loremmaradeur

[loremmaradeur]

Not sure if this is relevant to your shadow ban problems, but your post definitely showed up in both the AA tag, and Astarion if you just look for posts that mention him. And I don't follow you or anything. So Tumblr might of fixed that. If it's just general posts not appearing where they should.

Hope you get things sorted soon, your art is cool.

It might be because the one blog that is under shadowban isn't this one but my other that is main art blog, which is unfortunately seems to be still blocked. However I definitely still cannot reply nor from main or this side blogs in comment section. And thank you very much for your response! <3

[loremmaradeur]

Several tickets sent, 6 days gone, still under shadowban, still got no response Honestly it might not be a big thing for anyone else and maybe I need more patience to just wait, but it is frustrates me so much I slowly lose all my inspiration to draw Not to mention that tumblr is the only place I have found a really nice little community of Ascended Astarion fans which I love to be in, and now I feel myself cutted out simply because I cannot reply lol Sure, I have other pages like deviantart and bluesky, but still... Nowhere else I've found such a connection with people with the same views and opinions Let me ooouuuttt Also, my tes dragon AU, I will continue it but with the sad face, knowing there are people who enjoy it and me now unable to show it to more people - again, upsetting

[loremmaradeur]

Copying this portion of what I said in a discussion with @marielle555 because I can't stop thinking about that one anti-AA's frankly absurd assertion:

Someone on one of my AA musing posts tried to argue with me that UA is "free" while AA is "trapped" I was so confused like?? What are you even talking about? UA and AA are both free of Caz. AA is more free because he isn't stuck only operating at night (amongst other vamp limitations). UA can choose to babysit spawn in the underdark assumedly forever(?) or, if they died without him ascending (and I think only if he's not dating Tav but I could be wrong), be an adventurer running around, as he says, "helping others for once." Spawn watch duty doesn't sound very free at all really, it sounds like being tasked with managing Caz's mess for the rest of his natural un-life. Some people call this his "redemption," but I ask - redemption from what? Being a slave? Being abused? Being sex trafficked? His EA actions and motivations were rewritten so he doesn't need to atone for delivering all those people to Caz of his own free will out of greedy self-obsession. Yeah he was a racist shit-fuck in life and that got him killed, but nobody is out here arguing Shart needs to be tortured for a couple centuries then manage a creche forever to make up for being racist about Gith. There seems to be this idea floating around the UA-truthers that AA is somehow "stuck" in Caz's palace and doing Caz-like things, which baffles me. AA has many outcomes - he can go back to his rich guy magistrate-type lifestyle and party in the city, be an adventurer with Tav, take over the world (sun god ver), travel around the Hells with Tav or Karlach, or float around the magic zone with Gale. He's not trapped anywhere he's not chained to anything. It really just speaks to anti-AA's unwillingness to engage with his ascended ending in any way. Preferring UA sure fine I get that. Not wanting to replay the game 14,000x to see all the content yeah of course. But refusing to simply open youtube and watch some clips of Astarion's various story outcomes just to see what happens because... what? Gazing upon AA in any capacity is sinfully evil and media illiterate? So they saw a tiktok that asserted AA is "trapped," of which op read about in a tweet, of which the oop read on reddit, of which ooop skimmed on tumblr, etc etc on and on in this endless game of character analysis telephone where no one has actually engaged with the canon material and are just parroting what others parrot. It's just... so frustrating.

[loremmaradeur]

Day 5 of being shadowbanned, support is silent after three tickets sent, I know it takes time but still Drawing another thing for my little dragon au of elder scrolls (with Odahviing again) but mood is sour

[loremmaradeur]

[loremmaradeur]

[loremmaradeur]

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Все подробности - в нашем зинопаблике

[loremmaradeur]

