#Worked on my big side project a LOT this week so the dragons are a pleasant change of pace for a night

[corvarrow]

Couple of aberration dragon heads; I don't think I've ever drawn them before so I was mostly just trying to get a feel for them. :Va Originally I was planning to draw some of my actual dragons (of different species) but then fate was like......no. Aberrs be upon ye.

[vampkittyxoxo]

Hello there!!!!

I am a big fan of your work and I was wondering if it would be possible for you to write romantic relationship hcs for draco? Any pronouns are welcomed and appreciated!

Of course, I do hope not to pressure you! Please do take your time! And of course, if you do not wish to do this request, that is perfectly alright!!! 😁

-🌮

(btw sorry if my request is incoherent😓)

Thank you all for your requests!! I’ve gotten many people asking for Draco!

And may I say thank you for all the compliments!! You are all so sweet!!

I wasn’t sure if the unlabeled requests wanted romantic or just general hcs so I wrote both.

This is also my third time writing this because tumblr keeps refreshing the app if I even change the app for a second, so sorry if this feels rushed!

.·:*¨༺ ༻¨*:·.

.·:*¨༺ ༻¨*:·.

Draco romantic/general headcanons

.·:*¨༺ ༻¨*:·.

~ Obviously, his favorite genre is metal. That doesn’t mean he likes all metal though— he can’t stand sludge metal or glam metal. However, he loves power metal and alternative metal!

~ I’d assume he’s around 23-24 in age, given that he had to have had time to build up his audience and find his sound.

~ Draco would be a bit on the tall side, maybe around 6’3-6’5 (roughly 190-196 cm). He has a nice build that comes naturally from a fast metabolism.

~ Admittedly… He really wants to start drawing. However, Draco thinks he’s too old to start now, so he opts for doodling dragons and wyverns in his free time.

~ Draco has quite a special interest in dragons… and of course, the obligatory hyperfixation on Wings of Fire in middle school. I mean, it was bad. He was telling all his friends about it, made every class project somehow correlate to Wings of Fire, and even wrote... fanfiction.... granted it was terrible considering he was 12. (I am not speaking from past experience with warrior cats.... no....)

~ He has a pretty decently sized vocabulary. This is mostly from reading lots of poetry and literature to help him with lyrics, but he is also smarter than he looks.

~ Draco has always been bad at making friends despite being popular now. He doesn't know how to talk to people for the first time and isn't sure what's all socially acceptable and what isn't. In middle school, he had a small group of four people, himself included, but he was always the odd one out. Then, in high school, he went through three different friend groups of varying sizes. It was very hard for him to maintain friendships, meaning lots of lunch periods were spent alone.

~ He was a theatre kid. I stand by this. Before he got actually good at singing, he practiced by getting supporting roles in school plays during high school.

Romantic Headcanons

~ Yes, he's popular. No, he's never had a real partner. You're what he considers his first.

~ Draco is very, very nervous at the start. The first time he saw you, even if you were dressed lazily, he was awestruck. Given his past with friends, he was very hesitant to talk to you. But God, the way you smiled at him, he forgot all about his past and made conversation.

~ While in the talking/friend stage, he gushes about you through song lyrics he writes in his journal. He would never show you or even tell you about it, though. Maybe 40 years past marriage, on his death bed he would...

~ As friends, Draco tells you about his music (if you're already not a fan... if you are a fan, that's another bullet point). If you react positively, he feels so validated and falls for you even harder.

~ Had you already known he's decently popular, Draco worries that you're only talking to him because of that fame. He obsesses over this fear for a week before finally giving in and asking for assurance.

~ He waits forever to ask you out-- he really wants to make sure you're giving signs that you like him before he does anything. And when he does, he doesn't make it a huge deal. After he takes you home one night, while saying your goodbyes, he pauses to ask if you would be his partner. When you say yes, he has to contain every ounce of his excitement to not look weird or desperate.

~ At the beginning, he's very hesitant to make any big steps forward. You're his first real partner, after all. He starts small with hand-holding, then gradually works up to other forms of affection.

~ He loves touching you, though. Even hand-holding is enough to get him flustered and giggling. He cuddles with you when watching shows or movies, before you're about to go to bed, or any other time he can make an excuse to hold you (or be held by you...). He's mostly the big spoon-- he loves the feeling of protecting you, so to speak-- but he enjoys being held every once in a while.

~ His main love languages are physical touch and quality time. Considering he probably gets gifts all the time from fans, gifts don't mean anything super special to him as it would to most normal people. He does appreciate it when you praise him or reassure him that he's not a bad person/musical artist/etc.

~ Draco will take you on every tour he goes on-- if you want to come with him that is. If you decide to go, he'll show you around every town you stop in, spoil you with good food and small presents, and make sure your trip is just as fun as his. Obviously, you get right up to that barricade at his shows.

~ He would discuss this with you first, but if you were comfortable with it, he would totally bring you up to the stage so you could sing the backing vocals for a song. He would introduce you as his partner (sorry to the other fans in the crowd... sorry Edgar...) and he would make sure the crowd likes you.

~ If you decide to stay home, he's facetiming you every chance he gets. He would probably set his phone up somewhere on the stage so you can watch the show as well. He misses you lots and lots and lots whenever he's away.

~ Draco has definitely written a few songs about you. He just prays you two never break up, because some are his most popular songs...

.·:*¨༺ ༻¨*:·.

This is all I can think of right now... if I ever come up with more I'll make a new post. Requests are open <3

[rimeswithpurple]

Thank you @blackberrysummerblog for the tag! It's Sunday and oh boy do I have a lot to share! The kids are back in school and my hyperfixation has landed on drawing; I was up well past midnight every night this week.

CORB concept claiming has started and there are so many stellar concepts! I'm constantly blown away by the creativity in this fandom! While I wait to find out who my partner is, I'm plugging away at artwork for chapter 3 of Time Will Lie Down & Be Still. If you've read @blackberrysummerblog's post today, you'll have been introduced to Jeremy. I've become deeply invested in him and once I heard the idea, I knew I had to draw him.

My penchant for tiny details is alive and well. I sometimes think I enjoy making backgrounds more than drawing people. Bringing a space to life with little bits and Easter eggs here and there is something I find so deeply satisfying!

Side note: the dragon figurine is a nod to Paperback Writer, a big time comfort read of mine. In the fic, it's a figurine Baz keeps because he chucked at Simon's head

There's also a little project I'm working on for funsies. I really love Simon's expression in this and this is the nicest hair I've ever drawn!

No pressure tags and hellos below!

@talentpiper11 @messofthejess @valeffelees @artsyunderstudy @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @youarenevertooold @bookish-bogwitch @facewithoutheart @thewholelemon @larkral @run-for-chamo-miles @roomwithanopenfire @fiend-for-culture @cosmicalart @mooncello @that-disabled-princess @cutestkilla @noblecorgi @iamamythologicalcreature @best--dress @emeryhall @ileadacharmedlife @drowninginships @supercutedinosaurs @whatevertheweather @rbkzz @ebbpettier @cccloudsss @theimpossibledemon @katatsumuli @thehoneyedhufflepuff @theearlgreymage @theotherhufflepuff @onepintobean @orange-peony @hushed-chorus @fatalfangirl @ic3-que3n @bazzybelle @palimpsessed @martsonmars @aristocratic-otter @shrekgogurt @monbons @alexalexinii @prettygoododds @ivelovedhimthroughworse @raenestee @skeedelvee

[not-poignant]

Hi Pia!! Hope you’re doing ok this week 🩷

I’ve been loving Palmarosa (Astarion is my fav companion), and I’m curious about your player character! Do you have a go to race/class? Do you come up with backstory for your character or just go by vibes? And (bc I couldn’t just not ask but this is also a no pressure question!! you’ve already fed us so much and I know you have a bazillion projects) would you ever write bg3 fanfic about an OC?

Much love x

Hi anon,

My go to race is generally some kind of elf (in my first runthrough, it was a wood elf, and yes, his name was Temter.) Class is usually something well-suited to distance fighting, something with mage power most of the time.

I don't usually come up with a back story at all. Tbh the first time I did that was actually for Dragon Age: Veilguard only to find that they'd gutted so much of the previous worldbuilding around racism, slavery, Tevinter, and elves, it didn't actually matter, and I shouldn't have bothered.

