Talk:Bloodbending/@comment-24.61.65.126-20120819162120/@comment-3068994-20120820032537

What you leave out is that it is a subskill and possibility derived from bloodbending. Those who are capable of bloodbending, can develop that, if they hone their skills enought do so. How do you think Yakone managed to in the first place? Where did his 'genes' come from, if they didn't exist before? Genes only stand to divide and show who can bend what element. And even then; that's a hazy ground, because Bryke themselves never committed to saying genes were responsible for that.

And bloodbending can be taught one person to the other. Hama was in the process of training what she had taught to herself of bloodbending (that nobody knew how to do before, other than the fact they were waterbenders. Gene was not a factor in this possibility, but rather, the ability to learn).

As another example pointing back to Toph; nobody knew how to metalbend before Toph did it. Supposedly. So why could Toph suddenly do it? Because she paid attention and applied the concept, she thought to take her time to feel the element, to understand what it really was, instead of seeing it as an obstacle to move. She basically applied herself at a level of non-understanding, attempting to teach herself what it was that she was trying to do. This succeeded.

In Hama's/etc benders case, bloodbending is a difficult thing to perform. The full moon however, makes this difficult process much easier by empowering them greatly / they can more readily feel the energy of the water. So it's no wonder that they could more easily bloodbend then, with their powers enhanced. They simply didn't go the next step of struggling to bloodbend without the full moon, and Hama appeared to believe it was the full moon itself that allowed this capability, so she had believed she taught herself the limit of her ability. When somebody believes they have "learned it all," that is when they have learned the least.