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note (added 11/16/18): this tutorial was written like 5 years before hiveswap came out, so it's totally out of date on anything that is stated in hiveswap and I'm aware of that! it was also a couple months before the beta trolls were introduced, so they weren't taken into consideration when writing this either!H O M E S T U C K f a n T U T O R I A L
Hello, and welcome. I'll be listing helpful hints for creating a fan troll for the series Homestuck. This is in no way the laws of making a fan troll, it is merely a guide. You may follow whatever bits and pieces of the tutorial as you want, but be warned; the internet feeds off Mary-Sues and Gary-Stus.
Melodramatic warning aside, now let's continue.
Rule one to making a fan troll: You NEED to have read the actual webcomic before creating an oc. Going off of what you hear and not what's stated in the actual webcomic is the perfect way to mess everything up.
Now, some vocabulary, for those not familiar with the "proper" terms.
Trolls - If you do not know, get out.
Hemospectrum - The blood caste system which classifies the upper, middle, and low classes in troll society.
Blood Caste - A troll's position in the hemospectrum.
Culled - Being killed for being "useless" or "wrong" in troll society.
Lusus Naturae - usually shortened to lusus; it's a troll's caretaker, to put it simply.
Somewhat Unnecessary Table of Contents:
I- Design
II - Themes
III - Blood Colors
IV - Personality
V - Relationships
VI - Typing Quirk
VII - Ancestors
VIII - Lusii
I Design
Now, for the sake of all that is good, use common sense. Please, oh please use that common sense you were gifted with.
Now, all trolls have gray skin, yellow scelra, black/gray pupils and irises, black hair, and at least two orange horns on their head. If you break one of these rules, you should fix it immediately. These are the genetic facts about trolls, and should not be broken ever. You might think, "Gamzee has a white face, right?" That is face paint. "Blah blah, insert reasons here," No. All trolls have the listed features, there's no getting around it.
But, on the topic of eyes, as trolls get older, their macula (The colored part of the eye) begins to fill with their blood color. So, if you make an adult troll, they should have colored eyes. Also, there are trolls with oddly colored eyes, such as Terezi and Sollux. Each have a reason for their eye color, so if you want to have oddly colored eyes, you must have a reason. I.e., Terezi's eyes were burnt by the sun; Sollux's eyes are most likely due to his powers, and it fits in with his duality theme.
Trolls' eyes turn white when they're dead (like with dream bubbles or ghosts). The same might be true for humans, though.
And, a prickly topic, is colored streaks in troll's hair. Now firstly, you can't make the hair predominately colored, which means half or more. It should, preferable, be rather small. The streak should be the same color as the troll's blood color. Eridan's hair is the number one example of how to use colored streaks, considering he is also the only canon example thus far (along with his ancestor).
Though, colored streaks tend to be criticized by a lot of people regardless. Just a heads up.
Now, as it appears, troll wardrobes consist of mainly dark colors. Whether your troll's outfit is the most elaborate thing ever spawned or a tee-shirt and jeans, it should have some dark colors on it. While Feferi wears a lot of bright colors, she still has some black on. Now, if you want to have a rainbow color scheme on your troll, for god's/gog's/cod's/gpi's/ect.'s sake, don't over do it. People will be able to see, "Oh hey, cool, there's a rainbow theme,"but we don't want,"Oh god, my eyes!" To successfully pull of a rainbow color scheme, you pick a main color and then use the colors of the rainbow as accent colors. As in, a red streak there, some yellow decals there, not having the stripes of the rainbow in every place you could squeeze them in. This goes with other schemes as well, but I've seen rainbow one's mucked up the worst. Use common sense, please. Also, it's advisable to look up some complementary colors, find two main colors, and find complimenting colors of the decals. It will turn out nicely that way.
And on to the horns. First off, they have to be striped with orange, light orange, and yellow. That is how troll horns work. You can have painted pattern or something on it, but be sure to state it somewhere, or most people assume that it's natural. Horns by no means need to be symmetrical (shown with Kanaya and Vriska) and you can have some creativity with them. From swirls to sticks, arrows to nubs, you and use practically and shape you wish. Just so warn you, though; you should at least have two horns and at most four or five. Horns should not be placed on the center of the forehead (like a unicorn of any sort). They also shouldn't be longer than the troll's body, or any other insane size. If you're having troubles with your horns, I suggest looking up some form of horned animal and basing it off that, or base it off the symbol you chose for your troll. Try to avoid having horns exactly like a canon characters, though you can, it's not a big deal, really.
Also, horns can be broken (like Equius' horns).
As trolls grow older, their horns grow longer (as shown with the ancestors). So, have a troll's horns the right size for their age, as in a really young troll has small horns, and an adult would have long horns (long and small in comparison to their horns as a child/teenager).
Most trolls seem to have some form of large canines (fangs), at least larger than a human's. This is just extra, and doesn't have to be followed, seeing as Aradia has relatively flat teeth. And about having some sort of animal theme (like Nepeta being based off a cat). Don't over do it. You can have a hat with ears, sure. You cannot have actual ears. You can have a tail on your jacket or belt, that's fine. No real tails. Painting animal features on you (like little whiskers, or other decals). Sure, that actually fairly creative. Having a snout? Bad dog, bad!
