Incarnates for non-elementalists?
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2011-04-07 15:33 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
I recolored my Pyronic Judgement grey and have been RPing it as a high powered explosive grenade. Which works for the moment.
I'd love to see it with, say, the multi-missile blasts from those Heavy Troopers or the Rikti Pylons. Heck, I'd love a power with those, period.
Another thing I was thinking of is good for melee weapons users. Basically it's like Rain of Arrows, but with your weapon of choice. Fire it off, and you have a big pile of axes or swords or hammers or whatever falling out of the sky.
For a Stone Judgement power... hell, just give me the same power as that boss in the last mission of the Admiral Sutter TF and I'll be happy. You know the one.
You want to know the secret of the world? It's this: Save it, and it'll repay you, every second of every day.
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I was actually thinking of something along those lines, myself. I mean, you can't describe my visions of a "physical Judgement" as anything but Foot Stomp++, after all, so why not Hail of Bullets++ or Long Range Missile++ or some such?|
Originally Posted by Bronze Knight
I wonder if they could also do a [Hail of Bullets V2 on meth], judgment option.
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Something that just now became apparent to me is that all of the Judgement powers look magical in nature, much as I don't want to go with the "Well is magic" argument. What I mean by that is "you shoot elements out of your hands" is inherently slanted more towards magic or at least inborn powers, and doesn't leave much room for technology and, more than anything else, non-elemental-users. That's not to say a technologist can't explain these away, but more that a technologist may want missiles, guns or orbital lasers more than shooting lightning from his closed fists.
This concerns more than visual design, however. It concerns a fundamental conceptual problem with the Well of the Furies and the power it gives us. Are we treating the Well like an Epic pool, where the powers we gain can be explained as natural to us, just "unlocked" by the well, or are we treating the Well as a Patron, seeing the powers it gives us as powers alien to our characters given to us by another entity. In other words, by becoming an Incarnate, am I becoming better at what I used to do, or am I simply wielding someone else's powers?
That's a relevant question, I think, because it harkens back to Patron Pools and the arguments around those.
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Originally Posted by rian_frostdrake
well sam, heres an idea, super-sam has a huper powered brain, well, technically you could stretch science a bit and go with ion judgement and rationalize it as him brain being able to generate powerful synaptic electricity(the little zaps that travel down the axons in your brain cells) that he can then expel as a weapon.
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In Sam's case, what's defining to him is his speed, both in reaction and in action. He's the guy who will always spot a trap before it's even sprung, see the hidden sniper a mile away, catch thrown knives out of the air, cut people so fast they can't even attempt to block, shoot a flea in a hurricane and so forth. Yeah, I've occasionally stepped up his powers into amazing long-distance slashes with the typical "cutting wind" concept that shows up in so much anime, but his offence consists of cutting and shooting. Anything more than that just steps into a different character that I didn't write, because I didn't like it.
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Now, of course, I'm not arguing that there should be a Katana Incarnate, like, RIGHT NOW! But I just wish there were something which were easier to explain. It's fairly easy to think of something for might, but for speed and/or agility?
I have a thought rolling around in my head about something to do with transparent shadows, like what you see in Hail of Bullets. Say, your character first crouches, then disappears and splits into transparent shadows which go off in all directions, slashing/punching along the way. Yeah, this sounds kind of magic, like you're creating clones of yourself, but I could easily explain it as a character being so fast it feels like he's everywhere at once and manages to hit many people as if simultaneously. It's the classic Western tale of "six shots that sound like one."
It seems to me, now that I think about it, that the power of the Well seems overly focused on elements an energies, leaving physicality, such as strength, speed or agility behind. And, really, those are legitimate super powers. I mean, speed and agility is pretty much all the Flash has, right?
Like I said before - this is idle speculation, mostly for the sake of wrapping my head around the various concepts I have cooking. For an actual implementation, we'll see what we get in due time.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Maybe you can color Cryonic in brown, to look like crystal-earth-whatever magic power.
Btw, I know the devs said the power trees will be expanded, but since 4 issues after I16, we still have power customization incomplete, I think this will be unfinished/unexpanded too.
