: Rose has pretty much normal hair, but John has what are best described as hair horns, Dave's hair is a bird, and Jade's hair has a prominent double cowlick. More recently Jade has literally grown dog ears.
  • Animal Motifs: Though nowhere near the extent of the trolls, the Kids are associated with some animals, coincidentally their pets. As John doesn't have a pet, he doesn't have a motif. Dave's association with crows is the most blatant, but Jade and Rose have Bec and Jaspers respectively. Dave and Jade take the motif to the literal extreme however, because their alternate selves (and Jade herself) literally become half-crow and half-dog.
  • Badass Adorable
  • Because Destiny Says So: Plays a heavy hand in shaping their session, more so than regular sessions, because the Trolls are also advising them and telling them what to do because they saw them do it later in the timeline.
    • Their session is integral to the entire process of the creation and destruction of universes, and thus reality itself. They don't especially have a choice in the matter.
  • Came Back Strong: By the end of Act 5, all of them have died and been resurrected into the God Tiers. Jade in particular, as her God Tier incorporated Bec (their universe's first guardian) and a sprite (although it's not visible, Word of God confirms the powers are still there) making her even stronger than a normal God Tiered Hero of Space.
  • Color Coded for Your Convenience: Because of...
  • Creator In-Joke: The kids and Homestuck in general are a partially recycled idea that Andrew had about magical kids, which he scrapped for being too similar to the Harry Potter series. The concept art for that series can be seen on Rose's wall.
  • Four Kid Band
    • The Hero / The Fool / Mighty Glacier: John is the Hero because he is the central protagonist of the story. However he is also quite ditzy and foolish and tends to blunder along, though post-Time Skip he's showing signs of having outgrown that. Within the context of combat, he's somewhat of a Mighty Glacier in that he takes quite a few hits but has a lot of mangrit.
    • The Lancer / The Smart Guy / Squishy Wizard -> Mission Control: Rose is both the most openly intellectual and feminine of the Kids, though she is also fraught with darker impulses, being The Unfettered. Within the context of combat, she initially was a ranged fighter using magic, but currently has transitioned to a largely non-combat support role.
    • The Lancer / Ineffectual Loner / Lightning Bruiser: Dave also serves as the Lancer in more of a direct contrast to John, feeling intense rivalry with him at times. He primarily keeps to himself due to his winding path through time, but when he works with others he is a potent force. Within the context of combat, he's very quick and highly powerful, but tends to get knocked down and beaten rather easily.
    • The Big Guy / The Heart / Magic Knight: Jade is the Big Guy in that she's easily the most powerful member of the Team, but is also the Heart in that she is the focal point holding them together to a large extent. Within the context of combat, she is both physically dangerous and has potent space abilities, making her a Magic Knight.
  • Death Is a Slap on The Wrist: At this point, each of the kids has died twice. Dave and Rose died the first time and were revived via their dreamselves which died and became God Tier. John's real body was killed and he ascended to his God Tier, and then he was killed again by Bec Noir but auto-revived shortly afterwards. Jade's dreamself died, was brought back as her Sprite, and then became her God Tier when her real body died on her quest bed.
    • It isn't entirely a slap on the wrist though; their dead alternate selves genuinely died and are in dream bubbles, which is partially why Jadesprite thought they failed horribly.
  • Fake Band: All of the kids can play musical instruments, and some of the songs they made prior to the start of the series are available for purchase. Dave and Jade are by far the most prolific of the four.
    • Prospit & Derse, while non-canonical, is played by them as well, with accompaniment from Prospitians and Dersites.
  • Generation Xerox: They're all more or less identical physically and in personality to one of their parents. This is toyed with a lot however; Jade and John take after father and mother respectively, while Dave and Rose physically resemble their father and mother respectively, they have personalities more similar to their mother and father respectively.
  • Glowing Eyes: Upon ascension to God Tiers, Rose and Dave's Hero symbols occasionally appear in their eyes and Jade's eyes are just plain weird; they fade away and show where she's going to teleport.
    • Power Glows: All of them. During her Grimdark phase, Rose glowed black but now that she's a God Tiered Seer of Light, she'll probably have yellow. John demonstrates this most overtly.
  • Half-Identical Twins: Extends to their personalities too. John and Jade are generally upbeat and positive, while Dave and Rose are more snarky and aloof.
  • I Am Who?: Turns out not any regular schumck can play Sburb; only some people can, being predestined for it, and they're also destined to become demigods.
  • I Believe I Can Fly: All of them can fly as part of God Tiers, though Dave and Rose really have no explained reason why, aside from that dreamselves are kinda weird.
  • In the Hood: God Tiers come with God Hoods. However, Rose's is probably the only one that would be seen as a traditional hood; John's is a giant windsock, Jade's has been compared to a pair of stockings, and Dave's is a close fitting coif.
  • In Universe Nickname: In the mythos of the Post-Scratch Session, they are continually referred to as "The Gods", as at that point they have all reached their God Tiers.
  • Kid Heroes
  • Leitmotif: In addition to their actual themes listed below, each of the Kids in general is associated with an instrument, which will often show up during a [S] page, even if their themes do not. John is associated with pianos (and organs to an extent), Rose is associated with violins, Dave is associated with synths, and Jade is associated with both basses and flutes.
  • Magic Feather: Tied into their powers (see below). They all make weapons and items that allow them to focus their powers, but by the time they reach the top of their echeladders they no longer need them. John skipped most of his Echeladder, and thus never made an item; based on what his consorts say, he may have made a flute to play the wind, if it were a normal session at least.
  • Myth Arc: As a product of Sburb preparing them to become demigods in a new universe, it challenges them to better themselves as people as part of their mythological roles.
    • John's arc is about becoming a leader.
    • Rose's arc is about overcoming her destructive nature and trusting in her friends.
    • Dave's arc is about asserting himself as his own person.
    • Jade's arc is about tempering her dream-like idealism with reality.
  • Obfuscating Stupidity: Dave and John enjoy joking around too much to show how smart they are most of the time, and Jade willingly hides up until Sburb the full extent of her knowledge. Rose however has no real compulsions to do so and does not.
  • Out of Focus: During Acts 4 and 5, the comic became much more of an ensemble piece, and the Kids faded from the sole spotlight unlike where they were in earlier acts. Though the comic can also concentrate on them for periods of time, it is just less frequent as the number of characters increased.
  • Physical God: All of them as of ascending to the God Tiers, but Jade especially.
  • Plot-Relevant Age-Up: From 13 to 16 as they travel to the Alpha Session; John and Jade due to spending three years traveling between windows in Hussie's study, and Dave and Rose (and the surviving Trolls) due to the Furthest Ring being non-linear.
  • Smart People Wear Glasses: Everyone but Rose, who double subverts this. She is definitely the most openly intellectual of the Kids but is also the most Genre Blind.
  • Stock Super Powers: Everyone who plays Sburb is destined to become a demigod, and in addition, the Kids have reached their God Tiers, which make their powers even stronger. Of them, Jade is by far the strongest.
    • John is the Heir of Breath, and has strong wind powers, and some natural extensions of that, like Flight. As a result of his God Tiers, he also has Immortality.
      • Ironically, despite being the strongest of the four Kids for much of Act 5, John is now quite possibly the weakest if only in ability, though not in brute strength.
    • Rose is the Seer of Light and her powers manifest as pseudo-omniscience via seeing and understanding probabilities and likelihoods, in addition to various vision powers, like X-Ray Vision. However as the Seer class is a very passive one, her offensive capabilities seem fairly limited, especially upon her ascension to her God Tiers. She also has the ability to summon rain, but so far it's shown little use. Jaspersprite has said that it ties into her Myth Arc.
      • Rose also had command over dark magical abilities, although how much of it was her own natural ability and how much of it was granted by the Elder Gods is unclear. It remains to be seen how her God Tiers affected her abilities, as she has yet to demonstrate them since going God Tier.
    • Dave is the Knight of Time and has time manipulation powers. Part of his role in the session is to serve as the reset button if anything goes wrong. He's also worked it into his fighting style, taking his Flash Step to outright Teleport Spam, in addition to several copies of him running around for most of Act 5.
      • Heroes of Time are closely tied in with Derse as well, and Dave was "half-awake" on Derse before being fully awoken by Rose [1]. Dave however is a bit of an exception to other Derse players (such as Aradia or Feferi) in that he outright ignores or rejects the Elder Gods.
    • Jade is the Witch of Space, and as of ascending to the God Tiers is pretty much a Physical God, including reality warping [2], mild omniscience, functional omnipresence, and Immortality [3]. Because of the unusual circumstances of her God Tier ascension, she has all the powers of a sprite, a First Guardian [4], and a God Tiered Hero of Space, making her almost literally a god. The only thing that is explicitly not within her abilities is manipulating time. Jade lampshades it by not being entirely sure how many powers she has or what they originate from.
      • Heroes of Space are closely tied in with Prospit as well, and Jade has been awake on Prospit for most of her life. She also is connected with the First Guardian of Earth, Bec, who raised her. In addition, her Myth Arc is tied in with breeding frogs, as in the Homestuck-verse, Universes are literally god-like frogs, and it's the responsibility of a Hero of Space to breed a new one as part of the game.
    • There has also been hints that due to the complicated nature of their session in relation to the Post-Scratch Session, they may have hit a Superpower Lottery and have additional abilities, tied into the roles of their parents [5].
  • Teen Genius: All of them to some extent; Dave has an impressive array of blogs and websites for a 13 year old, John is Earth's foremost (and only) ectobiologist, Jade is probably one of the youngest experimental physicists on the planet, and Rose knows enough Eldritch Forgotten Lore to fill a Necronomicon.
  • Theme Table: A colour, a classical element, a Weapon of Choice, a humour, a musical instrument, a mythological title, a personal world in the Incipisphere, the remains of a deceased creature or family member, and a single guardian who seems to know something about the Ancient Conspiracy. Oh, and an African-American celebrity.
  • Tomboy and Girly Girl / Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Jade is the Tomboy to Rose's Girly Girl, although they both like wearing dresses. John is the Sensitive Guy to Dave's Manly Man, although in Act 5 that gets reversed.
  • Unwitting Pawn: Their plan to blow up the Green Sun was a trick of Doc Scratch's from the beginning; they end up creating the Green Sun. Dave and Rose's reaction is basically Oh Crap What Have We Done?
  • Unspoken Plan Guarantee: Played straight and averted. Rose's intricate plan to try to defeat Jack ends up creating the source of his power, while Jade's slapdash Indy Ploy goes off without a hitch. However, Rose's mission to John to cause the Scratch ended up working out.
  • You Can't Fight Fate: All have differing opinions on it. John believes that it is possible, Rose doesn't but is looking for a way around it, Jade revels in it and uses it to her advantage, and it drives Dave crazy trying to manage all the timelines.
    • Everything the Kids have ever done or will do is set in stone. We have UU from the future claiming to know that the Kids (with their Alpha counterparts) succeed in the new session, while the Trolls knew from before they started that their session was doomed. Not to mention Sburb is literally the entire reason for their existence.


