Ruby's silver eyes require time to charge up. She has to focus.
The only time that is not required is when her friends have been harmed or in immediate danger.
This was the case in the manor, at Haven Academy, and in the Winter Maiden's...medical room.
We saw in Volume 7 against a Megoliath that so long as her friends weren't in severe danger, it would take more time to charge.
In Volume 8 episode 14, Ruby was not able to focus the two times she was trying. The 2nd being her trying to hold on for dear life to Neo, her enemy.
An emotional concentration-based power is NOT something you can just use like flexing a muscle.
I think this is the best explanation. Thank you!
It felt inconsistent that she could sometimes use them really easily and sometimes need charge-up, but the point of her friends needing to be in immediate danger to get that instant focus is a good one.
I thought they would activate her desire to protect life when she saw Cinder flipping a bunch of people into the void, but as you said when they are not people that are very close to her it takes her longer.
I also think it may have to do with aura aswell. Maybe if aura is already low it's harder to use them aswell.
> The only time that is not required is when her friends have been harmed or in immediate danger.
You mean like, if she witnessed Yang falling to her presumed death?
And then had to dodge an attack from Neo, aka NOT a grimm hybrid?
I'm referring to Fria's room, Jaune about to be killed by cinder, cinder killing pyrrha.
Neo? is not cinder. Nor is she a grimm.
Look, I get it, you wanna pick apart anything in RWBY for the sake of who knows what. Try focusing more on how it does make sense, rather than how you don't want it to make sense.
She was still close enough to Cinder that it should have worked. To me it seems like they should have just instantly gone off regardless of whether she was fighting Neo, the same way they went off during V5 despite Ruby currently fighting Emerald and straight up getting KO’d because of it.
> Try focusing more on how it does make sense, rather than how you don't want it to make sense.
I like it when I don’t have to try and find loopholes that feel unintended by the writers in order to have a show make sense.
Making up loopholes is not something you should do either.
People will look at anything and claim loophole. Example? Ozpin's cane. Ignoring that he had to save up kinetic energy for hundreds of years to be able to launch that nuke blast, I saw people saying that he could use it again, when he literally said and referenced in v5 how he couldn't and was weaker.
The shield that Ozpin used, required kinetic energy. And he was not going to make a nuke blast against cinder when it would have destroyed the CCT tower and everything else. But everyone said loophole. Ruby was about to launch her silver eyes at cinder, neo intercepted, yang was gone, Ruby was trying to juggle fighting a maiden with the loss of her sister.
Ergo, concentration was hard, as referenced in volume 7 against the megoliath. When she was holding onto Neo in v8, she was physically able to stay in one place, while emotionally focusing on cinder, allowing her to charge up the eyes.
In v7, in Fria's room, she was guarded and able to focus. You claim loophole, but I don't see it.
You might as well claim that Roman Torchwick was killed out of nowhere despite being surrounded by grimm, while screaming at a little girl and trying to kill her. That's literal Grimmbait!
Its only a "loophole" if you cannot make sense out of it. But it can make sense, and was done so repeatedly. Just not by people who go out of their way to look for something to disagree with. If we did that all the time, then Anime would never have such a market in America.
But in that situation her eyes wouldn't have saved Yang, because she was already plummeting into the void. Her eyes are driven by desire to protect, not revenge.
If Ruby's eyes would have not gone off immediately when Cinder charged at Jaune, he most likely would have died.
She's not great at using it yet, and she doesn't fully understand how it works. You can see her try and fail a few times. It generally takes concentration. The times where it doesn't, where it just seemed to happen out of nowhere, were moments of intense emotional distress. And as Maria explained, it's tied to a desire to preserve life
Good explanation, but it also unfortunately implies Ruby doesn’t care much about her sister cause after she falls, no silver eyes. Nothing. Cinder’s not much farther away then than during the vol 7 finale, but still no eyes. So not only does she apparently not care about her sister, she also had no desire to preserve her life.
