Guardian


 * Not to be confused with First guardian.

Guardians are a concept in Homestuck. Each of the eight Homestuck Kids has a unique Guardian that watches over them in some form, is related to them Ectobiologically, or both. They are typically drawn with minimal facial features, though this is purely stylistic. They all singularly raise their respective children without outside help for unknown, possibly coincidental, reasons. In addition, Guardians can never be told what to do. Neither the omnipotent kind, nor the ordinary kind who raise kids in houses. HS 4154 (It's a universal law of reality).

The original four characters in B1 revealed to be Guardians were referred to in the narrative strictly by a three-letter word describing their relationship to the child (Dad, Mom, Bro, Bec). This tradition, while still holding true for these characters, has been abandoned with the revelation of the kids' ectobiological ancestors are also Guardians.

Colonel Sassacre (and to a lesser extent, Halley) can also be considered the Guardians of Nanna and Grandpa (pre-scratch), and Grandma and Poppop (post-scratch).

List of Guardians
Pre-scratch:
 * John Egbert has his Nanna (pre-scratch Jane).
 * He also has his Dad, biologically his half-brother.
 * Rose Lalonde has her Mom (pre-scratch Roxy).
 * Dave Strider has his Bro (pre-scratch Dirk).
 * Jade Harley has her Grandpa (pre-scratch Jake).
 * She also has her dog Bec, biologically unrelated.

Post-scratch:
 * Jane Crocker has her Poppop (post-scratch John).
 * She also has her Dad, biologically her grandson.
 * Roxy Lalonde has her Mom (post-scratch Rose).
 * Dirk Strider has his Bro (post-scratch Dave).
 * Jake English has his Grandma (post-scratch Jade).
 * He also has a plethora of Lusii he strifes with, though he sees them as average monsters.

The trolls of both Alternia and Beforus have two Guardian-like figures each, a Lusus that acts as their caretaker during childhood and an Ancestor that lived long ago, being their ectobiological relative. Kanaya Maryam is somewhat of an exception to this as she, like Jade, additionally has her planet's first guardian,, as a third Guardian.

Strife and Guardian Rubrics
The method in which the guardians aggress the kids are called Guardian Rubrics. Most of these 'attacks' are non-violent and are composed of ways to force unwanted gifts and treats upon the kids. It really bugs them. They are, however, also able to fight seriously as seen when engaging the various foes encountered in the Medium.


 * John (and presumably Jane)'s Dad utilizes cakekind.
 * Coddlebrand: An aggressive offering of cake, resulting in a Dotesmite.
 * Rose's Mom utilizes fistkind and, in more dangerous situations, riflekind.
 * Ironic Indulgence: A lavish gift, such as 'A Beautiful Pony!'
 * Ironic Negligence: An aggressive offer of a martini, though Rose is clearly a minor.
 * Dave's Bro utilizes bladekind and puppetkind. None of his Rubrics against Dave have been named.
 * Bec is a passive entity and only utilizes his first guardian powers to redirect Jade's attacks. Post-prototyping, he is shown using multiple powerful explosive attacks, but never towards Jade.
 * Nanna has only been shown to participate in a Strife post-prototyping, utilizing Sprite powers.
 * Grandpa utilizes riflekind, but has never been seen using it on Jade.
 * Colonel Sassacre and Halley have never been shown to Strife.
 * Roxy's Mom utilizes needlekind. She and Roxy did not live in the same time period and never engaged in strife.
 * Dirk's Bro utilizes bladekind. However, upon his death, his sword was broken in half, presumably resulting in ½bladekind. However, since he and Dirk do not live in the same time they do not engage in strife.
 * Grandma utilizes riflekind. It is doubtful that she and Jake ever strifed because he was quite young when she died.

Hobbies and Interests
Some Guardians have highly obsessive hobbies and interests that often irritate or upset the kids. Most often, the Guardians are simply trying to create common interests between them and their kid.