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On the one hand, yeah - they have the habit of making about half a feature with promise of finishing it "later" and never getting around to it. On the other hands, Incarnates seem to be "the thing" these days, and probably for the next few Issues, so there actually is a legitimate chance they may finish a feature before shelving it for a change.|
Originally Posted by Angelxman81
Maybe you can color Cryonic in brown, to look like crystal-earth-whatever magic power.
Btw, I know the devs said the power trees will be expanded, but since 4 issues after I16, we still have power customization incomplete, I think this will be unfinished/unexpanded too. |
Expanding the power trees may not be a bad idea, though. For a collection of powers that span all 14 ATs, it's surprising to me that there isn't more variety in Incarnate powers. I had a look through the Blaster Epics yesterday, looking for possible themes, and I discovered that Blasters get a broader range of themes in their Epics than they get from Incarnate powers.
Incarnates are Fire, Ice, Dark and Electric, whereas Blaster Epics are Fire, Ice, Electric, Force and "Guns"
Granted, they don't have Dark (yet, if we EVER see more powerset proliferation they might), but that's still five Epic themes to four Incarnate themes.And, by the way, I still feel that "guns" should be a legitimate divine power. I would totally pray to Boltlock, the god of Guns
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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I've not read every comment on this thread, so forgive me if this has already been mentioned. Instead of trying to write in the incarnate power as an expansion of your characters own powers, don't. It's widely known that the origin of the incarnate powers is the Well of the Furies so the powers granted to you by the well may, or may not, perfectly coincide with your own powers. It's the well's design to make your character more powerful, not necessarily your characters powers.
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That's a problem, though. Over the years, I've listed many reasons as "one of the biggest" why I'm still here, but by far THE biggest is that City of Heroes allows me to make my characters to my concepts, who look as I envisioned them and have powers that match or at least approach what I originally had in mind. In essence, I'm playing my characters, rather than selecting from a list of preset characters the developers made for me.|
Originally Posted by Phewmite
I've not read every comment on this thread, so forgive me if this has already been mentioned. Instead of trying to write in the incarnate power as an expansion of your characters own powers, don't. It's widely known that the origin of the incarnate powers is the Well of the Furies so the powers granted to you by the well may, or may not, perfectly coincide with your own powers. It's the well's design to make your character more powerful, not necessarily your characters powers.
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I can look past certain limitations, such as Samuel Tow not having the dual handguns + Katana combo he's supposed to, or Ezikiel being slower than I'd want, or hell, even Crash glowing red when she's not supposed to glow at all. But I balk every time I'm expected to explain a power which is completely out of character for one of mine to have. I'm not a power gamer. I don't take powers because they're good DPS or because they stack with each other or whatever. I pick powers because they make sense.
Now, I'm not saying Incarnate powers necessarily don't make sense for anyone ever. Like I said - a lot of characters can have a very easy time explaining them. My own Grimwall was a Fire/Fire/Flame Blaster turned Fire/Fire/Pyre Scrapper. Take a guess which Judgement makes sense for her to have
Revenant Jack is simialr - he's a D3 Scrapper, eventually to be Dark/Dark/Dark/Void. But it doesn't make sense for all concepts, at least from where I'm standing, and I'll be spending a lot of my time playing said characters trying to find a solution that I can work with.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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And not a singular groundpunch like the alternative animation for foot stomp (which I love)--but a ground "PUNCHPUNCHPUNCHPUNCHPUNCH" sort of thing...
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Originally Posted by Benchpresser
But yes... a Groundpunch opotion would be superb!!
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Like others, I love attacks that feel mighty. Foot stomps, ground punches, attacks that make me feel like I'm putting my foot down and shaking the world. I want to elbow drop the planet and make things go boom around me.
The tricky thing with a lot of the attacks suggested is that all Judgement powers have a 2 second animation time. So they can't be long, drawn out Final Fantasy Limit Break attacks where a cutscene plays every time you use it. :P
You want to know the secret of the world? It's this: Save it, and it'll repay you, every second of every day.
