Empathic manipulation
| Empathic manipulation | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Held by: | Syn Anders, Morgan Harvey, Joseph Sullivan (deceased) |
| Ability to: | Manipulate and control other people's emotions |
Empathic manipulation is the ability to alter others' emotions and feelings.
Characters
- Syn Anders has this ability. (Heroes Evolutions)
- Morgan Harvey has this ability. (Slow Burn)
- Joseph Sullivan had this ability. (The Puppet Master)
Limits
Syn has the ability of altering people's emotions by physically touching them. She can control a myriad of sentiments, both positive and negative. So far, it has been reported that she's capable of inducing happiness, joy, sympathy, anger, depression, sadness and fear. Syn can also control the intensity of these emotions: for instance, the positive emotions she creates can range from a simple smile to extreme happiness. The current emotional state of a person does not seem to pose a problem: she can suddenly move to tears someone who was previously experiencing intense joy. It appears that Syn can also affect multiple people at once: for instance, she can cause an angry mob or let the joy she creates spread to others.
So far, Syn cannot manipulate her own emotions.
Additionally, Syn has learned how to use her ability to persuade and manipulate others by altering their emotional state. She can even lead someone to suicide by evoking extreme depression.
Recently, Syn discovered a new aspect of her ability that allows her to feel the emotions contained in objects. She could feel the same emotions of some characters of a painting (Heroes Evolutions). The full extent of this aspect of her ability remains unclear.
In a list, Edgar said that Joseph Sullivan "controls emotions". Joseph was able to make Eric Doyle lose control over his ability and collapse. What emotions he manipulated to achieve this are unknown. Unlike Syn and Morgan Harvey, Joseph does not appear to require touch to use his ability.
Examples
- After seeing some paintings in Habbo, Syn felt the same emotions of the people in the paintings (Heroes Evolutions).
Notes
- Syn's ability to alter someone's emotions shouldn't be confused with Peter's ability to absorb powers through an empathic level, with Guillame's ability to manipulate sensations or with Lydia's ability to feel the desires of others.
- Morgan Harvey was mentioned several times to have this ability by The Watcher, but has never demonstrated it. According to her Heroes: Survival profile, she requires physical contact to use it.
- During a fight between Joseph Sullivan and Samuel Sullivan, Samuel shouted at Joseph to stop manipulating his emotions. Whether Joseph was using his ability on Samuel or if he was simply using that particular phrasing is unknown. (Brother's Keeper)
- Chris Coolidge's Assignment Tracker 2.0 profile lists his ability as empathic manipulation. However, this appears to be a mistake:
- The Primatech file about Chris never mentioned empathic manipulation.
- Chris's ability doesn't have the same characteristics as this ability. (It seems to be more in line with his niece's ability, enhanced synesthesia, which was mentioned in Chris's Primatech file.)
See Also
- For other uses of manipulation, see manipulation (disambig).
- For the ability to absorb other peoples abilities through empathy, see empathic mimicry.
- For the ability to cause positive and negative sensations in others, see bliss and horror.
- For the ability to know about others and their motives, see empathy.
- For the ability to incite uncontrollable anger in others, see primal rage.
Please refer to Theory:Empathic manipulation for fan-created theories and other speculation.