II Themes.
Most trolls and groups of trolls have a theme. It's a nice way to find ideas for you troll. But, sometimes people can over-theme their character. And example: You theme your character off of, per say, Egyptian culture. So, you design them in Egyptian robes, face paint, their lusus is a Sphinx, their hive is a pyramid ect ect. Try not to do this. Since Trolls are from a different planet, they probably wouldn't know much about any of our culture. To successfully use an ethnic theme, you'd have a name from that language (within reason), maybe have parts of their outfit inspired by the culture, maybe a little bracelet or pattern, not anything "in-your-face obvious". People can take a subtle hint, they don't need anything shoved down their throat.
Now, a grand offender of theme overload would be the "otaku" based trolls. Now, if you're troll had been on the internet and somehow found any form of anime and manga and became interested in it, that might make sense. But, I doubt they begin speaking Japanese and dressing completely in anime clothes. They would not have access to a lot of this stuff on their planet. Same goes for most stereotypes. They do not have any "Hot Topics" on Alternia, and I doubt the company could branch across the paradoxical galaxy.
Now, a good theme may be a god/goddess, an animal, color, or something of sort. Just remember: Be subtle. Don't have your troll dressed as the god and have the same power. Now, animal themes are a delicate subject. A good example would be Nepeta. Nepeta's theme is fairly obvious: cats. So, per say, you want a wolf theme. So you base everything of of a wolf. WRONG. You see, Nepeta isn't only based off of a cat. She's been based off many different things, not just cats.
So, be subtle, use common sense, and research. Don't do a poor job researching your theme and base your troll off of that. Poor research equals poor theme, poor theme could equal poor troll.
III Blood colors.
First off, let's get this out in the open: No rainbow bloods, no white bloods, no pink bloods, no transparent bloods. Now, if you're considered a mutant, fine, but if at least Karkat's blood is kind of close to the actual scale. No one will stand for a bright pink, a rainbow, or a transparent blooded troll. Ever. Keeping that in mind, now let's talk about the hemospectrum.
The range of bloods is fairly simple, and you should avoid deterring from these colors (In order of lowest to highest):
Dark Red - Brown - Yellow - Lime Green* - Green - Jade Green - Teal - Cerulean - Indigo - Purple - Violet - Fuchsia
* To note, within Homestuck canon all lime bloods were extincted. They're a special case and most canon information is from Caliopee's oc so the accuracy is questionable.
Karkat's blood, candy red, is not listed because it is a mutant color and is not part of the hemospectrum. More about mutants later.
Now, as you get higher on the hemospectrum, the probability of that the troll is violent rises. Low bloods are less violent, high bloods are more violent. That is not always the case, seeing as Aradia is fairly destructive, and Feferi is very nice and friendly.
Lower bloods are more likely to have some form of psychic powers (Aradia speaking to the dead, Tavros speaking to animals) and higher bloods are generally stronger (Equius is the best example).
Now, there are some exceptions, like Vriska having her powers, but don't over do it. You can be a little out of range, seeing as Vriska isn't extremely high up on the scale, but still. Use that ever so helpful common sense.
There are no blood colors between Violet (Eridan) and Fuchsia (Feferi) bloods. It was stated in canon, so violet is the highest blood aside from Fuchsia.
Now, you're troll should be fairly aware of the hemospectrum and their ranking on it. If a low blood blatantly goes against the spectrum, they may be culled. High bloods can be a bit more loose, but if they spend a lot of their time around low bloods, other high bloods may look down on them.
Feferi's blood (fuchsia) is the blood of high royalty, and having her blood designates the troll with it to be the next leader of the troll government, an empress/emperor. Be careful when using this blood color, and, just to be safe, I don't advise going above Eridan's blood (violet), but you can if you want.
A Troll's blood color should be shown on their shirt, unless they want to hide it, for some reason, such as being mutant.
Mutants, time to talk about them. Now, having a mutant character is a very delicate path to tread and it's not to late, you can run now. No? Well then, continue reading. If you don't have a mutant, I advise skipping this, it may get boring, and a lot is speculation.
Now, if your troll is a mutant, they had better not be proud of it. Mutants are culled, if they're not useful or if they do not get a lusus, I'm fairly certain, so it's not the kind of thing you just let the world know. Both high and low bloods look down on mutants, it they're hemospectrum-savy.
Now, to figure out how a mutant blood should act, take Karkat and his ancestor, the Sufferer, as an example. Now, seeing that the Sufferer was relatively calm and compassionate, and Karkat is a broiling ball of rage, mutant bloods don't have a specific violent-ness like most on the hemospectrum do. That in mind, it's safe to assume that the strength and psychic powers traits in normal bloods doesn't affect them either. It leads me to believe that they have neither psychic powers or large strength, seeing as Karkat had neither (to my knowledge), though this is only speculation.
Links to more info about the Hemospectrum in the Artist's comment.