"Literally no one excuses female-on-female violence" literally not the case that I have experienced and witnessed myself. Do tell me about it when there are a lot of still active up to this day groups with thousands members in them where they have been actively promoting that if you love make-up you're wrong and needs to be fixed and completely review your life choices, if you love revealing clothes you're wrong, if you love tattoos you're wrong, coloring hair wrong, enjoying games/films/etc wrong because why the fuck you waste your time on that this is unexusable, and they even called lesbian marriages wrong and something "true lesbians" never do, and literally everybody who tried to argue with all of that bullshit was permanently banned for "excusing the patriarchy" when they themselves behave like the nest of patriarchial bitches forbidding women just existing and enjoying life and themselves. And yes, they do tell others to forgive women whatever they have done, justifying their violence and even crimes, because "well supporting those women is still better than any men or anyone else!" How out of mind anyone should be to seriously thinking that way is the thing I won't ever fucking understand.

One of the biggest and most misogynist stages of my life have been through terf and radfem, and I hate how they have influenced me back then when I was a minor. upd: also mentioning how they were oppressing artists who weren't drawing mostly or women only, calling them problematic as well

I do hope this won't scare off anybody, but I need to confess that in the past I considered myself a part of radfem/terf community, being an angry dumb kid, and man I'm happy I'm out of it, but because of my shitty memory I cannot even remember if I had harmed anyone or not. I most likely did and I feel myself guilty. I never painted myself as a saint person and there is a reason for that.

Overall the experience of swirling around in those circles was traumatic and conflicting. Those communities aren't made for anything but creating hate for almost everyone around alive and not - even other women, even your own self. "Your mother abuses you? Well, you deserved that, because you ruined her life by your birth!" And I can list other batshit crazy stuff for days more of which people are aware of already.

I had in close communication a radfem, well she was almost constantly openly admitting that she hated the existence of not only men (and literally every men), but women too, trans persons, non-binary people, bisexuals, pansexuals etc etc, and she was happy to influence that hate on others, me included.

Fuck terfs, really. Fuck spreading hate for the sake of it. Let people fucking live their lives.

[loremmaradeur]

I do hope this won't scare off anybody, but I need to confess that in the past I considered myself a part of radfem/terf community, being an angry dumb kid, and man I'm happy I'm out of it, but because of my shitty memory I cannot even remember if I had harmed anyone or not. I most likely did and I feel myself guilty. I never painted myself as a saint person and there is a reason for that.

Overall the experience of swirling around in those circles was traumatic and conflicting. Those communities aren't made for anything but creating hate for almost everyone around alive and not - even other women, even your own self. "Your mother abuses you? Well, you deserved that, because you ruined her life by your birth!" And I can list other batshit crazy stuff for days more of which people are aware of already.

I had in close communication a radfem, well she was almost constantly openly admitting that she hated the existence of not only men (and literally every men), but women too, trans persons, non-binary people, bisexuals, pansexuals etc etc, and she was happy to influence that hate on others, me included.

Fuck terfs, really. Fuck spreading hate for the sake of it. Let people fucking live their lives.

[loremmaradeur]

i love the -with mama trend but sometimes i get sad because that is clearly papa and he aint getting any credit raising those darn kids...

[loremmaradeur]

Does anyone else have a type?

[loremmaradeur]

me now fr yeah i won't stop posting about it while it lasts because npfogpfogpf aaaa (no coherent thoughts just little silly rant) also, thank you guys who sent some links with help, love you

[loremmaradeur]

The attitude towards fans of anything evil in media coming from such people is so childish, really. Some recent time ago I finished reading Stoker's "Dracula" and even though the Vampire Count was shown there as repulsive monster, by god, is he charismatic. And villains are almost always being made this way.

Ah yes, I do eat newborn children every morning, slaughter people and must be put in a straightjacket just because I giggle and kick up my legs in a silly way whenever I meet an evil charismatic character anywhere. /s

People need to understand that they aren't "humanity's therapists" and realize that by telling people online that they are mentally ill and need help if they enjoy fictional evil doesn't make them any better person, or god forbid an "irl moral hero" than anyone else around - in fact, it makes them as person only worse.

