Why Navi and Tatl Can't Heal.

[Dragoncat]

There have been jokes about stuffing Navi in a bottle and demanding she grow healing powers. I believe our very own Shadsie was the one who said that...but regardless, I'm sure many of us have wondered: if the fairies you catch heal you, can Navi and Tatl do the same? If so, why don't they?

I came up with an explanation. And it's not "because being able to have your companion heal you all the time would make things too easy." My idea is that the fairies lose their healing powers when they bond with someone, a kokiri etc. Only "wild", unbonded fairies can heal. How this happens exactly is up to interpretation, I think there might be a ritual of some sort that the gods respond to and take away the fairy's healing magic. So no matter how long you keep Navi in that bottle, she won't get her healing powers back. She has bonded with Link so she no longer has them. After she leaves at the end of OoT...well, who knows? Maybe she becomes a wild fairy and gets that magic back through another ritual. Or maybe it's a one time thing...

Small theory, but a theory it is. Thoughts?

 

[Sheik]

My thoughts are that they can only give link a certain amount of helpfulness. So, Tatl uses her "helpfulness" by giving advice, and the others help by healing link... But one can't do both.

 

[Salem]

I believe someone suggested that they die of they heal you, but I don't believe that.

Maybe the powers of the fairies, of it's healing or advising a Kokiri is based on the "breed" of Fairies, the Deku Trees' flocks probably are incapable of healing but they are more intelligent that the pink ones that live in fountains, so they have different responsibilities.

 

[Dragoncat]

Maybe the powers of the fairies, of it's healing or advising a Kokiri is based on the "breed" of Fairies, the Deku Trees' flocks probably are incapable of healing but they are more intelligent that the pink ones that live in fountains, so they have different responsibilities.

That could be possible too...

Blue: Yeah it's mainly speculation. But maybe Tatl wasn't bonded with Skull Kid or Link at first, maybe her kokiri met a tragic end or something. As for the lending of strength, sounds plausable.

 

[Clank]

Maybe they just didn't want to give you invincibility...

 

[Terminus]

Surely if a single fairy could revive someone so easily, everyone would have one?

I remember reading somewhere that fairies became "rare" after a certain point. I can't remember the source, so feel free to shoot this down.

 

[Awesomehylian]

I honestly never really put Navi/Tatl in the same category as the healing fairies. I've always kind of taken it for granted that they are a totally different "animal," if you will. Navi is blue/white, Tatl is yellow/white, Tael is purple/white and the healing fairies are pink/white. I've kind of just gone with the idea that they are unrelated, though they may be of the same general species. Pink fairies don't talk and they run around in packs unless one has been randomly shoved or lost in a pot.

For me guiding fairy does not = healing fairy, and so their different abilities are not only okay, but to be expected.

 

[Justac00lguy]

Hmm never really thought about it before so props for noticing this.

Obviously it wasn't Nintendo's intention to have a companion that could continously heal Link over and over again, that would be too easy, but we have to enter the realm of theorising here. I would say that Navi and Tatl are simply a different breed/type, if we look at the typical fairy (heeling fairies) they cannot speak and don't really interact with Link himself, they just heal him when close. However, fairies such as Navi and Tatl can actually interact and guide Link on his journey - a much more significant purpose in my opinion.

So I simply think there are different types, you have healing fairies, companion fairies (such as the Kokiri based ones) and then the more advanced, Great Fairies. However, who's to say that Navi and Tatl don't heal Link? As the controller of Link we can die, maybe the mysterious force that revives Link time and time again is actually Navi/Tatl etc. I'm slightly joking there but it could be a possibility ;p

 

[Dragoncat]

My biggest problem about Zelda theories is how baseless they are. It is either because a. Not all fairies can heal or b. Nintendo didn't want to make it so you could heal all the damn time. That's the entirety of it. I highly doubt Aonuma and the others thought any more into it than that, and if I am right in thinking that (they didn't) then it is not canon. So speculating about it is pointless, imo.

A lot of theories fall into the category of the devs not putting as much thought into something as the fans...but pointless? Perhaps...but still, it's fun to come up with these theories.