IV Personality
Now, trolls have a wide range of unique personalities, just like humans, but keep in mind that the troll race is naturally violent. The amounts a violence has been stated many times in the web comic, and even Tavros got a little violent once (if you've read up to that point, you should know). But, don't have a character that can be absolutely happy one second, and a raving lunatic the next, it doesn't work like that. That personality has been done so much to death, it's funny how un-funny it is. A good personality is a consistent one. Such as, you have a kind loving troll; She'll be kind and loving to most people, not a raving sociopath half the time for no good reason.
And for your personality, make sure there is a reason for most everything, please, if you do nothing else, at least do this. Don't have some sad mopey troll whom tortures themselves for no reason. And don't make the reason stupid, like their lusus beat them or something. Lusus are animals with parental instincts towards their trolls, they practically live to care for their troll. A valid reason for being an "emo" stereotype would be that they've tried to befriend society, but their creepy behavior scared everyone away, or maybe they saw someone who was actually this sad and depressed, and though it looked cool, so they decided to copy them. Though, I advise staying away from all stereotypes in general.
Try not to exactly copy one of the canon characters' personality, that's just silly.
V Relationships.
Troll relationships are a complicated topic for most people, but I'll try to explain them here. (And I'm sorry if I use the wrong plural or other tense of these words.)
There are four types of relatonships: matesprits, morails, auspistice, and kismesis. The first two are redrom, and focus on positive emotions, and the latter two are blackrom and focus around negative emotions.
Matesprits are essentially lovers, and this is the most like human romance.
Morails are friends who look out for each other, it also involves the calmer one keeping the more violent one in a non-violent state.
Auspistice is a three-way relationship. Simply put, two of the trolls hate each other, and the third makes peace(Kind of) between the two.
Kismesis is two people with a love/hate relationship. In my opinion, this is the hardest one to explain. People often get kimesis confused with just being enemies, but there has to be a little bit of attraction (something like that...) *It is important to note, kismesis do not try and outright kill each other, that would honestly defeat the point. They keep the other alive so they can compete.
I advise looking these relationships else where, such as the MSPA Wiki, for a more in depth explanation.
So, with all that in mind, you can start filling your quadrants- Wait. I see you there. Yes you, the huge Eridan fan. Don't do it. Don't. Please don't.
Never, NEVER pair your character with a canon character IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM. It does not work like that. When the trolls were sent to the medium from their homeplanet, their homeplanet was destroyed, and so was everyone on it. And if you have a relationship way before then, the canon trolls would be kind of young, and you would be kind of creepy. And, if your troll is with other trolls(not canon ones) and is playing a session, that happens in a different timeline then the main troll's alpha timeline. It would take place in the alpha timeline for your troll group, and thus, the canon characters would be dead. A relationship with the canon trolls just will not work. Now, I could probably delve into paradox space, time travel, and the like, and find a reasonable way to fit a character into the canon characters plot, but that would involve a lot of research, and you'd be in a doomed timeline, assuming Hussie's writing the alpha timeline, and there would really be no point in all this work. No matter how hard you work, over half the internet will dislike your troll. So please, no relationships with canon characters. Ever.
My hatred towards canon relationships doesn't stop at romance. YOU SHOULD NOT KNOW, BE RELATED TO, OR ASSOCIATE IN ANY OTHER WAY WITH THE CANON CHARACTERS. Just don't do it! Be creative, geez!
Now, you can freely fill your quadrants with fellow trolls, but you can only have one troll per quadrant (besides auspistice, which needs two trolls and your troll).
So, have fun...
VI Typing Quirk
We all noticed that all the trolls have a certain way of typing, correct? Most all trolls have one of these, and your troll should to. Now, first thing, make it legible. You don't have to replace every single letter with something. And second, be creative. Don't just copy a canon's quirk.
And, it's nice to have something that relates to you character's theme, like how Nepeta uses cat puns. Such as, I've seen money orientated trolls replace an s with a $. You can base your quirk off of a canon's, like having some form of leet speak like Terezi, or messing around with the capitalization of certain letters, such as Gamzee or Tavros.
But before you can even use a quirk, you need a Trollian Handle (literately, a troll chum handle). It should relate to your troll's personality and hobbies. For an example, let's look at Vriska's handle, arachnidsGrip. The first words relates, obviously, to her spider lusus and very, very obvious spider theme. "Grip" refers to how she has had a major hand in many events, holding a grip over them. Also, to her power, which lets her take control of another trolls. So, all you need to come up with a good handle is a decent premise and a bit of time and research (probably about five minutes). But please, for the sake of all that is good, don't use extremely long words in an attempt to make you handle sounds "cooler". It will backfire in the end, especially if you end up misspelling your own handle. Just for your reference, this is exactly what I don't want to see: recockulousHonorificabilitudinitatibus (and yes, those are real words). I will weep tears of black, liquid sorrow if I happen upon a name like this.
(The phrase recockulousHonorificabilitudinitatibus is now belonging to Growleaf & co, for all intents and purposes, in case I, for whatever reason, need this extraordinarily humorous phrase.)