For the most part, I feel like... I have a track record of actually character assassinating player characters, even my own. Whether that's Temter in Palmarosa (I didn't actually make the in-game choices that Temter did, re: some of the more heartbreaking ones, but it's more interesting to me to write him that way). Or it's the farmer in Stardew Valley. Or a locked on Inquisitor in Dragon Age: Inquisition, I feel like I generally write player characters at best as obsolete, and then at worst, as outright antagonists and villains.

I don't really have any interest in writing a PC as a main character, and I actually don't tend to read fics that write this as the main pairing (I usually filter them out, RIP to anyone who ever tags PC/character as a side pairing). I'm very team 'I'm glad people are living their best lives by attaching to their OC player characters this way' but that's not really what I do.

To me the player character is almost always just a vessel (until Veilguard, where I was just doomed to disappointment early on), through which to view more interesting romanceable characters or NPCs. I don't tend to attach much history to them, and if I come up with some kind of big romance or intense storyline, it's often quite easy to graft it onto pre-existing characters within the world itself. Often, that's what the world lends itself best to. Whatever you make yourself to be, there's often a high chance you'll meet another character in that world who shares some similarities to you, and that character can hold the storyline just as well.

I know that's a bit unusual, and I've been this way with a lot of video games for a long time. I like attaching to characters, but I play video games to relax, and not to "work" - so I try not to do too much storytelling for my player character, and let the video game do it for me after the choices I've made. I think perhaps maybe this is why so many other people enjoy OCs with very deep storylines in video games, maybe because many of them aren't writing millions of words outside of that, and so it gets to be hobby / leisure storytelling for themselves, and they realise how much fun it can be, and that's a fantastic in-road into things like fanfiction etc. one day as well.

For me, the video game exists to give me the story, so I don't have to work that hard at it. So I generally don't work nearly as hard at characterising my player character, as I do when writing characters in my stories. The whole point is to relax and not think about working on characterisation!

(Even if I do eventually end up writing stories about video games ah well)

[bitttertrees]

“Dungeons and Dragons is for kids! Castles and Creepy Creatures is the true peak roleplaying experience.” “You realize adding ‘creepy’ to it actually makes it sound more childish, right?” “...Do you want to play or not?” Join the Sonic gang on an EPIC tabletop roleplaying adventure! Filled with tears, laughter, loss and a hint of bardic flirting on the side. Dungeon Master Tails sets the scene to introduce the squad to one of his favorite tabletop games of all time while they take a break from Eggman’s usual schemes. Sonic the Bard. Knuckles the Barbarian*. Amy the Paladin. And Sticks the Warlock! Ready to embark on a journey to defeat the evil creepy creatures that plague the magical land. *Knuckles’ role subject to constant change since the rules of each class are confusing him. What do you mean he can’t throw fire as a barbarian?

I got to participate as a writer in the @sthbigbang Big Bang Event! I had a blast being able to write this story that got way more ahead of me then I thought it would!

I also was happy to work with awesome artists @wereh0gz , @dragonofthedepths , @hel-helly , and @madcatscookiejar !! They really helped bring this fic to life! Give them and their awesome art a look when you have the chance!

Fic also under the cut since I have Ao3 locked down to registered users only.

They both stared at the note left on their door. A note that was multiple paragraphs long when, in Sonic’s opinion, it could have just been summed up in a ‘Hey! I’ll come by to try and kill you guys in a few days!’ He honestly ended up drifting off by the start of the second paragraph in the note. Meanwhile Tails, who stood beside him, read it in full. At least one of them cared enough to get through all of Eggman’s dribble and drabble, he supposed.

“It’s a lie.” Sonic finally just rolled his eyes. Letting Tails pull the note off the door. Well at least there wasn’t a random razor blade on the other side of the paper that time “Give it a few hours and egghead will be causing some sort of trouble with his, I dunno, robo-chicken 5000.”

Tails remained silent for a few moments as his eyes continued to scan over the note “He added some ‘reallys’.” 

“Some what?”

Tails moved closer to Sonic’s side and showed him the bottom of the note. Passing all of the fluffy words of Eggman going on about needing a few ‘me days’ and stating he would not be attacking them for about a week as he reflected on his life and the meaning of it, there was a ‘P.S.’ note on the bottom.

“I really, really, really, really mean it.” Sonic read the last bit out loud before he rolled his eyes once more. Clearly not buying it.

“Usually when someone uses a lot of reallys. They really mean it.” Tails nodded as if it truly was some unknown fact. Well Sonic had never heard of it so he was calling bull shit.

“Give it a day. Just one.” The hedgehog shook his head before he opened the door to their humble abode. “By tomorrow he’ll be tired of his vacation and come running into town. He at least better wait until AFTER chilidog o’ clock.”

“About that,” Tails flipped the paper over where somehow there was even MORE writing. Was that part of the plan? To bore them with excessive amounts of writing? Because it was working on Sonic. He already wanted to lay down for a nap with what little he’d read over “On the back there is a P.S.S. Yes, that’s a thing.”

Tails held a hand up to stop Sonic from asking his question. The hedgehog left with an open mouth before he huffed and crossed his arms over his chest.

“It says ‘No I won’t be tired of my vacation by tomorrow. I really, really, really-”

“I get it!” Sonic nearly shouted and rubbed at his eyes “Four more reallys! I still don’t buy it. I’m telling you, he’ll be back to his usual tricks by the afternoon.”

Come the next day, the afternoon came and went. Chilidog o’ clock uninterrupted, which on one hand meant he could eat in peace. But on the other hand it left him questioning if he’d actually been wrong and Eggman really WAS taking a week to himself.

“I think those reallys were serious.” Tails had mumbled with a slight smirk on his face when they’d returned home and there was nary a peep from the old egghead. No random threat. No robot attack. No trash can left turned over and litter strewn about. 

“He’ll attack tomorrow.” Sonic nodded with an air of confidence.

There was no attack the next day either. Amy had been brought over to read the note when she questioned why things had been so quiet. Reading it over carefully while Sonic tapped his foot with impatience.

“I mean,” She finally spoke and flipped the paper back and forth “There are no less than eight reallys. That is pretty serious.” She nodded and Tails joined her. Sonic was very close to banning that word from the house “I think he is taking a vacation. I hope not on some beach where the public can see him.” Amy grimaced at the thought and was probably mentally scolding herself for putting such an image in all of their heads.

“So say he is, which I’m not saying he is,” Sonic quickly interjected “What are we supposed to do until he decides he’s done sipping martinis on top of a killer robot on the beach?”

“Do you have a single hobby besides running and beating up Eggman?” Amy looked at him with a grimace and maybe a bit of pity. Sonic was about ready to talk back in offense when Tails jumped in first.

“What if we take the time to do something for ourselves then? Maaaaybe,” He looked a bit sheepish. A shy smile on his face “Play a game?”

Sonic immediately narrowed his eyes “What game?”

“Oh you know. Just…a game. A board game sorta. One with a lot of adventure. Decisions to make. Characters to build. Dice rolling-”

Sonic let out a loud and over exaggerated groan. He flopped down onto the couch and shook his head in clear disapproval. “You’re talking about that Clowns and Crickets game again aren’t you?”

Now it was Tails turn to look offended “FIRST off, it’s called Castles and Creepy Creatures. SECONDLY don’t knock it until you’ve tried it. It got the highest rating of any board game for three years in a row!” He sounded like a kid in a candy store as he bounced around in excitement. Amy looked endeared, Sonic looked just about done with everything.

“Emphasis on bored.” The hedgehog mumbled, letting out a small ow when Amy elbowed his side.

“Well I think it sounds interesting, Tails. When would we start?”

“Now hold on I never agreed-”

“We could start tomorrow!” Tails practically shouted, bouncing around so much it was a miracle he hadn’t accidentally knocked anything over. Sonic’s pleas had gone unheard as the little fox and Amy discussed details.

“I’ll tell Knuckles and Sticks the plan.” Amy sounded just as excited now “And we’ll be by tomorrow afternoon. I’ll be sure to bring the snacks too!”

