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'''Due to the application to both''' '''''Worm''''' '''and''' '''''Ward,''''' '''all spoilers for both are unmarked!'''
[[foldercontrol]]
Capes are the colloquial term for parahumans, individuals with superhuman powers granted through a symbiotic link with an extradimensional entity. The nature of these powers as well as how they're applied to humans tend to follow trends based on both human physiology, psychology, and the drives of the entities themselves.
! Passengers and Parahumans
[[folder:The Passengers]]
!!Passengers/Shards/Entities/Agents
The extradimensional entities that grant powers, each of which is a fragment of either the Eden or Zion entities. Needless to say, they're pretty big spoilers.
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* AlienGeometries: Take the form of crystalline structures that fold and unfold like tesseracts.
* BloodKnight: Passengers learn and develop through conflict [[ConflictBall and try to push their hosts into confrontation.]]
* BrainUploading: They take in the memories of their hosts, which in the case of Ashley in ''Ward'', gave her direct memories from her original template, fellow clones, and even the memories of parahumans who happened to know the host.
* BrokenMasquerade: After Scion's death at the end of ''Worm'', trigger events no longer wipe the memories conveyed during the process, and as a result the passengers have become openly acknowledged by capes.
* CastFromLifespan: They're constantly accumulating power as they grow, but it's possible for their human link to draw from them faster than they can replenish and kill them. Taylor finds this out during the battle with Scion when she overuses Doormaker's power.
* FreudianExcuse: Due to the way powers are gained in this setting, practically every villain has this to a degree if they had a natural trigger. Case 53 villains also count due to their disfigurements and memory loss.
* IHaveManyNames: Most commonly known as passengers by parahumans, with Scion referring to them as shards since according to Wildbow they take the form of crystals that fold and unfold like tesseracts. Other names include "fairies" (Glaistig Uaine) and agents.
* {{Nerf}}: The majority of shards granted to hosts are altered to that their powers cannot be used on the Entities.
* ObliviouslyEvil: Hardly evil themselves, as they act on impulse and instinct rather than anything else, but they enable evil people by giving them powers. They simply try and respond to a perceived need by giving people the powers necessary to fix a situation, such as Master powers when socially isolated or Brute powers when in physical danger.
* ParanoiaFuel: Passengers have their own goals and drives based on their purpose, and at least some have influence over the powers they grant and the minds of their linked humans. As a result, there's a lot of unease in-universe about how much any given cape is influenced by their passenger.
* PerceptionFilter: Can render themselves imperceptible to humans, on top of hiding out in out of the way places in barren versions of whatever planet they've chosen.
* PoorCommunicationKills: Quite literally. When Scion was alive, the shards could network all their information together using him as a hub, communicating with each other to find the precise way to adjust themselves so as not to kill their hosts. With Scion dead, all shards are cut off from each other (save cluster-triggers, who have a mini-network with each other), and can no longer communicate with each other, and broken triggers are the result when a shard cannot find enough information to properly match itself to its host.
* StrongerWithAge: They grow in power over time, eventually splitting in two when they're big enough.
* SuperpowerRussianRoulette: It can be a major gamble when getting powers. Sometimes you'll win the lottery like Eidolon or Glaistig Uaine and get gamebreaking powers. On the other hand, there's at least 70 different ways a trigger event can go wrong, from Case 53's where you get horrendously deformed to Case 70's where you and your identical twin get fused into a single being. A parahuman can even happen to be more than one case, as one of Contessa's memories in ''Ward'' has her dealing with two Case 53s who also happened to be fused together into a Case 70.
* TheSymbiote: They fuse with their hosts in order to give them powers.
* WalkingSpoiler: Played with. Their existence isn't even hinted at until a while into the story, and even then it's only as a theory for where powers come from. They become more commonly mentioned later on, and by the time of ''Ward'' they're common knowledge among capes.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Capes in General]]
* AttackItsWeakpoint: The Corona Pollentia, a lump of grey matter about an inch and a half across, embedded between the frontal and partial lobes with connective webbing throughout the entire brain. It's the biological center for the connection with a parahuman's passenger and control of their power, and if damaged or destroyed can render them powerless.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Some of the nicest capes are that way because their powers are too deadly to use to their full extent, like Sundancer.
* BodyHorror: Case 53s, capes whose powers come with severe mutations as a result of a bad reaction to a Cauldron vial, or directly consuming parts of an Entity, as seen with people from Contessa's home universe. These can vary from turning all of your flesh to metal (Weld) or reducing you to a tentacled face (Sveta).
* ComboPlatterPowers: It's not unusual for someone to have anywhere between two and four powers, or even just one power with multiple parts or applications. A more notable example of this is "cluster triggers," when multiple people trigger at about the same time while fairly close to one another. All the capes involved get their own power reduced by a bit, but also get a version of everyone else's power on top of that.
* DifficultButAwesome: Some powers have major drawbacks, or otherwise need specific scenarios to be used to their full power, but are devastatingly potent when they can be brought fully to bear.
* DiscardAndDraw:
** Second trigger effects work this way. Powers gain additional facets or developments, but there's always some loss or drawback.
** Certain powers require something specific on behalf of their host, such as eye contact or verbal commands to establish a Master effect. If the host becomes incapable of meeting those criteria, such as the aforementioned example becoming blind or deaf, the powers alter to continue to allow their host to use them. This is justified in-universe by the passengers, as their goal of gathering information through the use of powers would fail if their host couldn't use the powers they had.
* LovecraftianSuperpower: Some powers are... less than understanding of things like the laws of physics, biology, or human decency.
* NotWearingTights: Generally averted for similar reasons to why parahumans tend to avoid guns. Putting on a costume, even if it's just a mask, is like putting on a uniform as a parahuman and shows you're playing by the rules, marking you as a valid target to other parahumans. ''Not'' wearing one shows you aren't playing by the scaled-up cops-and-robbers rules and says you're playing for keeps. Case in point: throughout ''Worm'', a story that involves superpowered [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain neo-nazis]], a [[BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood government-controlled social cult]], and [[ApocalypseCult Endbringer worshippers]], the only characters who seek out cape fights while not wearing costumes are [[TheDreaded the Slaughterhouse 9]] and [[TheMenInBlack Cauldron operatives]], considered among the most dangerous groups in the setting.
* OnlyFleshIsSafe: Known in-universe as the Manton Effect. Most powers affect only organic or inorganic materials, hypothesized to be a safeguard preventing powers from harming their wielders that happens to extend to all organic material due to a lack of specificity. That said, some powers can effect any material regardless of its organic or inorganic nature, so this isn't universal.
* PersonalityPowers: A person's personality can have a lot of influence on how their powers manifest.
* PowerAtAPrice: Some powers come with drawbacks, such as alterations to thought processes, loss of certain social or mental skills, or physical mutations.
* PsychicPowers: Zigzagged. "Thought" isn't treated as some force of its own, and the ability to intercept and interpret the neural behavior of a brain is beyond any power seen, making true psychic powers out of reach of everyone but the Simurgh. That said, several Thinker and Master powers are close enough that the difference is largely academic.
* RidiculouslyHumanRobots: Sufficiently advanced mechanical intelligences are capable of triggering and gaining powers.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Most capes are immune to their own powers, with the Manton Effect hypothesized as an overzealous extension of this safeguard to other organic matter.
* TheSleepless: Some parahumans are known as Noctis capes, meaning they have no need to sleep and may actually be unable to. This feature is usually completely unrelated to the main power, making it difficult to anticipate if someone gets this power.
* SuperheroPackingHeat: Generally averted. Bringing firearms to a cape fight indicates a willingness to do greater harm and incites the risk of suffering greater harm, generally showing that someone isn't willing to play by the rules. Using guns tends to get one blacklisted from alliances with other parahumans and makes them targets of heroes and villains alike unless they knock it off. The exceptions are "game shooters," parahumans who use the gun to channel their power, use Tinker guns, have a power to help them ''not'' kill what they're shooting, or otherwise use or involve guns as a facet of their power. That said there are always situations that blur the line, like shooting a Brute to bring down their forcefield but not to injure them, or using a gun to kill someone you would have killed anyways, but even those are frowned upon. Part of it is probably due to Passenger meddling, as making parahumans shy away from guns makes them rely on their powers more and yields more useful data.
* SuperPoweredEvilSide: A few powers have effects on the user's emotions that make their general sanity or morality go down as they use their power to a greater extent, such as Burnscar becoming more sociopathic the more she uses her fire powers.
* TimedPowerUp: Some powers have a battery or time limit that restricts their use, forcing such parahumans to plan around this when using their powers.
* TraumaticSuperpowerAwakening: ''Every single natural trigger.'' Powers are received during a "trigger event", an occasion so stressful or traumatic that a passenger reaches out to give the effected individual powers in an attempt to give them the tools needed to deal with it. Of course, this isn't entirely true. Consuming materials tainted by or derived from one of the two entities can give powers as well, though this carries a higher risk of unwanted secondary mutations. Different circumstances leading to a trigger lead to diiferent powers.
* YourMagicsNoGoodHere: Most powers tend to get funky at best if they don't just straight up stop working upon a parahuman reaching the boundary of the Earth's atmosphere as a result of a combination of the Manton effect (So a teleporter cannot teleport themselves into space and then die from vacuum), and the shards not wanting to encourage travel from their host's home planet. Broken triggers lack this restriction, however.
[[/folder]]
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! Power Classifications
These power classifications exist in-universe as a way for the Parahuman Response team to quickly characterize the sort of powers a cape has and select the appropriate countermeasures for fighting them. Thus, it is important to remember that a cape may have a power that seemingly belongs to one category, but due to the nature of how it works, would give them a rating in another category. For example, if ComicBook/IronMan were a Parahuman, he'd be a fairly high level [[GadgeteerGenius Tinker]], as his engineering skills allow him to build technology far and away more advanced than most others in his universe. However, his focus on flying powered armor and energy beams means that he'd also be rated by the PRT as a powerful [[MadeOfIron Brute]], [[{{Flight}} Mover]], [[SuperStrength Striker]], and [[EnergyWeapon Blaster]], with some [[AwesomeByAnalysis Thinker]] thrown in because of the suit's sensors and combat AI. In countering him, the PRT would have to be sure to have some way to deal with each of his ratings.
Likewise, just because someone has one rating that often goes together with another, doesn't mean that they automatically get that rating. For example, SuperStrength often comes with [[MadeOfIron super toughness]], but not necessarily, so it's very possible in Worm that a character is a Striker only, [[GlassCannon whose punches hit like a truck but otherwise has standard human toughness]]. It's also possible to have a Brute only, who may be capable of [[StoneWall taking hits that would kill anyone else without any ability to do damage in return]].
Finally, remember that the number ratings for each category (Mover 1, Striker 9, etc.) are just an indication for PRT agents of what countermeasures are appropriate for that particular cape -- the higher the number, the more extreme the countermeasures. They are not universal PowerLevels for comparing capes to determine who's the strongest. In general, try not to get hung up too much on any one cape's rating, as even the PRT is willing to change them on the fly to suit the cape's demonstrated ability.
Why the categories' names all rhyme is unknown, but it does sound cool.
[[folder:Movers]]
Capes with a power that grants enhanced mobility.
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* {{Flight}}: Without question the most common Mover power.