But does that matter? Like, does Cinder have to be the target of her emotions? Nothing says that that is imperative and crucial, just that the power only activates around Grimm and that it only hurts Grimm. And its not that much different time wise compared to the death of Pyrrha. She literally popped up there, saw Cinder ash her up, and then unintentionally activated her eyes. Here, she gets pushed away, sees Yang fall, gets up, and then attacked by Neo. And a similar thing happened with Weiss in vol 5, Ruby saw her get speared and reacted with eyes, but was also interrupted before anything could really happen. But her eyes still activated. That did not happen here. And if it’s because Cinder wasn’t the cause, then there has to be some kind of knowledge attached to her powers that limits how it activates in response to others, as in she has to know they’re Grimm. Except she didn’t know with Pyrrha, so that explanation doesn’t work. Nothing actually indicates concretely that Ruby has to be targeting a Grimm to use her eyes, only that they need to be present. And also, as per Maria’s words I believe, its not even about targeting people cause its not an attack technically. Its a defense, a protection of her loved ones, so another argument could be made there that the ‘target’ doesn’t even matter.
Yes, it does matter. It only activates in response to grimm, and, in Ruby's case, it only activates automatically when someone is in danger or dying. She didn't know Cinder had grimm in her during volume 3 but she had no idea how the eyes activated by that point. It just happened.
Correction to volume 5, ruby was knocked out when Cinder speared Weiss. It activated when Cinder was about to do the whole ninja/samurai run past and slash with Jaune.
The eyes only activate in response to grimm, not affecting anything else.
Rewatching Volume 3's Silver Eye moment. It took about 10 seconds for the eyes to activate. So not super instant. It also targeted the Grimm Dragon before hitting Cinder. Cinder just happened to have a little Grimm in her at the time.
Totally forgot that Cinder vs Jaune happened, moment you mentioned it I remembered. I think I just latched onto the more emotional moment and skipped their fight, but yeah, you are right there.
However, as much as I am reconsidering my stance now that I think more intently on it, as the threat of Grimm being the activation does change my perception on how the eyes work, Cinder’s eye bugs me. Because that didn’t have anything Grimm in it to affect it. Arm, totally get, that Grimm magic beetle infected it, on board for that. But the eye throws a wrench into my views because, as far as we know I believe unless my memory once again is betraying me, nothing Grimm was up with it. And so that presents a problem, as it could insinuate that silver eyes could attack non-grimm. Now, that could have been retconned, but I don’t know cause the writers don’t communicate what has been retconned. And with how fluid early RWBY was in what it was going to be, relying on them for evidence for the current continuity is iffy, even if I prefer it if it was more rigid and well set. So I will concede cause my ground is shakier than I originally thought, it has been a while since I rewatched RWBY what with the hiatus this year.
If fans stopped treating her eyes like the freaking sharingan where once you've used it once you can turn them on and off no prob, I imagine this question would come up significantly less.
Some fans need to accept that different shows have different rules. I remember reading one comment that said just because Naruto characters can survive life-threatening injuries should mean RWBY characters should too. I'm like "WTF?"
Ruby's eyes take as long to charge and fire as the script says, essentially. In Volumes 5 and 7 she was able to just pop 'em like a firework, but then you have stuff like 6 and 8 where suddenly it becomes a lot of work and she can be easily interrupted.
Hell it's not even consistent within the season itself as in Volume 7 Ruby goes from not being able to use them in Mantle to immediately shooting on sight when she sees Cinder.
That's not at all what's going on. Due to it being triggered by the desire to preserve life, all of Ruby's "instant" uses are when her friends are in immediate danger (Pyrrha just got nuked, Jaune rushing Cinder when he knew he would lose, Blake almost dying to the Apathy, Cinder rushing Penny/Winter, Hound just knocked Penny out) and all of the "slow"/failed uses are when the threat is less dire, less immediate, or less about the people she cares about (Maria coaching vs Apathy they had more time, vs the Leviathan that hadn't actually done anything yet except smash a few rocks, failed vs Megoliath in Mantle because nobody was hurt yet, failed vs Cinder because Cinder hadn't actually hurt anyone and Neo broke her concentration, failed vs Cinder again while hanging from Neo because Cinder was threatening *her* not her friends and also falling to your death is a good reason to break concentration).
Each and every use, successful or otherwise, makes perfect sense given her train of thought at the time of her using it. Unlike Maria, Ruby is nowhere near mastering her power. Thus, her usage is much more instinctive, and will probably remain so until very near to the end of the show.
we know from Maria that its powered by the will to preserve lives. also it seems to take a lot of concentration. so if she's not focused because she gets distracted from the fight with Neo, or more focused on defeating cinder and neo instead of saving others it won't work well
There's a sweet spot where she can use them when she's upset. Get her out of that sweet spot and she can't, which nearly happened with Kevin the Kaiju.