“Great!” Tails continued to bounce around from foot to foot. It was probably the most excited Sonic had seen him since he’d built that giant slingshot that caused them to lose Sticks for a whole day. It sort of made him feel bad for not really wanting to play some chronics and canaries, or whatever it was Tails had called it.

But he didn’t really have anything on his schedule now that egghead was taking a vacation. Another five days left before the old man would return and Sonic could go back to his true hobby and-

Oh…maybe Amy was right. His lack of hobbies was a little sad.

Sonic shook his head and rejoined the conversation a little late. Tails rushing off to his workshop to start his planning phase, he had announced. Amy still looked endeared and once Tails was gone, she slowly turned towards the blue hedgehog. He was a fool to not use his speed at that moment and take off. Letting out a yelp when Amy latched onto an ear and pulled him back before he could so much as take a step!

“We are going to have FUN tomorrow. Aren’t we?” She gave him that tight smile that he knew meant he better damn well agree otherwise he’d be having a meeting between a pink hammer and his face.

“Why am I being scolded right now? I haven’t done anything!” He crossed his arms and started to pout. Looking nothing short of like a child about to be sent to the corner. “Because I know that uninterested face of yours.” Her grip on his ear disappeared and instead she switched it to pinching his cheek - which honestly might have been worse “I know you don’t like to sit around and listen for long. But we have nothing else to do and it’s something Tails has wanted to try for some time. So,” She pinched down harder on his cheek and gave it a little shake “We are going to sit there, listen to Tails, and play along with his game and have F-U-N.” She spelt out the word as if it would make it easier for Sonic to understand.

The blue hedgehog rolled his eyes and finally got himself free of Amy’s grip. That bit of guilt from before coming back as he processed Amy’s words and remembered Tails’ excitement. Okay, for just a few days. A few days he could sit around and play a game that his little brother seemed over the moon about. It might feel like torture - but he could do it. For Tails. 

“All right, all right. I get it. No need to threaten me further.” He put his hands up in defense to emphasize his point “Who knows, maybe it will stave off the boredom.” He could hope anyway.

“Good!” Amy’s tight smile became a genuine one. She proceeded to hold out three papers towards him. Sonic quirked a questioning brow at her “Had you been listening and not off in la la land you would have heard Tails talk about this.”

She first handed him a sheet with the word ‘Classes’ at the top. Wait, was learning involved? Did he have to watch a seminar to play a game? He glanced down at the other words to find where Tails had hastily written out things like warlock, fighter, artificer, etc. Okay, he had a vague idea of what the first two might be but what in all the rings was an ARTIFICER? Next to the words were equally hastily written summaries. 

“Use this to pick what you want to be.”

“I want to be me.” He looked back up from the paper, already feeling like playing the game was too much.

“Well you don’t get to be you, well not completely you. Just read through this and pick a class.” She then handed him a second paper “This will be for your stats and spells, if you have any, at least that’s what Tails said.”

“And I have to fill this whole thing out??” Sonic looked exasperated at that point, and they hadn’t even started! Looking down at the multiple blank spots on the sheet. Armor Class? Skill modifiers? Health points?? Why was there so much??

“I can come by in the morning and help you figure it out,” Amy sighed, looking as if she knew she’d have to help them ALL figure out what to put on the sheet to make sure it was correct. Lastly, she gave him the third paper, which was completely blank.

“Uh-”

“For your backstory. Tails said it adds to the roleplay experience. Just make something up after you pick your class.”

Sonic shook his head in disbelief “This seems like a lot of prep work for a game. Can’t we just play uno instead?”

“After what happened last time with Sticks - no. Never again.” They both shuddered at the memory. Uno was banned for a reason.

Sonic relented, for now, and took the papers into his hands. He frowned down at them as Amy headed towards the door to no doubt go spread the news of their latest activity to the others.

“Remember,” She stopped at the door and looked over her shoulder at him. That tight smile back on her face “This is going to be fun!”

x-x-x-x

Come morning he had an…inkling of an idea of what he wanted to be for the game. Sure, he could have spent the latter half of the previous day putting it together. But chili dog o’clock reared its head and then he needed a quick run to burn off all the calories he just ate. Another chili dog for the road. And before he knew it, it was getting dark! Can’t think when the sun is down!

When the sun did rise he grabbed the papers and tried to put something together. To at least put a little effort into it when that morning he passed by Tails setting a table up. A giant map spread across it with little figurines of not only people but landscapes too. In Chaos name, there really was more to it then he thought wasn’t there?

“There uh…is a lot of setup to this dragon and dungeon thing isn’t there?” He recalled saying as he stuffed a breakfast burrito into his mouth.

Tails rolled his eyes and GUFFAWED at him! “That’s a separate game. Besides! Dungeons and Dragons is for kids!” Tails announced, seeming to forget that he himself was still a kid “Castles and Creepy Creatures is the true peak roleplaying experience!”

“You realize adding creepy to it actually makes it sound more childish, right?” Sonic quirked an amused brow at him.

“...Do you want to play or not?”

The look of building disappointment on Tails face was enough to break the blue hedgehog. He had let out a sigh and gave the other a small smile “Yeah. I do. Can’t wait, little buddy.” With that he ruffled the top of the fox’s head, drawing a laugh from Tails before the two parted ways. Sonic quickly rushed to grab the papers left behind on his hammock and come up with something.

A class. Class, class, class. Why were there so many?? He only made it to the B Section before he just decided on what sounded the most entertaining. Bards were music sort of folk, right? And he was a music sort of guy! He hadn’t picked up the guitar in a year but details, details. He glossed over the brief description left on the paper and looked at the list of instruments to choose from. He wasn’t a drummer. Or ew…violin. A lute was like a guitar, wasn’t it? 

Eh, close enough.

He tossed the character stats page to the side. He’d need Amy for that one. He COULD ask Tails, but after peeking into the living room and watching his little brother frantically go around trying to set everything up, he decided it was best to leave him be for now. Onto the blank sheet!

He’d spent all of ten minutes trying to come up with something and writing bits of information down before a knock was heard on the door. Said door slammed open and hit the wall - yep, Knuckles had arrived.

Sonic sauntered into the room just as the big red oaf was distracting Tails with questions that clearly were bringing slight irritation to the little fox. Knuckles didn’t seem to take notice that Tails was still trying to set up and had no time for questions or for papers to be shoved into his face. “Hey, big red.” Sonic quickly came to the rescue and he could see the utter relief on his brother’s face “We’ll tick off Tails later while we play,” Ah, there went the relief. Sonic couldn’t help but give Tails a wink, to which the other just rolled his eyes “What are you bothering him for anyway?” “This thing.” Knuckles held up the blank character stat sheet, a hint of worry on his face “Too much math was involved. I couldn’t get it done!”

The hedgehog let out a snort and waved his hand as if to wave off all of Knuckles’ worries “Amy said she’d help with that once she got here. But in the mean time-” He lets out an audible YOINK as he takes the papers from Knuckles’ hands. Zipping around to different parts of the living room as he read over the papers that Knuckles so desperately tried to get back. 

Oof. Knuckles may have written his backstory in crayon but at least he had more lore than Sonic did. It even looked like some thought had been put into it too. Damn. Shown up by the guy that still read picture books. The shame.

“Barbarian huh? See you only made it to the B’s too.” He couldn’t help but yelp when Knuckles finally got ahold of his leg while Sonic was distracted with reading. The echidna let out a huff as he held Sonic upside down and snatched the papers back.

“I tried reading ahead. But everything else was so confusing. These guys just smash, I know how to do that.” He declared proudly before dropping Sonic on his head. Ignoring the indignant sound the other let out as he held his papers proudly in his hands.

“Wow, Tails. Nice setup.” Amy entered the little abode next with Sticks following shortly behind. A ton of papers in Amy’s hands and a load of snacks taking up real estate in Sticks’ arms. The badger tried to put the bags and drinks on the game table only for Tails to immediately stop her.

“Not there! I don’t want you guys getting anything on the board. This one is a limited edition!” His voice raised a couple octaves as the concern was clear in his tone. Ignoring the huff that Sticks’ let out as Tails guided her towards a smaller, separate table that was shoved into a corner of the room.

“How am I supposed to enjoy a game of death and destruction if I can’t eat during it??” Sticks argued but reluctantly put the snacks on the assigned table. Already opening up a bag of chips and stuffing some into her mouth.

