All Purpose Nanoha Fanfiction Thread!

Someone was asking about ideas for other uses/modes for Amuro's shield? What if it could unfold into a morning star like the gundam hammer? I remember there being something similar on the Amakusa.

Fate Grand Order players will know me as Ryusei-Go.

I was trying to decide how I wanted to handle a shield, yeah. Amuro using a shield is pretty iconic and I didn't want to abandon the idea, but no one that I'm aware of in Nanoha uses a physical shield like that, so I wasn't sure how best to incorporate it in Nanoha-verse mechanics. Making it a device would be an odd choice, since every device we've seen has been either an offensive weapon or an article of clothing (rings, gloves, shoes, etc), and a shield doesn't really fit either of those.

What I've decided for now is to make it part of his barrier jacket — still a little unusual, but that's alright. That also lets it be somewhat more disposable than Nanoha's devices are, which is a good thing since Amuro tends to destroy or discard his shields rather frequently.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

A shield can very well be a weapon.

Ask Shielder, if you don't believe me.

edited 27th Aug '16 9:27:53 AM by IAmNotCreativeEnough

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

Shielder, Captain America, Goofy, every legionnaire...

The point is, shield bashing is common.

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

All of that is true, and yet, it's also true that 1) we've never seen a device that's a shield or anything similar, and 2) being part of his barrier jacket rather than a device better fits the semi-disposable way Amuro treats his shields.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Except barrier jackets have never been treated in any way, shape or form that would lead one to believe they're 'disposable' to suggest that they'd fit because of that. Since, y'know, most mages would probably be paste without theirs.

Anyway, just because there hasn't been one like it before doesn't mean there can't be one now, and remember: Devices can repair themselves. Rig one up so that part of its function is discarding damaged parts and making new ones instead of 'healing' them.

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

Making defense-oriented mage? I mean, it's pretty much agreed in the fandom that the most prominent defense-oriented mage in the series (Yuuno) is basically one of the hardest mage to kill or kicked out from combat on the dint that in the series proper, nobody, nobody (alone) ever manages to crack his defense in meaningful way. And that's before factoring he's also support specialist, healing injuries, enhancing teammates and providing debuff and traps.

Amuro seeing him in action would turned gooey eyed from sheer fanboysm.

Anyone who doesn't think Yuuno is one of the hardest opponents to face clearly has never played Gears of Destiny.

God fucking dammit, Yuuno, y u do dis?

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

Gears of Destiny is just the final punchline, from fanon to official.

Barrier jackets are essentially spells. They're chunks of a mage's mana supply hardened into a defensive barrier. As they take damage, that mana is lost — which shows as Clothing Damage. This damage can be repaired by infusing more mana into the jacket (this usually isn't very useful, since if your jacket is taking that much damage in the first place means you probably don't have the spare mana needed to fix it, but we see people doing this at least once — in one of the movies, IIRC, when Nanoha transfers some of her mana to Fate, who uses the energy to repair her jacket). The point is, barrier jackets aren't reliant on anything but the mage and their mana, and can be continually regenerated or repaired as many times as necessary, as long as the mage is able to use magic and has some mana to spare.

Meanwhile, devices are pieces of equipment, not spells. They're physical objects, not just bits of mana. If they're lost, damaged, or destroyed, the mage can't simply repair them or create a new one by expending some mana. They have to be found, repaired, or replaced — which takes specialized skills, tools, parts, etc. It's true that devices are capable of a limited amount of self-repair, but it takes a considerable amount of time and we've seen devices damaged beyond their ability to fix themselves.

Given that every time we've seen a device take significant damage it's been presented as a Big Deal, and Amuro losing his shield is not treated that way (the best way I've seen it described is that Amuro's shield is basically an inanimate Red Shirt — the shield being lost or destroyed is a sign that the situation is serious, but it's not a major "Oh, Crap!" moment), my inclination is that making his shield part of his barrier jacket makes more sense than making it his device. I'm not saying that a shield as a device is impossible or even that it's necessarily a bad idea, I'm just saying that it doesn't really fit how I want to use it.