John

John Egbert

"You have a passion for REALLY TERRIBLE MOVIES. You like to program computers but you are NOT VERY GOOD AT IT. You have a fondness for PARANORMAL LORE, and are an aspiring AMATEUR MAGICIAN. You also like to play GAMES sometimes."

A fairly average boy living in suburban Washington with his father, on whose birthday our story begins.

He is the Heir of Breath of his session, and the de facto leader. His Chumhandle is "ectoBiologist", formerly "ghostyTrickster".

He has filed a pair of STRIFE SPECIBI in his STRIFE PORTFOLIO: HAMMERKIND ABSTRATUS and BUNNYKIND ABSTRATUS. He is a clone of Nanna Egbert and Grandpa Harley's paradox ghost slime, and is Jade's biological brother.

types without capitalizing letters, but uses proper punctuation! sometimes uses emotes and emoticons but not frequently after act 5, he's a bit more prone to swearing.

Andrew Hussie: John is adorable because he is honest and heroic and nerdy and a good friend.

That is IT.
EVERYBODY OUT.
You are DEAD SERIOUS.

  • Berserk Button: Cakes and baked goods in general. Especially Betty Crocker brand.
  • Blow You Away: As the Heir of Breath, John has power over wind. The first time we see him semi-consciously manifest his abilities, he's able to blow out a fire that's consumed half a planet. He only gets stronger after that.
  • Blue Eyes: According to Andrew [dead link], the kids' eyes match their text color.
    • Innocent Blue Eyes: His eyes are pretty vividly blue and in much of Act 5 he's very innocent, but it's averted in Act 6 as he's shown himself to have matured.
  • Buffy-Speak: John does this a lot. Lampshaded by Rose here:

EB: i'm going upstairs to the big platformy thing.
TT: The alchemiter?
EB: ??
TT: Try to learn the lingo.

  • Celibate Hero: Decided to be for the time being while Sburb is going on. He shows some slight disdain for romance in general as well.
  • Character Check: After the Time Skip in Act 6, John snaps back to his personality in Acts 1 and 2, being more openly joking and sweary, instead of simply being The Fool wandering around listening to people. He still is kind of course, it's just not his sole attribute any more.
  • Chekhov's Gunman: The alternate John who dies to Typheus ends up showing up much later.
  • Chronic Hero Syndrome: His natural instinct is to throw himself in between other people and danger, despite Vriska and Karkat repeatedly pointing out that doing so would make him a very short-lived immortal.
  • Costume Copycat: Unwittingly to Vriska, who makes him ditch his Junior Ectobiologist's Lab Suit for a copy of her outfit.
  • Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: He's prone to constantly goofing off and always has time to crack a joke. However, he has shown skill with the alchemiter, has the mangrit to dual-wield hammers, and was the strongest Kid for much of Act 5 after he reached his God Tiers.
  • The Cuckoolander Was Right: Irrationally claims in early Acts that Betty Crocker is evil, and has her gnarled claws in everything. He turns out to be 100% correct.
  • Cute Bruiser: In the end, John is essentially a geeky, loveable, good-natured young boy who also happens to be able to swing around two warhammers at once and have God-Tier powers over wind.
  • Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: Doomed-timeline John and Typheus had a nice chat before the latter killed the former.
  • Die or Fly: Staged by Vriska to trigger his powers over wind. It was an enormous success.

"DO THE WINDY THING DO THE WINDY THING DO THE WINDY THING"