Tails grimaced in response “We can…take breaks so you can eat. Please wash your hands before touching anything.”

Amy made her way to Sonic’s side and gave him an expectant look “I hope you did your homework.”

Sonic couldn’t help but roll his eyes. Did she really think he wouldn’t do it? Well…he almost didn’t. But in his defense he’d been in a chili dog induced coma and forgot! He’d at least come up with something that morning! And it was in PENCIL! Which in his opinion made his sheets better than Knuckles, even if the echidna had more substance to his.

“I did,” He quickly ran to his room and scooped up the two necessary papers before coming back to Amy’s side and presenting them to her “Picked my class. Made up my harrowing backstory. Just need that brain of yours to help with some numbers.” He couldn’t help but to tap the top of Amy’s head, shooting his fellow hedgehog a smirk in the process. It was Amy’s turn to roll her eyes now. But the little smile that came with it let Sonic know she was just the slightest bit amused.

Not a moment later he was shoved aside by Knuckles, who presented his papers to Amy with a smile of his own “I need that brain too! This math stuff made my brain hurt.”

“I’ll get it figured out before we start, don’t worry.” She took both their small piles of paper after putting down her own. Sonic grimaced at how meager theirs looked compared to Amy’s.

“You and Sticks really put a lot of thought into this, huh?” He reached over to grab one of the papers until Amy smacked his hand. The blue hedgehog let out a yelp before giving Amy a mockingly hurt look. Cue another eye roll. RUDE!

“None of those are Sticks’. It’s all mine.” She declared proudly. Sonic counted no less than thirteen or fourteen pages when he took a quick glance at the table again “Eleven pages of backstory that I think will help give Tails a perfect picture of the character I tried to create.”

“And everything else in this pile of dead trees?”

Amy huffed and shuffled through some of her papers, pulling out a few with some drawings on them “And these are for reference! How I envisioned my strong yet alluring paladin to look!”

All right, Sonic couldn’t lie, Amy’s drawings weren’t half bad. He was more impressed that she’d had the time to write everything up and even DRAW after their hang out session last night. She’d even had time to make up a drawing for Sticks!

“I’ll whip up something for you and Knuckles too.” She put her drawings down and put her full attention on what the two boys had given her. Sonic just letting her go about it since interrupting Amy when she had her game face on was just asking for a smack with a hammer.

Thus, he took a back seat for once and watched everything and everyone around him. And truthfully, despite not being all that gungho to play, Sonic was happy to see the excitement on the others faces. Even if the excitement was for varying different reasons. Amy was just happy to be able to pull some micromanaging and put everyone’s ideas together with some flare of her own. The mixture of pens and colored pencils already lining the kitchen counter as she worked with a speed that could have rivaled Sonic’s running (Okay, not really but Sonic would give her the compliment even if he wasn’t saying it out loud).

Knuckles seemed excited to be trying something new. Plopping down next to Sonic on the couch and droning on about being able to play a guy that could just smash and punch his way out of any situation. Seeming to forget he was already that sort of guy in real life. It was sort of endearing, if Sonic was being honest.

Sticks looked content with just eating the snacks. Already through one bag of chips and looking to be eyeing up another along with a giant bottle of soda. Once that inevitable stomach ache kicked in, she’d probably say it was caused by the government sending vibrations to their stomachs to make them sick. That had actually been a fun wack-a-doodle conspiracy theory to listen to.

And finally, Tails. He looked like a kid in a candy store as he went about setting up the game table. Moving things around every so often to no doubt make it PERFECT. Or at least what he envisioned to be perfect. Frankly, it looked fine to Sonic. But if adjusting some rock looking thing on the board slightly to the left made Tails happy, then it was best to let him be.

Another half hour later and they all surrounded the board. But not before Tails made Sticks wash her hands of all the food residue she had on them. 

“Are we ready?” The two tailed fox practically beamed. Smile so bright it was probably on par with the sun.

“Yes we are!” Amy declared, almost equally as excited as she gave Sonic and Knuckles back their character sheets before pulling some more papers out to put in front of Sticks. Sonic couldn’t help but raise a brow.

“She wrote all that?” 

“Of course not,” Amy waved him off before putting an arm around Sticks “She told me the basics of what she wanted and I expanded it for her!”

“I said I wanted to be able to shoot fire from my hands so that I can cause enough anarchy to throw the government off of my trail!” Sticks proudly declared before holding her stomach which made sounds akin to a whale “That way they stop sending signals to my stomach!!”

There it was. Sonic totally called it.

“And you got…” He counted the papers “Five pages worth of material out of that?”

“It was just enough to inspire me.” Amy looked just as proud, if not more so, than Sticks. All of them turned their attention back to Tails as he coughed into his hand. Wait…had he always had the hooded cloak on?

“Well, I think it’s time we get started. Welcome to the epic game of - CASTLES AND CREEPY CREATURES!” Tails used a small device to amplify his voice. Sonic shook his head. Amy looked amused. Knuckles bounced in his seat. And Sticks still held her stomach.

“Now,” The fox continued without interruption “Since we only have a few more days until Eggman returns from his vacation, I made sure to make this a quick campaign. Instead of months this will only last us the rest of the week-

“Hang on, hang on,” Sonic of course had to be the first one to draw them to a pause “MONTHS? These games can go for months? Wait…we are playing this for more than a day?” He saw Tails start to deflate slightly and just out of the corner of his eye he caught the unimpressed look Amy gave him. Quickly backtracking to save face “Uh…because that’s fine. Totally fine. Looking forward to it!”

He quickly plastered on a smile and that was enough for Tails. The blue hedgehog let out a sigh of relief before his two tailed brother continued with his spiel.

“Like I said, it’ll just take up the rest of the week. It was a little hard to come up with something on the fly, especially since I didn’t know what classes you all would be picking. But I think I got everything covered just enough where we can improvise the rest.” Tails stood there behind an upright board thingy - a DM Shield, Sonic was later corrected, the fox looking proud of himself. That changed instantly and he flipped the hood of his cloak off before hitting a button and the lights in the room went out momentarily. A sole light above the board turned on to give focus to both it and the little pieces on it. When the hell had he installed that?

“Welcome to the land of Cardovina! A usually peaceful country that has been plagued by monsters, bandits and extra creepy shadows in the past few years. You and your party already know each other. Having traveled to Cardovina in search of adventure. And to try and figure out why the land has been flooded by such evils. But are you also here for your own personal goal? To seek glory in slaying beasts? To be a helpful hero to the country folk? Or perhaps just here to collect the reward.”

Tails reached over his DM Shield and placed four wooden pieces on the board. Each one had a name on it. One for each of them. Tails opened his mouth to explain further but Sticks quickly snatched her piece off the board.

“They say wood is good for stomach cramps in some regions. Can I just-?” She was about to take a bite before Tails quickly took the piece back and placed it on the table.

“That is meant to represent you! It isn’t for eating.”

“I’ll get you some wood later, Sticks.” Amy gave their tummy aching friend a pat on the shoulder before motioning for Tails to keep going. Another huff left the fox but nonetheless, he continued on.

“As I was saying, you guys will already know each other. Amy is a paladin of Pelor. They are usually sworn by certain oaths and face consequences if they are broken. I also made her the leader-”

BOTH Sonic and Knuckles let out indignant sounds at that.

“But I’M the leader!” Knuckles complained, only to let out an oof when Sonic elbowed him in the stomach.

“Says you, knucklebrain. I’M the leader!”

Tails leaned forward and gave them both a look “Do either of you know the complexities of this game? Enough to make informed decisions that won’t get everyone killed immediately?”

“Well no…” Both got sheepish at that but Sonic trudged on “But Amy doesn’t-”

“Actually I read the rulebook last night.” The smug look on the pink hedgehog’s face almost made Sonic jump across the table “It was a light read. Besides, you two can relinquish leadership for a game.”

Knuckles grumbled in his seat. Sonic joined him with the added bonus of crossing his arms and looking like a pouting child.

“Sticks is your warlock,” Tails cleared his throat as he read off some papers of his own, holding one close to his face just to make sure he was reading it right “That was granted her powers from a patron that can’t be named in case the government is listening in and tries to take out said patron.” He gave both Amy and Sticks a look.