VII Ancestors
Ancestors are trolls that lived long before your troll and are very similar to your troll, having the same symbol and blood color. They tend to be nearly visually identical (but older, and usually with more elaborate outfits).
An important thing to note: This is not the Trollian equivalent of a parent. It is not known if a troll's ancestor was even the one that gave the genetic traits for your troll. Overall, your troll shouldn't know a lot about their ancestor, unless they happen to find something from them, like Vriska did with Mindfang's journals.
Ancestors seem to usually have an eight letter name, but seeing as Gamzee's ancestor broke this, it may not be a rule, though I do advise using an eight letter word. You can use unusual spellings, shown with Sollux's ancestor, the Ψiioniic. Another thing pointed out is that Jadeblood and lower castes tend to have titles, while higher castes have names.
All of the canon ancestors seem to have done at least one really major event, whether it be a direct influence (like the Condesce) or something less direct (like the Disciple). So, you should pick something for your troll's ancestor to have done. This could be something along the lines of being great at something, like a being a legendary blacksmith, or, if you have enough characters, you could have them be part of a larger story.
Design-wise, the ancestors' outfits seem to be mainly based around their symbol, but, as you can see with Dualscar, they can wear practically anything. Their color schemes seem to have, at most, three colors. Black is the base color, and your ancestor's outfit should be at least half black. Then, they use their blood color and some other accent color (like the Summoner's red stripe things on his pants, of the seadweller's gold jewelry). Though, the Ψiioniic had red and blue as his accents, due to Sollux's duality theme. Essentially, the ancestor should look like an older version of the troll.
An important thing to point out: Don't rip off a canon ancestor. Doing so would, firstly, be uncreative, and secondly, be boring. Be original! Do some research! Base the ancestor loosely off of whatever your troll is themed around.
Relationships for the ancestors are pretty much the same as they are for trolls. One per quadrant (two for auspitice) and no canon characters.
VIII Lusii
Lusii are a trolls caretaker. They pick a troll once they come out of the brooding caverns and take care of their troll for the rest of their life. The trolls also have to take care of their lusus, acting as a kind of zookeeper.
You could make your lusii any kind of animal, but it'd be more interesting if you did something creative, like mixed two animals together or gave it some kind of extra limbs. You lusii shouldn't be just a frog, but you could have the traits of one, like creating some kind of frog/squirrel abomination.
Most of the time, trolls are based on animals, but they could also be like Sollux's lusus and be based off of a mythological creature. Kanaya's lusus, a virgin mother grub, is extremely rare, and you probably shouldn't give your troll one. It is also exclusive to jade bloods.
Gl'bgolyb is a lusii attended to by the heiress and the empress, so unless your fuchsia blood has ascended to the position of heiress, do not have them care for Gl'bgolyb.
Jade bloods tend to get rare types of lusii, purple bloods, Gamzee's blood color, have semi-aquatic lusii, and violet and fuschia bloods (seadwellers) have aquatic lusii.
Your troll should not be raised by another troll. This was specific to the Sufferer and is not a common occurrence.
Miscellaneous.
Now to cover broad and random things.
- Trolls are nocturnal. The sun is extremely powerful and is capable of burning a troll's eyes out (see Terezi).
- Don't over complicate your symbol. It should preferably be made of lines and curves.
- Your name MUST have 6 letters in the first name and 6 in the last name. No exceptions.
- Do not give your troll a human name. Do not. Don't do it, even if it's six letters. Look at the canon troll's names and tell me human names would fit in, I dare you.
- Keep any special powers under control, no leveling cities on a whim. Try to do something to this affect; you have a super strong power, but it's extremely hard to use and you can't control it at all. Or; the move doesn't do much, but it's pretty easy to use.
- Trolls do not have siblings, so don't give them siblings.
- Have a reasonable weapon and captchalogue system. I don't like seeing about 50 fan trolls with a miracle captchalogue. Try and make up something cool.
- When figuring out your trolls age, those whom play the game are all around 6 sweeps (13 years old). Most adult trolls are off planet, keep that in mind.
- When picking a strife specibus, make it interesting. A "Sharp pointy stick" kind has more potentially to be fun and annoying then the infamous "sword" kind.
- Also, I don't want to see a whole roster of trolls with "dagger" kind, "sword" kind, "rapier" kind, "blade" kind, and "uber saber" kind. Don't abuse those poor adjectives.
- 1 sweep = 2.17 years.
Please, tell me if you think I've forgotten something, I'll be sure to add it in. I'm no expert on this, but I've researched everything I've put in this tutorial, so it should be fairly reliable.
So, have fun with your fan troll. There's some links in the artist's' comments box to give you further help with your troll.
Related content
Comments: 1585
Littleslinky [2019-07-13 09:53:10 +0000 UTC]
how do i make a violent troll that isn't purple blooded yet extremely,not sane
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
DraconicReveler [2018-09-27 21:23:13 +0000 UTC]
To be perfectly clear, Limebloods aren't all lime-coloured. They, like Karkat, are mutant-bloods, meaning they all have a wide variety of colours not represented by the hemospectrum. However, each blood colour they possess would also be linked to their sign (as Karkat, Kankri and The Signless all share signs and blood-colour). Rainbow blood is still an impossibility in the official homestuck universe, though if rainbow blood were to exist it would be a lime-blood. So for instance, the popular "pink-blood" type would be considered Lime-blooded by rank in the hemospectrum, and all other pink-bloods would share the same sign.