Amuro's not really defensively-oriented (and definitely not support-oriented) so much as Jack of All Trades — he's equally at home at long range or in melee, on offense or defense, in one-on-one duels or fighting multiple opponents, etc — which lets him exploit his enemies' weaknesses by forcing them into fights on his terms. He's also a Combat Pragmatist who has no problem with shooting his enemies in the back, setting traps and then opponents into them, throwing out distractions and then sucker punching them while their attention is diverted, etc. And he has a habit of coming up with unconventional tactics, as well — using equipment in ways it wasn't designed for, happily sacrificing spare weapons (or even allowing his mobile suit to take damage) if it gives him an opening, etc.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Here's the thing, tho: By the way Barrier Jackets work, their actual shape is completely meaningless. That's why Nanoha's dress is just as protective as Fate's stripper outfit, even though the latter leaves Fate's legs completely open while the former covers Nanoha from neck to toes without leaving the slightest bit of skin visible save for her hands.

A shield as part of a barrier jacket makes no sense because it limits movement without offering the benefits of a shield because that's already what the barrier jacket is doing.

Furthermore, the devices themselves being damaged is a big deal. Not because they're so hard to repair, though. It's because they're really hard to damage. And their weapon forms? Those are just bits of mana that can be repaired with relative ease. Hell, Fate does this with Bardiche, during the original series, and IIRC, she also does it in A's in the middle of the first fight with the Wolks.

edited 27th Aug '16 11:16:45 PM by IAmNotCreativeEnough

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

Yes and no. Fate's jacket is a lot lighter than Nanoha's (and most everyone else's, for that matter); it offers less protection, but uses less mana (which can then be used on speed and firepower instead). So you're right in that there's little functional difference between, say, Nanoha's dress and Chrono's trenchcoat, but that doesn't mean that all barrier jackets are created equal, even among mages of the same power level.

The form of the jacket does seem to make some difference, though. While barrier jackets do project areas not visibly covered by the jacket, different parts of the jacket can be broken through separately. For example, during their first battle in the very beginning of A's, Vita breaks through the part of Nanoha's barrier jacket (the weird half-jacket thing that covers her arms and upper torso), which shatters into Nanoha's pink mana and dissolves, but the rest remains intact. The Nanoha wiki suggests that this is an explicit ability of barrier jackets, where part of the jacket is deliberately sacrificed in order to counter a blow that would normally have destroyed it anyway.

With that in mind, I can totally see a shield as part of a barrier jacket being used the same was as a shield in real life is; as a mobile chunk of extra armor that isn't as heavy (ie, use as much mana) as a full suit of armor, but has to be used to actively intercept attacks rather than just passively providing protection.

Like I said, only to a point. We've seen devices taking minor damage and fixing themselves with just a bit of mana. We've also seen devices damaged to the point where they were almost entirely nonfunctional and essentially had to be completely rebuilt. But no matter how badly a barrier jacket gets torn up, we've never seen one need repairs or anything — just throw some mana at one and it can go from "torn to shreds" to "good as new" instantly.

edited 28th Aug '16 8:04:57 AM by NativeJovian

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Fate has to deliberately modify her barrier jacket to do that. When it's in its normal state, it's just a normal barrier jacket. It's only when she goes into Sonic Form that it forgoes protection for speed.

And I don't know how barrier jackets being able to sacrifice parts of themselves to block large amounts of damage is relevant to this conversation.

edited 28th Aug '16 8:35:52 AM by IAmNotCreativeEnough

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

I don't think that's true. We know that some mages are more geared toward offense or defense even outside their spell repertoire (for example, Victoria in Vivid has extremely high defenses, and her barrier jacket looks more armor-ish than most) and we know that mages can choose the form of their barrier jacket, so there doesn't seem to be any reason why there has to be some average level of defense that all barrier jackets use by default unless they have an alternate form that alters that balance. Even if Fate's standard barrier jacket does provide a "normal" level of protection, given the fact that we know mages can adjust the mana usage of their jackets, there's no reason to think that someone couldn't use a higher mana/higher protection or lower mana/lower protection form as their default.

You were suggesting that the form of a barrier jacket made no difference to the amount of protection it offered — I was pointing out a counterexample. I very much doubt that Nanoha would have been able to sacrifice part of her jacket that wasn't the part taking the hit in that situation. Vita hit her in the chest, so she purged the armor protecting her chest. If Vita had hit her in the head, it's doubtful that Nanoha would have been able to counter that by purging, say, her boots. So the form of the barrier jacket does have an effect on the protection it provides, rather than being (in your words) "completely meaningless".

More to the point re: shields, I'm suggesting that a shield as part of a barrier jacket (rather than a separate device) could provide an additional layer of protection at a lower mana cost than simply increasing the strength of the entire jacket, and that a shield like that could be considered more disposable and easily replaceable (sacrificed to block hits and then regenerated whenever you had the mana to spare) than a shield-as-device would be.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

The only time Fate's barrier jacket is said to work differently from how anyone else's works is when she's deliberately modifying it. Otherwise, Fate's just as durable as Nanoha is and in fact might be more durable than Nanoha is, given the punishment she endures from Precia.