Amy shrugged in response, “I can only use what I was given to work with.”

“The Mobius Bureau of Sketchy Affairs will NEVER know who grants me the power of fire!” Sticks practically shouted before she let out a maniacal laugh.

“Right…then Knuckles is your barbarian. They can typically enter a rage which makes them stronger than they already are. So Knuckles-”

“I can smash EVERYTHING!” He shouted and was almost on par with Sticks. Both of them happily high fiving each other from across the table.

“These next few days are going to be long.” Sonic sighed deeply, not that anyone paid him any mind.

“And Sonic is your bard. Musical geniuses who can use spells-”

“I have SPELLS??”

After going into more depth on everyone’s classes and giving them a better picture, the game was set to begin. Tails offered his four players dice before he began his next round of narration and let the immersive experience begin.

x-x-x-x

The group set off into the first town that rested along the borders of Cardovina. A bustling average sized town where upon arrival they were immediately bombarded with requests to help slay some goblins. Help capture a thief. Get that RAT Prudence to stop flirting with Gary’s husband. Typical things requested of adventures such as themselves.

“Not even five minutes here and they’re already lining up for help!” Amy declared with surprise. Though in hindsight, the four stood out like sore thumbs amongst all the civilians. Her in full armor, Knuckles in a small amount of his own. Sticks carrying around a staff and Sonic…well he didn’t think he looked out of place. The only requests he had gotten were to play some songs. The respect for him was LACKING!

The group were given options by the narration in the sky. Pick up some odd jobs around the village and see if it leads to something grander. Or go to the well populated and most popular inn in town to see if there were bigger fish to fry. To see if grander information could be gathered there as to why Cardovina had become so plagued with problems as of late.

“Why would people at a motel-” (“Inn, Sonic. Motels don’t exist yet.”) “At an inn know more than anyone else on the street?”

“If it’s so popular, it’s probably the place where other travelers go to converse too.” Amy declared, already having made up her mind for the group and heading in the direction of the inn. The others were given the option by the narration in the sky to go and speak to other civilians if they didn’t want to go with Amy, but one look from their paladin and the remaining three thought it best to follow their ‘leader’.

Upon arrival at the inn, it was definitely a given that it was a popular meeting point. A bustling tavern greeting them as the entrance to the inn. Not only were civilians walking between tables and trying to serve drinks, but there were many more folks at tables that could easily be clocked as other adventurers. Dressed in armor, carrying weapons, sitting in loud, drunken groups. They hadn’t even gotten a chance to talk to anyone before Knuckles found the biggest guy in the inn and challenged them to an arm wrestling contest.

“Gotta show them who the strongest guy here is.” Knuckles smirked and gave his friends a confident look.

“Go ahead and roll for athletics.” Tails couldn’t help but to smirk, everyone else able to tell that he was waiting for Knuckles to fail. Knuckles on the other hand remained oblivious and happily rolled his dice. Tails smirk fell after both dice finished rolling on the table and BOTH displayed the number twenty.

“How…you got a nat twenty?? Twice??” The fox looked down in astonishment. Amy looked just as surprised while the rest of them seemed confused. “You just beat a barbarian with a paladin multiclass…they have the highest strength…”

“That a good thing? Did I send the guy flying through the table?” Knuckles beamed.

The barbarian did indeed send his fellow barbarian through the table they arm wrestled on. The losing barbarian’s companions laughing at his misfortune while serving maids just rolled their eyes and continued to serve drinks. One of them shouting that the loser on the floor better pay for the repairs! Before Knuckles could challenge anyone else, Amy latched onto his arm and dragged him towards a table.

“We’re here for information. Not fighting.” She scolded her fellow party member.

“But how will they know who is in charge if I don’t wrestle them all??” Knuckles complained, but his complaints were promptly ignored.

“What do we do now? Just go up to people and ask about their shady business?” Sonic let out a snort, glancing around the inn. (“Bard classes have high charisma. Remember that. It’ll make talking easier!”)

“We can also listen in and see if we hear anything of value. Just get a drink and walk around.” Amy paid for the whole table. Giving the other three their mugs before urging them to walk around the inn. 

“Everyone roll a perception check.” Tails looked down at his papers before looking back up at all of them. Dice hit the table moments later. Amy let out a huff at the measly five she had gotten. Sticks somehow rolling even lower and letting out a huff just to copy Amy. Sonic rolled a sixteen which he figured was good since Tails nodded in approval. And Knuckles-

“You got ANOTHER round of twenties??” The fox looked absolutely baffled as he stared down at Knuckles’ dice. Two twenties staring back at him. 

“That’s still a good thing right? Did I find someone else to arm wrestle?”

No. Knuckles did not in fact find someone else to arm wrestle and smash through a table. (“Aw…”) But while their lady companions were having trouble tuning into conversations above all the talking in the inn, Sonic and Knuckles had no such issues. Stumbling upon a group where they caught a bit of JUICY information that might be of use.

“I heard some weird beast might have cast a spell onto the land. Nothing like that Tiamat thing that cult tried to summon in Baldur’s Gate last spring. It’s a minor beast but still enough to apparently cause a fair bit of trouble.” They heard one of their fellow inn-goers say.

“A beast summoning other beasts I understand. But bandits? What creature would summon bandits?”

That was all the two could hear before the hustle and bustle of everyone else in the inn covered up anything else the group was saying.

“That’s enough, right?” Sonic looked to the others “Got what we needed now we can just go beat up…I don’t know? Some robot?”

“There aren’t any robots in Castles and Creepy Creatures.” Tails quickly interrupted “At least not in this edition OR this campaign. They are only included in the sixteenth-”

“Right, right, right. Whatever it is,” He quickly waved off Tails words before the other went off on an unrelated tangent “Still got what we needed.”

“But we don’t know where the beast is. You need to find out more.” Amy argued.

“Why can’t you talk to them and find out?” Sonic complained. Feeling as if he’d already done enough for the group by getting even that tiny hint of intel. Now he just wanted ACTION!

“I didn’t roll high enough in perception. So I’m technically not over there and technically have no idea what they are talking about. Tails already told you bards have high charisma so you can-”

“What if I just keep listening in?” Sonic didn’t want to roleplay out any sort of conversation. Looking to Tails for confirmation.

“In that case you could roll stealth. But you should probably-”

Sonic quickly picked up his dice “I roll stealth!”

The blue bard tried to sneak between a few people and get closer to the table of other adventurers. But unfortunately he caught the leg of a serving maid with his foot. Sending them both crashing to the ground. Drinks flying with one managing to land in the lap of a fellow bard at the table he’d been trying to eavesdrop on.

“What in the realms?! How dare you!” The bard shouted, directing his anger at Sonic “Watch where you are going!”

(“...You can’t roll to get out of this right now, Sonic. You have to respond.”)

Sonic groaned as he peeled himself off the floor. Looking at the other bard with nothing short of an unimpressed look “It was an accident. Besides, you looked thirsty.”

The other bard scoffed in offense, slowly unstrapping his lute from his back and holding it in his hands “Do you mock me, sir?”

“Wait, is this a fight?” Sonic perked up with a smirk. Looking to Tails for confirmation again.

“If you don’t talk him down, it could become one. And I’m really not supposed to but since it’s your first game, I suggest maybe-”

Sonic pulled off his own instrument from his back. His own lute that he plucked a few strings on momentarily before looking back to the other bard. Holding his lute out in front of him like it was some sort of sword.

“This is more like it! If I win, you tell me everything you know about that beast you guys were talking about earlier!” Sonic declared, he wanted action but he also wanted the plot to keep moving! A fight for information? Right up his alley!

The other bard stuttered over their words, holding their instrument close to their chest “D-deal! And what song are you challenging me to?”

Sonic didn’t even give a response before he swung his lute towards the other bard’s head and-

Tails let out a long sigh, Amy joined him as she buried her face in her hands. Knuckles and Sticks seemed to be the only two amused with Sonic’s antics. Even egging him on!

“I want to hit someone with my staff! Is anyone looking a bit TOO suspicious? Anyone drinking juice instead of mead?” Sticks looked from Tails to the board on the table, as if it would answer her question for her.

“Oh! I want to hit someone with her staff too!” Knuckles declared next.