  • Does Not Like Spam: Any type of baked goods (cookies, birthday cake, etc) sends him into a Freak-Out. This is because of the truly ridiculous number of cakes his dad makes for him. He's been eating cake all day, so John's pretty much sick to death of baked goods at the moment. Finding out that Fruit Gushers are a Betty Crocker product was enough to almost make him flip the fuck out.
    • Averted later. John's okay with cake in moderation.
  • Doting Parent: The few times he acts like a father to Casey and later the infant Jade, Rose, and Mom are all rather touching.
  • Drop the Hammer
  • Dual-Wielding: Does it briefly himself at the end of Act 3 with his Pogo Hammer and Wrinklefucker, but also has the Remote Ghost Gauntlets which can let him Quadruple Wield if he had a 4th hammer.
    • However by the time he alchemized a fourth hammer, Fear No Anvil, he's gone back to single wielding entirely. Later he receives a fifth hammer, The Warhammer of Zillyhoo, which is also wielded singly.
  • Emotions vs. Stoicism: John's more emotional, compared to Dave's stoicism. Reversed as of Act 5 with Dave becoming more open with his emotions, while John learns to be a bit calmer.
  • Expressive Shirt: Seen for one panel here.
  • Eye Glasses
  • Facial Dialogue: First shown when the reader attempts to name him "Zoosmell Pooplord." John and his shirt facially emote upset, commanding the reader to "Try Again, Smartass."
  • The Fool: Both in terms of his naivety, and his niceness bringing him good karma: even when he dies, it works out okay for him, twice.
  • Genius Ditz: John's naively optimistic, quite gullible, not too swift on the uptake, and has absolutely no taste in movies, but he was also able to work out punchcard alchemy, nailed some of Rose and Dave's psychological issues in their birthday letters, and is responsible for more time-travel-based trolling shenanigans than the trolls are. And of course, his father and sister are canonically geniuses, so that part's probably literal.
    • Defied later. John wises up and becomes incredibly Genre Savvy, though he's still silly.
  • Good Thing You Can Heal: Good thing you have a dream self, right, John?
    • Good thing you're immortal now, right, John?
  • Guilty Pleasures: He enjoys watching terrible movies, not out of any sort of ironic appreciation or Bile Fascination, but out of incredibly poor taste. He considers each and every one of them a masterpiece. Except Mac and Me.
    • Chekhov's Hobby: As a result of this, Dave gives him the ironic present of the bunny from Con Air. This was then sent back in time with baby Rose, where it eventually got dilapidated and was then later repaired and given to John again as a birthday present from Rose. This version was sent back in time with baby Jade, who turned it into the Game Breaker cyborg bunny that gave Jack Noir the ability to overthrow the Black Queen, but also protected Dream John from Jack.
  • Genre Savvy: Starting to get this way since Act 5 Part 2, pointing out numerous trappings of Sburb, including how every number seems to be important somehow.
    • Upon reading another note from Jade's mysterious pen-pal: "Grandmother? You wonder who that could be? It's probably just Jade. What with all the time shenanigans." He's right, sort of.
    • EB: before i fell asleep, i was about to prototype something really ridiculous to make jack weaker. i am pretty sure that it would have made jack lose both eyes, both arms, and give him silly blue hair, and possibly also make him be a girl? Vriska doesn't let it happen but he tried.
    • Has decided romance is a huge distraction in Sburb and is avoiding it. The Post-Scratch and Troll sessions underwent huge drama because of romance, and several people ended up dead in the Troll session because of it, though John knows nothing about any of that.
  • Hearing Voices: WV commanded John around for a while; they've seemingly become friends through it as well. However now that John's real self is dead, he can no longer be contacted by an exile.
  • The Heart: Role shared with Jade. Tries his best to stop Rose going grimdark, and pretty much the only person who got Vriska to reconsider her actions.
  • Horrible Judge of Character: Subverted twice. Intially it seems like trusting Terezi, shortly after she had gotten him killed in a doomed timeline, is a bad idea and everyone readily pointed that out to him. As time went on and her character was explored more, it became apparent she wasn't evil at all. He also trusts Vriska who manipulates him into getting killed again, but does so in order to help him ascend to the God Tiers.
    • On the other hand, trusting Karkat, WV, and the Consorts all turned out to be pretty smart moves.
      • Courtyard Droll? Not so much.
  • How Do I Shot Web?: John has a lot of trouble at first figuring out how to work his Sylladex and play the Sburb beta. (Finally getting the hang of using the game mechanics makes him take a few levels in badass later on though.)
    • On a similar note, once he grasps the various ways the trolls are, well, trolling them, he manages to counter-troll them ridiculously well.
    • He has no idea initially how to summon The Breeze. He gets much better at it.
  • Ignorance Is Bliss: Practically everyone seems to hide information from John at some point or another (for instance, Rose not telling him that the Tumor is a bomb and that she plans to send her dream self to blow up the Green Sun with it once he retrieves it for her, and Vriska not telling him that Bec Noir was going to kill him when he slept on the Quest Bed), with the objective of making sure he isn't nervous about what will happen. Ironic for someone whose medium entry task was to bite an apple.
    • He doesn't seem to mind too much that he's out of the loop.
    • At the moment, the biggest thing he doesn't know about is that Vriska is dead.
  • Infinity+1 Sword: The Warhammer Of Zillyhoo
  • Insistent Terminology: "the windy thing", in regards to John's powers as the Heir of Breath.
  • Interspecies Romance: He has some level of interest in Vriska; when Dave questions him about it though he admits he'd probably be an awkward d8. This also applies to Beta John, who also shows some interest in her despite not having ever even gotten to know her, beyond a long forgotten trolling.
    • Defied later. John admits it was kinda dumb to have feelings over the span of a single day and also in hindsight thinks Vriska was kind of crazy.
  • Large Ham: Given any chance to act out his favorite scene, he will overact it.
  • Leitmotif: Showtime (his original theme and Strife music) and Doctor (his planet's theme).
  • Like Brother and Sister: With Jade; they never have the same joking sexual tension that Rose and Dave did in early chatlogs. They are brother and sister biologically, and cousins legally, although they were initially unaware of both.
  • Lovable Nerd
  • Magikarp Power: Compared to Dave and Rose, John had much more trouble adjusting to fighting in The Medium. Then he develops wind powers capable of covering a planet and reaches the top of his Echeladder before either of them. However it's subverted later, as despite ascending to his God Tiers, everyone else ascends to theirs as well, with presumably equal abilities.
  • Martyr Without a Cause: Upon learning that the only thing that can kill him permanently is a Heroic Sacrifice, John comes up with a bunch of plans that involve exactly that. His nature as The Fool makes him pretty much unable to comprehend NOT being heroic, and also unable to fully think out the consequences.
  • Meta Guy: Since Act 5 Act 2, he's been the one mostly hanging lampshades on both the trappings of Sburb and the reader's expectations.
  • Mighty Glacier: Seems to be this kind of fighter in Sburb, as he takes a lot of hits but eventually has pretty good attacking power.
  • Missing Mom: He was raised by his Dad and never had a mother figure. This is because he is the child of Nanna and Grandpa via paradox slime.
  • Mind Screw: He made himself in a ectobiology lab from his grandmother and Jade's grandfather's genes. This means his grandmother is actually his mother and his father is his half-brother.
    • Nannasprite points out that through this he is sort of her dad through initiating this process - which if you think on it, makes him his own pseudo-grandfather.
  • Morality Pet: To Vriska.
    • Also to Rose here. And to Dave in a sense.
  • The Movie Buff: With the twist that his taste in movies is questionable at best. His descriptions of them venture into Cloudcuckoolander territory at times.
  • Nerd Glasses: Though it can be hard to tell at times if he's wearing glasses due to a lack of a bridge between the lenses, he is indeed sporting spectacles.
  • Nice Guy: To messianic levels. So much so that even Doc Scratch doubts he'll die anything other than a martyr's death.
  • Nice Hat: Discussed with the Bunny Sassacre Fedora, although he never wears it.
  • Oblivious To Hate: Although not necessarily so much "oblivious" as "unaware of what it actually means".
    • He also was blissfully unaware that Vriska is/was developing feelings for him until Karkat laid it out in a particularly explosive fashion.
      • Defied later. John has clearly put some thought into romance but decides to be a Celibate Hero until Sburb is over.
  • Odd Name Out: The kids' chumhandles initials are TT, TG, GG... except John's is EB. It's later revealed that the trolls' harassment caused him to change away from his original chumhandle, GT.
    • According to Word of God, this retroactively became symbolic of the how the trolls managed to give his universe cancer under Karkat's leadership.
    • His last name is also the only one that differs from his Generation Xerox parent's birth name, Nanna having married and passed on her married name Egbert to his dad, and by extension him.
  • Plot Allergy: Averted; although John is deathly allergic to peanuts, it isn't brought up ever again shortly after it was introduced.
    • Although it becomes a Brick Joke when Jake's dreamself dies from being fed peanuts.
  • The Pollyanna: Relentlessly optimistic. Hilarity Ensues whenever he runs up against Karkat. Rose notes that this (and John's Arbitrary Skepticism) is a variety of Cursed with Awesome:

EB: i am still skeptical about that, though.
TT: That's why you're our leader, John.
EB: huh?
TT: Optimism through stalwart skepticism is a defect not everyone is lucky enough to be cursed with.