@Dr. Reverend - My DeviantArt Gallery
Crow Call - Gods of the Golden Age
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To be honest, if any attack in the game deserved to be longer, Judgement would be it. I mean, we have attacks that take up to 3.3 seconds (like Total Focus) and 4.0 seconds (Full Auto) and those still get used. In fact, a lot of those look like a souped-up versions of Full Auto - 90s recharge, more damage, higher target cap, faster animation, no crash.|
Originally Posted by Doc_Reverend
The tricky thing with a lot of the attacks suggested is that all Judgement powers have a 2 second animation time. So they can't be long, drawn out Final Fantasy Limit Break attacks where a cutscene plays every time you use it. :P
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Even if we have to keep down to two seconds, though, there's still room for some more physical powers. A bigger, more impressive version of Ground Punch with a larger radius, more screen shake, maybe a geyser of dust or debris... I would totally use that, and on quite a few characters.
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I wonder if we'll ever get very powerful single-target attacks... That might be interesting to see.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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I honestly think this could be solved with animation changes instead of whole new powers(though I wouldn't be apposed to them). OK take pyronic judgement the fire one what if we could be allowed to shoot that out of assault rifle or even dual pistols. What about a swing of a sword only for a giant fireball/lightning etc to come flying off as seen in many animes(inuyasha anyone). Just some ideas.
This games all about customization and I would very like some of these things to be better explainable as well.
My Plant/TA controller is a Natural hero who wears body armor, carries a bow with trick arrows, and has a bag of ancient quick-grow seeds she found in an archeological dig. She'll be getting the Pyronic Judgement power and rationalizing it as a high-tech incendiary device that Vanguard is letting her test.
My Sonic defender is a Tech hero with a cloak made of piezoelectric fabric he invented that converts electricity to sound. He'll be getting the Clarion Destiny and probably the Void Judgement, and rationalizing them as advanced tweaks to his super-tech sonic cloak.
My Thugs/Traps MM is Natural. She's the ringleader of a carnival troupe with a lot of black ops gadgets. She already has the Fire APP, which is just carnival tricks (rings of fire and such) applied to combat. She'll probably be rationalizing the incarnate powers as high technology gifts from an alien or a praetorian that the carnival is now sheltering.
In a universe as open-ended as this one, there's a way to work cosmic powers into any character concept.
...
New Webcomic -- Genocide Man
Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass slaughter can be hilarious.
Few more nifty things I saw, if they'll help you Sam.
Void colored blue/light blue and passed off as a personal force field explosion. Character was natural with tech elements.
Void colored bright freaking purple and explained as a psychic detonation.
Pyronic colored murk/bright green and explained as an acid bomb (this was the coolest, especially considering Pyronic leaves those scorch marks on the ground).
Ion colored solid black and explained as a biomechanical nanite swarm that spreads through enemies and eats away at their bodies.
Pyronic colored solid white and explained as "the most powerful flashbang grenade in existence."
My guides:Dark Melee/Dark Armor/Soul Mastery, Illusion Control/Kinetics/Primal Forces Mastery, Electric Armor
"Dark Armor is a complete waste as a tanking set."
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Cosmic-level powers, yes. But not every concept benefits from having fire, ice, electric or dark powers, is my argument. And again - you can explain anything and everything with enough handwaving, but after a certain point, you're no longer talking about the same characters. And I don't really want just any character out there. I'm rather very specific with who and what I want my characters to be.|
Originally Posted by RemusShepherd
In a universe as open-ended as this one, there's a way to work cosmic powers into any character concept.
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When I say "super reflexes, katana, pistols," I mean "super reflexes, katana, pistols." Not "and psychic powers" or "that and super tech" or "that and magitek gadgets." Characters are defined by what they CAN'T do as much as by what they can, and while I've no problem upping their power levels to ludicrous degrees, it's how those power levels manifest that concerns me.
Really, if we get down to this particular argument thread, it's no different from when Patron Pools came out. Some people jumped at the change to use Arachnos tech, some people insisted they "stole" the Arachnos tech and some managed to explain them as personal powers. I, personally, simply never used them almost at all. My Electric/Electric Brute is (or was) aiming to snag Scirocco's Mu Lightning simply because of what villain Electric Melee/Armour looks like, and I have a Fire/Fire Brute alien who's rationalising Black Scorpion's Mace powers as alien tech. He's currently on hold, since genuine fire powers make much more sense for him, but Fire epics can't be recoloured.