Furthermore, in A's, Vita broke Nanoha's Barrier Jacket, it didn't detonate itself to protect her, and I haven't seen the official source that the wiki is quoting when it says that the Barrier Jacket did it deliberately. And again furthermore, even if that were the case, due to the way that they work, yes, I would absolutely expect that sacrificing her boots would've had the exact same effect, because Barrier Jackets don't just protect the skin they cover.

And as for them using 'different' levels of mana... when and where? because nobody ever makes a point to say that a Barrier Jacket has less or more mana than any other, and that they alter the amount of mana going into it to achieve a desired outcome, or that it can be done in the first place. What we know is that the shape of the barrier jacket can be changed, and that it protects the mage. No more, no less.

A 'shield' does literally nothing if it's part of a barrier jacket, because it offers the exact same amount of protection that blocking bare-armed would when you have a barrier jacket on.

edited 28th Aug '16 10:45:02 AM by IAmNotCreativeEnough

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

For the record, I've seen fanfics - hell, I think one that IANCE wrote is even the main one I'm thinking of - where there are defensive spells that create physical "hold it on your arm" shields that were presented as more durable than the "energy force field" spells we normally see used (such as Protection, Round Guard, etc.), but have to be actively wielded with one of your arms in order to be of any use. Meaning, if your Device spots someone going for a headshot on you from behind, it can't autonomously cast that spell to block it independently of your also doing something.

Given that creating the shield only takes one cast and AFAIR (I think it was a Belkan-type spell) didn't really take much mana to maintain once it was created, does that sound like an idea worth pursuing?

Oh, I recall that and the stories I stole it from, and that's basically just a barrier you can move around and actively smack people with, instead of hoping people run into it.

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

That's more or less what I'm suggesting already, except built in as part of a barrier jacket rather than being a separate spell, and its main advantage isn't that it's stronger than normal defensive spells, but rather that it's faster. Since it doesn't require actively casting or dismissing a spell, it lets you react faster to attacks and counterattack faster once you drop your defense.

Though the idea that it's a separate spell rather than integrated into a barrier jacket is an interesting one. Have we seen any spells in-series before that actually create physical objects like that? The only thing I can think of (other than barrier jackets) are the bits that spawn when Nanoha uses Starlight Breaker Multi-Raid, but I think that's one of Raising Heart's weapon modes rather than a function of the spell itself.

Either way, carrying a shield created by a spell and carrying a shield created as part of your barrier jacket seems functionally identical in terms of usage. It's an extra layer of defense that has to be actively employed (rather than being automatically activated like auto-guard spells used by devices, or passive defenses like barrier jackets) and can be freely sacrificed or abandoned and then regenerated with a little concentration and some mana later on.

Using it as a spell might be the better option (from a narrative perspective), if for no other reason than it would require less exposition. "Amuro can do something unique with is barrier jacket" would need some time devoted to explaining it, while "Amuro develops a custom spell with a custom effect" is pretty self-explanatory.

edited 29th Aug '16 7:32:55 AM by NativeJovian

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

I seem to remember that barrier jackets are shaped by one's mind. Maybe the first time Amuro makes a barrier jacket he also makeses a shield on his arm. Then you could have the instructor point out that a shield as part of his jacket is impractical and start him on the custom spell method.

Fate Grand Order players will know me as Ryusei-Go.

See, the thing is that you said that it's functionally identical in that it's another layer of defense, but if it's part of the Barrier Jacket, it's not. The barrier jacket's defensive capabilities do not change whether it's full plate armor or a Thong of Shielding.

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari

Well, we disagree on that point. I've already explained why; I don't think going "nuh-uh!" "yuh-huh!" at each other further is really a productive use of anybody's time.

Yeah, that's probably what I'll end up doing.

edited 30th Aug '16 7:30:41 AM by NativeJovian

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

At this point, I'd probably just make it a spell instead of part of the Barrier Jacket.

What if it's an instant cast spell loaded into the barrier jacket?

Unlikely. Mostly because nothing suggests that Barrier Jackets can even do that to begin with.

Easier to just use a spell to make a shield. Makes it easy to replace too.

himitsu keisatsu seifu chokuzoku kokka hoanbu na no da himitsu keisatsu yami ni magireru supai katsudou torishimari