I also HIGHLY suggest making your oc/trollsona have a sign that exists within the extended zodiac. I find it really helps cement the character within the Homestuck/Hiveswap universe and by doing so you set a baseline for all their other characteristics. This stipulation would only restrict what their sign looks like, as even trolls who have the same sign will still have different personalities and different classes, its just their aspect that would stay the same. In that regard, trolls with the same sign are the closest they really get to being siblings.
Overall, best guide I've seen on making trolls so far. However, this is still one person's opinion. Keep in mind that you can still defy these guidelines, but do so sparingly and with a purpose. You'd need a damn good reason to stray from more than 1 or 2 of these.
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Novanplz In reply to DraconicReveler [2019-12-28 05:18:35 +0000 UTC]
Not precisely. Lime are a canon caste, and Karkat is technically a mutated Lime. The issue with making limes is that they were driven to extinction, with Karkat really only existing because of Sufferer followers among the Jades, and his ancestor being a meteor baby
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CHA1-T3A [2018-09-17 15:40:04 +0000 UTC]
I love how most of this stuff is absolutely shit on by hiveswap
👍: 0 ⏩: 2
Growleaf In reply to CHA1-T3A [2018-11-17 02:18:01 +0000 UTC]
when hiveswap was released and then friendsim, I knew that my notifications were fucking done for and I accepted that fate. my 15 year old hubris when writing this in the first place has doomed me to this fate
👍: 1 ⏩: 1
CHA1-T3A In reply to Growleaf [2018-12-01 17:47:37 +0000 UTC]
KRGBKGDGDG WOW WHAT A FUCKING MOOD
👍: 1 ⏩: 0
StarsPlague [2018-09-06 08:00:28 +0000 UTC]
i have a question since i created a trollsona based off my zodiac, are you able to make them based off a zodiac?? or is it just a no?
👍: 1 ⏩: 1
SoraNeko150 In reply to StarsPlague [2019-07-02 18:43:10 +0000 UTC]
👍: 1 ⏩: 0
pikasparks [2018-08-03 13:43:21 +0000 UTC]
does anyone have any ideas for names for planet based trolls? specifically neptune, but im planning to make others soon too!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Docplaguecrow413 In reply to pikasparks [2021-03-22 14:49:06 +0000 UTC]
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
TheMisadventuresCrew [2018-07-16 18:34:02 +0000 UTC]
also i use human names for a few of my fantrolls but i have completely swapped around the spelling
Example:
Dilela (instead of Delilah)
Airean (instead of Aren/Eren)
Aodrai (instead of Audrei)
Tiylar (instead of Tyler)
Sumael (instead of Samuel)
but i also have Asherr (instead of Asher) and Jazhz (instead of Jazz), as well as Luccah (instead of Luca). ive been meaning to find a new spelling for Asherr, but do you think these names are alright? if some dont seem good, what do you suggest i do to change them. I don't want to figure out completely new names, but if i really have to i will
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
TheMisadventuresCrew [2018-07-16 18:28:57 +0000 UTC]
i was wondering:
A friend of mine tried to make something called a black blood. I believe it would have been like a sort of mutated blood right between dark and brown?? do you think that would be okay to use?
also, a set of my fantrolls (the fantroll and her ancestors) have lime blood but i have made it that they have been dead a long time so by the time my session of trolls comes about, the lime blood is a ghost, is that alright?
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
GaetanDaquin [2018-06-19 19:24:31 +0000 UTC]
This is a really helpful guide, thank you for making this! In the interest of clarification/getting help, I have a few questions:
1. I personally know a human Kanaya who was absolutely born before Homestuck began, so I kind of counted Kanaya as a human name even though it's uncommon. With that in mind, if I found an incredibly uncommon human name that fit in the 6-letter rule and I thought might fit in troll society, so you think that would be acceptable to use?
2. As for adult trolls... Do you have any advice on creating a title/name for an adult troll? I want to create an adult troll and I have his background all figured out, complete with his name as a wiggler and all that, but for the life of me I cannot think of what would be a good fit for his adult name. Do you have any tips on how to come up with one? Like, should it be based off their function as an adult or off of their personality?
3. If I had a troll dye their hair and gave an actual reason for it, would that make sense? I understand that all trolls genetically have black hair, but would dyeing it be an actual option or would it ping as too special-snowflakey for it to work?
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
DraconicReveler In reply to GaetanDaquin [2018-09-27 21:17:48 +0000 UTC]
To answer based off the guide (and personal opinion),
1. Yes. If you say it fits in well, then go for it. From the friendsim, names like Tomman (Tom), Dickus (Dick) and Harriy (Harry), exist, even if it is in joke form. From that I see no reason why you cannot name a troll a pre-existing human name that is already more imaginative than those previous three.