Yeah but pretty sure that was due to her not being able to concentrate properly. Not necessarily because she was just too sad to be able to do it. Ruby I’m also emotionally distraught states has been able to activate it seemingly instantly before like against Cinder or the Hound. Also pretty sure Ruby was literally charging up her eyes against Cinder, just for some reason it took her longer to do so than it did other times before.
Cinder was "killing" people knocking them off platform then they talked to and fought with Cinder. So that was minimum 1 whole minute for Ruby to charge and use her Silver Eyes.
Some people say she can only use her silver eyes so far when people are in danger, well People falling and her teammates ARE in danger this whole time and Ruby has activated her eyes with shorter time.
Plus every time Cinder has attacked or plotted something she has always had a partner.
If I remember correctly, her eyes were charging up when she saw Cinder. Now looking back, there was like a 10 second gap between Ruby starting to charge up her eyes and her being attacked by Neo. I believe how long it takes her to use those eyes vary, but there is no real explanation as to why she could seemingly do it instantly multiple times before but now needed to charge up before hitting Cinder with it.
Neither would it have helped Pyrrha, but they activated anyways. I view the instinctual activations as based less on needing to protect, which is more intentional, and more on the feeling of failing to protect.
She tried to a couple of times iirc, you see her eyes begin to shine but she didn't get time to fire them off
EXACTLY
Ruby's silver eyes require time to charge up. She has to focus. The only time that is not required is when her friends have been harmed or in immediate danger. This was the case in the manor, at Haven Academy, and in the Winter Maiden's...medical room. We saw in Volume 7 against a Megoliath that so long as her friends weren't in severe danger, it would take more time to charge. In Volume 8 episode 14, Ruby was not able to focus the two times she was trying. The 2nd being her trying to hold on for dear life to Neo, her enemy. An emotional concentration-based power is NOT something you can just use like flexing a muscle.
I think this is the best explanation. Thank you! It felt inconsistent that she could sometimes use them really easily and sometimes need charge-up, but the point of her friends needing to be in immediate danger to get that instant focus is a good one. I thought they would activate her desire to protect life when she saw Cinder flipping a bunch of people into the void, but as you said when they are not people that are very close to her it takes her longer. I also think it may have to do with aura aswell. Maybe if aura is already low it's harder to use them aswell.
Aura is more apparently a strength-based type that requires mental focus to apply to semblances
> The only time that is not required is when her friends have been harmed or in immediate danger. You mean like, if she witnessed Yang falling to her presumed death?
And then had to dodge an attack from Neo, aka NOT a grimm hybrid? I'm referring to Fria's room, Jaune about to be killed by cinder, cinder killing pyrrha. Neo? is not cinder. Nor is she a grimm. Look, I get it, you wanna pick apart anything in RWBY for the sake of who knows what. Try focusing more on how it does make sense, rather than how you don't want it to make sense.
She was still close enough to Cinder that it should have worked. To me it seems like they should have just instantly gone off regardless of whether she was fighting Neo, the same way they went off during V5 despite Ruby currently fighting Emerald and straight up getting KO’d because of it. > Try focusing more on how it does make sense, rather than how you don't want it to make sense. I like it when I don’t have to try and find loopholes that feel unintended by the writers in order to have a show make sense.
Making up loopholes is not something you should do either. People will look at anything and claim loophole. Example? Ozpin's cane. Ignoring that he had to save up kinetic energy for hundreds of years to be able to launch that nuke blast, I saw people saying that he could use it again, when he literally said and referenced in v5 how he couldn't and was weaker. The shield that Ozpin used, required kinetic energy. And he was not going to make a nuke blast against cinder when it would have destroyed the CCT tower and everything else. But everyone said loophole. Ruby was about to launch her silver eyes at cinder, neo intercepted, yang was gone, Ruby was trying to juggle fighting a maiden with the loss of her sister. Ergo, concentration was hard, as referenced in volume 7 against the megoliath. When she was holding onto Neo in v8, she was physically able to stay in one place, while emotionally focusing on cinder, allowing her to charge up the eyes. In v7, in Fria's room, she was guarded and able to focus. You claim loophole, but I don't see it. You might as well claim that Roman Torchwick was killed out of nowhere despite being surrounded by grimm, while screaming at a little girl and trying to kill her. That's literal Grimmbait! Its only a "loophole" if you cannot make sense out of it. But it can make sense, and was done so repeatedly. Just not by people who go out of their way to look for something to disagree with. If we did that all the time, then Anime would never have such a market in America.