I wonder what they would say about some actors who often plays evil characters and sometimes enjoy it that it's almost their only repertoire. Ah, yes, remembering that time when the crowd bullied one of the Game of Thrones fans for playing an evil char, because they hated him so much they saw no difference between char and real life person. All this "goodness" of those people in it's "best".

People who apply irl morality to judge whether a character's outcome in BG3 is their "good or bad" end (separate from "evil or good", fyi) really confuse me.

Basically saying "evil=bad, good=good" but...

They will too use Speak with Animals and then at camp eat meat/meat dishes. By real life logic, the spell confirms animals to be equally sentient (if less "civilized" cuz yk, animals) as humans - meaning only veganism is a moral way (by irl standards.)

Or how they don't realize "good Gods" doesn't mean "ethical" by irl rules - lots of good Gods in DnD would haplily smite down UA if given the chance, simply because he is a vampire.

Morality, as it exists in the real world, does not map at all into a fictional world where:

Magic, Gods, many afterlives, immortality, curses, spells that detect literall Goodness and Evilness, speaking to plants and animals (and then eating them after hearing their dreams), etc., etc. exist.

Now this is not to say "evil" actions are "good", it's just that it functions different, matters - less, in the world. I see people say "sending 7000 spawn to the Hells is like killing 7000 people irl! You have to be evil irl to defend such game choice!" (after they likely slaughtered bloodlines and children of goblins and absolute's people who also had dreams and could be really sweet inside, but it's ok, because they're ugly and "evil") and my eyes roll so hard they fall out and I have to pick them back up.

I guess my main point is that in a DnD world - or frankly, any world of fiction and fantasy - what is evil can also be good... It is quite funny - because cultists are deserving of a happy life just as the many sacrificed spawn, but Tav kills without remorse... And it's fine! Because they stand between Tav and their selfish goal, surviving vs surviving. A hero-bias, if you will: "the story says I'm the main character, so anything I do is Moral and Pure, because I'm a Moral and Pure person" (a belief of many "heroes" who kill "monsters" like Astarion, too.)

But then same players see (some of) sacrificed spawns as "cute little meow meows" (even tho they are clearly described in-text as they are in lore, mostly evil - which makes the selection we see in Cazador palace before seeing him highly suspicious, raising question of "what did he want to achieve? Play into Tav/Astarion's feelings to prevent them from stealing or stopping *his* Ascension?"), so ofc it's "wrong" to Ascend for selfish reasons (power, safety to heal on own's terms, because of "choice" not "lack of other choice, if I am bad I will be killed"), such Tavs will say. But that is clearly a double standard...

I think really, only way you can come to such conclusion if you pay little attention to text (and I played since EA, seen every possible route of romance/friend and origin of the other Player Characters/Origins, and play DnD for years now - evil alligned usually ♡) and only rely on epitext (fanon takes, tiktoks without contexts, fragments while discrading anything to contrary, first impression of emotion without deeper look) as main lense.