    • It's especially prominent when we meet the John Terezi killed. Not only does he not hold a grudge against her or the denizen, but he expresses gratitude for having helped the alpha versions of himself and Dave.
  • Poster Gallery Bedroom: Physical proof as The Movie Buff for really terrible movies.
  • Power Glows: As the Heir of Breath, he shows some sky blue glow when 'doing the windy thing.' Also, when automatically resurrected following his and Rose's Curb Stomp Battle against Jack, he gives off a rainbow glow.
  • Puberty Superpower: John was initially unable to lift a sledgehammer without assistance; after a few hours, he's garnered enough MANGRIT to dual wield them.
  • Red Oni: To Dave's Blue Oni.
    • Also, Blue to Karkat and Vriska's Red, and briefly Red to Terezi's Blue.
    • Red to Rose's Blue as well.
  • Replacement Love Interest: For Vriska, replacing Tavros. See her entry for more.
  • Scary Shiny Glasses: Occasionally, though he still remains a nice guy. As of Act 5 it's become very commonplace, but only because just about anyone who wears glasses has this happen. John's eyes usually only appear in the standard sprite style, and that has become much rarer of late.
  • Sensitive Guy: As a foil to Dave's Manly Man.
  • Ship Sinking: In Act 6 Intermission 2, after a year of traveling between sessions, John looks back at all the romantic shenanigans of the previous acts with a huge shrug, since that was all just stuff that happened on a single crazy day. He's more interested in adventure and games than his half-forgotten conversations with Vriska or Karkat's crazy shipping grid. He also says that he wasn't even remotely sure how to react to Vriska's flirtations, and dismisses the idea that he had feelings for her.
  • Shonen Hair
  • Shout-Out: Besides things relevant to his interests, also refers to himself as the Wind Waker in a conversation with Vriska, prior to comparing his outfit Junior Ectobiologist Labcoat to "link if zelda was about an elf scientist".
  • Stage Magician: Implied as one of his dreams through aspiring to be an amateur magician, even possessing a chest filled with StageMagic gear.
  • Stealth Pun: One of his weapons, Fear No Anvil, is a hammer that stops time.
  • Took a Level in Badass: He takes quite a few, until in Act 5 he's the strongest Kid of all.
  • Took a Level In Kindness: Not that he was ever a real jerk (although he has his moments), but his overall niceness is much more apparent in later acts. Snapped back later with him being a lot swearier in Act 6 and more teasing to Jade.
  • Toothy Issue: He has quite the overbite.
  • Trademark Favorite Food: John loves Fruit Gushers. Until he found out they are made by Betty Crocker.
  • Trial And Error Captchaloguing: One description on how John starts his Sylladex's Fetch Modus operating.
  • Trickster Archetype: In his Genius Ditz moments. You cannot hope to beat Egbert in a prank-off. He is simply the best there is. Although he's completely beaten by Nanna and Dad.
    • Successfully trolls Dave in the comic's very first pesterlog regarding the apple juice. And once he gets the hang of time-travel trolling, he demolishes Karkat and Kanaya, and leaves Vriska struggling to keep pace. Only Terezi can get the better of him.
  • Truly Single Parent: More of a Truly Single Midwife in this case, but you get the idea.
  • Unwitting Pawn: Not only is he tricked into giving Dave the codes for Rose's journals, but he also immediately trusts Terezi to lead him through the game faster, which leads to his death in an alternate future. May in turn make him a Spanner in the Works: he may have got himself killed in that timeline, but he got a sweet jetpack and hammer out of it, not to mention saving Dave from the horrors of Calsprite. And giving Dave the codes for the journals may have screwed them over, but at the same time it was essential for getting Dave's spare beta copies to Jade so that they both have the means to enter the Medium.
    • He was instructed by Rose to retrieve the Tumor from the heart of the Battlefield and bring it to her - so she could use it as a bomb in her Self-Sacrifice Scheme to take out the Green Sun and Bec Noir. John wasn't happy when he found out the specifics.
  • Weirdness Censor: John doesn't tend to react very much to some of the weirder issues of the comic.
  • "Well Done, Son" Guy: Inverted. John's Dad seems to tell him how proud he is constantly to the extent that it's lost most of its meaning, leading to a lot of ennui and Wangst on John's part.
    • They are genuinely happy to see each other again, for the brief moment they meet, and John flew into one of his few moments shown of genuine anger upon finding his corpse.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: During his first alchemy binge, John creates BARBER'S BEST FRIEND, using an umbrella and straight razor, and mentions that he has an UMBRELLAKIND strife specibus lying around. Neither the weapon or the strife specibus are ever mentioned again.
  • When All You Have Is a Hammer: Both literally and with his wind powers. John's powers are relatively simple compared to his friends' but he uses them in creative ways, and the sheer level of power backing them as of ascending to the God Tiers certainly helps.


Rose

Rose Lalonde

"You have a passion for RATHER OBSCURE LITERATURE. You enjoy creative writing and are SOMEWHAT SECRETIVE ABOUT IT. You have a fondness for the BESTIALLY STRANGE AND FICTITIOUS, and sometimes dabble in PSYCHOANALYSIS. You also like to KNIT, and your room is a BIT OF A MESS. And on occasion, if just the right one strikes your fancy, you like to play VIDEO GAMES with your friends."

A girl with a fondness for psychoanalysis, writing and wizards, who lives with her mother in an isolated mansion situated atop Rainbow Falls in New York.

In Sburb, she is the Seer of Light. Her Chumhandle is "tentacleTherapist".

She has allocated her STRIFE SPECIBUS with the NEEDLEKIND ABSTRATUS. She can play haunting refrains on her violin. She is a clone of Mom Lalonde and Bro Strider's paradox ghost slime, and is Dave's biological sister.

Types with stringent punctuation and capitalization syntax, with a tendency toward excessive verbosity. After Act 5, she's prone to adding in some silliness. ;)

  • Action Girl: She's friendly enough, but her tastes veer toward the dark and gothic and be-tentacled. She also uses extremely painful dirty-fighting tactics in battle... when she's not simply blasting them to atoms with raw, eldritch power.
  • All Girls Like Ponies: Her name is MAPLEHOOF.
  • Awesomeness By Analysis: Reaching the God Tiers grants Rose a comprehensive understanding of fortune. This lets her know exactly what needs to happen to achieve the most favorable outcome for everyone.
  • Back from the Dead: After being killed by Jack, she was revived by John as her Dream Self on Derse, which also had the benefit of knocking her out from her Grimdark state. Technically also happens when she ascends to the God Tiers.
  • Badass: Remember how long it took John to defeat his first Crude Ogre? Rose has managed to dispatch hers in a manner of seconds. With a pair of knitting needles and some yarn.
    • And then of course we have this.
  • Badass Adorable: See above. She then proceeded to sit cross-legged on its back to open her laptop and answer her Pesterchum. Sitting on a pillow too.
  • Badass in a Nice Suit: She too, has alchemized herself some elegant clothes over the course of their game.
  • Berserk Button: She straight up flips the fuck out when Jack kills John a second time.
  • Black Speech: She was stuck talking in it after she went Grimdark. After her real self was killed, she's seemingly back to talking normally.
  • Blind Seer: Not actually blind, but her God Tier hood is clearly designed to be evocative of this trope by being large enough to cover her eyes.
  • Broken Pedestal: Minor example: Kanaya thought that Rose's session must have gone better than it did after reading her guide, and was quite disappointed when she actually found Rose and saw what actually became of her session, finding the real Rose couldn't live up to her lofty expectations.
    • Played with in the "Flighty Broads and their Snarky Horseshit" sequence before being completely subverted when Kanaya learns that Rose really did blow up her first gate. Inverted later when it turns out Rose's "failed" session actually has turned out better than Kanaya's.
  • Chronic Hero Syndrome: Mixed with The Unfettered and Determinator, Rose is completely dedicated to making sure her friends survive, and is a bit hasty in throwing herself into suicide missions. This gets used against her and doesn't really end well.
  • Covert Pervert: Really seems to like teasing Dave about "Retracing the steps of some of our Freudian semi-blunders in conversations past", and gleefully grabs a trashy troll romance novel away from Karkat.
  • Cute Witch
  • Dark Feminine: To Jade's Light Feminine.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Particularly when Dave is involved.
  • Disappeared Dad: She only has her mother taking care of her. Her dad, through genetics, is Dave's Bro.
  • Dropped a Bridge on Him: In order to keep a pace "characterized by a reduction in granularity," Doc Scratch treats her thus:

Doc Scratch: The duel ends. The Seer dies. The Slayer departs.