“No one is hitting anyone with a staff!” Amy interrupted, causing the enablers to whine in response.

“You’re really going to hit him with your lute?” Tails grimaced at his older brother “Rather than use a spell or even play a song?”

“Why do any of that when I’ve caught him by surprise? He wants to play a song to beat me and instead I just…you know…beat him over the head.” Sonic shrugged as if his logic made perfect sense. He’d probably do that in real life too. Maybe not with one of his nicer guitars. He could use that old one he’d gotten from a flea market to bludgeon someone with. But in a kid friendly, made for television sort of way.

Tails gave a look of exasperation, pulling out a book that Sonic hadn’t been aware he’d been hiding behind his DM Shield. Flipping through it like he’d never faced this dilemma before. And maybe he hadn’t. Sonic didn’t know any of the other times his little brother had played his Chromes and Chips game.

“Uh…I guess…roll for unarmed strike?” Tails sounded unsure of himself as he closed the book and put it down. Sonic took his dice back from Amy, who’d stolen them to make sure he’d actually roleplay out his talk with the other bard rather than keep rolling his dice to get out of it.

“Show him a cracked open skull!” Knuckles shouted as he leaned closer to Sonic, the hedgehog let out a snort.

“Maybe not that far. But enough to daze him.”

The lute met the side of the other bard’s head, sending him crashing against another table and onto the ground. Hit hard enough that it had knocked him completely out! His companions sat there in shock. But their friend was not the only casualty. Sonic left holding up a lute that had broken in half after having made impact.

“What?? How??” Sonic shouted “Skull doesn’t beat wood! Or whatever it is a lute is made from!”

“It does when you roll well for an unarmed strike but also all high on strength.” Tails smirked. Oh, he was so getting the little brother swirly special later “You were too strong. The lute didn’t stand a chance.”

“I think you killed him.” Knuckles looked over Sonic’s shoulder in wonder.

“What did you do?!” Amy strode over with Sticks. Their paladin looked nothing short of furious while their warlock poked at the unconscious man with her staff.

“Have to make sure he’s actually dead. Did you double tap? You always hit twice.” Sticks raised her staff to deliver another blow only for Amy to quickly grab her.

“We didn’t kill anyone!”

“Right?” Amy looked desperately at Tails. Sighing in relief when he nodded.

“And we aren’t about to kill anyone. Why did you hit him?” The pink paladin turned her attention to her blue companion. A look that could match that of a furious mother on her face. If Sonic had a mother, he might have been scared. 

Okay, he was a little scared.

“He and these other chumps know about some freaky beast that is causing all the problems! He started the fight! I only said if I won that they had to tell me what else they know!” 

“And to win, instead of playing a song like you are MEANT to do, you hit him?”

“It worked!” Sonic argued, throwing his hands up in the air and causing his broken lute to dangle on the still intact strings.

“Okay, tough guy, if it worked out so well for you, what are you going to use now to play songs and cast spells?” Amy quirked a brow at him as she gestured to his damaged instrument.

Sonic held the lute out in front of him and grimaced slightly “Maybe I can still salvage this. Does medieval duct tape exist?”

Before any response could be uttered, one of the bard’s friends stood up and shouted “GUARDS!”

“Then-”

“Break time!” Knuckles declared and stood up, eyes already falling across the snack table left in the corner “All this beating up imaginary people has left me hungry!”

“Those are MY snacks!” Sticks growled as she jumped up from her seat.

Knuckles tilted his head to the side “I thought your stomach hurt?”

“The government stopped it’s mind control on my stomach.” Sticks crossed her arms with a huff. Knuckles only response was to push against her face and send the badger stumbling to the ground before he darted towards the snack table. Sticks had let out an offended shout before she raced after him.

“Uh…so break?” Sonic gave his little brother a small smirk. Tails stood there in stunned silence before he shook his head and let out a soft sigh.

“Yeah. Break.”

The break was longer than perceived and ended with them calling it a night for now. Amy lamented that they hadn’t gotten much done with Tails telling her some campaigns spend two whole sessions in a single inn! This game made zero sense to Sonic! Who spent that long just talking in a game? He liked to think he jazzed it up a bit by taking a guy out with a lute alone! Even if it apparently was going to cause them future problems.

“We’ll see you tomorrow!” Amy hefted a food coma stricken Sticks over her shoulder. Smiling at Tails before her eyes drifted to Sonic. Ah, that tight smile was back “And once we get you a new lute - no more hitting with it. Read over those spells I wrote down on your character sheet.”

“You know it’s kind of late. And that looked like a lot of reading for one night. Why don’t I-” Amy’s smile grew tighter, a fist was clenched. Sonic quickly held up his hands in defense “All right, all right! I’ll read it!”

“Good boy.” Amy nodded in approval before she carried Sticks out. Slamming the door shut behind her. Sonic couldn’t help but to sigh in relief once she was gone. Turning around only to walk into Knuckles chest.

“What are you still doing here?”

“Spending the night! Don’t wanna lose all of the notes Amy made for me!” Knuckles gestured towards his character papers that had been left on their game table. Sonic quirked a brow up at him.

“You could just leave them here for the night.”

Knuckles sheepishly pushed two fingers together, avoiding making eye contact with Sonic “Well, you know, it might rain tonight. Don’t want to get sick. Might not be able to beat up anyone in our game then! Tails would do something like that! I get sick and then my little barbarian guy gets sick!”

“You want to come and share my hammock again don’t you?” Sonic had let out a soft snort as Knuckles gave a nod. How was a blue hedgehog to refuse? Knuckles had even gone through the trouble of trying to come up with an excuse to stay. He’d probably been thinking up that excuse all game!

“All right, all right. Come on.” Sonic waved the red echidna along. Knuckles bounced momentarily in excitement before he scooped Sonic up and rushed towards the hedgehog’s room “You aren’t hogging my good pillows this time though!”

He just barely managed to catch a glimpse of Tails sitting on the couch and reading through his Cackles and Cacophony nerd book. A determined look on his face as he flipped through the pages. Sonic couldn’t help but to call out before he was forced into a cuddle session.

“Don’t stay up too late, little buddy! Need you paying attention in case I wanna hit someone else over the head with a drum!” He laughed just as he caught Tails rolling his eyes.

x-x-x-x

 Breakfast? Eaten. Beating Knuckles with the pillow he drooled on? Done. Watching Tails mutter to himself and go back and forth from reading his book to writing down notes in a furious fashion? Eh, Sonic would have liked to be doing anything else.

“You’re uh…taking this game a little seriously, aren’t you?” Sonic took a step back as Tails slowly raised his head. A sort of manic look on the fox’s face.

“I don’t understand how Knuckles rolled perfectly - TWICE! Or how you managed to do something I’ve never seen before!” He proceeded to flip through his book again. Looking to be reading the pages but Sonic wasn’t entirely sure what with how fast his little brother was flipping “I’ve played eight different campaigns and no bard ever used their instrument as a weapon before.”

Sonic pulled smugly on his neckerchief “Just consider me the first. And clearly the best bard there is.” 

Tails didn’t seem to think the same as he shot the hedgehog an unimpressed look before returning to his book. Writing down a few more notes that he hid from Sonic’s view.

“No spoilers! You’ll see what happens when we play!”

Sonic simply shrugged and walked away. Despite leaving Tails to his ramblings, that didn’t mean he escaped the dreaded roleplaying world. Knuckles flopping down on the couch next to him once Sonic had returned from his run. Going over how his barbarian could beat up everyone in that inn and probably beat up the dragon they were going to face at the end!

“How do you know it’s a dragon? Did you peek at Tails notes?” Sonic pretended to be ashamed of his friend. Even putting a hand to his chest to give his act more flare.

“No! I can’t even read all those big words he’s writing down!” Knuckles pouted, arms crossed over his chest “But isn’t that how all these things end? With a dragon?”

Sonic shrugged in response. He wasn’t that big on fantasy. And he definitely wasn’t big on Checkers and Chestnuts! Sure, being able to win what seemed like a bar fight was pretty fun. But he’d rather have been fighting ACTUAL baddies. Something about piledriving a robot into the ground by just jumping on them was more satisfying than pretending to hit a belligerent guy over the head with an instrument. 