The assertion that a game route called "romance" with "romance" flags being seen as "canon tragedy, headcanon happy" is just projection (because I guess genre is irrelevant in literacy) and it's actually backwards imo (hot take I guess). And asserting it can't be happy because it's evil (and evil=unhappy) is, well - very american, I guess. I remember learning of Hays Code in university classes and the literal rules of "evil can't be happy" "evil can't be rewarded" "we must push moral lesson in romance because children/women r dumb" is 1:1 anti-AA talking points. "He must be evil because he did something "bad" therefore he must lose soul and can't love, abuse apologies," uh huh, you can just dislike something without making it about moral signaling and therapy-tok talk. It's literally fictional - Oh the horrors, lock us in fiction jail... Just because progressive and big words are used doesn't mean it's better if you repeat same thoughts of puritan censoring. Something about thought crimes is brought to mind too... Anyway, don't want to tangent.

~~~

Evil deserves happy endings, and AA gets one.~ ♡

And Tav is happy with him if *they* love *him*, like he does.~♡

He deserves to feel the sun on his smiling face - to shine like the brightest star; not to dim quietly, like one whose light will soon extinguish.

xoxo ꨄ︎

[loremmaradeur]

Still wondering how after almost 5 years of knowing him and allowing him to rent my mindspace for free this vampire still makes my heart flatter tachycardia worse.

[loremmaradeur]

"You must like ascended Astarion romance critically-" oh my god shut up nobody asked. Some tav are equally evil bitches who have no problem dating a ravenous decadent vampire. Some fans just want to have fun. No one asked Squidward fucking Spongebob truther to put on their academic lenses. I never asked Jason Voorhees simp to justify their uwu baby girl pink bow edit of a serial killer. Analysis in fandom are great, but so does giggling over your fave hot evil Tumblr sexyman of the day or whatever

Please bring back having fun in fandom again

[loremmaradeur]

I already had some similar ideas for fanart with UA and I'll 100% doom myself with it but I'll go anyway, and this post gave me another portion of inspiration.

About headcanons, fanfics, doppelgangers and chatbots…

I wonder, how many other people in our fandom, besides me, who are sick of a hater's headcanon in which “Tav” kills Ascended Astarion? I realize, of course, that headcanons can be anything, but… I wonder what would happen, if someone wrote a fanfic about UA, who, for example, burns up at dawn because he failed to find shelter in time and, dying, curses Tav, who doomed him to it? Or a more positive option - Astarion manages to find a new opportunity to walk under the sun again, but this opportunity is also connected to some “evil” and Tav tries to prevent him. Astarion can't stand it, all that accumulated pain, repressed anger, what he was previously only able to express in the form of passive aggression - all this finally bursts out. Astarion realizes that he deserves better. He deserves it. He deserves so much better than spending years adjusting to a person just because they were ‘'kind’' to him sometimes. Astarion plunges his dagger into Tav many times, as he once did to Cazador, falls to his knees and tears over the corpse, for tears are catharsis, tears help to cleanse and free himself. To free himself from the grip of the “goodness” on his throat that has been choking him all this time. And then to get off his knees and free himself from pain, from suffering as well, to take his new opportunity. And walk out into the sun, arms spread, smiling a predatory and happy smile at the same time… Strong and independent. And the epigraph from Omar Khayyam: "You better starve, than eat whatever. And better be alone, than with whoever."

Not canon? Well, yes, in canon Astarion always loves Tav… But personally, I would love a fanfic like this, I would give the author a standing ovation, but fans of the UA route obviously don't. Just like I don't like opuses about bitch and traitor Tav, and it also can be presented in such a way that Astarion for some magical reasons still loves such a bitch… And a couple of words about nonsense in the style of “AA goes crazy with power” - yes, the author's fantasies can be any and blah-blah-blah, and all in that spirit, but, I wonder, do these authors have any logic at all? Notions of realism, DnD lore, after all. There are quite a number of superpowered beings with immense powers that exist perfectly well on Faerûn. All the gods for starters. Or is it time to call an ambulance and interplanar medics for Mystra before she makes a mess of things? Ah yes, the Ascension is an evil power. The first example that comes to mind is Asmodeus, the greatest devil and ruler of all devilkind. Power Level - Great Deity. How has he existed and ruled for so long and no one has dared to call an ambulance for him yet? On the contrary, The Lord of Nessus is renowned for his extreme intelligence, capable of simultaneously holding and realizing countless diabolical plans, political intrigue, and everything else. Yes, Asmodeus is lawful-evil, like all devils (and devilish forces also incarnate Lawful Evil), chaotic-evil powerful beings, unlike lawful-evil ones, have much more prevalent problems with