* FragileSpeedster: A Mover without Brute powers can move fast and may hit hard if they have some Blaster or Striker effect, but they're just as squishy as a normal human.
* NotQuiteFlight: Some Mover powers are effectively flight, but aren't quite.
* SuperSpeed: Not a commonly seen Mover power, but it exists. When it does show up it's usually coupled with some other power, typically a Breaker one, to prevent it from damaging its user.
* TeleportationWithDrawbacks: One of the more common Mover powers, though usually there's some other power tied in with it.
* WallCrawl: One of the milder Mover powers.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Shakers]]
Capes with powers that effect an area.
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* AreaOfEffect: The basic nature of Shaker powers, though what they do to that area varies wildly.
* CastingAShadow: True cases of shadow manipulation are a Shaker power.
* ElementalPowers: Most tend to shake out as some variety of Shaker power, though some have a Blaster sub-classification thanks to their combat potential.
* EmotionBomb: Powers that alter emotions in an area, such as fear-inducing screams or an awe aura, are a Shaker power.
* GodzillaThreshold: When someone has a Shaker rating of 9+, PRT protocols ''start'' with evacuation of the area in case of conflict.
* GravityMaster: Though it's never seen at levels powerful enough to create mini-blackholes, some Shaker powers can increase, reduce, or redirect gravity.
* HavingABlast: Just creating explosions is a Shaker power, albeit one that's usually coupled with a Blaster rating.
* MasterOfIllusion: When the illusions in question are externally created, it's a Shaker power.
* MindOverMatter: Telekinesis and its more specialized variants is considered a Shaker effect.
* PlayingWithFire: Pyrokinesis is technically a Shaker power, but tends to be coupled with a Blaster classification since, you know, it's [[KillItWithFire fire]].
* PowerOfCreation: Being able to create matter is a Shaker power. Of course, they technically don't ''create'' it so much as draw the mass from another dimension and shape it to their desires, but that's neither here nor there.
* RealityWarper: All Breaker powers to some extent, but true manipulation of that scale is rated higher than the ten on the scale and tend to come with drawbacks.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Brutes]]
Capes with powers that enhance their own strength or durability.
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* AdaptiveAbility: Only seen in Crawler, but considered to be one of the best Brute powers out there.
* BarrierWarrior: Please note that Forcefields are not a Brute ability, and come under Breaker instead.
* BatmanCanBreatheInSpace: Rare, but some Brute capes no longer need to breathe.
* EnergyAbsorption: A Brute power, usually coupled with some sort of Striker or Blaster power to release the absorbed energy.
* GodzillaThreshold: Responding to a 9+ Brute involves intercity missile barrages and only escalates from there.
* HealingFactor: Probably one of the more basic Brute powers.
* IgnoredEnemy: When a Brute is of a higher level than a group is capable of hurting or at least hampering, the standard procedure is to ignore them as much as possible. This can works better than you'd expect, especially if the Brute doesn't have other powers to help them get into the fight or make them hard to ignore, as they can't really do anything if their enemies won't bog themselves down in a fight. It's less practical when the objective of a battle is something beyond "beat these guys," and a lot of capes do have others powers that make ignoring them not really an option.
* {{Immortality}}: Averted. No matter how high someone's Brute rating is, they ''can'' be killed. Just ask Behemoth.
* InstantArmor: Another form of Brute power.
* MightyGlacier: Brutes are the most durable parahumans, but unless they have some Mover power they're vulnerable to being slowed, delayed, or just outrun.
* NighInvulnerable: The most common form of Brute powers is just being outright immune to whatever hits you.
* SuperStrength: Another common Brute power that often goes with the durability is enhanced strength.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Breakers]]
Capes whose power is limited to themselves and their immediate surroundings. The most common form is capes who can transform into an alternate form in which they have powers, but are otherwise normal humans.
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* AchillesHeel: More common than in other classifications. Whether it be a weakness to something specific, a timer or condition on their transformation, an altered mental state, or reverting back to a human form after taking enough damage, most Breakers have some sort of flaw to their SuperMode that will force them to turn back to a regular human sooner or later. Since they usually lack powers when untransformed, the general strategy against a Breaker is to figure out that weakness and then exploiting it to temporarily depower them.
* RealityWarper: Limited in scope, but Breaker powers tend to screw with physics more than most.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Immunity to one's own powers is considered a Breaker trait, making it technically one of the most common powers, though in those case the designation is usually not applied.
* SuperMode: The most obvious form of Breaker powers. Most Breakers actually only have powers while in their alternate form, making the task of reverting them back to human by one way or another the top priority when fighting one.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Masters]]
Capes with powers to control others, whether those others are people, animals, or created minions.
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* AnimalEyeSpy: Masters who directly control animals or people can sometimes see through their minions' senses.
* BadPowersBadPeople: Masters powers are some of the most frightening of the categories and it's been noted Masters tend to be villains more often than not.
* TheBeastmaster: Some Masters control or otherwise manipulate animals, while some can create monsters of their own.
* DemonicPossession: A rarely seen Master power, though it does exist.
* EmotionControl: Surprisingly enough, most emotion controls are actually not classified as Masters. The point of Masters is that they make minions, and most emotion controllers simply lack the strength and/or versatility to actually make people do what they want, being either able to control one emotion strongly, or many emotions weakly. Most are instead classified as Blasters or Shakers.
* MasterOfIllusion: When the illusions in question are a result of sensory manipulation, it's a Master power.
* MookMaker: Powers that create controllable minions are considered Masters, though the exact nature of those minions can wildly vary.
* MoreThanMindControl: Because "thought" isn't some standard force in the ''Worm''-verse, "mind control" usually isn't. When it's not outright puppeteering someone's body, it's typically manipulating them through emotions into wanting to obey.
* ParanoiaFuel: In-universe, Strangers and Masters are the two biggest causes for paranoia.
* PestController: There's at least three precedents for masters that control vermin or other small animals.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tinkers]]
Capes with incredible technological knowledge, though only in a specific field, or with peculiar quirks to their creations or creative process.
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* ArtificialLimbs: A potential Tinker specialty is making limbs.
* AwesomeButImpractical: A common limitation of tinker tech is that the more ambitious a project is, the more unwieldy, unstable, or resource intensive it becomes.
* ClothesMakeTheSuperman: Nearly every Tinker wears some sort of suit or armor laden down with all the gear and tech they need in the field.
* ConditionalPowers: One type of tinker has an extreme level of versatility in what they can build, their specialty instead being a particular range of materials or design philosophy. For instance, a tinker might be able to create any device they can imagine, but it has to be made out of glass, or run on steam power, or all its components have to meet at right angles...
* CrazyPrepared: To a degree. A Tinker can prepare for almost anything, though the nature of their preparations depends on their specialization. The drawback is that they can only be prepared for as much as they can carry equipment for.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Played with. All Tinkers have a specialization in what they can make. What that specialization is can grant them a wide field of options, but they're still limited to that field, so a Tinker specializing in laser guns may not be able to make a forcefield.
* {{Cyborg}}: If you see a person with cybernetics, they're either a Tinker themselves or pretty good friends with one.
* EquivalentExchange: Another common tinker limit is that a project's reliability or effectiveness is proportional to the resources or effort invested into it. These tinkers often focus their efforts on either endlessly improving a small number of swiss-army gadgets, or create large numbers of disposable projects that work just well enough to be usable.
* GadgeteerGenius: Basically what all Tinkers are.
* JackOfAllTrades: So-called free Tinkers can built whatever they want due to a broadness in specialization, though the price they pay can vary wildly. Armsmaster, for example, can make just about anything due to his miniaturization specialization allowing him to pack a lot into a small space. Leet, on the other hand, can make anything at all... so long as it's not too close to anything he's made before.
* {{Jetpack}}: Played with. Due to the versatility flight grants, a lot of Tinkers with the necessary resources create these. However, usually these are either too big and bulky to warrant use outside of a mech suit or too weak to grant more than a slight lift.
* MagicPoweredPseudoscience: The most succinct description of these abilities, as the only limitations for a Tinker's creations are their specialty and their imagination.
* MiniMecha: When a Tinker adds enough to their powered armor it strays into this, though it doesn't happen often.
* PoweredArmor: At least four Tinkers have created these to help them carry and make use of all the specialized gear they need.
* PowerCopying: Of a sort. Tinkers are limited by their specializations, but they can study the work of other Tinkers to create items based on both the observed tech and their own expertise. So a sonics Tinker studying the work of an optics Tinker wouldn't be able to make x-ray cameras, but they could make advanced sights for their own sonic weapons, or adapt the scanning algorithms to improve their sonar. This overlaps into AwesomenessByAnalysis for some tinkers with specialties that let them analyze and reverse-engineer ''any'' cape's powers, either letting them artificially copy the power or [[VariantPowerCopying a rough approximation thereof]]
* PowerIncontinence: Chaos Tinkers don't have much control over the end product they make due to particularly controlling behavior from their passenger.
* ReedRichardsIsUseless: ZigZagged in that the general principals of tinker tech can sometimes be understood and reverse-engineered, leading to many small advances in the setting's technology, their most advanced devices are often so far beyond the edge of human scientific knowledge that even other tinkers can have trouble figuring out ''why'' they work, let alone ''how''. Additionally, tinker devices have a tendency to break in strange, often dangerous, ways at the slightest provocation and often cannot be repaired by anyone but another tinker.
* RobotBuddy: Robotics is a potential Tinker specialization.
* SelfMadeSuperPowers: Another way to conceptualize Tinkers; while they generally don't have native powers, they can build impossible devices that can do things other parahumans need powers to accomplish:
** Armsmaster, as Defiant, replaced his internal organs and parts of his brain with artificial equivalents, reducing his need to sleep, eat, and eliminate waste to less than fifteen minutes a day.
** Mannequin, a tinker who specializes in sustaining life, modified himself to have inhuman reflexes, internal rifling, multiple arms, and various types of lethal gas.
** Bonesaw can emit deadly toxins and poisons from her body while being immune to her own poisons and other diseases.
** In ''Ward'', the team fights a tinker who uses special armbands to turn his arms and legs into lightning arcs that somehow still support his weight.
* SuperPowerLottery: Some Tinkers win this big time, with specializations broad enough that they can make just about anything so long as it abides by a minor limit or two.
* WhereDoesHeGetAllThoseWonderfulToys: Played with. On one hand, it's addressed that creating the stuff they do tends to require a lot of resources. On the other, this doesn't stop any Tinker we've seen so far from pulling all sorts of gadgets out as needed. Justified, though: when your power revolves around resource management, strategy and crafting, you're likely to think up scenarios where you'll need a fall-back plan or two -- and, then make and carry the tools to at least try [=McGyvering=] that plan up at a pinch, should you not be carrying the exact attachments you now need.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Blasters]]
Capes with a ranged power, usually offensive.
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* AbnormalAmmo: There are dozens of different categories, from poison streams to antimatter.
* AnatomyArsenal: The most common blaster techniques are probably EyeBeams, SuperSpit, and HandBlasts.
* EmotionBomb: Some Blaster powers deliver an emotional payload alongside their physical damage.
* GlassCannon: Blaster powers are usually the best for dealing high damage at a distance, but unless they have a Brute of Shaker power to help protect them they go down as easily as a normal human.