  • Drowning My Sorrows: In Davesprite's timeline.
  • Dual-Wielding: A pair of magic wands/knitting needles. The only one of the kids to dual wield consistently as well.
  • Dark Is Not Evil/Light Is Not Good: On one hand, she's a Black Magician Girl who consults Eldritch Abominations... but she's mostly doing it to try and save her and her friends' lives. On the other, she's the 'Seer of Light' in the Kid's SBURB session, and there's evidence to suggest she's not really following her quest pathline, as she mainly spends time ripping the game apart with dark magic wands, communing with horrorterrors and Doc Scratch, and generally trying to see the game achieve victory by any means necessary.
    • She's basically been flat out told by Doc and Jade that she's being used by the Gods as a tool and decided she doesn't care and wants to break the game apart anyways to avenge her mother's death. And then, of course, this happens.
    • Rule of Symbolism: Rose's natural fashion choice tends towards purple, but her Seer of Light outfit is bright yellow. This mirrors the dichotomy between Derse and Prospit; ie Dark and Light in Sburb.
  • Dark Magical Girl: For a character not in a Magical Girl series, she ticks off a surprising number of traits: cynicism, slight ruthlessness, outward creepiness, damaged family bonds, a hidden need for friendship, and her embrace of Black Magic. Unlike the most versions of the trope, she starts out a good guy and stays there, even through her descent into darkness, but her arc and character growth fit well in the genre from striking it out alone to apprenticing to the villain to revelation of how she's been played and return to the bonds of friendship.
  • Fling a Light Into the Future: Rips her walkthrough out of the internet and puts it into a server in the Furthest Ring for other SBURB players to find. In an inversion, one of the people to find it is Kanaya, in the past.
  • Glowing Eyes of Doom: After officially going grimdark.
  • Go Mad from the Revelation: Rose asked Doc Scratch's omniscient cue ball if the horrorterrors were evil or not. Whatever the actual answer was, it was not healthy for her psyche.
  • Heroic BSOD: Jade should not have brought up her mother's death.
  • Heroic RROD: Asking if the horrorterrors are evil or not to the magic cue ball does not end well for her.
  • Hot-Blooded: Shows shades of this when she asks a question so hard it ends up breaking reality on a small scale, and her mind on a bigger scale.
  • Improbable Weapon User: Has the least practical Strife Specibus amongst the Kids. However it's quickly subverted when she basically uses them to create magic wands.
  • Jumped At the Call
  • Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: "As is now painfully obvious to anyone with a brain, you have basically gone completely off the deep end in every way."
  • Humanoid Abomination: After her Grimdark bloodfester throes, she can only speak in Black Speech, is surrounded by Black Magic, and has dark gray skin. But, she still seems to be herself when she's with John, so it's ultimately Subverted.
  • Killed Off for Real: At least her real self is. John kisses and awakens her dreamself, who is conveniently un-grimdarked, although the blackout lingers around her.
  • Lady of Black Magic
  • Leitmotif: Aggrieve and Endless Climb.
  • Leeroy Jenkins: Considering her Hot-Blooded nature, her Genre Blindness, and her Chronic Hero Syndrome, this should not come as a surprise in the slightest.
  • Magijyk Needlewands
  • Ms. Exposition: The baton is passed to her for Act 6 intermissions as the Seer.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: At least according to Aradia, Rose's actions of deliberately tearing apart Sburb and listening to the dark gods beyond the Veil has (or will have) some huge consequences.
    • It also turns out that her plan to destroy the Green Sun in fact created it.
  • Nightmare Fetishist: Her love of the Zoologically Dubious.
  • Not So Above It All: Rose: Wear the scarf. Be the Rider.
  • Pet the Dog: Or rather, the cat. Looks like Rose still cares after all.
    • She may have now officially gone grimdark, but she still finds time for some cute moments with John in this Flash. Even if her half of the conversation is in an eldritch tongue, it's clear that Rose is still in there somewhere.
  • Power Glows: And she glows black.
  • Punny Name: The innuendo of her chumhandle never mentioned in the comic.
    • It gains a new level of significance, as well, when you consider her "love of the Zoologically Dubious" and her tendency to "dabble in PSYCHOANALYSIS."
  • Purple Eyes: Same as her text color.
  • Purple Prose: And it's even a visual pun.
    • Lampshaded by denial: "My introduction will be sparse. There will be no majestic prose blustering into the sails of a galleon as we embark on this voyage together. Nor will there by any hamfisted prose whippings its limbs under a bedsheet like a retarded ghost, for that matter."
  • Roaring Rampage of Revenge: "You make a halfhearted attempt to resist the urge. Alas, one is not easily shaken from the broodfester tongues. They are stubborn throes."
  • Scarf of Asskicking: It's pink.
    • She seemed to have ditched it after it got singed in the house fire, though, but made another one as part of her black-and-white squiddle robe and uses it as a belt.
  • Screw Destiny: "I am not playing by the rules anymore. I will fly around this candy-coated rock and comb the white sand until I find answers. Nobody can tell me our fate can't be repaired.".
    • Inverted, as while she thinks she's in control of her own destiny she's really playing right into the tentacles of the horrorterrors, who pretty much only have their self-preservation in mind and nothing else.
  • Self-Sacrifice Scheme: Her plan to take The Tumor and destroy The Green Sun. She knocked Dave out to ensure that she would be the one to take the fall rather than him.
  • Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: She seems to have gotten a bit more curt since she decided to Screw Destiny; she even admonishes Kanaya for rambling. However, she does slip back into it while talking with John.
    • The series likes to use the verbal construct "You [verb] all the [nouns]. All of them". Rose does it thusly: "We would come into possession of all the disasters. Exhaustive possession. Monopolization, in fact."
  • Sophisticated As Hell: Oh fuck.
    • Welcome to the party, motherfuckers.
  • The Straight Girl
  • Stealth Pun: Late in Act 5, she pilots the Moon of Derse into the Furthest Ring, making her the Sailor (of a) Moon.
    • Her name is Rose. Her primary weapons for most of Sburb are the Thorns of Oglogoth.
  • Stepford Snarker
  • The Stoic
    • Not So Stoic: She knows John means well with his word play, but sometimes his barbs are a little harsh to her. In the same log, she also confesses that she finds "flying across rainbow oceans with a couple of magic wands and a salamander in a little cowl" both practical and fun, even if it is absurd.
    • Her mother's death also garnered quite a reaction. She went a bit crazy afterward, though not as bad as some were thinking.
  • Sugar and Ice Personality: For all her snarkiness and "spookiness" she does care about her companions and will occasionally show Not So Stoic colors.
    • Displayed heartbreakingly so in her conversation with Jade after learning of the death of Mom. After spending the series passing off her mother's affections as sarcastic Rose reveals how highly she thought of her, all while seemingly on the verge of tears. It treads a very fine line between sweet and sad.
  • Swiss Army Weapon: Her magic needlewands basically can be used for anything she wants to do. Later on it's revealed it's not actually magic.
  • This Is All The Tropes Bitch: "WELCOME TO THE PARTY, MOTHERFUCKERS."
  • The Shrink: Her interests include psychoanalysis.
  • The Unfettered: Turned into this in her desire to break the game. It was used against her.
  • Too Dumb to Live: Fighting Jack against everyone's advice, and possibly to a lesser extent trusting Doc and the Elder Gods to begin with.
  • Unwitting Pawn: Her attempt to destroy the Green Sun creates it. Just as Scratch planned.
    • Double Subversion; She fully knows and anticipates that Doc and the Gods are using her to further their own plans, but underestimates to what extent.
  • Voice with an Internet Connection / Mission Control: During Act 1 and 2 mainly. She takes a more direct role in the story later on.
  • What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Rose's Light powers have only manifested as X-ray vision and eye powers. Compared to Dave and Jade's manifesting powers, hers are pretty bad. John is a bit of an exception as his powers are basically just brute force. This trope may eventually be averted if she goes back on track with her quest-line.
    • Heart Is an Awesome Power: As X-ray vision can be rather useful when you have a device that knows everything, but obscures the answers in plastic. See Wrong Genre Savvy below for how that turned out.
      • After going God Tier, her Seer of Light powers essentially manifest as knowing what must be done next in order to achieve the desired result. Pretty damn gamebreaking, although after losing needleKind she's probably become the least useful Kid in a fight. But then, that seems to be part and parcel of the Seer's role.
        • On top of that, given that several kids have been shown to have multiple specibi, and John found a blank literally just lying around, there's no reason to believe she couldn't just get another one later on, and even that assumes John can't just hand her original right back to her now that he doesn't need it to cause the Scratch.
  • Wall of Text: Her Sburb walkthrough.

