a quick and dirty guide to my headcanon.
Given the Megaman franchise and its...somewhat flexible canon, I figured it would be a good idea to put down how I approach things somewhere, so! The fanon I'm using, the fanon I'm not using, and all that general headcanon shit.
Always subject to addition if I think of more!
>> fucking armor, how does it work?
The eternal question. Does the armor come off? Can reploids just ditch all the heavy metal crap and walk around in jeans and a t-shirt?
I go with yes. My reasoning: first, the original Megaman has been depicted armorless in the Ariga manga, and while I admit I'm not really up on what is and isn't counted in the classic series, it's my understanding that the Ariga manga is considered canon. I don't really see Dr. Light going backwards when designing his next creation.
Granted, you could say that it makes sense for Megaman because he was originally built as a lab assistant, and only later fitted for battle, but -- that brings me to the second half of my reasoning: Dr. Light's holograms overall give the impression that he didn't necessary want X to fight, and that all the armor upgrades were there if X should want/need them. Dr. Light's entire agenda was to see robots and humans living in peace, so I tend to think that in building the first robot able to choose its own path, he'd design with more than just KILLIN' THINGS in mind.
Ergo, armor comes off. Granted, first X is going to have to find a change of clothes, since he hasn't brought anything else into the game with him, but that's his problem.
>> fucking...everything else, how does it work?
I've seen arguments I'm willing to buy for reploids being capable of ingesting food (I think it mostly came down to "internal combustion as an alternate fuel source, also allows them to socially function in ways that would be easier for humans to accept"), though obviously they don't need it.
Beyond that, though, I'm just kind of Not Going There. I'll buy eating, and I imagine a shower would be a good way to wash off the blood coolant remains of one's defeated enemies at the end of the day. But depending where you look in fandom, I've seen reploids get drunk, throw up, brush their teeth, and...yeah, I'm just not going there.
(Although yeah, according to MHX, reploids bleed green. Who knew.)
>> let's do the time warp again
They keep editing the timeline as outlined on Megaman Wiki, and when I first hashed out my canon for X's app, I was going by what was listed there at the time. Oops.
My completely arbitrary age for X is fifty-eight, counting from his activation by Dr. Cain. He's not sure how long he spent in the capsule before that, so I don't think it's vital that I know that one, either. He was activated in 2114, which puts the current year in his timeline as 2173; as he came into hometrail from early September in his own time, he'll actually be turning fifty-nine any day now in-game (i.e. when I feel like using it for log fodder).
(I do have him count his birthday from when Dr. Light finished him, rather than when Dr. Cain activated him. He'll take anything he can get that makes him feel connected to his father.)
I'm playing him post-X8, but he hasn't been through the events of Command Mission yet.
>> what about hunter ranks?
X5 got kind of ridiculous with all that PA GA bullshit MAN I DON'T EVEN KNOW, GUYS. As far as I'm concerned, the Hunter class system just goes:
D ➔ C ➔ B ➔ A ➔ S
And that's it.
I interpret Hunter rank and Hunter class as being two different systems, though. Class is a grade assigned as a quick summary of a Hunter's overall battle prowess, while rank is their actual place in the organization's chain of command -- the two are unrelated.
Currently, X holds the rank of Commander, leading the 17th Unit Elite Forces, and is graded at S-class. Until X5, canon is hilariously vague about who exactly is calling the shots in the Hunters overall, but thanks to one throwaway line about X being "their leader" in X2, I headcanon X as having been Grand Commander during the Second and Third Uprisings -- Zero inherited the position from Sigma, X inherited it from Zero, and he was finally able to shake it off and get himself back down to being a plain old unit commander sometime before the Repliforce incident.
>> x1 versus maverick hunter x
MHX/Day of Sigma is AU and I treat it that way. I like some of it and I pull from some of it, but original game canon takes precedence for me.
The most obvious thing here is that...Dr. Cain didn't die until sometime closer to X4.
I prefer to assume that unlike the scenes in Day of Sigma, X was not ever activated to speak to Dr. Light before Light's death. Partly because I find it more poignant, and partly because those scenes make it sound more like Light wanted him to fight, instead of the implication I'd always felt from the games that Light made him to choose and just made preparations in case X should decide to fight.
I do like the fact that the virus is less of a factor in MHX (if it can even be called a factor; Sigma's defection, even if he is still probably infected, seems remarkably calculated), because I've always seen the virus as a big factor in creating Mavericks, but definitely not as the sole cause -- because if a Maverick is just a reploid who kills humans, then obviously that choice is always theirs. (And when Lumine acts like it's some amazing new development that they can choose to go Maverick, I figure he's just trippin' balls.) Basically, I see the virus as something akin to getting really fucking drunk: it severely reduces inhibitions. For reploids already questioning human authority, or who have brash, violent personalities, the consequences of this should be obvious.
And I like that showdown in Day of Sigma where X disarms, gets lightsabered in the gut, and SHINING FINGERS Sigma in the face. In my headcanon, that totally stays, unless I ever get a Zero or a (yeah right) Sigma who doesn't want to roll with it. I doubt it'll come up, but hey.