* LongRangeFighter: A ranged power is what designates someone as a Blaster.
* ShockAndAwe: When it's in the form of lightning bolts, a Blaster power.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Thinkers]]
Capes with powers related to information gathering and processing.
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* AnimalEyeSpy: Masters who can see through the senses of their pets, whether created or controlled, have a secondary Thinker rating.
* AuraVision: What the aura is can vary wildly, but it's a Thinker power nonetheless.
* BlessedWithSuck: More than most powers, Thinker abilities tend to come with unavoidable alterations to how one intakes and reacts to information, which can have a severe impact on their ability to function normally.
* CombatClairvoyance: The strongest Thinkers can be nearly impossible to touch thanks to how well they know everything happening around them.
* TheEmpath: Emotion detection is a Thinker power.
* GeniusBruiser: Combat Thinkers are Thinkers whose powers lend themselves to physical combat, usually in a way that makes them incredibly obnoxious to deal with.
* InnateNightVision: A mild Thinker power.
* LikeCannotCutLike: Thinker powers cancel each other out at best, and give outright false information at worst. While some people have figured out how to circumvent this, Thinker powers are generally useless against one another.
* SherlockScan: Most Thinker powers let the user gain much more information with a quick glance than a normal person could.
* ShootTheMedicFirst: All things being equal, PRT standard procedure is to target Thinkers first (with Masters second).
* SuperSenses: A form of Thinker power, though pretty low on the rating scale no matter how super they are.
* {{Telepathy}}: A lot of Thinker powers resemble this to some degree, and true telepathy is itself a Thinker power, but there's only one true telepath in the Wormverse.
* TooCleverByHalf: The AchillesHeel of Thinker powers. Their capes can be assured their ideas are perfectly correct despite being way off the mark.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Strikers]]
Capes with a touch-ranged power.
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* {{Biomanipulation}}: Technically there's only one ''true'' case of this, but it's touch range.
* CloseRangeCombatant: By the nature of Striker powers, they have to touch a target to affect it. As such, those whose powers focus on debilitating an enemy rely on this fighting style.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: A common Striker ability is the power to drastically manipulate the impact of melee attacks.
* HealingHands: Powers that relate to healing are almost exclusively touch-ranged, though they tend to involve some dimensional fuckery rather than outright healing.
* SuperEmpowering: Several Striker powers do this to objects, charging them with effects or properties that they can then use.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Changers]]
Capes with some form of shapeshifting power.
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* MultiformBalance: Changers with multiple alternate forms often have this.
* VoluntaryShapeshifting: All Changer powers involve some form of this.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Trumps]]
Capes whose powers influence or are in some way related to other powers.
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* AllYourPowersCombined: Probably the worst Trump power to fight is one who can copy, steal, or otherwise shuffle through several powers at once.
* {{Antimagic}}: The most dangerous Trumps are those who shut down powers at the source rather than countering their effects.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Trumps whose powers focus exclusively on negating or redirecting the powers of others are pretty much helpless when facing [[BadassNormal anyone without powers]].
* PowerCopying: A versatile, if fairly mild, Trump power is the ability to copy the powers of other parahumans.
* PowerNullifier: One of the more recognizable forms of Trump powers is a way to negate the powers of others.
* MetaPower: Trumps deal in powers which either affect or are affected by the abilities of others, and triggers that grant Trump powers are directly associated with interactions involving parahumans. Positive relations tend to make power gifting or amplifying more likely, whereas the opposite tends to lead to power stealing or nullification.
* NoSell: A more defensive Trump power is immunity to the effect of others' powers. Of note there is that immunity doesn't mean those powers ''stop'' working, just that they don't work on you. Not so great at stopping a hostile cape, but at least you'll be walking away fine.
* PowerParasite: Luckily only one cape is known to have this power, as it's pretty much the trump card of Trump powers.
* SuperEmpowering: One common form of Trump powers is being able to grant powers to others, which is more common if the cape had positive associations with powers prior to triggering.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Strangers]]
Capes whose powers revolve around stealth and infiltration.
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* IntangibleMan: One of the few Stranger powers that focuses on mobility rather than manipulating or avoiding perception.
* {{Invisibility}}: One of the more mundane Stranger powers is invisibility.
* ParanoiaFuel: In-universe, Strangers and Masters are the two biggest causes for paranoia. As Stranger ratings go higher so does the urgency of the responses, going from passwords and marked entrances to constant communication to shoot-on-sight for anyone who goes dark.
* PerceptionFilter: Several types of Stranger powers screw with perception. Sometimes you can't perceive them, sometime you can perceive them but can't perceive of them as a threat, sometime you can perceive them and perceive them as a threat but can't make yourself to act against them...
* StealthExpert: What most Strangers shape up to be, though the effectiveness varies from power to power depending on what they're trying to sneak by.
[[/folder]]
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Go back to the work page for ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' or ''Literature/{{Ward}}''.
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[[center: [-[[Characters/WormUndersiders The Undersiders (Worm)]] | [[Characters/WormBrocktonBayHeroes Heroes in Brockton Bay]] | [[Characters/WormBrocktonBayGangs Gangs of Brockton Bay]] | [[Characters/WormSponsoredHeroes Sponsored Heroes]] | [[Characters/WormWorldwideThreats Worldwide Threats]] | [[Characters/WormOthers Other Characters (Worm)]]]]-]
[[center: [-[[Characters/WardBreakthrough Breakthrough]] | [[Characters/WardTheUndersiders The Undersiders (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardHeroes Heroes (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardVillains Villains (Ward)]] ([[Characters/WardMercenaries Mercenaries]], [[Characters/WardSClassThreats S-Class Threats]]) | [[Characters/WardEarthShin Earth Shin]] | [[Characters/WardOthers Other Characters (Ward)]]]]-]
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'''Due to the application to both''' '''''Worm''''' '''and''' '''''Ward,''''' '''all spoilers for both are unmarked!'''
[[foldercontrol]]
Capes are the colloquial term for parahumans, individuals with superhuman powers granted through a symbiotic link with an extradimensional entity. The nature of these powers as well as how they're applied to humans tend to follow trends based on both human physiology, psychology, and the drives of the entities themselves.
! Passengers and Parahumans
[[folder:The Passengers]]
!!Passengers/Shards/Entities/Agents
The extradimensional entities that grant powers, each of which is a fragment of either the Eden or Zion entities. Needless to say, they're pretty big spoilers.
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* AlienGeometries: Take the form of crystalline structures that fold and unfold like tesseracts.
* BloodKnight: Passengers learn and develop through conflict [[ConflictBall and try to push their hosts into confrontation.]]
* BrainUploading: They take in the memories of their hosts, which in the case of Ashley in ''Ward'', gave her direct memories from her original template, fellow clones, and even the memories of parahumans who happened to know the host.
* BrokenMasquerade: After Scion's death at the end of ''Worm'', trigger events no longer wipe the memories conveyed during the process, and as a result the passengers have become openly acknowledged by capes.
* CastFromLifespan: They're constantly accumulating power as they grow, but it's possible for their human link to draw from them faster than they can replenish and kill them. Taylor finds this out during the battle with Scion when she overuses Doormaker's power.
* FreudianExcuse: Due to the way powers are gained in this setting, practically every villain has this to a degree if they had a natural trigger. Case 53 villains also count due to their disfigurements and memory loss.
* IHaveManyNames: Most commonly known as passengers by parahumans, with Scion referring to them as shards since according to Wildbow they take the form of crystals that fold and unfold like tesseracts. Other names include "fairies" (Glaistig Uaine) and agents.
* {{Nerf}}: The majority of shards granted to hosts are altered to that their powers cannot be used on the Entities.
* ObliviouslyEvil: Hardly evil themselves, as they act on impulse and instinct rather than anything else, but they enable evil people by giving them powers. They simply try and respond to a perceived need by giving people the powers necessary to fix a situation, such as Master powers when socially isolated or Brute powers when in physical danger.
* ParanoiaFuel: Passengers have their own goals and drives based on their purpose, and at least some have influence over the powers they grant and the minds of their linked humans. As a result, there's a lot of unease in-universe about how much any given cape is influenced by their passenger.
* PerceptionFilter: Can render themselves imperceptible to humans, on top of hiding out in out of the way places in barren versions of whatever planet they've chosen.
* PoorCommunicationKills: Quite literally. When Scion was alive, the shards could network all their information together using him as a hub, communicating with each other to find the precise way to adjust themselves so as not to kill their hosts. With Scion dead, all shards are cut off from each other (save cluster-triggers, who have a mini-network with each other), and can no longer communicate with each other, and broken triggers are the result when a shard cannot find enough information to properly match itself to its host.
* StrongerWithAge: They grow in power over time, eventually splitting in two when they're big enough.
* SuperpowerRussianRoulette: It can be a major gamble when getting powers. Sometimes you'll win the lottery like Eidolon or Glaistig Uaine and get gamebreaking powers. On the other hand, there's at least 70 different ways a trigger event can go wrong, from Case 53's where you get horrendously deformed to Case 70's where you and your identical twin get fused into a single being. A parahuman can even happen to be more than one case, as one of Contessa's memories in ''Ward'' has her dealing with two Case 53s who also happened to be fused together into a Case 70.
* TheSymbiote: They fuse with their hosts in order to give them powers.
* WalkingSpoiler: Played with. Their existence isn't even hinted at until a while into the story, and even then it's only as a theory for where powers come from. They become more commonly mentioned later on, and by the time of ''Ward'' they're common knowledge among capes.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Capes in General]]
* AttackItsWeakpoint: The Corona Pollentia, a lump of grey matter about an inch and a half across, embedded between the frontal and partial lobes with connective webbing throughout the entire brain. It's the biological center for the connection with a parahuman's passenger and control of their power, and if damaged or destroyed can render them powerless.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Some of the nicest capes are that way because their powers are too deadly to use to their full extent, like Sundancer.
* BodyHorror: Case 53s, capes whose powers come with severe mutations as a result of a bad reaction to a Cauldron vial, or directly consuming parts of an Entity, as seen with people from Contessa's home universe. These can vary from turning all of your flesh to metal (Weld) or reducing you to a tentacled face (Sveta).
* ComboPlatterPowers: It's not unusual for someone to have anywhere between two and four powers, or even just one power with multiple parts or applications. A more notable example of this is "cluster triggers," when multiple people trigger at about the same time while fairly close to one another. All the capes involved get their own power reduced by a bit, but also get a version of everyone else's power on top of that.
* DifficultButAwesome: Some powers have major drawbacks, or otherwise need specific scenarios to be used to their full power, but are devastatingly potent when they can be brought fully to bear.
* DiscardAndDraw:
** Second trigger effects work this way. Powers gain additional facets or developments, but there's always some loss or drawback.
** Certain powers require something specific on behalf of their host, such as eye contact or verbal commands to establish a Master effect. If the host becomes incapable of meeting those criteria, such as the aforementioned example becoming blind or deaf, the powers alter to continue to allow their host to use them. This is justified in-universe by the passengers, as their goal of gathering information through the use of powers would fail if their host couldn't use the powers they had.
* LovecraftianSuperpower: Some powers are... less than understanding of things like the laws of physics, biology, or human decency.