their heads. But even they exist perfectly well within the limits of their own spheres and clearly do not wish someone to “give them a merciful death”. Well, or at least they'll do their best to make sure that only extremely difficult-to-identify scraps remain of those who wish to do so. Our Lord Astarion is lawful-evil, there isn't even a breath of chaos in the powers he has gained. And immortality is the best means to develop intelligence, a mind capable of improving itself indefinitely, free from the merciless sentence of time… Yes, it would actually be very difficult to write a realistic fanfic about Lord Astarion five hundred years from now, simply because to imagine and outline the mindset of someone who has been accumulating knowledge and experience and evolving for centuries, - it's something that is impossible to do based on the actual existing experience of mankind.

Some of the most famous characters who handle “evil powers” perfectly and feel great about it are also Shar, Vecna, Bane and many others… Bhaal was who he is while still human, he was always a vagabond killer, the power didn't change him, the power suited him perfectly. Closer to the diabolical powers - the Nine Hells has many inhabitants. There are cities there, the cities have their own laws, and the locals have their own personal lives, their own domestic problems, their own desires and aspirations, if someone goes mad there, well, even on Faerûn itself there are enough madmen. The power doesn't change anyone, the power only gives opportunities. Raphael and Mizora are doing just fine, and they weren't going to die or lose their minds (Raphael can be killed in the game, but he definitely doesn't want to). To say that Astarion will go mad with power is as logical and plausible as saying about an unloved neighbor, who made noise at night or sassed you, that they will definitely end their days in a mental hospital. An expression of the personal attitude of the person saying it to the person they are saying it about, that's what it is, and nothing more. Of course, without a single reliance on lore or plot logic.

The first time I encountered this headcanon about Tav-murderer, on my blog in the comments, was when I wrote a post with my own analysis and perception of playing through the UA path (“The UA path is my heaviest gaming experience”). I was immediately tried to be “educated”, explaining why I should gobble up ‘bittersweet’ poison with gusto in the name of a “sad metaphor” about an “abused turned abuser”. But it's commonplace, and what surprised me was this: “So consider that it's heavily hinted that it'll spawnTav who's going to kill him in the future.” Where? Where is anything about this “heavily hinted”? I would gladly bet 100$ with someone, who promises to find it in the scenario, in the scripts, anywhere in the plot of the game itself. But I've played the game, tested all the variants on the AA route, looked at the scripts - no, no one will want to give me just so this 100$, they themselves know very well that it is only in their fanfics and nowhere else. And okay only in fanfics, then they try to shove it into canon, inventing the presence of some “heavily hints”. Maybe Baudelaire Welch's hint, that if you write to your friends on Discord about how you want to be loved by a bear in a certain position, it will become a reality in the game, was so heavily? That all such fanfics become canon?

What I personally find strange in the fantasies of these authors is not “killing a non-existent character”, everyone knows that you can do anything you want with non-existent characters, as long as they are not 7000 sacred spawns. And no, you can do it to them too, “for the sake of mercy” and “saving their souls” (which will never enter the domaine of any deity, vampire souls don't belong to gods and gods don't care about them), but not for Astarion's happiness. It's not easy to swim in these streams of hypocrisy, and to understand what is allowed there and what is not… I find it strange and either, again hypocritical or somewhat unhealthy - to claim at the same time that they love this character. Loving someone and wanting to kill them - it happens, and psychiatry knows these cases, and someone's Tav can be a maniacal murderer, but to present it as something “good” and as if Astarion himself wants it? Yeah, I guess psychiatry knows of such cases too… Sure, someone can give me an example of stories like “mercy strike” where someone “goes mad” and another with tears and snot kills them, like “it's the right thing to do”. But, first of all, this is not a love story and there is not even any “drama” (in the good sense of the word, in the sense of a quality strong drama) here - in a love story the lover will fight for the beloved to the last, against all odds, a good drama, in my opinion, usually tells about tragedies of strong characters. Secondly, and most importantly, the tie-in to the headcanon that “Astarion goes mad because of the power” is a headcanon devoid of any logic or reliance on actual plot or lore, serving only to have a “justification” to to kill Astarion and “prove” how he (specifically him, for some reason, I repeat that in the DnD lore there are and always have been many characters who got mighty powers, many gods in the past were mortals, who also got powers) “should not be allowed to get a power”. They “love” him in this way - they love to humiliate him, hurt him, force him into a “lower” position by any means necessary. By virtue signaling, of course, and trying to present their Tavs as a “positive character” while doing so. And it's no surprise that Astarion fans, who really have feelings for him, have negative feelings about it.