[[color:red:TG: oh my god
TG: so many words
TG: do you think like the pulitzer committee is secretly scouring the dregs of the gamefaq archives or something]]

  • With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: In terms of both range and firepower, the Thorns of Oglogoth are probably the most powerful item crafted by any of the kids so far. But they don't seem to be doing much for Rose's mental health either, whether directly or indirectly.
  • Wrong Genre Savvy: Sure trust the guy whose whole thing is manipulating people into a Heroic Sacrifice, that sounds like a great idea.
    • Genre Blind: You'd think she'd know better than to ask the infallibly accurate information-gathering device for a glimpse into the psychology of Eldritch Abominations, considering her choice of light reading material.
      • Fridge Brilliance: Rose is the most Genre Blind amongst the kids because prior to Sburb, she was the most interested in apocalyptic scenarios, magic, and talking with the trolls. She's living out her fantasies.


Dave

Dave Strider

"You have a penchant for spinning out UNBELIEVABLY ILL JAMS with your TURNTABLES AND MIXING GEAR. You like to rave about BANDS NO ONE'S EVER HEARD OF BUT YOU. You collect WEIRD DEAD THINGS PRESERVED IN VARIOUS WAYS. You are an AMATEUR PHOTOGRAPHER and operate your own MAKESHIFT DARKROOM. You maintain a number of IRONICALLY HUMOROUS BLOGS, WEBSITES, AND SOCIAL NETWORKING PROFILES. And if the inspiration strikes, you won't hesitate to drop some PHAT RHYMES on a mofo and REPRESENT."

A boy unceasingly devoted to the pursuit of (what he perceives to be) irony in all aspects of life, who lives with his Bro in an apartment in Houston, Texas.

In Sburb, he is the Knight of Time. His Chumhandle is "turntechGodhead".

He had allocated his STRIFE SPECIBUS with the BLADEKIND ABSTRATUS, but an incident with Bro and a "cheap piece of shit" turns it into the 1/2BLADEKIND ABSTRATUS. He is a clone of Mom Lalonde and Bro Strider's paradox ghost slime, and is Rose's biological brother.

He is also the author of Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff.

types with no caps and no punctuation except sarcastic question marks and occasional ellipsis

TG: bow down before your new king bitch

    • Badass Cape: As the Knight of Time, his god-tier outfit doesn't just have a trailing god-hood, but a full-blown crimson cape.
    • Badass in a Nice Suit: He has at least three suits. The Puppet Felt Tux (A red tux that feels more like a pair of ACTION PAJAMAS), the Four Aces Suited (A black, stiff suit that replaces his broken record with a broken cue ball) and the Felt Duds (A lime green suit that replaces the broken record symbol with a broken 8-ball.) Of also importance is the long-sleeved broken record shirt Dave has been known to wear - while not exactly classy, it's been implied that the Dave wearing this shirt is the one furthest along his individual timeline... excluding Future Dave/Davesprite, who comes from a Bad Future where John died before he could get Jade into the game.
  • Berserk Button: Loses his carefully maintained stoicness any time Rose's life is threatened.
  • Big Ol' Eyebrows: Damn, son.
  • Blue Oni: to John's Red Oni, as well as Red to Rose's Blue.
  • Can't Catch Up: Dave's nowhere near weak, but he's a little concerned over the rapidly growing power gap between himself and John. A doomed Dave from a timeline offshoot tries to gain the God Tier levels, but Dave doesn't have the heart to kill himself. Later, he actually does ascend to the God Tiers, and considering the sorts of powers Aradia showed after doing so he's quite possibly caught up
  • Character Blog: the blog of dave strider, which was then abandoned. Presumably irony factored in there somewhere.
  • Characterization Marches On: Before Dave was named by the readers, it's a little obvious that his personality wasn't fully determined yet. He was more likely to use punctuation and emotion, and less likely to ramble, not to mention how easily John was able to troll him. In short, he acted more like an actual kid.
    • Character Check: After Act 5, he's less prone to his depressed shtick that he developed in that act and is more akin to his character in Act 3.
  • Clothing Damage: It's dramatic rather than fan service; the record emblem is cut in two but his shirt is still intact from his fight with Bro.
  • Cool Shades
  • Cutting the Knot: When he can't pull the sword in the Crocodile Statue out of its stone, he breaks it out.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Particularly when Rose is involved.
  • Dual-Wielding: Inverted. He uses half a sword.
  • Elemental Sword: His Snoop Dogg Snow Cone Machete has freezing powers. Ironic, given that between his affinity for the color red, and his Land of Heat and Clockwork, his associated element is clearly Fire.
    • On the other hand, he is a cool dude.
    • He eventually ends up just going back to the Caledscratch.
  • Establishing Character Moment: Chopping his name bar in half. Yeah.
  • Flat What: Here.

DAVE: (rose whos the john looking kid)
ROSE: (I think it's young Father-Grandad Harleybert.)
DAVE: (what)

EB: like monsters or something.
TG: howie???
EB: haha I WISH.
TG: dude monsters arent real
TG: thats stupid kids stuff for stupid babies
EB: maybe. yeah you're right.
TG: what are you an idiot
TG: of course there are monsters in your house
TG: youre in some weird evil monster dimension come on
TG: skepticism is the crutch of cinematic troglodytes
TG: like hey mom dad theres a dinosaur or a ghost or whatever in my room. "yeah right junior go back to bed"
TG: fuck you mom and dad how many times are we going to watch this trope unfold it wasnt goddamn funny the first time i saw it
TG: just once id like to see dad crap his pants when a kid says theres a vampire in his closet
TG: "OH SHIT EVERYONE IN THE MINIVAN"
TG: be fuckin dad of the year right there

  • Gretzky Has the Ball : Dave doesn't know much about sports, but insists otherwise. His attempt to talk Rose out of her mission to destroy the Green Sun devolved into a fantastic series of bungled sports metaphors.
  • Heroic BSOD: Pretty much constantly since Bro's death. Most evident in his dream conversation with Rose. Rose's Self-Sacrifice Scheme almost pushes him over the edge again. Of course since it's Dave, it's hard to tell how much is serious problems and how much is snark.
  • Hilariously Abusive Childhood: Word of God confirms it even.
  • Hipster: Prior to character development, was obsessed with doing things ironically.
  • I Just Want to Be Normal
  • Ineffectual Loner: Even in Sburb, he mostly keeps to himself due to having to keep track of all of the timelines and out of personal preference. He's also the weakest of the Kids aside from Jade who just entered.
  • Inferiority Superiority Complex: Talks himself up a lot, but part of his Character Development revolves around learning that he doesn't need to compete with Bro or John for the limelight, but can be awesome as his own person. That most of his bragging seems to have been passed down to him from Bro is probably one of the reasons for this.
  • Interspecies Romance: Vaguely in a relationship with Terezi at one point during their long trip to the Post-Scratch Session. It's unknown if this continued.
  • Irony: Used to be his main drive in life. Not so much anymore.
    • Then again, in a somewhat dramatic way: he couldn't muster the guts to kill himself to ascend to the God Tiers. Then, he effectively commits suicide by Jack Noir when fighting him, apparently somewhat senselessly, just to wake up on Derse.
  • Leitmotif: Beatdown and Atomyk Ebonpyre.
  • Lightning Bruiser: Ultimately develops into this
  • Manly Man: To John's Sensitive Guy.
  • Me's a Crowd: Thanks to his time powers, at one point there are over 40 Daves running around.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Accidentally managed to set Gamzee off.
  • Not So Stoic: In this conversation with Rose, we can see that he definitely cares about his friends' wellbeing.