* NotWearingTights: Generally averted for similar reasons to why parahumans tend to avoid guns. Putting on a costume, even if it's just a mask, is like putting on a uniform as a parahuman and shows you're playing by the rules, marking you as a valid target to other parahumans. ''Not'' wearing one shows you aren't playing by the scaled-up cops-and-robbers rules and says you're playing for keeps. Case in point: throughout ''Worm'', a story that involves superpowered [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain neo-nazis]], a [[BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood government-controlled social cult]], and [[ApocalypseCult Endbringer worshippers]], the only characters who seek out cape fights while not wearing costumes are [[TheDreaded the Slaughterhouse 9]] and [[TheMenInBlack Cauldron operatives]], considered among the most dangerous groups in the setting.
* OnlyFleshIsSafe: Known in-universe as the Manton Effect. Most powers affect only organic or inorganic materials, hypothesized to be a safeguard preventing powers from harming their wielders that happens to extend to all organic material due to a lack of specificity. That said, some powers can effect any material regardless of its organic or inorganic nature, so this isn't universal.
* PersonalityPowers: A person's personality can have a lot of influence on how their powers manifest.
* PowerAtAPrice: Some powers come with drawbacks, such as alterations to thought processes, loss of certain social or mental skills, or physical mutations.
* PsychicPowers: Zigzagged. "Thought" isn't treated as some force of its own, and the ability to intercept and interpret the neural behavior of a brain is beyond any power seen, making true psychic powers out of reach of everyone but the Simurgh. That said, several Thinker and Master powers are close enough that the difference is largely academic.
* RidiculouslyHumanRobots: Sufficiently advanced mechanical intelligences are capable of triggering and gaining powers.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Most capes are immune to their own powers, with the Manton Effect hypothesized as an overzealous extension of this safeguard to other organic matter.
* TheSleepless: Some parahumans are known as Noctis capes, meaning they have no need to sleep and may actually be unable to. This feature is usually completely unrelated to the main power, making it difficult to anticipate if someone gets this power.
* SuperheroPackingHeat: Generally averted. Bringing firearms to a cape fight indicates a willingness to do greater harm and incites the risk of suffering greater harm, generally showing that someone isn't willing to play by the rules. Using guns tends to get one blacklisted from alliances with other parahumans and makes them targets of heroes and villains alike unless they knock it off. The exceptions are "game shooters," parahumans who use the gun to channel their power, use Tinker guns, have a power to help them ''not'' kill what they're shooting, or otherwise use or involve guns as a facet of their power. That said there are always situations that blur the line, like shooting a Brute to bring down their forcefield but not to injure them, or using a gun to kill someone you would have killed anyways, but even those are frowned upon. Part of it is probably due to Passenger meddling, as making parahumans shy away from guns makes them rely on their powers more and yields more useful data.
* SuperPoweredEvilSide: A few powers have effects on the user's emotions that make their general sanity or morality go down as they use their power to a greater extent, such as Burnscar becoming more sociopathic the more she uses her fire powers.
* TimedPowerUp: Some powers have a battery or time limit that restricts their use, forcing such parahumans to plan around this when using their powers.
* TraumaticSuperpowerAwakening: ''Every single natural trigger.'' Powers are received during a "trigger event", an occasion so stressful or traumatic that a passenger reaches out to give the effected individual powers in an attempt to give them the tools needed to deal with it. Of course, this isn't entirely true. Consuming materials tainted by or derived from one of the two entities can give powers as well, though this carries a higher risk of unwanted secondary mutations. Different circumstances leading to a trigger lead to diiferent powers.
* YourMagicsNoGoodHere: Most powers tend to get funky at best if they don't just straight up stop working upon a parahuman reaching the boundary of the Earth's atmosphere as a result of a combination of the Manton effect (So a teleporter cannot teleport themselves into space and then die from vacuum), and the shards not wanting to encourage travel from their host's home planet. Broken triggers lack this restriction, however.
[[/folder]]
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! Power Classifications
These power classifications exist in-universe as a way for the Parahuman Response team to quickly characterize the sort of powers a cape has and select the appropriate countermeasures for fighting them. Thus, it is important to remember that a cape may have a power that seemingly belongs to one category, but due to the nature of how it works, would give them a rating in another category. For example, if ComicBook/IronMan were a Parahuman, he'd be a fairly high level [[GadgeteerGenius Tinker]], as his engineering skills allow him to build technology far and away more advanced than most others in his universe. However, his focus on flying powered armor and energy beams means that he'd also be rated by the PRT as a powerful [[MadeOfIron Brute]], [[{{Flight}} Mover]], [[SuperStrength Striker]], and [[EnergyWeapon Blaster]], with some [[AwesomeByAnalysis Thinker]] thrown in because of the suit's sensors and combat AI. In countering him, the PRT would have to be sure to have some way to deal with each of his ratings.
Likewise, just because someone has one rating that often goes together with another, doesn't mean that they automatically get that rating. For example, SuperStrength often comes with [[MadeOfIron super toughness]], but not necessarily, so it's very possible in Worm that a character is a Striker only, [[GlassCannon whose punches hit like a truck but otherwise has standard human toughness]]. It's also possible to have a Brute only, who may be capable of [[StoneWall taking hits that would kill anyone else without any ability to do damage in return]].
Finally, remember that the number ratings for each category (Mover 1, Striker 9, etc.) are just an indication for PRT agents of what countermeasures are appropriate for that particular cape -- the higher the number, the more extreme the countermeasures. They are not universal PowerLevels for comparing capes to determine who's the strongest. In general, try not to get hung up too much on any one cape's rating, as even the PRT is willing to change them on the fly to suit the cape's demonstrated ability.
Why the categories' names all rhyme is unknown, but it does sound cool.
[[folder:Movers]]
Capes with a power that grants enhanced mobility.
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* {{Flight}}: Without question the most common Mover power.
* FragileSpeedster: A Mover without Brute powers can move fast and may hit hard if they have some Blaster or Striker effect, but they're just as squishy as a normal human.
* NotQuiteFlight: Some Mover powers are effectively flight, but aren't quite.
* SuperSpeed: Not a commonly seen Mover power, but it exists. When it does show up it's usually coupled with some other power, typically a Breaker one, to prevent it from damaging its user.
* TeleportationWithDrawbacks: One of the more common Mover powers, though usually there's some other power tied in with it.
* WallCrawl: One of the milder Mover powers.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Shakers]]
Capes with powers that effect an area.
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* AreaOfEffect: The basic nature of Shaker powers, though what they do to that area varies wildly.
* CastingAShadow: True cases of shadow manipulation are a Shaker power.
* ElementalPowers: Most tend to shake out as some variety of Shaker power, though some have a Blaster sub-classification thanks to their combat potential.
* EmotionBomb: Powers that alter emotions in an area, such as fear-inducing screams or an awe aura, are a Shaker power.
* GodzillaThreshold: When someone has a Shaker rating of 9+, PRT protocols ''start'' with evacuation of the area in case of conflict.
* GravityMaster: Though it's never seen at levels powerful enough to create mini-blackholes, some Shaker powers can increase, reduce, or redirect gravity.
* HavingABlast: Just creating explosions is a Shaker power, albeit one that's usually coupled with a Blaster rating.
* MasterOfIllusion: When the illusions in question are externally created, it's a Shaker power.
* MindOverMatter: Telekinesis and its more specialized variants is considered a Shaker effect.
* PlayingWithFire: Pyrokinesis is technically a Shaker power, but tends to be coupled with a Blaster classification since, you know, it's [[KillItWithFire fire]].
* PowerOfCreation: Being able to create matter is a Shaker power. Of course, they technically don't ''create'' it so much as draw the mass from another dimension and shape it to their desires, but that's neither here nor there.
* RealityWarper: All Breaker powers to some extent, but true manipulation of that scale is rated higher than the ten on the scale and tend to come with drawbacks.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Brutes]]
Capes with powers that enhance their own strength or durability.
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* AdaptiveAbility: Only seen in Crawler, but considered to be one of the best Brute powers out there.
* BarrierWarrior: Please note that Forcefields are not a Brute ability, and come under Breaker instead.
* BatmanCanBreatheInSpace: Rare, but some Brute capes no longer need to breathe.
* EnergyAbsorption: A Brute power, usually coupled with some sort of Striker or Blaster power to release the absorbed energy.
* GodzillaThreshold: Responding to a 9+ Brute involves intercity missile barrages and only escalates from there.
* HealingFactor: Probably one of the more basic Brute powers.
* IgnoredEnemy: When a Brute is of a higher level than a group is capable of hurting or at least hampering, the standard procedure is to ignore them as much as possible. This can works better than you'd expect, especially if the Brute doesn't have other powers to help them get into the fight or make them hard to ignore, as they can't really do anything if their enemies won't bog themselves down in a fight. It's less practical when the objective of a battle is something beyond "beat these guys," and a lot of capes do have others powers that make ignoring them not really an option.
* {{Immortality}}: Averted. No matter how high someone's Brute rating is, they ''can'' be killed. Just ask Behemoth.
* InstantArmor: Another form of Brute power.
* MightyGlacier: Brutes are the most durable parahumans, but unless they have some Mover power they're vulnerable to being slowed, delayed, or just outrun.
* NighInvulnerable: The most common form of Brute powers is just being outright immune to whatever hits you.
* SuperStrength: Another common Brute power that often goes with the durability is enhanced strength.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Breakers]]
Capes whose power is limited to themselves and their immediate surroundings. The most common form is capes who can transform into an alternate form in which they have powers, but are otherwise normal humans.
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* AchillesHeel: More common than in other classifications. Whether it be a weakness to something specific, a timer or condition on their transformation, an altered mental state, or reverting back to a human form after taking enough damage, most Breakers have some sort of flaw to their SuperMode that will force them to turn back to a regular human sooner or later. Since they usually lack powers when untransformed, the general strategy against a Breaker is to figure out that weakness and then exploiting it to temporarily depower them.
* RealityWarper: Limited in scope, but Breaker powers tend to screw with physics more than most.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Immunity to one's own powers is considered a Breaker trait, making it technically one of the most common powers, though in those case the designation is usually not applied.
* SuperMode: The most obvious form of Breaker powers. Most Breakers actually only have powers while in their alternate form, making the task of reverting them back to human by one way or another the top priority when fighting one.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Masters]]
Capes with powers to control others, whether those others are people, animals, or created minions.
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* AnimalEyeSpy: Masters who directly control animals or people can sometimes see through their minions' senses.
* BadPowersBadPeople: Masters powers are some of the most frightening of the categories and it's been noted Masters tend to be villains more often than not.
* TheBeastmaster: Some Masters control or otherwise manipulate animals, while some can create monsters of their own.
* DemonicPossession: A rarely seen Master power, though it does exist.
* EmotionControl: Surprisingly enough, most emotion controls are actually not classified as Masters. The point of Masters is that they make minions, and most emotion controllers simply lack the strength and/or versatility to actually make people do what they want, being either able to control one emotion strongly, or many emotions weakly. Most are instead classified as Blasters or Shakers.
* MasterOfIllusion: When the illusions in question are a result of sensory manipulation, it's a Master power.
* MookMaker: Powers that create controllable minions are considered Masters, though the exact nature of those minions can wildly vary.