Then and now, it has always been possible to explain why a particular character has a particular power... If you're not the owner of said character or not terribly particular about what the character should represent. And I know this is probably my fault, but I've already told many, many stories regarding these characters I'm talking about. They're established in my own universe. It's been seven years since Samuel Tow was created, and his story and concept has settled into a very static state over time as I felt comfortable with what I wanted.
This is the character I want to play - super reflexes, katana, pistols. And nothing else. If I can't find a way to explain his new-found powers as an extension of his own skills, then he will not have such powers.
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In a broader sense, Judgement powers seem very hard to justify for weapon users in general, and I have MANY of them. I have 2xAxe, 2xMace, 4xSword, 3xKatana, 3xDuam Blades, 4xClaws and really very few of them have an elemental secondary to match their weapons. Most of those are pure weapon users, and at least 6 are at or near level 50. Suffice it to say that I have a lot of thinking to do.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Those do give me a few good ideas, actually. I have a psychc, a toxic monster and a man whose body is made up of nannites, so that's not a bad call. That's at least three characters down, which isn't bad, truth be told.
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Originally Posted by Nalrok_AthZim
Few more nifty things I saw, if they'll help you Sam.
Void colored blue/light blue and passed off as a personal force field explosion. Character was natural with tech elements. Void colored bright freaking purple and explained as a psychic detonation. Pyronic colored murk/bright green and explained as an acid bomb (this was the coolest, especially considering Pyronic leaves those scorch marks on the ground). Ion colored solid black and explained as a biomechanical nanite swarm that spreads through enemies and eats away at their bodies. Pyronic colored solid white and explained as "the most powerful flashbang grenade in existence." |
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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My favorite way to explain the new powers is that I'm tapping into an outside source of powers, a "well" of powers if you will, and using this new source for new powers.
Issue 16 made me feel like this.
Warning: This poster likes to play Devil's Advocate.
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Yeah my plan for explaining the new powers on my AR/Dev is along those lines:|
Originally Posted by Nalrok_AthZim
and I've even seen a few Arachnos Soldiers/AR Blasters pass off Pyronic as a high-output incendiary grenade.
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Pyronic Judgement: Incendiary Grenades
Reactive Interface: Incendiary Bullets
Rebirth Destiny: Nanite Healing Swarm
The Lore is a little trickier, I eventually decided it's going to be some Praetorian Resistance Allies teleporting in to help him. I haven't made up my mind if it's going to be the Praetorian version of him (who would be a renegade IDF Commander) or some Seers that he rescued.
However for the Caridac Alpha the lore is that he figured out a way to tap into the power of the well and use it as a supplementary power source for his armor.
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Dude, maybe you could help me. I'm gonna post a thread over in Virtue and ask the players there for some RP advice on Lore. Mind popping by in, oh... 5 minutes?
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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
Yeah my plan for explaining the new powers on my AR/Dev is along those lines:
Pyronic Judgement: Incendiary Grenades Reactive Interface: Incendiary Bullets Rebirth Destiny: Nanite Healing Swarm The Lore is a little trickier, I eventually decided it's going to be some Praetorian Resistance Allies teleporting in to help him. I haven't made up my mind if it's going to be the Praetorian version of him (who would be a renegade IDF Commander) or some Seers that he rescued. However for the Caridac Alpha the lore is that he figured out a way to tap into the power of the well and use it as a supplementary power source for his armor. |
My guides:Dark Melee/Dark Armor/Soul Mastery, Illusion Control/Kinetics/Primal Forces Mastery, Electric Armor
"Dark Armor is a complete waste as a tanking set."
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^This. These powers do not come from us, they come from the Well of Furies. With each of my characters, I examine whether or not they would even pursue power from the Well, which is an ammoral entity at best, and a malevolent, manipulative, and evil entity at worst. |
Originally Posted by Vanden
My favorite way to explain the new powers is that I'm tapping into an outside source of powers, a "well" of powers if you will, and using this new source for new powers.
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Characters who feel more power is worth risking their morality, obviously will choose the power that gives them the most strength, regardless of how it matches their inherrent abilities.