2. My advice would be it's a mix between their personality, their rank and their title. "The Grand Highblood" is by title alone, while "Spinneret Mindfang" goes by appearance and special qualities. Possibly go by what the adult troll wants people to remember them as, since at adulthood it seems like they get to choose their own name. "Dualscar", "Redglare", "Darkleer", all names seem to point to how their young selves would want their adult names to be.
3. Again, I see no reason not to, so long as there is a good explanation for it. But keep in mind that trolls find it stupid to alter their body in stand-offish ways. If it's to rebel, against who, the empire? Their Lusus? Neither would care. What about for grabbing attention? Why not paint "please cull me" on the back of your shirt? I can only really see it happen if they have aspirations to be a hair-dresser or similar, but if you can think of a better reason than those I'd love to see it
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
GaetanDaquin In reply to DraconicReveler [2018-10-02 17:34:47 +0000 UTC]
Thank you so much! This does help a lot. (:
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Mini-Wolfie [2018-06-03 23:21:13 +0000 UTC]
So I have a question is there anything interesting I could do with the pillow kind? I just need a suggestion or two. (I know picking pillow kind was sort of stupid and I might change it but I thought it would be clever because the oc is sloth) Anyways please help I'm out of ideas.
👍: 0 ⏩: 2
SoraNeko150 In reply to Mini-Wolfie [2019-07-02 18:48:20 +0000 UTC]
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trollianAlternate In reply to Mini-Wolfie [2018-06-07 14:19:10 +0000 UTC]
As warned in the guide, try not to take canon characters or attributes. A sloth is already used for Xefros Tritoh's lusus so I would advise changing that.
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Mini-Wolfie In reply to trollianAlternate [2018-06-10 00:47:59 +0000 UTC]
I was talking about the sin sloth. my fan trolls are based of the seven deadly sins. But I appreciate you trying to help
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trollianAlternate In reply to Mini-Wolfie [2018-06-12 15:07:29 +0000 UTC]
*nods* Carry on, then.
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SwampertScale [2018-03-17 23:39:30 +0000 UTC]
I have a small cast of fantrolls and fankids with the main troll as an edited version of my trollsona. Her name is Juunoh Astrid with the Jupiter sign (it should be Libittanius, Teal/Prospit/Void, but she was literally made a day before the Extended Zodiac came out) Her name comes from the wife of Jupiter, Juno, and her last name is a genderbent version of another character's name, Astrio, which blends with the whole 'space opera' theme of my fic, since it comes from astro (stars). Her lusus is six-winged golden eagle (the sacred animal of Zeus/Jupiter). She is a Thief of Void, her strife specibus is thrwknfekind (throwing-knife kind), and frequently uses Fraymotifs in battle, especially with her fellow Void heroes Jhovve Astrio and Will Sanchez. Juunoh often relies on others because on her own she tends to get bored and do stupid things and picks fights she can't win. She has a matespiritship with the team's mechanic, Yermec Arussi. Her land is the Land of Gold and Caves and knows her way around the ruins of Prospit because she used to scavenge for materials to fix the ship before she got a hold of her 'void h4x'. Her horns are shaped like the hook of the Jupiter sign.
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StabStabMan [2018-03-17 22:38:27 +0000 UTC]
Actually there is a canon extended zodiac and personality quiz to determine your blood color, dream planet/moon and aspect which all contributes to a specific sign.
hs.hiveswap.com/ezodiac/index.…
So that should help cut those things down quite quickly.
Oh and just in case you were wondering, I'm a taurist (Bronze blood, dreams on prospit, time aspect)
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quinneox [2018-02-24 14:21:13 +0000 UTC]
So.. I have a trollsona. I ended up naming her Athene Titaia. My idea of a sona came to me through a dream, so mind me, the idea of her may not be entirely canon. As far as I know, from my dreams, her strifes are clawkind and crossbow kind. She's actually a rare caste. Her blood colour is orchid, and I'm assuming her caste would fall just in between Eridan and Gamzee, possibly below Gamzee, possibly above. She is a land-dweller I have no explanation for her to avoid culling.. yet, as I dream of her at times, in her perspective; she has a blocked memory. There are memories she cannot quite tap into yet. She does have special abilities, actually. She seems to show abilities of pyromancery and astroprojection. Her modus is ouija. She has scars on her arms and neck as a result from an injury she had during some war when she used far too much of her power. Her lusus is a mix of a dragon and a cat. She has two horns, two going straight out and two curving a bit. She seems to also have her own religion or magical thing going on. I'm not sure quite what it is but her eyes can turn entirely her blood colour.. Kind of like Kurloz? She does have piercings in her horns and ears. She does not seem to be in a SBURB session, but she seems to have her own planet anyways, which I ended up naming the land of ember and magic. She has no relation to any canon characters, however for some reason she met Tavros asking where Gamzee was? :0? I'm certain that she is an adult and I don't know quite how she met Tavros, especially on her planet. I can just assume it's some weird timeline stuff.