* MoreThanMindControl: Because "thought" isn't some standard force in the ''Worm''-verse, "mind control" usually isn't. When it's not outright puppeteering someone's body, it's typically manipulating them through emotions into wanting to obey.
* ParanoiaFuel: In-universe, Strangers and Masters are the two biggest causes for paranoia.
* PestController: There's at least three precedents for masters that control vermin or other small animals.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tinkers]]
Capes with incredible technological knowledge, though only in a specific field, or with peculiar quirks to their creations or creative process.
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* ArtificialLimbs: A potential Tinker specialty is making limbs.
* AwesomeButImpractical: A common limitation of tinker tech is that the more ambitious a project is, the more unwieldy, unstable, or resource intensive it becomes.
* ClothesMakeTheSuperman: Nearly every Tinker wears some sort of suit or armor laden down with all the gear and tech they need in the field.
* ConditionalPowers: One type of tinker has an extreme level of versatility in what they can build, their specialty instead being a particular range of materials or design philosophy. For instance, a tinker might be able to create any device they can imagine, but it has to be made out of glass, or run on steam power, or all its components have to meet at right angles...
* CrazyPrepared: To a degree. A Tinker can prepare for almost anything, though the nature of their preparations depends on their specialization. The drawback is that they can only be prepared for as much as they can carry equipment for.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Played with. All Tinkers have a specialization in what they can make. What that specialization is can grant them a wide field of options, but they're still limited to that field, so a Tinker specializing in laser guns may not be able to make a forcefield.
* {{Cyborg}}: If you see a person with cybernetics, they're either a Tinker themselves or pretty good friends with one.
* EquivalentExchange: Another common tinker limit is that a project's reliability or effectiveness is proportional to the resources or effort invested into it. These tinkers often focus their efforts on either endlessly improving a small number of swiss-army gadgets, or create large numbers of disposable projects that work just well enough to be usable.
* GadgeteerGenius: Basically what all Tinkers are.
* JackOfAllTrades: So-called free Tinkers can built whatever they want due to a broadness in specialization, though the price they pay can vary wildly. Armsmaster, for example, can make just about anything due to his miniaturization specialization allowing him to pack a lot into a small space. Leet, on the other hand, can make anything at all... so long as it's not too close to anything he's made before.
* {{Jetpack}}: Played with. Due to the versatility flight grants, a lot of Tinkers with the necessary resources create these. However, usually these are either too big and bulky to warrant use outside of a mech suit or too weak to grant more than a slight lift.
* MagicPoweredPseudoscience: The most succinct description of these abilities, as the only limitations for a Tinker's creations are their specialty and their imagination.
* MiniMecha: When a Tinker adds enough to their powered armor it strays into this, though it doesn't happen often.
* PoweredArmor: At least four Tinkers have created these to help them carry and make use of all the specialized gear they need.
* PowerCopying: Of a sort. Tinkers are limited by their specializations, but they can study the work of other Tinkers to create items based on both the observed tech and their own expertise. So a sonics Tinker studying the work of an optics Tinker wouldn't be able to make x-ray cameras, but they could make advanced sights for their own sonic weapons, or adapt the scanning algorithms to improve their sonar. This overlaps into AwesomenessByAnalysis for some tinkers with specialties that let them analyze and reverse-engineer ''any'' cape's powers, either letting them artificially copy the power or [[VariantPowerCopying a rough approximation thereof]]
* PowerIncontinence: Chaos Tinkers don't have much control over the end product they make due to particularly controlling behavior from their passenger.
* ReedRichardsIsUseless: ZigZagged in that the general principals of tinker tech can sometimes be understood and reverse-engineered, leading to many small advances in the setting's technology, their most advanced devices are often so far beyond the edge of human scientific knowledge that even other tinkers can have trouble figuring out ''why'' they work, let alone ''how''. Additionally, tinker devices have a tendency to break in strange, often dangerous, ways at the slightest provocation and often cannot be repaired by anyone but another tinker.
* RobotBuddy: Robotics is a potential Tinker specialization.
* SelfMadeSuperPowers: Another way to conceptualize Tinkers; while they generally don't have native powers, they can build impossible devices that can do things other parahumans need powers to accomplish:
** Armsmaster, as Defiant, replaced his internal organs and parts of his brain with artificial equivalents, reducing his need to sleep, eat, and eliminate waste to less than fifteen minutes a day.
** Mannequin, a tinker who specializes in sustaining life, modified himself to have inhuman reflexes, internal rifling, multiple arms, and various types of lethal gas.
** Bonesaw can emit deadly toxins and poisons from her body while being immune to her own poisons and other diseases.
** In ''Ward'', the team fights a tinker who uses special armbands to turn his arms and legs into lightning arcs that somehow still support his weight.
* SuperPowerLottery: Some Tinkers win this big time, with specializations broad enough that they can make just about anything so long as it abides by a minor limit or two.
* WhereDoesHeGetAllThoseWonderfulToys: Played with. On one hand, it's addressed that creating the stuff they do tends to require a lot of resources. On the other, this doesn't stop any Tinker we've seen so far from pulling all sorts of gadgets out as needed. Justified, though: when your power revolves around resource management, strategy and crafting, you're likely to think up scenarios where you'll need a fall-back plan or two -- and, then make and carry the tools to at least try [=McGyvering=] that plan up at a pinch, should you not be carrying the exact attachments you now need.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Blasters]]
Capes with a ranged power, usually offensive.
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* AbnormalAmmo: There are dozens of different categories, from poison streams to antimatter.
* AnatomyArsenal: The most common blaster techniques are probably EyeBeams, SuperSpit, and HandBlasts.
* EmotionBomb: Some Blaster powers deliver an emotional payload alongside their physical damage.
* GlassCannon: Blaster powers are usually the best for dealing high damage at a distance, but unless they have a Brute of Shaker power to help protect them they go down as easily as a normal human.
* LongRangeFighter: A ranged power is what designates someone as a Blaster.
* ShockAndAwe: When it's in the form of lightning bolts, a Blaster power.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Thinkers]]
Capes with powers related to information gathering and processing.
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* AnimalEyeSpy: Masters who can see through the senses of their pets, whether created or controlled, have a secondary Thinker rating.
* AuraVision: What the aura is can vary wildly, but it's a Thinker power nonetheless.
* BlessedWithSuck: More than most powers, Thinker abilities tend to come with unavoidable alterations to how one intakes and reacts to information, which can have a severe impact on their ability to function normally.
* CombatClairvoyance: The strongest Thinkers can be nearly impossible to touch thanks to how well they know everything happening around them.
* TheEmpath: Emotion detection is a Thinker power.
* GeniusBruiser: Combat Thinkers are Thinkers whose powers lend themselves to physical combat, usually in a way that makes them incredibly obnoxious to deal with.
* InnateNightVision: A mild Thinker power.
* LikeCannotCutLike: Thinker powers cancel each other out at best, and give outright false information at worst. While some people have figured out how to circumvent this, Thinker powers are generally useless against one another.
* SherlockScan: Most Thinker powers let the user gain much more information with a quick glance than a normal person could.
* ShootTheMedicFirst: All things being equal, PRT standard procedure is to target Thinkers first (with Masters second).
* SuperSenses: A form of Thinker power, though pretty low on the rating scale no matter how super they are.
* {{Telepathy}}: A lot of Thinker powers resemble this to some degree, and true telepathy is itself a Thinker power, but there's only one true telepath in the Wormverse.
* TooCleverByHalf: The AchillesHeel of Thinker powers. Their capes can be assured their ideas are perfectly correct despite being way off the mark.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Strikers]]
Capes with a touch-ranged power.
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* {{Biomanipulation}}: Technically there's only one ''true'' case of this, but it's touch range.
* CloseRangeCombatant: By the nature of Striker powers, they have to touch a target to affect it. As such, those whose powers focus on debilitating an enemy rely on this fighting style.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: A common Striker ability is the power to drastically manipulate the impact of melee attacks.
* HealingHands: Powers that relate to healing are almost exclusively touch-ranged, though they tend to involve some dimensional fuckery rather than outright healing.
* SuperEmpowering: Several Striker powers do this to objects, charging them with effects or properties that they can then use.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Changers]]
Capes with some form of shapeshifting power.
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* MultiformBalance: Changers with multiple alternate forms often have this.
* VoluntaryShapeshifting: All Changer powers involve some form of this.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Trumps]]
Capes whose powers influence or are in some way related to other powers.
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* AllYourPowersCombined: Probably the worst Trump power to fight is one who can copy, steal, or otherwise shuffle through several powers at once.
* {{Antimagic}}: The most dangerous Trumps are those who shut down powers at the source rather than countering their effects.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Trumps whose powers focus exclusively on negating or redirecting the powers of others are pretty much helpless when facing [[BadassNormal anyone without powers]].
* PowerCopying: A versatile, if fairly mild, Trump power is the ability to copy the powers of other parahumans.
* PowerNullifier: One of the more recognizable forms of Trump powers is a way to negate the powers of others.
* MetaPower: Trumps deal in powers which either affect or are affected by the abilities of others, and triggers that grant Trump powers are directly associated with interactions involving parahumans. Positive relations tend to make power gifting or amplifying more likely, whereas the opposite tends to lead to power stealing or nullification.
* NoSell: A more defensive Trump power is immunity to the effect of others' powers. Of note there is that immunity doesn't mean those powers ''stop'' working, just that they don't work on you. Not so great at stopping a hostile cape, but at least you'll be walking away fine.
* PowerParasite: Luckily only one cape is known to have this power, as it's pretty much the trump card of Trump powers.
* SuperEmpowering: One common form of Trump powers is being able to grant powers to others, which is more common if the cape had positive associations with powers prior to triggering.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Strangers]]
Capes whose powers revolve around stealth and infiltration.
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* IntangibleMan: One of the few Stranger powers that focuses on mobility rather than manipulating or avoiding perception.
* {{Invisibility}}: One of the more mundane Stranger powers is invisibility.
* ParanoiaFuel: In-universe, Strangers and Masters are the two biggest causes for paranoia. As Stranger ratings go higher so does the urgency of the responses, going from passwords and marked entrances to constant communication to shoot-on-sight for anyone who goes dark.
* PerceptionFilter: Several types of Stranger powers screw with perception. Sometimes you can't perceive them, sometime you can perceive them but can't perceive of them as a threat, sometime you can perceive them and perceive them as a threat but can't make yourself to act against them...
* StealthExpert: What most Strangers shape up to be, though the effectiveness varies from power to power depending on what they're trying to sneak by.
[[/folder]]
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to:
Go back to the work page for ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' or ''Literature/{{Ward}}''.
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[[center: [-[[Characters/WormUndersiders The Undersiders (Worm)]] | [[Characters/WormBrocktonBayHeroes Heroes in Brockton Bay]] | [[Characters/WormBrocktonBayGangs Gangs of Brockton Bay]] | [[Characters/WormSponsoredHeroes Sponsored Heroes]] | [[Characters/WormWorldwideThreats Worldwide Threats]] | [[Characters/WormOthers Other Characters (Worm)]]]]-]
[[center: [-[[Characters/WardBreakthrough Breakthrough]] | [[Characters/WardTheUndersiders The Undersiders (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardHeroes Heroes (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardVillains Villains (Ward)]] ([[Characters/WardMercenaries Mercenaries]], [[Characters/WardSClassThreats S-Class Threats]]) | [[Characters/WardEarthShin Earth Shin]] | [[Characters/WardOthers Other Characters (Ward)]]]]-]
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'''Due to the application to both''' '''''Worm''''' '''and''' '''''Ward,''''' '''all spoilers for both are unmarked!'''