Characters who believe that the Pratorian threat warrants risking it, will choose the power that serves the cause best, once again, regardless of how it matches their inherrent abilities.
Super goody-two shoes red white and blue hero types who don't want to risk their morality for more power will not pursue the Incarnate path for fear that it will compromise their moral code.
If you throw out in-game lore all together than any of thousands of explanations will work.
Example: This power did not come from the Well...I made a super cool ray gun that shoots stuff that looks like it came from the Well, but is a different color.
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I disagree. This is a horrible and, above all, unnecessary plot device. One would have thought the Origin of Powers controversy would have made it clear that re-writing people's concepts for them is not a good idea, and yet now we get a new source of power that's not our own? Why? What was wrong with giving us a source of power that enhanced OUR powers and gave us access to new powers which could be explained as extensions of our own? Like Epics. What was wrong with Epics? You could always claim your Ring of Fire on your BS/Regen Scrapper was a gift from the gods, or you could claim it was part of his true power all along. Why go the route of Patrons? Why keep stepping on people's concepts?|
Originally Posted by Irish Fury
^This. These powers do not come from us, they come from the Well of Furies. With each of my characters, I examine whether or not they would even pursue power from the Well, which is an ammoral entity at best, and a malevolent, manipulative, and evil entity at worst.
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I'm going to be honest here - I do not want to compromise my concepts by writing gods into them for no real reason, not when a better explanation could have been had. I will do my very best to write MY characters by MY rules, and if I can't, then such characters will not be written. I didn't spend the last seven years writing for these guys only to swap them out for someone else's reinterpretation of what they were always supposed to be.
I'm looking for reasonable explanations for how Incarnate powers can fit MY characters without changing them into someone else's characters, or changing them into characters that aren't nearly as interesting. For some, this is easy - triple fire powers get pyronic, triple ice powers get the ice Judgement, triple dark get the dark one and so forth. Beyond that, there can be a fair few reinterpretations of what the powers actually represent, like Void being evil psychic powers or Ion being nanomachines and so forth. But beyond even that, there is nothing.
I'm prepared to reinterpret what the powers constitute, but I have no interest in reinterpreting what my characters constitute. I didn't do it for Patrons, I didn't do it for the Origin of Powers, I didn't do it for Vanguard, Midnight, Praetoria and whatnot. I'm not about to start now. That's why I put this argument in my original post - I'm not interested in re-imagining my characters into something they're not, for the simple fact that I like what I came up with and I don't like the things I didn't make them all along. That's why I didn't make them into those other things.
Simply put - I'm looking for explanations of how Incarnate powers could work for my EXISTING characters without needing to re-write them. For the most part, they actually do work pretty well. For the rest, I'll keep looking for an explanation, or alternatively keep waiting for more options. My own fiction is the primary reason why I'm still here, and I have no intention of compromising that. Nothing is worth that.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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For tech/gadget based powers it's relatively easy: All that stuff can presumably be recreated by gadgets. Likewise magic (It's magic, duh)
It's the natural heroes who are trickier.
"Men strunt �r strunt och snus �r snus
om ock i gyllne dosor.
Och rosor i ett sprucket krus
�r st�ndigt alltid rosor."
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I understand that, but...you already have a katana that can cut through a Freak Tank's armor, and your super reflexes allow you to dodge fireballs and radiation emissions. You're already using magitek. Is it that difficult to envision an extra layer of magitek to explain the incarnate abilities?|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
When I say "super reflexes, katana, pistols," I mean "super reflexes, katana, pistols." Not "and psychic powers" or "that and super tech" or "that and magitek gadgets."
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This is the character I want to play - super reflexes, katana, pistols. And nothing else. If I can't find a way to explain his new-found powers as an extension of his own skills, then he will not have such powers. In a broader sense, Judgement powers seem very hard to justify for weapon users in general, and I have MANY of them. I have 2xAxe, 2xMace, 4xSword, 3xKatana, 3xDuam Blades, 4xClaws and really very few of them have an elemental secondary to match their weapons. Most of those are pure weapon users, and at least 6 are at or near level 50. Suffice it to say that I have a lot of thinking to do. |
Well, Pyronic is a ranged AoE, and Cryonic is a cone. It wouldn't be hard to justify them as special ammunition for a gun, *if* we could change the animation to use a gun when the powers are fired. That's a big 'if', though.