TG: but i dont want you to die

  • Obfuscating Stupidity: Dave is easily just as smart as Rose, not that you will ever see him act like it.
  • Onion Tears: Terezi predicted that Dave would be crying. Apparently she wasn't aware of the effect onions had on humans.
  • Parental Abandonment: He lives with his Bro and neither parent is anywhere to be seen. He's genetically the son of Rose's Mom and his own "Bro".
  • Phrase Catcher / Say My Name: STRIIIIIIIIIIIDEEEEEEEEEERRR
  • Pretty Fly for a White Guy: Is a textbook example, given his passion for rapping.
  • Punny Name: (K)night of Time.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: While he is a dangerous Badass and an insufferable prick, he generally hides his eyes behind his sunglasses, and isn't evil in the slightest. They also match his text color.
    • If Karkat is to be believed his wearing of sunglasses is due to insecurity over his eye color [6], though this could just be Karkat projecting.
  • Rule of Symbolism: He's the Knight of Time of the Kids' Sburb Game, which involves a lot of looping back to the past. His symbol? A broken record.
    • His other motif, the broken sword, evokes symbolic comparisons with a different Strider - and the fact that he (and Davesprite) had to break Caledfwlch while "maybe if john was to try with his pure heart and shit it woulda popped out like a champagne cork and fuckin hero confetti woulda blasted him in the face" leads to symbolism with Lancelot and Arthur. In fact, Caledfwlch is the Welsh name of Excalibur.
    • When he finally ascends to the God Tiers, his hood makes him look like a chain-mail wearing knight.
  • Save Scumming: The real purpose of Dave's time powers is to basically act as the reset button if something goes wrong with the Alpha timeline.
    • One of the earliest demonstrations of this was Dave essentially New Game Plussing himself.
  • Senseless Sacrifice: Karkat at least considers Dave's death to be this, as there was no way he didn't know it was going to happen. Dave doesn't know what to think about it, because he knew it was inevitable.
  • Sir Swearsalot
  • The Stoic: His mouth is almost always flat. His sunglasses may well edge him into Frozen Face territory, though. Even when he throws his dead alternate-universe self out the window. Then again, in the Bad Future he seems to be more emotional, but then again, well, two of his friends were dead.
    • His mouth does open when he makes an attack; he also frowned when some puppets fell on him, and he smirked once when talking to Jade. He has also cried, but those were Onion Tears.
    • The following is Dave's reaction to his own death:

TG: welp

ROSE: You're wondering why I didn't tell you?
DAVE: no
[[color:#b536de:ROSE: You're specifically wondering why I wasn't forthcoming
 with an answer to your question at the time, "hey who was that
choice babe in the pajamas?"]]
 DAVE: god fucking dammit

TG: the thing with time travel is
TG: you cant overthink it
TG: just roll with it and see what happens
TG: and above all try not to do anything retarded


Jade

Jade Harley

"You are an avid follower of CARTOON SHOWS OF CONSIDERABLE NOSTALGIC APPEAL. You have a profound zeal for marvelous and fantastical FAUNA OF AN ANTHROPOMORPHOLOGICAL PERSUASION. You have an uncanny knack for NUCLEAR PHYSICS, and not infrequently can be found dabbling in RATHER ADVANCED GADGETRY. You enjoy sporadic fits of NARCOLEPSY; your love of GARDENING transcends the glass confines of your ATRIUM; and you are at times prone to patterns of PRECOGNITIVE PROGNOSTICATION."

A quirky, upbeat girl living alone on a remote island off the northeast coast of Australia, guarded only by her "dog" Becquerel and the taxidermied body of her late Grandpa.

In Sburb, she is the Witch of Space. Her Chumhandle is "gardenGnostic".

She has allocated her STRIFE SPECIBUS with the RIFLEKIND ABSTRATUS and PAPERKIND ABSTRACTUS. She is a clone of Nanna Egbert and Grandpa Harley's paradox ghost slime, and is John's biological sister.

Additionally, Jade's dream self spent some time as Jadesprite, her sprite prototyped with Becquerel and the corpse of her dream self. Jadesprite was merged back into normal Jade when said normal Jade ascended to the God Tiers, so tropes for Jadesprite are folded in here as well, as they are not really separate characters.

types with no caps or periods but often overpunctuates with exclamation marks and ellipses!!!!! she also likes to use smilies and hearts <3 as jadesprite she also barks occasionally woof woof!!!!!! since reaching god tier she has a bit of a verbal tic woof!!