[[foldercontrol]]
Capes are the colloquial term for parahumans, individuals with superhuman powers granted through a symbiotic link with an extradimensional entity. The nature of these powers as well as how they're applied to humans tend to follow trends based on both human physiology, psychology, and the drives of the entities themselves.
! Passengers and Parahumans
[[folder:The Passengers]]
!!Passengers/Shards/Entities/Agents
The extradimensional entities that grant powers, each of which is a fragment of either the Eden or Zion entities. Needless to say, they're pretty big spoilers.
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* AlienGeometries: Take the form of crystalline structures that fold and unfold like tesseracts.
* BloodKnight: Passengers learn and develop through conflict [[ConflictBall and try to push their hosts into confrontation.]]
* BrainUploading: They take in the memories of their hosts, which in the case of Ashley in ''Ward'', gave her direct memories from her original template, fellow clones, and even the memories of parahumans who happened to know the host.
* BrokenMasquerade: After Scion's death at the end of ''Worm'', trigger events no longer wipe the memories conveyed during the process, and as a result the passengers have become openly acknowledged by capes.
* CastFromLifespan: They're constantly accumulating power as they grow, but it's possible for their human link to draw from them faster than they can replenish and kill them. Taylor finds this out during the battle with Scion when she overuses Doormaker's power.
* FreudianExcuse: Due to the way powers are gained in this setting, practically every villain has this to a degree if they had a natural trigger. Case 53 villains also count due to their disfigurements and memory loss.
* IHaveManyNames: Most commonly known as passengers by parahumans, with Scion referring to them as shards since according to Wildbow they take the form of crystals that fold and unfold like tesseracts. Other names include "fairies" (Glaistig Uaine) and agents.
* {{Nerf}}: The majority of shards granted to hosts are altered to that their powers cannot be used on the Entities.
* ObliviouslyEvil: Hardly evil themselves, as they act on impulse and instinct rather than anything else, but they enable evil people by giving them powers. They simply try and respond to a perceived need by giving people the powers necessary to fix a situation, such as Master powers when socially isolated or Brute powers when in physical danger.
* ParanoiaFuel: Passengers have their own goals and drives based on their purpose, and at least some have influence over the powers they grant and the minds of their linked humans. As a result, there's a lot of unease in-universe about how much any given cape is influenced by their passenger.
* PerceptionFilter: Can render themselves imperceptible to humans, on top of hiding out in out of the way places in barren versions of whatever planet they've chosen.
* PoorCommunicationKills: Quite literally. When Scion was alive, the shards could network all their information together using him as a hub, communicating with each other to find the precise way to adjust themselves so as not to kill their hosts. With Scion dead, all shards are cut off from each other (save cluster-triggers, who have a mini-network with each other), and can no longer communicate with each other, and broken triggers are the result when a shard cannot find enough information to properly match itself to its host.
* StrongerWithAge: They grow in power over time, eventually splitting in two when they're big enough.
* SuperpowerRussianRoulette: It can be a major gamble when getting powers. Sometimes you'll win the lottery like Eidolon or Glaistig Uaine and get gamebreaking powers. On the other hand, there's at least 70 different ways a trigger event can go wrong, from Case 53's where you get horrendously deformed to Case 70's where you and your identical twin get fused into a single being. A parahuman can even happen to be more than one case, as one of Contessa's memories in ''Ward'' has her dealing with two Case 53s who also happened to be fused together into a Case 70.
* TheSymbiote: They fuse with their hosts in order to give them powers.
* WalkingSpoiler: Played with. Their existence isn't even hinted at until a while into the story, and even then it's only as a theory for where powers come from. They become more commonly mentioned later on, and by the time of ''Ward'' they're common knowledge among capes.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Capes in General]]
* AttackItsWeakpoint: The Corona Pollentia, a lump of grey matter about an inch and a half across, embedded between the frontal and partial lobes with connective webbing throughout the entire brain. It's the biological center for the connection with a parahuman's passenger and control of their power, and if damaged or destroyed can render them powerless.
* BewareTheNiceOnes: Some of the nicest capes are that way because their powers are too deadly to use to their full extent, like Sundancer.
* BodyHorror: Case 53s, capes whose powers come with severe mutations as a result of a bad reaction to a Cauldron vial, or directly consuming parts of an Entity, as seen with people from Contessa's home universe. These can vary from turning all of your flesh to metal (Weld) or reducing you to a tentacled face (Sveta).
* ComboPlatterPowers: It's not unusual for someone to have anywhere between two and four powers, or even just one power with multiple parts or applications. A more notable example of this is "cluster triggers," when multiple people trigger at about the same time while fairly close to one another. All the capes involved get their own power reduced by a bit, but also get a version of everyone else's power on top of that.
* DifficultButAwesome: Some powers have major drawbacks, or otherwise need specific scenarios to be used to their full power, but are devastatingly potent when they can be brought fully to bear.
* DiscardAndDraw:
** Second trigger effects work this way. Powers gain additional facets or developments, but there's always some loss or drawback.
** Certain powers require something specific on behalf of their host, such as eye contact or verbal commands to establish a Master effect. If the host becomes incapable of meeting those criteria, such as the aforementioned example becoming blind or deaf, the powers alter to continue to allow their host to use them. This is justified in-universe by the passengers, as their goal of gathering information through the use of powers would fail if their host couldn't use the powers they had.
* LovecraftianSuperpower: Some powers are... less than understanding of things like the laws of physics, biology, or human decency.
* NotWearingTights: Generally averted for similar reasons to why parahumans tend to avoid guns. Putting on a costume, even if it's just a mask, is like putting on a uniform as a parahuman and shows you're playing by the rules, marking you as a valid target to other parahumans. ''Not'' wearing one shows you aren't playing by the scaled-up cops-and-robbers rules and says you're playing for keeps. Case in point: throughout ''Worm'', a story that involves superpowered [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain neo-nazis]], a [[BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood government-controlled social cult]], and [[ApocalypseCult Endbringer worshippers]], the only characters who seek out cape fights while not wearing costumes are [[TheDreaded the Slaughterhouse 9]] and [[TheMenInBlack Cauldron operatives]], considered among the most dangerous groups in the setting.
* OnlyFleshIsSafe: Known in-universe as the Manton Effect. Most powers affect only organic or inorganic materials, hypothesized to be a safeguard preventing powers from harming their wielders that happens to extend to all organic material due to a lack of specificity. That said, some powers can effect any material regardless of its organic or inorganic nature, so this isn't universal.
* PersonalityPowers: A person's personality can have a lot of influence on how their powers manifest.
* PowerAtAPrice: Some powers come with drawbacks, such as alterations to thought processes, loss of certain social or mental skills, or physical mutations.
* PsychicPowers: Zigzagged. "Thought" isn't treated as some force of its own, and the ability to intercept and interpret the neural behavior of a brain is beyond any power seen, making true psychic powers out of reach of everyone but the Simurgh. That said, several Thinker and Master powers are close enough that the difference is largely academic.
* RidiculouslyHumanRobots: Sufficiently advanced mechanical intelligences are capable of triggering and gaining powers.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Most capes are immune to their own powers, with the Manton Effect hypothesized as an overzealous extension of this safeguard to other organic matter.
* TheSleepless: Some parahumans are known as Noctis capes, meaning they have no need to sleep and may actually be unable to. This feature is usually completely unrelated to the main power, making it difficult to anticipate if someone gets this power.
* SuperheroPackingHeat: Generally averted. Bringing firearms to a cape fight indicates a willingness to do greater harm and incites the risk of suffering greater harm, generally showing that someone isn't willing to play by the rules. Using guns tends to get one blacklisted from alliances with other parahumans and makes them targets of heroes and villains alike unless they knock it off. The exceptions are "game shooters," parahumans who use the gun to channel their power, use Tinker guns, have a power to help them ''not'' kill what they're shooting, or otherwise use or involve guns as a facet of their power. That said there are always situations that blur the line, like shooting a Brute to bring down their forcefield but not to injure them, or using a gun to kill someone you would have killed anyways, but even those are frowned upon. Part of it is probably due to Passenger meddling, as making parahumans shy away from guns makes them rely on their powers more and yields more useful data.
* SuperPoweredEvilSide: A few powers have effects on the user's emotions that make their general sanity or morality go down as they use their power to a greater extent, such as Burnscar becoming more sociopathic the more she uses her fire powers.
* TimedPowerUp: Some powers have a battery or time limit that restricts their use, forcing such parahumans to plan around this when using their powers.
* TraumaticSuperpowerAwakening: ''Every single natural trigger.'' Powers are received during a "trigger event", an occasion so stressful or traumatic that a passenger reaches out to give the effected individual powers in an attempt to give them the tools needed to deal with it. Of course, this isn't entirely true. Consuming materials tainted by or derived from one of the two entities can give powers as well, though this carries a higher risk of unwanted secondary mutations. Different circumstances leading to a trigger lead to diiferent powers.
* YourMagicsNoGoodHere: Most powers tend to get funky at best if they don't just straight up stop working upon a parahuman reaching the boundary of the Earth's atmosphere as a result of a combination of the Manton effect (So a teleporter cannot teleport themselves into space and then die from vacuum), and the shards not wanting to encourage travel from their host's home planet. Broken triggers lack this restriction, however.
[[/folder]]
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! Power Classifications
These power classifications exist in-universe as a way for the Parahuman Response team to quickly characterize the sort of powers a cape has and select the appropriate countermeasures for fighting them. Thus, it is important to remember that a cape may have a power that seemingly belongs to one category, but due to the nature of how it works, would give them a rating in another category. For example, if ComicBook/IronMan were a Parahuman, he'd be a fairly high level [[GadgeteerGenius Tinker]], as his engineering skills allow him to build technology far and away more advanced than most others in his universe. However, his focus on flying powered armor and energy beams means that he'd also be rated by the PRT as a powerful [[MadeOfIron Brute]], [[{{Flight}} Mover]], [[SuperStrength Striker]], and [[EnergyWeapon Blaster]], with some [[AwesomeByAnalysis Thinker]] thrown in because of the suit's sensors and combat AI. In countering him, the PRT would have to be sure to have some way to deal with each of his ratings.
Likewise, just because someone has one rating that often goes together with another, doesn't mean that they automatically get that rating. For example, SuperStrength often comes with [[MadeOfIron super toughness]], but not necessarily, so it's very possible in Worm that a character is a Striker only, [[GlassCannon whose punches hit like a truck but otherwise has standard human toughness]]. It's also possible to have a Brute only, who may be capable of [[StoneWall taking hits that would kill anyone else without any ability to do damage in return]].
Finally, remember that the number ratings for each category (Mover 1, Striker 9, etc.) are just an indication for PRT agents of what countermeasures are appropriate for that particular cape -- the higher the number, the more extreme the countermeasures. They are not universal PowerLevels for comparing capes to determine who's the strongest. In general, try not to get hung up too much on any one cape's rating, as even the PRT is willing to change them on the fly to suit the cape's demonstrated ability.