 

[XskywardX]

I can agree with this, but what I would think is that Navi and Tatl don't heal you is because if they do, they would die; they give their live energy to you. Don't you notice how the fairies wither away after they heal you?

 

[Shadsie]

Was that one of my jokes?

The healing fairies have always been pretty arbitrary in Zelda. In some of the games, they fill up all of your hearts. In other games, they fill up eight hearts, or six hearts. I've always figured that the "guide fairies" like Navi, Tatl and Tael were a different "breed" of fairy - that fairies that are meant to bond with Kokiri were of a special kind while the healing fairies were more "wild" and had different instincts and abilities. The Great Fairies are a different breed still, a kind of "higher fairy" almost like a "higher order of angel" for those into that kind of mythology, or an "evolution" for those of you into Pokemon. (Okay, so there's this comic out there where Link is playing Pokemon with Navi and she evolves into a Great Fairy...).

Maybe all the pink fairies graduated Fairy Medical School, have studied the Faeries' Medical Handbook and have gotten medical licenses from wherever Dr. Mario got his credentials.

Trying to get Navi to heal you may result in Link being the first person in Hyrule to file a malpractice suit...

 

[Dragoncat]

Was that one of my jokes?

The healing fairies have always been pretty arbitrary in Zelda. In some of the games, they fill up all of your hearts. In other games, they fill up eight hearts, or six hearts. I've always figured that the "guide fairies" like Navi, Tatl and Tael were a different "breed" of fairy - that fairies that are meant to bond with Kokiri were of a special kind while the healing fairies were more "wild" and had different instincts and abilities. The Great Fairies are a different breed still, a kind of "higher fairy" almost like a "higher order of angel" for those into that kind of mythology, or an "evolution" for those of you into Pokemon. (Okay, so there's this comic out there where Link is playing Pokemon with Navi and she evolves into a Great Fairy...).

Maybe all the pink fairies graduated Fairy Medical School, have studied the Faeries' Medical Handbook and have gotten medical licenses from wherever Dr. Mario got his credentials.

Trying to get Navi to heal you may result in Link being the first person in Hyrule to file a malpractice suit...

I think you said it somewhere...

LOL fairy medical school! And that comic sounds hilarious. Reminds me of another one. When the fairy type was announced, somebody drew a dragonite on the ground covering its ears(or ear holes...whatever) because Navi was annoying it to death with "Hey! Listen!" One of the commenters was mad because Navi didn't do that during the battle with Volvagia and instead made them run around playing hide and seek/whack a mole.

I can agree with this, but what I would think is that Navi and Tatl don't heal you is because if they do, they would die; they give their live energy to you. Don't you notice how the fairies wither away after they heal you?

OR they just leave.

 

[Beauts]

I think they're just two species of fairy. In Ocarina of Time, the healing fairies were always pink. They disappear once they've healed you. Navi, Tatl and Tael are maybe some more advanced form of fairy. Like, they can speak and keep you company, but maybe in that evolution they lost the ability to heal, or maybe they evolve into pink fairies seeing as in later games in the timeline, companion fairies completely disappear. I associate them with the forest, and perhaps when the magical period of the forest is over (after MM) they all died out. Who knows? They're definitely not present in Twilight Princess anyway, so maybe they will resurface later on down on the defeat timeline. Also, consider the Great Fairies. They're presumably still fairies, according to MM made up of little pieces of fairies to form a whole huge queen fairy. They're nothing like either Navi etc or the healing fairies. I would look at it as lions, tigers, and normal cats. They're all feline, just different types.

 

[Zander]

Navi tries to talk to the wounds. After several minutes of "Hey, Listen!" With intermittent ramblings of old magic sounding words and how bad Link was doing, she gives up and hides in Link's hat.

The pink ones are full of peptobismol. They solve all of Link's medical problems.

The great fairies are both because they consumed enough of the other fairies to gain immense magic power, thus increasing in size and intelligence.

I jest. But what has been seen cannot be unseen.

 

[Dragoncat]

The pink ones are full of peptobismol. They solve all of Link's medical problems.

Nausea heartburn indigestion upset stomach diarrhea! Yay pepto bismol! Pink does more than you think!

I can't be the only one who's seen that commercial...but I don't see big bleeding wounds in there. So no lol.