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SoraNeko150 In reply to quinneox [2019-07-02 18:52:40 +0000 UTC]
How vivid this is kinda scares me tbh
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PartyPoisonsgrrl56 [2018-02-17 07:05:46 +0000 UTC]
Any advice you can give on creating a name? I have an idea for a troll; her theme is music and I wanted her name to reflect that. I have her unofficially named Naamah Melodi currently.
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GaetanDaquin In reply to PartyPoisonsgrrl56 [2018-06-19 19:55:39 +0000 UTC]
I definitely like the music theme but the idea seems a bit too broad. I suggest using a specific genre of music or a specific artist as a theme rather than music as a whole, although you can definitely use music as a whole for a theme and I could accept that.
As for the name itself, there are a lot of ways you can do that. If you're set on having their name include musical terms, you can find some less obvious musical terms and modify them to make them fit in more and fit the 6-letter rule. For example, Cadence is a musical term that means things like "a sequence of notes or chords comprising the close of a musical phrase" (dictionary definition) or "rhythm". That definitely isn't a 6-letter name, but if you modified it, it would work.
First, to fit the rule, I would change the ce at the end to make:
Cadens
However, that is visually ugly. Look at that. So I would fix the first letter:
Kadens
After all, the names don't have to obviously look exactly like their source word.
Other Suggestions:
Agadio (Meaning slow tempo) [Cons: Kind of looks like a mash of Aradia Megido's first and last names which would look even worse if you were making a rust blood. Not a game-breaker, however.]
Oktave/Octave (Based off Octave, which is the note in between two other notes -like a half step between) [Cons: Kind of ugly to look at, fairly obvious)
Alegro/Elegro (Based off Allegro, which is when you play music lively/fast) [Cons: Might not fit with her personality]
Lonnen (Based off Lennon, aka John Lennon) [Cons: Might be too obvious, might not be the genre/artist you want to draw inspiration from]
Dacapo/Dakapo/Dekapo (Da Capo, an instruction to play the beginning of the piece again and then stop at the final chord) [Cons: Not the best look visually, May be hard to pronounce]
Elegee/Ehlegy (Elegy, an "instrumental lament with praise for the dead") [Cons: This seems like something very rustblood like, as they are stereotyped to be obsessed with death, but can definitely be used for other blood types; may not fit personality; displeasing to the eye)
Pacito (This is actually meant to be a shortened version of the song "Despacito", which is fairly popular. Using a song or band reference in your name may be useful to think about) [Cons: Won't work well rhythm-wise for many last names, definitely sounds spanish which may lead to the idea the rest of your character should be Spanish-themed]
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PartyPoisonsgrrl56 In reply to GaetanDaquin [2018-07-28 03:37:00 +0000 UTC]
Hey, sorry it's been a while since I replied. I've been busy and also have been trying to figure out some things about my character. I forgot to mention that the character I want to make is a Dancestor/Ancestor. I had the thought of the theme of Celtic music, because I absolutely love that genre. I noticed someone in the comments saying something about translating a relevant phrase in English into another language and modifying it into a name, so going off my Celtic idea, I typed "beautiful song" into Google Translate English to Gaelic and got "òran àlainn". I don't know how close it is to the actual language (again, Google Translate), but I modified it to Oranna Alainn. Your thoughts?
Another thing if I may ask: if I'm going with a Celtic theme, would that affect aspects of her character, i.e her clothing, her way of speaking, etc? Or would that be too much?
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GaetanDaquin In reply to PartyPoisonsgrrl56 [2018-07-30 22:46:42 +0000 UTC]
I think that either having her clothes be inspired by Irish and Scottish styles and having some differences in slang/speech would fit with her theme and would make her stand out, although you have to make sure to not make her a stereotype of those cultures. Give her a personality beyond her inspired culture, make sure to bring the music aspect in firmly so it's a definite character trait and doesn't get lost as you expand your theme, and you will be perfectly fine.
The name Oranna Alainn sounds nice and I think it works as a troll name. I don't know how close the phrase you translated actually is to how it would be said in that language, as I may have Celtic roots but I never earned the language. Either way, it's close enough. Although, if you're making her an adult, make sure to give her a proper title as well.
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BrownieTheArtPuppy [2018-02-04 05:33:38 +0000 UTC]
I'm still working on my oc. Her blood is a light blue and her lusus is a mix of a bull terrier (Dogs with the football shaped heads) and a bat, since it has wings. I'm thinking about changing her bit because she's a day walker, but never goes out because she hates bright lights. I just don't know if I should keep the day walker thing because I've only seen it in jade bloods and it might be mary suish :/
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CordeliaHyder4604 [2017-12-03 21:32:22 +0000 UTC]
Hello! This is a great reference, thank you for it! Question; could I fuchsia-blood feel the need for a bodyguard? And could that bodyguard potentially also be their Moirail? I'm thinking that the bodyguard is a blueblood like Equis.
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Mini-Wolfie In reply to CordeliaHyder4604 [2018-06-04 10:33:30 +0000 UTC]
if your oc is going to have any kind of red violet blood then they would be related to Feferi. Or at least I've been told. The blue blood part would work tho
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DraconicReveler In reply to Mini-Wolfie [2018-09-27 21:30:17 +0000 UTC]
Trolls don't really have "relatives", apart from those who share the same sign. So long as a Fuchsia-blood has a different sign from Feferi, they wouldn't be related at all. They would still be destined to rule as Queen/King and Commander, though.