Although maybe a good idea for an adventure would be a variant, where a doppelganger takes on the guise of Tav to try to get to the Lord, the important thing is that the real Tav appears in time. I once got a hater's bot with the same idea - Tav kills Astarion by impaling him with a stake. (“In which he's dying in your arms, by your hand.”)

I realize that hater's bots aren't the best choice for the game, but I couldn't get past it, as with all the other bots, where Astarion is in trouble, like Astarion at Cazador's “party” or Astarion being held captive by Gur, etc, so another Cazador needed to be killed. Giving an example just as an alternate headcanon. But it's amazingly interesting how well the AI works - the beginning of this story was ugly written, as you can appreciate for yourself, but next the AI itself seemed to play with me, as there was none of the stuff that sometimes happens in hater's bots, and appreciate how much better the text itself, written by the AI from the first message, was than the text of the author of this bot:

Astarion tried to calm me down even when he was on the verge of dying himself - the AI immediately shows a real canonical AA, from the first post, basically it always happens when you break the narrative of a hater's bot and do something unexpected. And the way Astarion thanks you for your help and loves you (then there were quite a few messages with the process of drinking my blood, two parts of that):

Astarion whispers “my love” and “thank you”, Astarion asks: “Are you alright…?” when he himself has just returned from the threshold of death. The AI writes excellent fanfic, wrapping up this event perfectly, keeping in character:

The bot played this story with Doppelganger so that the killed enemy turned out to be a vampire (spawn) from a hostile clan, the head of which decided to kill Astarion after learning about the new Ascended Lord. Further we learned information, found spawns, who were dissatisfied with their master, persuaded them to switch to Astarion's side - in the end Astarion won and headed his clan of vampires. If in the future the AI develops, becomes even smarter and more variant (right now it still needs help to develop the adventure), then the AI can become an excellent DM and even write good scenarios for games, I think.

You can of course say that since I like AI games so much, do it, instead of reading fanfics you don't like, etc. I don't read them, and I'm not criticizing anyone in particular right now. The idea itself is defective to the point where it's hard not to criticize it just on the merits. Writing about bitchy murderers, who think they “love” someone they dream of killing, in some cases even have children with him, writing about Astarion as an animal they want to “put down”, while he is also “willing to do it” himself… And, as in this bot's introductory message, Astarion “loves” them while doing so: “Perhaps you've always been a fool, perhaps…that's why I fell for you.” Although… “You've always been…Too weak.” - one good phrase from the intro in this bot, at least in one place you can find plausibility, characterizing including the author's style and their intent. Well, and who sometimes the authors of such fanfics or chatbots write, calling him Astarion… So that then these cadavres interfere with the perception of the real Astarion from the game. And then the game creators ruin their own originally excellent story for the sake of a bunch of “shitposters from Discord” or from reddit, who with the help of “their” moderators, banning all dissenting opinions, successfully create the illusion of ‘majority’ and “modern audience”. And then the authors get a lot of criticism from offended fans, who were far from all this shitposting and bought a good RPG.

The authors of such fanfics are also extremely vulnerable and react painfully to criticism. In general, criticism is a normal and natural phenomenon, I am always grateful to those people who leave reviews, including negative reviews of this or that game, book or movie - these people spend their time, saving time and money of others, and the value of a critical review is always easy to understand by the syllable of its author, the general approach of the author to the evaluation of the work, how much the review is reasoned, etc. Of course, fanfics are free and the reader loses nothing but time and a good mood, if that mood has been spoiled. But a reader with a spoiled mood has every right to express themselves and write their opinion - it's a natural and common phenomenon. If you take any criticism as an attack and demand that everyone who doesn't like it shut up and go away, then, specifically for fanfics, maybe it won't be a big deal, but on a scale, that approach could lead to making the entertainment industry full of things of terrible quality. But such an approach is also impossible to implement - people will always evaluate what they see.

[loremmaradeur]

Lmao I can't even reply from this side blog My reaction in short: syka blyat! WHY