Always subject to addition if I think of more!
>> fucking armor, how does it work?
The eternal question. Does the armor come off? Can reploids just ditch all the heavy metal crap and walk around in jeans and a t-shirt?
I go with yes. My reasoning: first, the original Megaman has been depicted armorless in the Ariga manga, and while I admit I'm not really up on what is and isn't counted in the classic series, it's my understanding that the Ariga manga is considered canon. I don't really see Dr. Light going backwards when designing his next creation.
Granted, you could say that it makes sense for Megaman because he was originally built as a lab assistant, and only later fitted for battle, but -- that brings me to the second half of my reasoning: Dr. Light's holograms overall give the impression that he didn't necessary want X to fight, and that all the armor upgrades were there if X should want/need them. Dr. Light's entire agenda was to see robots and humans living in peace, so I tend to think that in building the first robot able to choose its own path, he'd design with more than just KILLIN' THINGS in mind.
Ergo, armor comes off. Granted, first X is going to have to find a change of clothes, since he hasn't brought anything else into the game with him, but that's his problem.
>> fucking...everything else, how does it work?
I've seen arguments I'm willing to buy for reploids being capable of ingesting food (I think it mostly came down to "internal combustion as an alternate fuel source, also allows them to socially function in ways that would be easier for humans to accept"), though obviously they don't need it.
Beyond that, though, I'm just kind of Not Going There. I'll buy eating, and I imagine a shower would be a good way to wash off the blood coolant remains of one's defeated enemies at the end of the day. But depending where you look in fandom, I've seen reploids get drunk, throw up, brush their teeth, and...yeah, I'm just not going there.
(Although yeah, according to MHX, reploids bleed green. Who knew.)
>> let's do the time warp again
They keep editing the timeline as outlined on Megaman Wiki, and when I first hashed out my canon for X's app, I was going by what was listed there at the time. Oops.
My completely arbitrary age for X is fifty-eight, counting from his activation by Dr. Cain. He's not sure how long he spent in the capsule before that, so I don't think it's vital that I know that one, either. He was activated in 2114, which puts the current year in his timeline as 2173; as he came into hometrail from early September in his own time, he'll actually be turning fifty-nine any day now in-game (i.e. when I feel like using it for log fodder).
(I do have him count his birthday from when Dr. Light finished him, rather than when Dr. Cain activated him. He'll take anything he can get that makes him feel connected to his father.)
I'm playing him post-X8, but he hasn't been through the events of Command Mission yet.
>> what about hunter ranks?
X5 got kind of ridiculous with all that PA GA bullshit MAN I DON'T EVEN KNOW, GUYS. As far as I'm concerned, the Hunter class system just goes:
D ➔ C ➔ B ➔ A ➔ S
And that's it.
I interpret Hunter rank and Hunter class as being two different systems, though. Class is a grade assigned as a quick summary of a Hunter's overall battle prowess, while rank is their actual place in the organization's chain of command -- the two are unrelated.
Currently, X holds the rank of Commander, leading the 17th Unit Elite Forces, and is graded at S-class. Until X5, canon is hilariously vague about who exactly is calling the shots in the Hunters overall, but thanks to one throwaway line about X being "their leader" in X2, I headcanon X as having been Grand Commander during the Second and Third Uprisings -- Zero inherited the position from Sigma, X inherited it from Zero, and he was finally able to shake it off and get himself back down to being a plain old unit commander sometime before the Repliforce incident.
>> x1 versus maverick hunter x
MHX/Day of Sigma is AU and I treat it that way. I like some of it and I pull from some of it, but original game canon takes precedence for me.
The most obvious thing here is that...Dr. Cain didn't die until sometime closer to X4.
I prefer to assume that unlike the scenes in Day of Sigma, X was not ever activated to speak to Dr. Light before Light's death. Partly because I find it more poignant, and partly because those scenes make it sound more like Light wanted him to fight, instead of the implication I'd always felt from the games that Light made him to choose and just made preparations in case X should decide to fight.
I do like the fact that the virus is less of a factor in MHX (if it can even be called a factor; Sigma's defection, even if he is still probably infected, seems remarkably calculated), because I've always seen the virus as a big factor in creating Mavericks, but definitely not as the sole cause -- because if a Maverick is just a reploid who kills humans, then obviously that choice is always theirs. (And when Lumine acts like it's some amazing new development that they can choose to go Maverick, I figure he's just trippin' balls.) Basically, I see the virus as something akin to getting really fucking drunk: it severely reduces inhibitions. For reploids already questioning human authority, or who have brash, violent personalities, the consequences of this should be obvious.
And I like that showdown in Day of Sigma where X disarms, gets lightsabered in the gut, and SHINING FINGERS Sigma in the face. In my headcanon, that totally stays, unless I ever get a Zero or a (yeah right) Sigma who doesn't want to roll with it. I doubt it'll come up, but hey.