R4E1 Composite Jojolity

Judge Gilgamesh (Flamechar)

What does it mean to be immortal? To paraphrase the Jojolity for this match, what does immortality mean to these two? Both teams have done a great job at weaving this into the narrative and mechanics of this strategy — I’m giving both a **9** but I want to discuss a bit more about it. The strats both start off with two contrasting ideas on immortality, especially in regards to interacting with mortals:

Ouroboros on the idea that an immortal *shouldn’t* love or form connections, that they are ‘beyond’ such things — that they don’t deserve it, with all the lives they had taken or torn apart, and focuses on trying to force Markov to acknowledge this ‘fact’ — having her either be crushed by the crowds or to fight back, using a body as a shield — all while generally showing no care for the lives of those in the crowd.

Markov on the other hand portrays the argument of Legacy and memory, of personal growth, and how connections foster such things — looking back on her past, taking inspiration from her time with Rasna and choosing to prioritise a smaller number of weapons as opposed to a wider variety such as in prior matches, all while taking care to only target Ouro and his Stand with lethal force: nonlethally scaring off the crowds with an airsoft gun.

Both themes contrast one another, but not completely — for while Ouroboros rants about how they shouldn’t be making connections, he already *has*. Evergreen, Markov’s hosts, so many others: both immortals have grown, have *Changed*, due to those they have met throughout the tournament — to those whom they *Loved* in one way or another.

Love and change…two key points throughout this tournament, intertwining with each other thoroughly, but oh so more present here. Afterall, love and change are a presence felt throughout life and time, whether by their presence or absence, so of course such themes would find themselves rooted within the debates of immortality…to love is to change, to be loved is to be changed.

Judge Ravana (Alphamon)

Alright buddy it’s JoJolity time! It’s time to praise everyone’s hard work in adhering to a second objective, and I mean it!

We’ll start with East, who have an incredibly strong throughline painted by the mechanics, and glued together with the force of will that is the ending, which stands atop the thesis, “Immortality Is What You Gain By Ceaselessly Taking From Others”.

Ouro starts on this thesis and stands on business… and the soon-to-be, if not already, corpses of his fallen stand fodder. He stole their senses with his gun, by firing into the crowd. He stole their safety and their lives with that same gun, and shows just what it means to keep taking, past the point of pointlessness, with him closing in nice and slowly, taking all the damage in the world to heal himself and prove his point, before finally killing Markov’s host.

This is ended with a tour-du-force of the inside of this man’s head, which ends with how absolutely broken it makes him feel. He doesn’t deserve others’ company, but they keep coming to him, they keep helping him, they keep giving to him.

He doesn’t deserve it.

He does, however, deserve this **10**!

Moving onto Guyver With Rover, we have something I alluded to in the crux of my quality delib: Markov is using this current host in the same way she’ll use the next one. She’s iterating, moving forward, taking things as they happen and building up from there.

It’s a long con, especially considering that it can use former strats- or future stories- to build off of itself, but each strat has to be taken on its level until the very final match of the tournament, so I’ll note but put it aside.

It’s iterative. It’s a plan for an immortal, not looking back but looking forward. It’s the chase towards the future through the current design, by using what’s available to make the path forward, to then create the next path forward, and so on, and so on.

The narrative really does ride or die on these practically explanatory story sections, so I’m very glad they’re there. Take this **9** for your collection.

Judge Qin Shi Huang (Extra)

I'll just get the scores out of the way first: both of these are extremely solid **9s.**

Ouroboros takes his side of what it means to be immortal by turning the crowd into chaos. He pops innocent people in the head just because he can, sows fear and dread among the "lesser beings," and simply elects not to care about the fleeting lives of the common people. The blatant disregard for the sanctity of life really nails the idea that Ouroboros is different than them - for better in some ways, for worse in most. The flavor section has some nice emotional punch to it that ties the mechanics together with a neat little bow.

Markov does the opposite - as I mentioned in quality, the focus on attacking the threads of TS as a metaphor for attacking the foundations of immortality and deconstructing the notion that it keeps the immortal separate from the mortal is a very fun and well-executed idea. The notion of immortality in a figurative sense, a legacy that never fades, supplementing the literal idea of immortality as "not dying," provides the other end of the counterbalance. Simply put, a coherent and compelling narrative done in an impressively short time.