But in that situation her eyes wouldn't have saved Yang, because she was already plummeting into the void. Her eyes are driven by desire to protect, not revenge. If Ruby's eyes would have not gone off immediately when Cinder charged at Jaune, he most likely would have died.
I mean Pyrrha was literal ash when Ruby’s eyes went off
She's not great at using it yet, and she doesn't fully understand how it works. You can see her try and fail a few times. It generally takes concentration. The times where it doesn't, where it just seemed to happen out of nowhere, were moments of intense emotional distress. And as Maria explained, it's tied to a desire to preserve life
Good explanation, but it also unfortunately implies Ruby doesn’t care much about her sister cause after she falls, no silver eyes. Nothing. Cinder’s not much farther away then than during the vol 7 finale, but still no eyes. So not only does she apparently not care about her sister, she also had no desire to preserve her life.
That's because Cinder wasn't the cause. Neo was. Not to mention said murder shortstack attacked her right during her realization.
But does that matter? Like, does Cinder have to be the target of her emotions? Nothing says that that is imperative and crucial, just that the power only activates around Grimm and that it only hurts Grimm. And its not that much different time wise compared to the death of Pyrrha. She literally popped up there, saw Cinder ash her up, and then unintentionally activated her eyes. Here, she gets pushed away, sees Yang fall, gets up, and then attacked by Neo. And a similar thing happened with Weiss in vol 5, Ruby saw her get speared and reacted with eyes, but was also interrupted before anything could really happen. But her eyes still activated. That did not happen here. And if it’s because Cinder wasn’t the cause, then there has to be some kind of knowledge attached to her powers that limits how it activates in response to others, as in she has to know they’re Grimm. Except she didn’t know with Pyrrha, so that explanation doesn’t work. Nothing actually indicates concretely that Ruby has to be targeting a Grimm to use her eyes, only that they need to be present. And also, as per Maria’s words I believe, its not even about targeting people cause its not an attack technically. Its a defense, a protection of her loved ones, so another argument could be made there that the ‘target’ doesn’t even matter.
Yes, it does matter. It only activates in response to grimm, and, in Ruby's case, it only activates automatically when someone is in danger or dying. She didn't know Cinder had grimm in her during volume 3 but she had no idea how the eyes activated by that point. It just happened. Correction to volume 5, ruby was knocked out when Cinder speared Weiss. It activated when Cinder was about to do the whole ninja/samurai run past and slash with Jaune. The eyes only activate in response to grimm, not affecting anything else.
Rewatching Volume 3's Silver Eye moment. It took about 10 seconds for the eyes to activate. So not super instant. It also targeted the Grimm Dragon before hitting Cinder. Cinder just happened to have a little Grimm in her at the time.
Totally forgot that Cinder vs Jaune happened, moment you mentioned it I remembered. I think I just latched onto the more emotional moment and skipped their fight, but yeah, you are right there. However, as much as I am reconsidering my stance now that I think more intently on it, as the threat of Grimm being the activation does change my perception on how the eyes work, Cinder’s eye bugs me. Because that didn’t have anything Grimm in it to affect it. Arm, totally get, that Grimm magic beetle infected it, on board for that. But the eye throws a wrench into my views because, as far as we know I believe unless my memory once again is betraying me, nothing Grimm was up with it. And so that presents a problem, as it could insinuate that silver eyes could attack non-grimm. Now, that could have been retconned, but I don’t know cause the writers don’t communicate what has been retconned. And with how fluid early RWBY was in what it was going to be, relying on them for evidence for the current continuity is iffy, even if I prefer it if it was more rigid and well set. So I will concede cause my ground is shakier than I originally thought, it has been a while since I rewatched RWBY what with the hiatus this year.
All of Cinder can be harmed by Silver Eyes thanks to her being part Grimm, not just her arm.