Why the categories' names all rhyme is unknown, but it does sound cool.
[[folder:Movers]]
Capes with a power that grants enhanced mobility.
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* {{Flight}}: Without question the most common Mover power.
* FragileSpeedster: A Mover without Brute powers can move fast and may hit hard if they have some Blaster or Striker effect, but they're just as squishy as a normal human.
* NotQuiteFlight: Some Mover powers are effectively flight, but aren't quite.
* SuperSpeed: Not a commonly seen Mover power, but it exists. When it does show up it's usually coupled with some other power, typically a Breaker one, to prevent it from damaging its user.
* TeleportationWithDrawbacks: One of the more common Mover powers, though usually there's some other power tied in with it.
* WallCrawl: One of the milder Mover powers.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Shakers]]
Capes with powers that effect an area.
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* AreaOfEffect: The basic nature of Shaker powers, though what they do to that area varies wildly.
* CastingAShadow: True cases of shadow manipulation are a Shaker power.
* ElementalPowers: Most tend to shake out as some variety of Shaker power, though some have a Blaster sub-classification thanks to their combat potential.
* EmotionBomb: Powers that alter emotions in an area, such as fear-inducing screams or an awe aura, are a Shaker power.
* GodzillaThreshold: When someone has a Shaker rating of 9+, PRT protocols ''start'' with evacuation of the area in case of conflict.
* GravityMaster: Though it's never seen at levels powerful enough to create mini-blackholes, some Shaker powers can increase, reduce, or redirect gravity.
* HavingABlast: Just creating explosions is a Shaker power, albeit one that's usually coupled with a Blaster rating.
* MasterOfIllusion: When the illusions in question are externally created, it's a Shaker power.
* MindOverMatter: Telekinesis and its more specialized variants is considered a Shaker effect.
* PlayingWithFire: Pyrokinesis is technically a Shaker power, but tends to be coupled with a Blaster classification since, you know, it's [[KillItWithFire fire]].
* PowerOfCreation: Being able to create matter is a Shaker power. Of course, they technically don't ''create'' it so much as draw the mass from another dimension and shape it to their desires, but that's neither here nor there.
* RealityWarper: All Breaker powers to some extent, but true manipulation of that scale is rated higher than the ten on the scale and tend to come with drawbacks.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Brutes]]
Capes with powers that enhance their own strength or durability.
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* AdaptiveAbility: Only seen in Crawler, but considered to be one of the best Brute powers out there.
* BarrierWarrior: Please note that Forcefields are not a Brute ability, and come under Breaker instead.
* BatmanCanBreatheInSpace: Rare, but some Brute capes no longer need to breathe.
* EnergyAbsorption: A Brute power, usually coupled with some sort of Striker or Blaster power to release the absorbed energy.
* GodzillaThreshold: Responding to a 9+ Brute involves intercity missile barrages and only escalates from there.
* HealingFactor: Probably one of the more basic Brute powers.
* IgnoredEnemy: When a Brute is of a higher level than a group is capable of hurting or at least hampering, the standard procedure is to ignore them as much as possible. This can works better than you'd expect, especially if the Brute doesn't have other powers to help them get into the fight or make them hard to ignore, as they can't really do anything if their enemies won't bog themselves down in a fight. It's less practical when the objective of a battle is something beyond "beat these guys," and a lot of capes do have others powers that make ignoring them not really an option.
* {{Immortality}}: Averted. No matter how high someone's Brute rating is, they ''can'' be killed. Just ask Behemoth.
* InstantArmor: Another form of Brute power.
* MightyGlacier: Brutes are the most durable parahumans, but unless they have some Mover power they're vulnerable to being slowed, delayed, or just outrun.
* NighInvulnerable: The most common form of Brute powers is just being outright immune to whatever hits you.
* SuperStrength: Another common Brute power that often goes with the durability is enhanced strength.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Breakers]]
Capes whose power is limited to themselves and their immediate surroundings. The most common form is capes who can transform into an alternate form in which they have powers, but are otherwise normal humans.
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* AchillesHeel: More common than in other classifications. Whether it be a weakness to something specific, a timer or condition on their transformation, an altered mental state, or reverting back to a human form after taking enough damage, most Breakers have some sort of flaw to their SuperMode that will force them to turn back to a regular human sooner or later. Since they usually lack powers when untransformed, the general strategy against a Breaker is to figure out that weakness and then exploiting it to temporarily depower them.
* RealityWarper: Limited in scope, but Breaker powers tend to screw with physics more than most.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Immunity to one's own powers is considered a Breaker trait, making it technically one of the most common powers, though in those case the designation is usually not applied.
* SuperMode: The most obvious form of Breaker powers. Most Breakers actually only have powers while in their alternate form, making the task of reverting them back to human by one way or another the top priority when fighting one.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Masters]]
Capes with powers to control others, whether those others are people, animals, or created minions.
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* AnimalEyeSpy: Masters who directly control animals or people can sometimes see through their minions' senses.
* BadPowersBadPeople: Masters powers are some of the most frightening of the categories and it's been noted Masters tend to be villains more often than not.
* TheBeastmaster: Some Masters control or otherwise manipulate animals, while some can create monsters of their own.
* DemonicPossession: A rarely seen Master power, though it does exist.
* EmotionControl: Surprisingly enough, most emotion controls are actually not classified as Masters. The point of Masters is that they make minions, and most emotion controllers simply lack the strength and/or versatility to actually make people do what they want, being either able to control one emotion strongly, or many emotions weakly. Most are instead classified as Blasters or Shakers.
* MasterOfIllusion: When the illusions in question are a result of sensory manipulation, it's a Master power.
* MookMaker: Powers that create controllable minions are considered Masters, though the exact nature of those minions can wildly vary.
* MoreThanMindControl: Because "thought" isn't some standard force in the ''Worm''-verse, "mind control" usually isn't. When it's not outright puppeteering someone's body, it's typically manipulating them through emotions into wanting to obey.
* ParanoiaFuel: In-universe, Strangers and Masters are the two biggest causes for paranoia.
* PestController: There's at least three precedents for masters that control vermin or other small animals.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tinkers]]
Capes with incredible technological knowledge, though only in a specific field, or with peculiar quirks to their creations or creative process.
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* ArtificialLimbs: A potential Tinker specialty is making limbs.
* AwesomeButImpractical: A common limitation of tinker tech is that the more ambitious a project is, the more unwieldy, unstable, or resource intensive it becomes.
* ClothesMakeTheSuperman: Nearly every Tinker wears some sort of suit or armor laden down with all the gear and tech they need in the field.
* ConditionalPowers: One type of tinker has an extreme level of versatility in what they can build, their specialty instead being a particular range of materials or design philosophy. For instance, a tinker might be able to create any device they can imagine, but it has to be made out of glass, or run on steam power, or all its components have to meet at right angles...
* CrazyPrepared: To a degree. A Tinker can prepare for almost anything, though the nature of their preparations depends on their specialization. The drawback is that they can only be prepared for as much as they can carry equipment for.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Played with. All Tinkers have a specialization in what they can make. What that specialization is can grant them a wide field of options, but they're still limited to that field, so a Tinker specializing in laser guns may not be able to make a forcefield.
* {{Cyborg}}: If you see a person with cybernetics, they're either a Tinker themselves or pretty good friends with one.
* EquivalentExchange: Another common tinker limit is that a project's reliability or effectiveness is proportional to the resources or effort invested into it. These tinkers often focus their efforts on either endlessly improving a small number of swiss-army gadgets, or create large numbers of disposable projects that work just well enough to be usable.
* GadgeteerGenius: Basically what all Tinkers are.
* JackOfAllTrades: So-called free Tinkers can built whatever they want due to a broadness in specialization, though the price they pay can vary wildly. Armsmaster, for example, can make just about anything due to his miniaturization specialization allowing him to pack a lot into a small space. Leet, on the other hand, can make anything at all... so long as it's not too close to anything he's made before.
* {{Jetpack}}: Played with. Due to the versatility flight grants, a lot of Tinkers with the necessary resources create these. However, usually these are either too big and bulky to warrant use outside of a mech suit or too weak to grant more than a slight lift.
* MagicPoweredPseudoscience: The most succinct description of these abilities, as the only limitations for a Tinker's creations are their specialty and their imagination.
* MiniMecha: When a Tinker adds enough to their powered armor it strays into this, though it doesn't happen often.
* PoweredArmor: At least four Tinkers have created these to help them carry and make use of all the specialized gear they need.
* PowerCopying: Of a sort. Tinkers are limited by their specializations, but they can study the work of other Tinkers to create items based on both the observed tech and their own expertise. So a sonics Tinker studying the work of an optics Tinker wouldn't be able to make x-ray cameras, but they could make advanced sights for their own sonic weapons, or adapt the scanning algorithms to improve their sonar. This overlaps into AwesomenessByAnalysis for some tinkers with specialties that let them analyze and reverse-engineer ''any'' cape's powers, either letting them artificially copy the power or [[VariantPowerCopying a rough approximation thereof]]
* PowerIncontinence: Chaos Tinkers don't have much control over the end product they make due to particularly controlling behavior from their passenger.
* ReedRichardsIsUseless: ZigZagged in that the general principals of tinker tech can sometimes be understood and reverse-engineered, leading to many small advances in the setting's technology, their most advanced devices are often so far beyond the edge of human scientific knowledge that even other tinkers can have trouble figuring out ''why'' they work, let alone ''how''. Additionally, tinker devices have a tendency to break in strange, often dangerous, ways at the slightest provocation and often cannot be repaired by anyone but another tinker.
* RobotBuddy: Robotics is a potential Tinker specialization.
* SelfMadeSuperPowers: Another way to conceptualize Tinkers; while they generally don't have native powers, they can build impossible devices that can do things other parahumans need powers to accomplish:
** Armsmaster, as Defiant, replaced his internal organs and parts of his brain with artificial equivalents, reducing his need to sleep, eat, and eliminate waste to less than fifteen minutes a day.
** Mannequin, a tinker who specializes in sustaining life, modified himself to have inhuman reflexes, internal rifling, multiple arms, and various types of lethal gas.
** Bonesaw can emit deadly toxins and poisons from her body while being immune to her own poisons and other diseases.
** In ''Ward'', the team fights a tinker who uses special armbands to turn his arms and legs into lightning arcs that somehow still support his weight.
* SuperPowerLottery: Some Tinkers win this big time, with specializations broad enough that they can make just about anything so long as it abides by a minor limit or two.
* WhereDoesHeGetAllThoseWonderfulToys: Played with. On one hand, it's addressed that creating the stuff they do tends to require a lot of resources. On the other, this doesn't stop any Tinker we've seen so far from pulling all sorts of gadgets out as needed. Justified, though: when your power revolves around resource management, strategy and crafting, you're likely to think up scenarios where you'll need a fall-back plan or two -- and, then make and carry the tools to at least try [=McGyvering=] that plan up at a pinch, should you not be carrying the exact attachments you now need.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Blasters]]
Capes with a ranged power, usually offensive.
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* AbnormalAmmo: There are dozens of different categories, from poison streams to antimatter.