  • Action Girl: Somewhat less so than Rose, but she has a gun, knows how to use it and uses it well enough that she refuses to get a bigger one.
  • Angst Dissonance: In-universe. Jade is... not too pleased about Jadesprite having trouble calming down, to say the least -- although from Jadesprite's perspective she's been dead for thirteen years and it's realistic for her to have trouble coping with suddenly being dragged back into Sburb.
  • Animal Jingoism: God Tier Jade has an uncontrollable urge to growl and bark at Jaspersprite when the latter meows the song "Happy Birthday" to John thanks to instincts inherited from Bec. She says she's not even mad at him, but she can't help it.
  • Arbitrary Skepticism: Alternate dream selves, teleporting devilbeast dog, and basically all of Sburb? Perfectly acceptable. Aliens called trolls who happen to be able to contact you at any time during your life using a chatroom? Ridiculous. Justified in that she's known all of the former (except Sburb) her entire life.
    • And the trolls have been, well, trolling her for so long that she never exactly felt inclined to believe any of the things they said; she even calls Karkat out on it, and points out that maybe if they had just been a little nicer to her she might have believed them and they could have worked together to solve both of their problems.
  • Badass Adorable: Once ascending to the God Tier, she's... well, essentially omnipotent. But she's still Jade.
  • Berserk Button: Don't even think about meowing near her. However she doesn't really consciously control it either.
  • Beware the Nice Ones: ... did she just use dream kung-fu to beat the tar out of Courtyard Droll?
    • Delivers a hell of a verbal smackdown to both Past and Future Karkat here.
    • And more recently to Jadesprite.
  • Brought Down to Normal: With the death of her dream self and the increasing destruction of her home, Jade lost much of the advantages that she had over the other kids, and given that she didn't communicate with the trolls and had been asleep for hours, she was out of the loop entirely about Sburb. However shortly after her entry, future Dave helps her make a shitload of cool new stuff and she catches up on the info pretty quick.
    • Eventually averted: by the end of Act 5 she's miniaturizing planets.
  • Break the Cutie: Averted. The death of her dreamself, the explosion of her dreambot, and her nightmare visions of Eldritch Abominations put a dent in her chipper demeanor for a little while, but she's soon back in full genki mode.
  • Came Back Wrong/Damaged Soul: Apparently normal creatures aren't too compatible with First Guardians. Among other things, Jadesprite's grief is due to being either heavily annoyed or even blinded by the ever-present light of the Green Sun, besides being pulled out of her afterlife dream bubble.
    • God Tier Jade has none of these problems.
  • Catapult Nightmare: Twice.
  • Catch Phrase: oh nooooooo
    • Jadesprite still uses Jade's oh noooooo, but also tends to woof from time to time. Although her catch phrase might as well be "BOO HOO HOO" for all the times it shows up.
  • Cloudcuckoolander: Mostly while asleep and as her dream self, so not really anymore.
  • Decon Recon Switch: Starts off as a borderline Parody Sue, before getting deconstructed during the End of Act 4 flash and through the first half of Act 5-2, and reconstructed through the second half of Act 5-2, culminating in the End of Act 5 flash. This has her become probably the most powerful heroic character in the comic, with dog ears to boot, saving the day while The Hero looks on gobsmacked. And, remarkably, it makes complete sense in context.
  • Despair Event Horizon/Heroic BSOD: Jadesprite has a breakdown over being brought back to life and believing that their destiny was a lie and everyone had died for nothing.
  • Distaff Counterpart: Of John, at least in looks and purehearted innocence. They happen to be related.
  • The Ditz: As Dave points out, she's kind of an idiot when she's asleep.
  • Dynamic Entry: As seen here.
  • Expressive Shirt: Unlike the other characters, the design on Jade's shirt has changed multiple times, from an atom [dead link] to a pumpkin to a leaf, with a total of ten different designs. Readers voted to pin it to these three: Atom, Spirograph, and Sun.
    • Since her Wardrobifier was destroyed, it's been stuck on Bec's face.
  • Fainting Seer: Well, narcoleptic precognitive, at any rate. Apparently, it's not really narcolepsy or precognition.
  • Fan Nickname: Before her actual name was revealed, forum members often called her "Gigi" (get it?)
    • Her rise to God Tier incorporating Jadesprite and thus giving her dog ears was quickly dubbed "Dog Tier".
  • Finger Framing: Does this while she's enlarging the Fourth Wall, probably just to look cool.
  • Friend to All Living Things / Horrible Judge of Character: She even gives Jack fucking Noir the benefit of the doubt right after he killed Dave right in front of her. She seems to assume that he killed Dave by accident, and treats him like a misunderstood, misbehaving dog.
  • Furry Fandom: She's a huge fan of it, but isn't into fursuits.
    • Given some utterly fantastic callbacks later in that she becomes part-dog twice - once as Jadesprite, and again by merging with Jadesprite when ascending to the God Tiers.
    • In A6I2, she logs into a Ghostbusters II MMORPG set up by John with a fox-headed furry character, complete with silver & blue Mismatched Eyes and a crown of human hair.
  • Genki Girl
  • Get a Hold of Yourself, Man!: She tries this on Jadesprite, who upon being revived is constantly bawling and blubbering. When it obviously isn't working, she upgrades the Bright Slap to bright-beatdown, then just starts beating her to make her shut up.
  • Girls Love Stuffed Animals: She loves to play with her Squiddle toys and her Manthro Chaps.
  • Green Eyes: According to Andrew [dead link], the kids' eyes match their text colors.
  • The Gunslinger: She has experience in target shooting and keeps rifles in her room, though she refuses to aim at anything innocent, ANTHROPOMORPHICALLY PERSUADED OR OTHERWISE.
  • Harpoon Gun: Inherited from Grandpa, and can be used as a Grappling Hook Pistol in a pinch.
  • The Heart: Role shared with John.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: She tossed John out of the path of the massive meteor bearing down on them both, losing her dream self in the process.
  • Hypocritical Humor: When Jade can't take any more of Jadesprite's despair she starts RANTING AND RAVING IN ALLCAPS FOR HER TO PULL HERSELF TOGETHER YOU BIG PANSY WHO CARES WHAT YOURE GOING THROUGH WEVE GOT A FUTURE TO FIGHT FOR just like a certain someone she couldn't stand talking to, who was probably about to warn her of this very situation.
  • Is This What Anger Feels Like?: The normally bubbly and cheerful Jade occasionally flies into a rage when someone is being uncontrollably obnoxious around her. See Hypocritical Humor and Reason You Suck Speech.
  • Kubrick Stare: Jade has a fondness for plants, so witnessing a potted plant rain triggers this look.
  • Leitmotif: Gardener, which is actually a remix of The Beginning of Something Really Excellent.[7]
  • Light Feminine: To Rose's Dark Feminine.
  • Little Bit Beastly: Her God Tier dog ears, a product of merging with Jadesprite. Word of God is that is the only part of her anatomy that's changed.
  • Medium Awareness: She lets the audience play with her memory modus for a while, but, ironically, you don't get to play.
  • Meganekko
  • Mind Rape: [S] Jade:Wake Up
  • Mukokuseki: Inverted. Jade, like the other kids is designed to not be any particular race and isn't in terms of the plot but fanart often portrays her as looking Asian.
  • Nietzsche Wannabe: Jadesprite insists everything is pointless. Probably pretty justifiable since she DIED.
  • Oracular Urchin: Jade often sees visions of the past, present and future in Skaia's clouds while dreaming on Prospit's moon. This leads her to know a lot of things before the other kids do, making her this.
  • Parental Abandonment: Her grandfather is dead and taxidermied, leaving her in the care of her pet devilbeast, Bec.
  • Parody Sue: Initially, and a subtle example. Jade's absurd number of interests and skills, as well as the benefits provided her by her equally talented grandfather and her "cute" flaws, seemed to be making her out to be a Mary Sue; she also happens to be an orphan. But like with everything else Andrew Hussie does, she's taken to such ridiculous extremes that she seems to be more parody than straight-up Sue.
  • The Pollyanna: Like John. Though since it's been revealed that she saw her dreamself's corpse in her Grandpa's lab and she didn't know that dreamselves could die for most of her life, she's a bit more so as she continued to put on a smile when she assumed that she would die very young.
    • And then that broke down when she couldn't take Jadesprite's constant woe and crying anymore and just flipped the fuck out.
  • Precision F-Strike: oh fuck!!!!!!
    • Cluster F-Bomb: During her brief angry shouting matches, she starts cursing a lot more.
  • Rainbow Pimp Gear: All the kids have moments of this, but Jade truly went above and beyond in turning it into an art form.
  • Raised by Wolves: She was taken care of more by Bec than by her grandfather. Mentioned here.
  • Reckless Gun Usage: A really good example of exactly why wigglers should not be allowed to dual-wield flintlock pistols...
  • Rich in Dollars, Poor In Sense: Jade deciding to give Dave's apartment "a woman's touch." She starts with wetting a towel in the toilet. "This is how ordinary people clean ordinary houses, right?"
  • Self-Made Orphan / Shoot the Dog: Both tropes subverted by being a goofy, carefree, non-villainous example. When she 2nd-tier prototypes Becsprite with her dreamself, she wipes his personality out of existence, and even lampshades what's she's doing:

Becquerel comes quickly at the promise of irradiated steak. He is such a good boy, and truly the best friend a girl could ever hope for.
You're sure gonna miss him!

  • Shadow Archetype: Possibly why Jadesprite's despair disturbs Jades so much: that she, who has grown up with firearms, hellhounds, and psychic powers, can become unhinged due to dying without all the facts. With help from acting-psychiatrist Karkat:

GG: wait...
GG: so me arguing with my dead dream self
GG: and smacking her around while screaming at her
GG: makes me SANE???
CG: YES, ABSOLUTELY.
CG: IT MEANS ALL OF YOUR HIDEOUS FLAWS DISGUST YOU.


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  1. ↑ In the branched timeline Davesprite is from, he managed to wake up as a result of John's death
  2. ↑ Includes a lot of things. She has strong Telekinesis, enough to make John's own Breath powers look like small potatoes. She shows no sign of fatigue while using it, and casually mentions that she can maintain a ship at near light speed for almost 3 years. She also has the ability to freely alter the size of objects on a planetary scale, although lands are Baby Planets. Extrapolating from other sprites, she can also Beam Spam and heal people. Plus all the other stuff that follows this point!
  3. ↑ Twice over; she's immortal as a God Tiered Hero of Space and as a First Guardian
  4. ↑ Note; she has most of the powers of Doc Scratch, but because Bec was not omniscient, she doesn't seem to be either
  5. ↑ Dave's half-awake self on Derse is hinted to have been related to Dirk's own ability to control both his dreamself and realself at the same time and Rose blacked out during part of Act 5 similarly to Roxy blacking out the entire Post-Scratch Session. However, Life and Hope (Jake and Jane's elements) are still too poorly understood to draw comparisons to John and Jade
  6. ↑ The only outright unnatural color amongst the kids
  7. ↑ For a variety of reasons that aren't especially interesting, Jade's original leitmotif, Guardian, was replaced.
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