 * John's Dad's interest is Harlequins, and John's house is appropriately adorned with many. This behavior was later discovered to be caused by harlequin doodles John drew over his room in his sleep, previously unnoticed by both him and the reader. Gamzee Makara and his mysterious chucklevoodoo powers were later discovered to be the cause.
 * Nanna enjoys pranks and once ran a joke shop before her death. She also obsessively bakes sweet treats like cookies and cakes. These actions are often approved of by John, though his distaste of Betty Crocker products is readily apparent.
 * Rose's Mom is an alcoholic and keeps entire rooms full of various beverages. She is also, quite frankly, obsessed with Wizards. Her house is adorned with paintings and statues of them. Though Rose originally believed this hobby to be a passive aggressive façade to annoy her, Rose enjoys wizards too, and her Mom is likely trying to create a common interest.
 * Dave's Bro fills his apartment to the brim with Puppets and related merchandise, to a point where is can become disconcerting to even walk around. He also has a knack for placing Saw-like traps and hundreds of shitty swords around the house to test and/or spite Dave.
 * Grandpa, a true adventuring man, has many sorts of collections. Among them are Big Game Trophies, Mummies, Knights, and Rifles. His most fond interest, however, are his Beauties of a cerulean complexion. He is even seen at several points with a life-sized blue doll.
 * Bec is simply obsessed with his master, Jade. He is a dog, after all.
 * Colonel Sassacre and Halley, being relatively normal, have no definable interest. Sassacre became a famous comedian and prankster in both B universes, however.
 * Jane's Dad used to mimic Jane's interests more throughout the household which lead to many strifes in her early teens, HS 6096 (but not so much anymore.) Now he embraces more plain, fatherly interests. These include Serious Business, ties, fedoras, and most anything else on sale at the Dadly Depot.
 * Poppop spent his life mastering jokes and pranks, even taking up the role of a famous comedian. Beyond that, little is known about him.
 * Roxy's Mom became a famous fiction writer about wizards, crafting Complacency of the Learned into a novel. She is highly suspected to have a quiet interest in Dark Majyyks, as her series made more money than the United States could count circulating in the economy. It is also worth noting that she kept large amounts of alcohol around.
 * Dirk's Bro became a famous director, making films based on the lives of Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff. His mastery of irony played a key part in their ultimate success. He also manufactured shitty JPEG image files as tangible objects. They sold for negative amounts of money, which ironically made him a fortune.
 * Grandma's main interests are rifles and adventuring, paralleling Grandpa. However, she also retained her pre-scratch interests in advanced sciences and horticulture, the latter of which ended up leading to a majority of the island being overgrown after her death.

Connections to Sburb
Though most Guardians initially appear to be bland adult characters with no interest or knowledge of the game their child is playing, there are numerous hints scattered about that tie them into the very origin of the game in each respective universe.


 * John's Dad, since meeting Rose's Mom the day that Nanna died, collects HS 2445 (newspaper articles concerning nearby meteor strikes) in order to sleuth out more info about the mysterious woman.
 * Rose's Mom is a head scientist for a large company that is strongly hinted to be Skaianet. She happens to live right next door to Skaianet Laboratory, which is connected to a mausoleum for Jaspers in their backyard. In the laboratory, various Ectobiology experiments have been run, resulting in mutant kittens. There is also a two-way Transportalizer that connects her room to the center of the lab.
 * Unlike the other Guardians, Bro originally had an interest in Sburb and originally intended to play it, buying two copies for Dave and himself, though presented both copies to Dave after a heated Strife during the meteor storm.
 * He also had a window under Complete Bullshit titled "skaianet newsfeed / beta released / stable release date / bug reports".
 * Bec is a first guardian, a designated protector of Earth, that was created in an Ectobiology Lab inside of The Medium itself.
 * This lab eventually became the Frog Temple that he, Grandpa, and Jade live right next door to.
 * Grandpa displays many of the heaviest connections to Sburb. He is stated to be the wealthy founder of a large multinational corporation, strongly hinted to be Skaianet, as well as the heir to the Betty Crocker franchise.
 * Below the elevator of the Frog Temple on his island are HS 6954 (two transportalizers) that lead into the Medium, specifically Prospit and Derse.
 * His house is constructed in a similar manner as the kids' dream selves' towers on Prospit and Derse.
 * Among the Big Game Trophies that Grandpa hunted, the head of a Crude Ogre and several other Underlings can be seen.
 * Grandpa is seen within the Medium several times, coexisting with the kids and helping the other Guardians along their journey, despite the fact that he is chronologically dead by this point. He pilots a HS 3796 (large battleship).
 * Nanna stated to John that she has HS 4698 that she is John's biological mother and John created them via Ectobiology. It's possible she knew this from her upbringing as Grandpa's adopted sister and the batterwitch's adopted daughter.
 * Colonel Sassacre has few relations to the game itself, save witnessing Nanna and Grandpa's meteor arrivals.
 * Halley has one important relation to Sburb, that being the biological basis for the creation of Bec.
 * Poppop possesses no immediate connections to the creation of the game in B2.
 * Roxy's Mom and Dirk's Bro also feature no connections to the process of releasing the game; however, they were aware of certain mechanics of it and fought Her Imperious Condescension in order to protect their biological ancestors from her machinations and traps.
 * Grandma is known to play largely the same role as Grandpa did pre-scratch; founding Skaianet, visiting the Medium, and bringing back information before her untimely death. It is unknown, however, if she was able to travel through time in any way, as she has not visibly appeared in the Medium alongside the kids.

Trivia

 * Nearly all of the post-scratch iterations of the kids or Guardians have the same Strife Specibi as their pre-scratch versions.
 * It is also implied that they retain their same Fetch Modi.
 * Jake's modus is capable of holding incredibly large items, which may explain the large battleship that Grandpa was able to take into the Medium.