* AnatomyArsenal: The most common blaster techniques are probably EyeBeams, SuperSpit, and HandBlasts.
* EmotionBomb: Some Blaster powers deliver an emotional payload alongside their physical damage.
* GlassCannon: Blaster powers are usually the best for dealing high damage at a distance, but unless they have a Brute of Shaker power to help protect them they go down as easily as a normal human.
* LongRangeFighter: A ranged power is what designates someone as a Blaster.
* ShockAndAwe: When it's in the form of lightning bolts, a Blaster power.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Thinkers]]
Capes with powers related to information gathering and processing.
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* AnimalEyeSpy: Masters who can see through the senses of their pets, whether created or controlled, have a secondary Thinker rating.
* AuraVision: What the aura is can vary wildly, but it's a Thinker power nonetheless.
* BlessedWithSuck: More than most powers, Thinker abilities tend to come with unavoidable alterations to how one intakes and reacts to information, which can have a severe impact on their ability to function normally.
* CombatClairvoyance: The strongest Thinkers can be nearly impossible to touch thanks to how well they know everything happening around them.
* TheEmpath: Emotion detection is a Thinker power.
* GeniusBruiser: Combat Thinkers are Thinkers whose powers lend themselves to physical combat, usually in a way that makes them incredibly obnoxious to deal with.
* InnateNightVision: A mild Thinker power.
* LikeCannotCutLike: Thinker powers cancel each other out at best, and give outright false information at worst. While some people have figured out how to circumvent this, Thinker powers are generally useless against one another.
* SherlockScan: Most Thinker powers let the user gain much more information with a quick glance than a normal person could.
* ShootTheMedicFirst: All things being equal, PRT standard procedure is to target Thinkers first (with Masters second).
* SuperSenses: A form of Thinker power, though pretty low on the rating scale no matter how super they are.
* {{Telepathy}}: A lot of Thinker powers resemble this to some degree, and true telepathy is itself a Thinker power, but there's only one true telepath in the Wormverse.
* TooCleverByHalf: The AchillesHeel of Thinker powers. Their capes can be assured their ideas are perfectly correct despite being way off the mark.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Strikers]]
Capes with a touch-ranged power.
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* {{Biomanipulation}}: Technically there's only one ''true'' case of this, but it's touch range.
* CloseRangeCombatant: By the nature of Striker powers, they have to touch a target to affect it. As such, those whose powers focus on debilitating an enemy rely on this fighting style.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: A common Striker ability is the power to drastically manipulate the impact of melee attacks.
* HealingHands: Powers that relate to healing are almost exclusively touch-ranged, though they tend to involve some dimensional fuckery rather than outright healing.
* SuperEmpowering: Several Striker powers do this to objects, charging them with effects or properties that they can then use.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Changers]]
Capes with some form of shapeshifting power.
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* MultiformBalance: Changers with multiple alternate forms often have this.
* VoluntaryShapeshifting: All Changer powers involve some form of this.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Trumps]]
Capes whose powers influence or are in some way related to other powers.
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* AllYourPowersCombined: Probably the worst Trump power to fight is one who can copy, steal, or otherwise shuffle through several powers at once.
* {{Antimagic}}: The most dangerous Trumps are those who shut down powers at the source rather than countering their effects.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Trumps whose powers focus exclusively on negating or redirecting the powers of others are pretty much helpless when facing [[BadassNormal anyone without powers]].
* PowerCopying: A versatile, if fairly mild, Trump power is the ability to copy the powers of other parahumans.
* PowerNullifier: One of the more recognizable forms of Trump powers is a way to negate the powers of others.
* MetaPower: Trumps deal in powers which either affect or are affected by the abilities of others, and triggers that grant Trump powers are directly associated with interactions involving parahumans. Positive relations tend to make power gifting or amplifying more likely, whereas the opposite tends to lead to power stealing or nullification.
* NoSell: A more defensive Trump power is immunity to the effect of others' powers. Of note there is that immunity doesn't mean those powers ''stop'' working, just that they don't work on you. Not so great at stopping a hostile cape, but at least you'll be walking away fine.
* PowerParasite: Luckily only one cape is known to have this power, as it's pretty much the trump card of Trump powers.
* SuperEmpowering: One common form of Trump powers is being able to grant powers to others, which is more common if the cape had positive associations with powers prior to triggering.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Strangers]]
Capes whose powers revolve around stealth and infiltration.
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* IntangibleMan: One of the few Stranger powers that focuses on mobility rather than manipulating or avoiding perception.
* {{Invisibility}}: One of the more mundane Stranger powers is invisibility.
* ParanoiaFuel: In-universe, Strangers and Masters are the two biggest causes for paranoia. As Stranger ratings go higher so does the urgency of the responses, going from passwords and marked entrances to constant communication to shoot-on-sight for anyone who goes dark.
* PerceptionFilter: Several types of Stranger powers screw with perception. Sometimes you can't perceive them, sometime you can perceive them but can't perceive of them as a threat, sometime you can perceive them and perceive them as a threat but can't make yourself to act against them...
* StealthExpert: What most Strangers shape up to be, though the effectiveness varies from power to power depending on what they're trying to sneak by.
[[/folder]]
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* PowerCopying: A versatile, if fairly mild, Trump power.
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* PowerCopying: A versatile, if fairly mild, Trump power.power is the ability to copy the powers of other parahumans.
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* MetaPower: Trumps deal in powers which either affect or are affected by the abilities of others.
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* MetaPower: Trumps deal in powers which either affect or are affected by the abilities of others.others, and triggers that grant Trump powers are directly associated with interactions involving parahumans. Positive relations tend to make power gifting or amplifying more likely, whereas the opposite tends to lead to power stealing or nullification.
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* SuperEmpowering: One common form of Trump powers is being able to grant powers to others.
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* SuperEmpowering: One common form of Trump powers is being able to grant powers to others.others, which is more common if the cape had positive associations with powers prior to triggering.
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* ArtificialLimbs: A potential Tinker specialty.
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* ArtificialLimbs: A potential Tinker specialty.specialty is making limbs.
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* {{Cyborg}}: If you see one, they're either a Tinker themselves or pretty good friends with one.
* EquivalentExchange: another common tinker limit is that a project's reliability or effectiveness is proportional to the resources or effort invested into it. These tinkers often focus their efforts on either endlessly improving a small number of swiss-army gadgets, or create large numbers of disposable projects that work just well enough to be usable.
* EquivalentExchange: another common tinker limit is that a project's reliability or effectiveness is proportional to the resources or effort invested into it. These tinkers often focus their efforts on either endlessly improving a small number of swiss-army gadgets, or create large numbers of disposable projects that work just well enough to be usable.
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* {{Cyborg}}: If you see one, a person with cybernetics, they're either a Tinker themselves or pretty good friends with one.
* EquivalentExchange:another Another common tinker limit is that a project's reliability or effectiveness is proportional to the resources or effort invested into it. These tinkers often focus their efforts on either endlessly improving a small number of swiss-army gadgets, or create large numbers of disposable projects that work just well enough to be usable.
* EquivalentExchange:
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Why the categories RhymeOnADime is unknown, but it does sound cool.
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Why the categories RhymeOnADime categories' names all rhyme is unknown, but it does sound cool.
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Why the categories RhymeOnADime is unknown, but it does sound cool.
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[[center: [-[[Characters/WardBreakthrough Breaththrough]] | [[Characters/WardTheUndersiders The Undersiders (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardHeroes Heroes (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardVillains Villains (Ward)]] ([[Characters/WardMercenaries Mercenaries]], [[Characters/WardSClassThreats S-Class Threats]]) | [[Characters/WardEarthShin Earth Shin]] | [[Characters/WardOthers Other Characters (Ward)]]]]-]
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[[center: [-[[Characters/WardBreakthrough Breaththrough]] Breakthrough]] | [[Characters/WardTheUndersiders The Undersiders (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardHeroes Heroes (Ward)]] | [[Characters/WardVillains Villains (Ward)]] ([[Characters/WardMercenaries Mercenaries]], [[Characters/WardSClassThreats S-Class Threats]]) | [[Characters/WardEarthShin Earth Shin]] | [[Characters/WardOthers Other Characters (Ward)]]]]-]
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* SuperStrength: Another common Brute power that is often goes with the durability.
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* SuperStrength: Another common Brute power that is often goes with the durability.durability is enhanced strength.
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Capes with powers that enhance their own durability.
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Capes with powers that enhance their own strength or durability.
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* SuperStrength: Another common Brute power that is often goes with the durability.
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* CloseRangeCombatant: By the nature of Striker powers, they have to touch a target to effect it. As such, those whose powers focus on debilitating an enemy rely on this fighting style.
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* CloseRangeCombatant: By the nature of Striker powers, they have to touch a target to effect affect it. As such, those whose powers focus on debilitating an enemy rely on this fighting style.style.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: A common Striker ability is the power to drastically manipulate the impact of melee attacks.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: A common Striker ability is the power to drastically manipulate the impact of melee attacks.
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More accurate.
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* {{Teleportation}}: One of the more common Mover powers, though usually there's some other power tied in with it.
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* {{Teleportation}}: TeleportationWithDrawbacks: One of the more common Mover powers, though usually there's some other power tied in with it.
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* MetaPower: Trumps deal in powers which either affect or are affected by the abilities of others.
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Frickin' Laser Beams entry amended in accordance with this Trope Repair Shop Thread
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These power classifications exist in-universe as a way for the Parahuman Response team to quickly characterize the sort of powers a cape has and select the appropriate countermeasures for fighting them. Thus, it is important to remember that a cape may have a power that seemingly belongs to one category, but due to the nature of how it works, would give them a rating in another category. For example, if ComicBook/IronMan were a Parahuman, he'd be a fairly high level [[GadgeteerGenius Tinker]], as his engineering skills allow him to build technology far and away more advanced than most others in his universe. However, his focus on flying powered armor and energy beams means that he'd also be rated by the PRT as a powerful [[MadeOfIron Brute]], [[{{Flight}} Mover]], [[SuperStrength Striker]], and [[FrickingLaserBeams Blaster]], with some [[AwesomeByAnalysis Thinker]] thrown in because of the suit's sensors and combat AI. In countering him, the PRT would have to be sure to have some way to deal with each of his ratings.
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These power classifications exist in-universe as a way for the Parahuman Response team to quickly characterize the sort of powers a cape has and select the appropriate countermeasures for fighting them. Thus, it is important to remember that a cape may have a power that seemingly belongs to one category, but due to the nature of how it works, would give them a rating in another category. For example, if ComicBook/IronMan were a Parahuman, he'd be a fairly high level [[GadgeteerGenius Tinker]], as his engineering skills allow him to build technology far and away more advanced than most others in his universe. However, his focus on flying powered armor and energy beams means that he'd also be rated by the PRT as a powerful [[MadeOfIron Brute]], [[{{Flight}} Mover]], [[SuperStrength Striker]], and [[FrickingLaserBeams [[EnergyWeapon Blaster]], with some [[AwesomeByAnalysis Thinker]] thrown in because of the suit's sensors and combat AI. In countering him, the PRT would have to be sure to have some way to deal with each of his ratings.
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* BarrierWarrior: Please note that Forcefields are not a Brute ability, and come under Breaker instead.
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* InstantArmor: Another form of Brute power.