But he was writing that tactic down for future reference. Just in case. Maybe he should start carrying that old guitar around with him.

Amy and Sticks arrived with a plethora of new snacks. Sonic took note that the variety of foods were healthier and no soda was in sight. Sticks grumbled as she dropped all the new bags of food onto the table. Arms soon crossed and looking like a child who just lost their favorite toy as she pouted. Sonic looked to Amy for an answer. 

“She threw up on my rug last night after gorging on snacks here,” Amy sighed, clearly not having been happy to have cleaned up vomit. “She’s less likely to eat all of this in under five minutes.”

“Right, might have lengthened it to ten minutes.” Sonic smirked as he teased. Despite Sticks’ grumbling, she still eyed the snack table. Knuckles alongside her. The two only looked away when Amy grabbed them both and dragged them to the game table. Tails was already waiting as he finally closed that giant rulebook of his and put it off to the side. Donning his cloak once more.

“Okay,” He let out a sigh like he was a tired old man that was at his limits dealing with his unruly children. And judging how yesterday’s session had gone, Tails couldn’t be blamed for his reaction. Sonic swore he saw a few extra papers filled with notes behind Tails’ DM Shield before he’d sat down “Had a little blip yesterday. But now we can get back on track.”

“First order of business, get Sonic a new lute. Otherwise he won’t be able to do anything for the rest of the game.” Amy quickly declared. Making their plans for them before anyone else could suggest anything. Again, fair to do.

“What do I need a new lute for? Can’t I just…I don’t know…use a dagger or something?” He turned to Tails “Bards can use daggers, right?”

Amy’s eye twitched slightly “Didn’t I tell you to-”

“READ! Yes! You did. Buuuut you only told me to read the spells. Which I did. Mostly.” Sonic smirked at Amy, trying his best not to be intimidated by the look she gave him. He at least managed to stare her down for five seconds before turning away. That’s three more seconds than normal!

Take THAT Miss Rose!

“Bards can use daggers,” Tails gave a nod “But, it shouldn’t be the only weapon you have at your disposal. Bards have spells for a reason and you need an instrument to cast them. So Amy’s right. You need a new lute otherwise you’ll be pretty USELESS the rest of the game.”

Sonic caught the emphasizing of that word! And he knew Tails used it to try and goad him. The smirk that his little brother shot him was just as telling! Fine, fine. He’d get a new lute and bust out some of those spells he’d read about. Ideas already bouncing off the walls of his mind. The rest of the table wouldn’t know what hit them. And neither would the fake-not-robot enemies in the game!

“Can’t we just get him some spoons and he can use them as drumsticks?” Knuckles suggested with his usual dopey smile, putting an arm around Sonic “Then he’d have a drum anywhere he goes! You could use my skull for one.”

Sonic couldn’t help but to let out a snort and use two fingers to drum on the stop of the echidna’s head. Knuckles letting out a loud laugh in response.

“Doesn’t work that way.” Tails shook his own head but actually looked amused with the antics “Or at least I’m not going to try and figure out IF it could work that way.”

x-x-x-x

The group had previously set out to try and find information in regards to the weird coming and goings of the land of Cardovina. And information they had found! But at a price. An unintentional bar fight had ensued thanks to their bard. ( “Worth it. Ow! Amy!” ) And while their bard came out of the fight victorious, it had cost him his lute. The very thing needed for a bard to be USEFUL to his fellow adventurers. 

The other, defeated bard lay on the ground unconscious. His friends yelled out to the guards for assistance. Pointing at the party of four that had just dared to bring harm to their friend.

“HE came at ME first!” Sonic argued, but the other bard’s friends were hearing none of it. Still yelling for guards until the hedgehog raised his already broken lute to take them out too. Amy quickly intervened and grabbed hold of Sonic’s arm to pull him away.

“No! Not again!”

“Why not?? The thing is already broken!” He gestured to his broken lute. Grumbling when Amy managed to pry the instrument out from his hand, leaving him weaponless. Well, save for the dagger, which he coooould-

Before more bloodshed and broken glasses could occur, Amy was dragging the party out through a doorway opposite of the one they’d entered through. Happy to get away from the guards that had finally answered the call but were stuck trying to get through the unruly crowd in the inn. It seemed as if that one little fight had started a massive one throughout the entire place! ( “Uh, you’re welcome.” )

“Where do we go now for a new string thingy?” Sticks asked once they were outside. Looking around their immediate area, they only took notice of various fruit and vegetable vendors as well as stands selling a few bits and bobbles. But no instruments.

“We’d need to look around town to see if anyone even sells lutes.” Amy let out an exasperated sigh.

“The drummer with spoons idea is still on the table.” Knuckles piped up, his idea once again going ignored.

“We also need to figure out how we can afford it-”

“Wait, what is this, Mobius-Opoly? We actually have to pay attention to money?” Sonic looked over his character sheet, skimming through it to see where it even mentioned them having a spot for their money.

“Next time you are coming over and reading the rulebook with me before we play any games.” Amy rubbed at her eyes, Sonic knowing it was a PROMISE and not just a threat. He’d have to make sure his running shoes were primed and ready whenever that day came about “Yes! Money is involved. And since I helped put together everyone’s sheets, we all have only ten gold coins each.”

Amy rubbed at her chin in thought “Depending on how much a new lute costs, we could pull all our coins together to afford it. But then there is the possibility we won’t be able to afford anything else.”

Sonic watched as the pink hedgehog wracked her brain. The other so lost in thought she didn’t realize when Knuckles pulled two spoons out of nowhere and tried to hand them to Sonic. The hedgehog responded by slowly lowering Knuckles’ hand back down.

“Wait!” Amy snapped her fingers “It’s a starter town!”

“And when we came into town, people were already asking us for help! We help a few people out and get a few extra coins and hopefully won’t have to use all of our funds just for one thing! Plus! We can find out more information!” Amy looked rather proud of herself as she laid out her plan.

After coming to an agreement to stay together (And a perception check to take in more of the town as they walked - yes, Knuckles rolled another twenty. Much to Tails’ absolute confusion.) the group found a ‘quest’ that paid both a decent amount and was in their skill level. Sure, it wasn’t the most HEROIC of quests. A little old granny wanted lunch delivered to her grandson that worked at the town bank. A reverse fetch quest, one could say.

And was probably only given to them so they could move the story along quickly and efficiently. Since it was clear by Tails’ face he hadn’t expected them to spend so much time in the FIRST town.

“And here we are!” Amy held her arms out once they stood in front of the bank. The group walked inside to find only a few tellers and customers. Some doing their daily banking. Some arguing. Nothing out of the ordinary for a bank “Let's find the grandson, get a new lute, and then find this big bad evil that is harming these poor country folk!”

“And then smash them?” Knuckles added on with a smile.

“And then smash them - yes.” Amy nodded in agreement. Turning to Sticks and losing her confident smile almost immediately when she finds their warlock digging through the basket of food and eating the contents.

“You ATE our quest item??” Amy groaned and buried her face in her hands. Tails looked like he wanted to do the same thing but settled on just grimacing. Sonic couldn’t help but to laugh.

“My warlock was hungry and had to feed the fire demon inside that grants her the POWER!” Sticks shouted proudly, standing up and putting her foot on the table. Tails let out a concerned shout of his own when Sticks’ dirty foot was placed on his board “TAKE THAT STOMACH UPSETTING GOVERNMENT!”

“Can you sit down??”

With no food left in the basket - the quest was a bust. Such an easy task…failed. The group prepared to turn around and find something else to earn some coins before Sticks stopped them.

“What if we just take money from the bank?” She looked at Tails with a serious expression.

The fox’s grimace only grew. Amy now matched his expression “I don’t think that’d be the best idea. I mean there are other quests you can do that-”

Sticks quickly shook her head. “Banks, even spooky big medieval ones with no metal detectors, are scams made by the shadow government.” 

Sonic leaned forward with a smirk, chin resting on his hands “Is that the same as the stomach upsetting government?”

Once again, she shook her head rapidly “No. Two different branches. Though the shadow government pays the stomach upsetting government to send signals-”

“Are we really about to rob a bank??” Amy intervened before Sticks could go into an all out conspiracy driven rant. Shame. Sonic almost wanted to hear all about that one.

