Application
Character
Name: Selphie Tilmitt
Fandom: Final Fantasy VIII
Gender: Female
Age: 17
Time Period: post-game
Wing Color: Yellow
History: Wiki for you, wiki for me~
Personality:
To say that Selphie is hyperactive is a bit of an understatement. Selphie is an energetic ball of spunk as shown by the way that she frequently speaks her mind throughout the game. She's not doing it to be mean, it's just the way she is; honest. Being cheerful, perky and optimistic, most people tend to view Selphie as an annoying idiot but there is so much more to her than that. She was one of four people out of her entire class of SeeD cadets who successfully passed the field exam along with her friends Squall and Zell from the Orphanage Gang. Later on, on their quest to save their world, she became the pilot of the Ragnarok. This shows that she is quite proficient in using electronics as well as disarming missiles but only after a couple sessions of hardcore button mashing. Other examples of being proficient with electronics include the use of her blog, the redesign of the Balamb Garden Festival Committee's webpage and her Shrine to Laguna.
She has a natural charisma, warmth and kindness about her as her time spent at Trabia Garden as a Cadet had her seen and observed to have many friends from Trabia who care for her deeply and on the Garden Festival Committee at Balamb Garden. She's willing to put her own feelings and happiness aside if it means that her friends and those around her will cheer up which of course can be a double-edged sword for her. It indicates that Selphie keeps a lot of her personal secrets to herself and wouldn't dare to tell the world without a great deal of prodding. She'll stick to her guns and -- periodically -- take the time to think her way through a situation. She loves Moombas and Chocobos with all her heart and hates to see people being bullied. She's also pretty damn skilled at relaying messages and doing reconnaissance. That spunky side of hers is well complimented (in a bad way) toward her recklessness and her notion for getting into trouble. The girl jumps off a cliff without a care in the world after all! However, she somehow has a knack for getting out of a tight situation but this usually done by taking things by the horns and doing whatever it takes and holy crap does she do it with an air of confidence! Despite all this, Selphie sometimes happens to have the subtlety of a bag of hammers.
There are times however when Selphie finds herself overwhelmed and just needs to be left alone for a little bit. When the stage to the Garden Festival was destroyed during the moving of Balamb Garden, she was devastated to say the least. She needed some time to herself because she was genuinely upset by this. She'll spend the day running around making sure that everyone else was okay and doing her best to cheer them up, only to pour out she's feeling. She does bounce back from these events after a little bit which shows that she somehow manages to work things out in the end. In the latter scenario, Selphie wants to get revenge on the people who destroyed her beloved Trabia Garden. That point in time is probably about the closest you'll ever hear Selphie saying that she hates something in the world because she does her best to see the best in everything. This can give off the feeling that her view on the world is naive or completely innocent.
This isn't to say that Selphie doesn't have her fair share of negative points either. Her cheerful disposition has others thinking that she's annoying and a bother or that she can't get things done. That natural bubblyness that comes out of her can give off the impression to people that she's a ditz or a complete airhead which is nowhere near the case. Selphie definitely does not epitomize "Think before you leap" at all as she's always rushing head-long into situations where if more careful thought were put into what she does every day, she'd realize that what she's doing is not such a good idea after all.
Strengths:
Selphie is a SeeD from early on in the game. The girl has been trained to fight and she can and will kick your ass because when you've been training to be a mercenary since you're about ten years old, you'd likely know a thing or two about fighting. Selphie fights with a nunchaku. Think Michelangelo’s weapon from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and supersize it. She's very, very accurate with this weapon which is displayed by the fact that her hits almost never miss during the thousands of random encounters through the game. Selphie also has the ability to use powerful magical attacks in a time of desperation without the aid of a Guardian Force or using up stocked magic that is collected throughout the game. These range from powerful elemental magic to fully healing the entire party. Selphie is also a well of cheer for her friends. The minute that the group arrived at the remains of the destroyed Trabia Garden, Selphie was running around her friends up and making sure that they were okay. She's also somewhat of a techno-nut. She pilots the Ragnarok, redesigns the entire Balamb Garden Festival Website, maintains a blog AND has a shrine to her beloved Sir Laguna. Her cheerfulness is her greatest weapon in times of sadness. Finally, Selphie has this knack for keeping things about herself secret. When Squall and Company found the computer in Trabia Garden where Selphie's information popped up, she rushed in and made the information inaccessible to others.
Weaknesses:
Selphie by far suffers from one of the worst cases of logic failure that I've ever seen as there is no logic at all in jumping off a cliff to your certain death. Upon first meeting Selphie in the game, she shouts after the squad before tumbling down a pile of rubble which makes it painfully clear that she's a total klutz. She's reckless and rushes into things head first upon many an occasion with one such event almost resulting in her and her companions deaths when they rushed into an army base to disarm some missiles and consequently were trapped inside the Galbadian Army's missile base that was doomed to self destruct. These times also don't happen very often but when Selphie becomes so overwhelmed by a traumatic or distressing situation, her world will fall apart. The destruction of the stage that was going to be used for the Garden Festival had her showing another side of herself at this time -- disappointment and despair. Selphie is also a total klutz as she's known to run into students and tumble down a hill when trying to locate people to deliver important messages. It's also indicated early on in the game that Selphie gets lost easily as she requests a tour of Balamb Garden from Squall.