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Novanplz [2017-12-02 03:38:01 +0000 UTC]
As for "trolls do not have siblings" the Soliel twins beg to differ: whatpumpkin.tumblr.com/post/16…
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Novanplz [2017-11-30 02:18:33 +0000 UTC]
General note: A troll's horn can in fact, be pierced like one would pierce an ear.
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sillybilly2000 [2017-11-28 09:20:44 +0000 UTC]
Like the GCAT pattern, the naming scheme is also Homestuck-centric, seeing as the names of humans are not all 4 letters long.
I'm not sure how it is in Hiveswap, but if the 6x6 pattern is also there, keep in mind the kind of person who made it...
So far I'm not seeing any canon reason why the 6x6 pattern should be abided by (but I do it anyways because constraints help creativity)
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cynicalTabbie [2017-11-25 22:50:54 +0000 UTC]
Does your trollsona have to based off of a constellation?? Every time I ask my friend, he snaps at me for asking such a dumb question, but never gives me an answer :0??
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toasted-rupees3119 In reply to cynicalTabbie [2018-03-10 21:03:05 +0000 UTC]
No, it doesn't have to be! In fact, the only reason the canon trolls are "based off of constellations" is because in canon, they are literally the Gods of our universe. The Zodiac constellations exist because of them (in Homestuck lore, obviously). If you're making a troll that had nothing to do with the session that created "our" universe, don't worry about it.
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w0rm-is-here In reply to cynicalTabbie [2017-12-15 04:50:38 +0000 UTC]
It really doesn't, seeing as the Hiveswap trolls are partially-to-not based from the constellations.
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PhoenixGirl561 [2017-11-06 02:20:03 +0000 UTC]
So, I'm fairly new to Homestuck and my active mind is currently piecing together a Fan Troll, I will continue reading so I can get more information, but I do have a forming idea for one. I might make him a purple blood, but I am basing him around mythological tricksters, his name, Sacian is a mix of Saci, a Brazilian trickster known as either an annoying prankster or malicious and dangerous, and Daucian, a Fijian trickster who was well known for seducing women (I can't find much information about this figure, but I'm doing some more digging). Since tricksters were well known for going against what was considered normal among society Sacian doesn't care much for the Hemospectrum or his position on it and finds Higher Bloods relatively dull and uninteresting, so he seeks to satisfy his boredom through low bloods.
That's what I have down for him so far, and I wanted to get an opinion as to how his development is going >~>
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Foxears11 [2017-11-01 20:12:22 +0000 UTC]
Impressive guide, very helpful for someone like me who jumped on the Homestuck bandwagon really late. Though I do have a question that I haven't found a clear answer to if you don't mind. So mutants hide their blood color with gray, but can non-mutants too? I've heard some say that some lower bloods would to protest the Hemospectrum, but it's not really a big movement. I want to know as I have an idea about 2 trolls(one introverted land dweller and another a lively sea-dweller)who both don't publicly share their blood color. Most think it's because the land dweller is a mutant or just really odd and the sea dweller is only doing it as a fashion statement or because they're moirails. In reality HE is the mutant(bright violet or some shade of pink blood) who pretends to be higher upper and the land dweller is a blue blood who wants to protect/support her moirail. So they pull off this whole pretense in order not to get caught. Could this work?
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GaetanDaquin In reply to Foxears11 [2018-06-19 20:11:55 +0000 UTC]
I definitely think that having two trolls that use grey text would work, although I would stray away from pink blood because fuschia/pink blood is exclusive to the Condense and her kin. When Karkat used grey, his friends seemed to see it more as him being/stubborn/shy/mysterious than the fact that he is a mutant. Due to that, it seems to me that it is a practice used by more than just mutants. Ny the way: Using grey text would definitely make the friends of your fantrolls curious, so you should keep that in mind.
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Foxears11 In reply to GaetanDaquin [2018-06-21 02:49:44 +0000 UTC]
Thank you, I appreciate that you took the time to respond! I will definitely make sure that the two are careful when communicating with others.
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GaetanDaquin In reply to Foxears11 [2018-06-21 20:17:19 +0000 UTC]
No problem! I'm glad I could help you out.
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ZeoMaddox [2017-10-20 05:28:59 +0000 UTC]
Hey, great guide! It helped me a lot! I wanted to run an idea by you, though. I asked a couple of friends this, and they said it was fine, but I'm still not sure; so I was thinking of making a sea-dweller troll oc, except that they hide their blood color because they're a mutant yellow blood who's social standing is totally skewed due to this.
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Growleaf In reply to ZeoMaddox [2017-10-26 05:50:33 +0000 UTC]
That could work as a concept, though they might have been culled at birth for opposing the hemospectrum like that, so making some kind of background reasons for them to have lived through the brooding caverns could add some credibility and also give an interesting set up to work with in my opinion.
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