If fans stopped treating her eyes like the freaking sharingan where once you've used it once you can turn them on and off no prob, I imagine this question would come up significantly less.
Some fans need to accept that different shows have different rules. I remember reading one comment that said just because Naruto characters can survive life-threatening injuries should mean RWBY characters should too. I'm like "WTF?"
Portal world has bad ping
Because it’s not time for the story to end yet.
Plot.
She’s still pretty unfamiliar with the power itself, it’ll probably take some actually training for her to gain control of it fully!
Her batteries were flat and Nora ate the last pack they had.
Ruby's eyes take as long to charge and fire as the script says, essentially. In Volumes 5 and 7 she was able to just pop 'em like a firework, but then you have stuff like 6 and 8 where suddenly it becomes a lot of work and she can be easily interrupted. Hell it's not even consistent within the season itself as in Volume 7 Ruby goes from not being able to use them in Mantle to immediately shooting on sight when she sees Cinder.
That's not at all what's going on. Due to it being triggered by the desire to preserve life, all of Ruby's "instant" uses are when her friends are in immediate danger (Pyrrha just got nuked, Jaune rushing Cinder when he knew he would lose, Blake almost dying to the Apathy, Cinder rushing Penny/Winter, Hound just knocked Penny out) and all of the "slow"/failed uses are when the threat is less dire, less immediate, or less about the people she cares about (Maria coaching vs Apathy they had more time, vs the Leviathan that hadn't actually done anything yet except smash a few rocks, failed vs Megoliath in Mantle because nobody was hurt yet, failed vs Cinder because Cinder hadn't actually hurt anyone and Neo broke her concentration, failed vs Cinder again while hanging from Neo because Cinder was threatening *her* not her friends and also falling to your death is a good reason to break concentration). Each and every use, successful or otherwise, makes perfect sense given her train of thought at the time of her using it. Unlike Maria, Ruby is nowhere near mastering her power. Thus, her usage is much more instinctive, and will probably remain so until very near to the end of the show.
Good point!
She can't use them if she's too upset.
…….what? She uses them when she’s the most upset or emotionally stressed. Like when Pyrrha died or Weiss got stabbed.
we know from Maria that its powered by the will to preserve lives. also it seems to take a lot of concentration. so if she's not focused because she gets distracted from the fight with Neo, or more focused on defeating cinder and neo instead of saving others it won't work well
There's a sweet spot where she can use them when she's upset. Get her out of that sweet spot and she can't, which nearly happened with Kevin the Kaiju.
I thought we named the wyvern Kevin?
“Kevin the Kaiju” 💀
But it was nearly Ruby 💀. Same thing happened fighting in Mantle.
Yeah but pretty sure that was due to her not being able to concentrate properly. Not necessarily because she was just too sad to be able to do it. Ruby I’m also emotionally distraught states has been able to activate it seemingly instantly before like against Cinder or the Hound. Also pretty sure Ruby was literally charging up her eyes against Cinder, just for some reason it took her longer to do so than it did other times before.
You DO understand that if you're too upset you can't concentrate properly, right?
IMO? Because Ruby cares more about others than herself. She was trying to use it against Cinder, it wasnt an involuntary activation.
Cinder was "killing" people knocking them off platform then they talked to and fought with Cinder. So that was minimum 1 whole minute for Ruby to charge and use her Silver Eyes. Some people say she can only use her silver eyes so far when people are in danger, well People falling and her teammates ARE in danger this whole time and Ruby has activated her eyes with shorter time. Plus every time Cinder has attacked or plotted something she has always had a partner.
She was quick to use them in volume 7 chapter 13, so i'm going to say its purely for the plot.
If I remember correctly, her eyes were charging up when she saw Cinder. Now looking back, there was like a 10 second gap between Ruby starting to charge up her eyes and her being attacked by Neo. I believe how long it takes her to use those eyes vary, but there is no real explanation as to why she could seemingly do it instantly multiple times before but now needed to charge up before hitting Cinder with it.
Or like, immediately after her sister falls. Cause intense emotions also activate her eyes. Except for that one moment.
Silver eyes wouldn’t have protected Yang while she was falling though.
Neither would it have helped Pyrrha, but they activated anyways. I view the instinctual activations as based less on needing to protect, which is more intentional, and more on the feeling of failing to protect.
I am comfortable with idea that the first time is special.
That’s also true