To be honest I don't like any of the options in the Lore set, and for most of my characters I intend to slot Lore but never summon the pets. Even if my heroes *had* the ability to summon the souls of defeated enemies they wouldn't *do* it. It's an incredibly unheroic thing to do.
Maybe you could slot the incarnate powers for the level boost, but just not use them?
...
New Webcomic -- Genocide Man
Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass slaughter can be hilarious.
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More or less. But I want to reword that a bit. It's not so much the "natural" characters that are the problem, as "natural" could stand for "energy being from another dimension," as it's the non-elemental, non-energy characters that present a quandary. If your character of choice wields fire, ice, ligntning, energy, darkness, radiation or so forth, there's always a legitimate option, at the very least a kludge.|
Originally Posted by Arilou
For tech/gadget based powers it's relatively easy: All that stuff can presumably be recreated by gadgets. Likewise magic (It's magic, duh)
It's the natural heroes who are trickier. |
However, if your character uses guns, melee weapons or is otherwise physical - by which I mean his super power is HIS BODY - then there is no legitimate option, as Incarnate powers that use the body as a weapon haven't been instituted yet. And I say "yet" because I hope that won't always be the case. Precedent casts an unfavourable light on the situation, but we'll see.
Like I said, though - a mega ground punch, super guns and/or a "multi-strike" option would not go amiss.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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This is a fair point. I suppose as a relatively new player (9 months), it is easier to build my characters around the lore, but I can certainly understand the frustration of a player who has developed a character over seven years now being told where their power originates. Point conceded. Samuel Tow-1 ; Irish Fury-0.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
I'm going to be honest here - I do not want to compromise my concepts by writing gods into them for no real reason, not when a better explanation could have been had. I will do my very best to write MY characters by MY rules, and if I can't, then such characters will not be written. I didn't spend the last seven years writing for these guys only to swap them out for someone else's reinterpretation of what they were always supposed to be.
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Giving your character access to a lore-based source of power doesn't rewrite your concept any more than having them fight Trolls or Outcasts. You provide the character, CoH provides the world, and the Well and Incarnate system are part of the world.
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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
I disagree. This is a horrible and, above all, unnecessary plot device. One would have thought the Origin of Powers controversy would have made it clear that re-writing people's concepts for them is not a good idea, and yet now we get a new source of power that's not our own?
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Issue 16 made me feel like this.
Warning: This poster likes to play Devil's Advocate.
well sam, heres an idea, super-sam has a huper powered brain, well, technically you could stretch science a bit and go with ion judgement and rationalize it as him brain being able to generate powerful synaptic electricity(the little zaps that travel down the axons in your brain cells) that he can then expel as a weapon.
. i always balk at adding too much dbz style blasts to marital arts, thats one style of martial arts films, but not the only, or even main one. and going with a fancy shuriken limits us to looking too close to the pool powers(and cuts out practitioners of non-japanese styles, thematically) so yeah, really the issue is that non-elemental covers a lot of things, swords dont specifically mean medieval or samurai movie, and with the variety of weapons customization, you can run from tech to naturalistic to fantasy. best i can say is the pistol(add some high tech looking options too) would be a start, maybe when we are working on the customizations later on we could go a bit further with alternate animations that would include a more techie heads up display and orbital blast, or a magic glyph(maybe rune of warding, nudge nudge) as the animation, and then while they still are technically elemental, you would have more thematic breadth
as for Ezekiel, stone/stone, id actually think, barring waiting for a stone judgement, fire for his ability to generate powerful geothermal energy.
now for the discussion, good question, rian is a marital artist, but hes also a dragon, ..named frostdrake, so not a huge amount of thought on that one. but i can see your point quite well. ya know, one thing i was speculating long ago would be some sort of customizable weapon, like thors hammer, that would open to us, maybe a pistol that just does crazy hand cannon style aoe blasts wouldn't be out of the question, and it would work well for your concept, better than my brain chemistry bodge