“I say we go for it.” Sonic gave an approving nod as Sticks beamed at the thought of her idea being acknowledged “What are they going to do? Arrest us?”

“That is EXACTLY what they could do!” Amy argued. But even with being the leader, at a three to one vote, she was forced to go along with it. Both her and Tails looked nothing short of exasperated. But really, what did they expect from a group of non-planners?

Their barbarian had the LUCK of spotting an unoccupied bag of coins nearby. A bank teller had been counting some at his station and putting some into a small bag up until he was momentarily called away. Knuckles giving his companions a nudge and gestured towards the bag.

“Perfect! I’ll just go on over and-” Sonic let out an undignified yelp as Sticks pushed by him and went towards the abandoned station.

“I got it!” She called back, the others trying to SHUSH her as a few eyes curiously glanced over before returning to their business. Once in front of the station, the badger glanced around. To the left. To the right. No one seemed to be looking. She raised a hand and-

“You rolled a nat one.” Tails looked like he wasn’t sure whether to be annoyed that Sticks’ failure would make this whole scenario go on longer, or to be amused that she failed THAT badly.

“No! That's two! I think that makes a two.” The badger narrowed her eyes at the dice before looking to Amy for confirmation. The other gave a tired nod in response before Sticks looked back to Tails and gestured to her dice “Two!”

“Two ones don’t equal a two. Well…I mean they do. But not in this case. But even if they did, you still failed. Doesn’t matter what your sleight of hand modifier was either.”

“I could have got it for us!” Now it was Sonic’s turn to groan. A hand ran down his face before he looked across the table to Sticks “I have a high hand sleight thing! Right?” 

All eyes once again fell onto Amy - the one who’d put together their sheets to begin with. The pink hedgehog let out an exhausted sigh and for the umpteenth time, she gave a nod.

Sticks’ hand merely hovered over the bag before the group heard someone shout. The bank teller in charge of those very coins pointed over to the warlock.

“You there! Those aren’t yours! Stop!”

And like that, guards were upon them. Surrounding them faster than they had at the inn, seeing as there was no crowd at the bank to slow them down. Three of the four of them getting captured ( “How did you roll ANOTHER twenty??” ). Knuckles was able to get away at the last second while the rest of his group was dragged off towards the town’s jail. The townsfolk, including the granny who’d sent them to the bank, looked on in disappointment and shame.

“Rub it in a little more, Tails.”

“Well…now what?” Sonic sighed as they sat in their too cramped jail cell. All of their gear save for the clothes on their backs taken from them. Not that they really had much to begin with. 

“Maybe I could talk to the guards? Tell them this is just a big misunderstanding. Maybe say Sticks is just from a country where banks are self-service!” The paladin wracked her brain for ideas. Surely such a ridiculous lie could be believed if she was convincing enough!

“Why don’t you let me save you guys?” Knuckles bounced in his seat, an odd look of excitement on his face “I got away! I could SMASH the wall to your cell down and bust you guys out!”

“That would just bring more attention and they’d still be after us.” Amy sighed and leaned back “Just let me take care of it. I think I can-”

“I want to get them out!” Knuckles proceeded to ignore Amy, much to the other’s offense. He turned to Tails with a huge smirk on his face. Amy became even more offended when Tails looked to be considering it.

“Didn’t you make me the leader to make decisions like this for us??” She quickly complained.

“Well…yeah…” For a moment the fox looked guilty before he shook his head “But I also…sorta…kind of…want to see how this plays out?” Tails’ gave Amy a shaky smile and a shrug to go along with it. Amy’s only response was to groan and rest her head on top of the table.

“Make me the lawyer class!” Knuckles was ready to throw out his current character sheet and to start anew until Tails stopped him.

“First off, there is no lawyer class. At least none in this edition of the game. Maybe in the fourth.” He spent a moment thinking on it before he moved on. “Second, you can’t just switch classes like that. You need a special NPC to do that for you or an item. And with where you are right now-”

“So I can’t be a smart guy person to get them out?” Knuckles’ smile changed instantly to a frown “Guess I can still do the smash method. It works in real life!”

“Like…forty percent of the time.” Sonic sighed and crossed his arms. He made a mental note to never let Knuckles be his only phone call if he were ever stuck in prison.

Tails seemed deep in thought when the others looked back at him. A sigh escaped him before he gave a nod “You know what? Okay. I’ll allow it.”

“You’ll allow it?” Knuckles arched a questioning brow.

“You’ll ALLOW it??” Amy on the other hand shouted and looked indignant.

Tails ignored her, as did the rest of the table, as he pulled out another character sheet and started writing things down on it “You can be a temporary wizard. We’ll say you took a potion to do so, or something.” Tails cringed a bit, looking as if even he was upset with his own decision. But he seemed to quickly get over it before he held out the new character sheet to Knuckles “Only two spells available since this is temporary. But wizards come with high wisdom. You get to be-” He sighed “A smart guy person.”

“A lawyer!” Knuckles shouted, his smile returned tenfold as he looked down at his character sheet as if he could understand it.

“WHY??” Amy let out a shout of her own.

Tails turned to her and huffed “I just want him to stop getting twenties!”

“Ugh!” Amy shouted once more before getting up “I’m calling for a break. I have a headache starting.”

“You and me both…” The fox rubbed at his eyes but nodded in agreement for the break. The break once again went longer than expected before they called it a night.

“You have a home right?” Sonic questioned his red echidna friend when the other hadn’t left with the others.

“Your hammock is comfier than the trees.” Was the only response he got. Fair enough. His hammock was pretty damn comfortable.

It wasn’t until the afternoon before they got started again. Amy had stated she needed a morning to sleep in after the previous day. Tails had also needed the extra time. Stating it was their last day to be able to do anything before Eggman reared his ugly mustached face again. They’d have to speed run through their current situation and he had to figure out how to get them to the final boss without making it seem TOO rushed

Speed was Sonic’s middle name. So he was fine with that.

“I thought your middle name was ‘the’.” Knuckles frowned and earned himself a look from Sonic.

“We are not having this talk again.”

Once Tails felt fairly confident he could get them to the big baddie in a natural way, and once Amy pulled Sticks away from the snacks again, they were ready for their third and final day of Combs and Companies. Or whatever it was called.

Knuckles practically kicked open the doors to the prison. Striding in as if he owned the place and giving his comrades a wink as he spotted them in one of the first round of cells. Managing to reach through the bars and pluck the hat right off Sticks’ head before putting it on himself.

“Hey!” The warlock gave a shout, trying to reach through the bars herself to get it back. Knuckles simply took a step back out of her reach.

“I need it! Got to complete the whole wizard look.”

“Me and the fire monster inside of me will COME FOR YOUR TOES!”

“Maybe later,” Knuckles waved her off before approaching the jailers. Still ever confident as he looked them over “I am here to get my buddies out of jail! They were thrown in there by mistake! Clearly someone else tried to steal those coins and framed my associates!”

“Watch a lot of Mobius Legal lately?” Sonic smirked at him.

“Maybe a little.” Knuckles looked a bit sheepish before he put his attention back on Tails “So does it work?” 

“Uuuh.” Tails flipped through his notes “Roll me charisma.”

Knuckles’ expression dropped “Charisma?? But I became a super smart guy with the smart gene!” He proceeded to whine “Shouldn’t I roll…I don’t know. Smart guy things??”

It was Tails turn to smirk now. Ah, cocky little guy planned for this. Those twenties really were driving him up a wall “You said you wanted to be a smart person class. So I made you a wizard. But being smart isn’t enough to convince these guys to let everyone out of prison. Roll charisma.” 

At that, Knuckles started to pout and crossed his arms “And ruin my streak? No way!” Even Knuckles knew that the rolls may not be in his favor. Especially with the nice ZERO modifier next to his charisma on his sheet.

“How about I talk to the guards?” Amy spoke up quickly before anyone else could. Trying to rein back in control. Sonic could tell by the twitch of her eye that another headache could be imminent. And Amy with a huge headache and minor inconvenience was enough to throw her over the edge and end up in a flipped table. She might be able to control it enough to at least flip over the snack table rather than the game one though. Just as a favor to Tails. But Sonic wouldn’t risk it and end up with an upset little brother. Even if he did want the game to end.

“Amy and I could both talk to them. We both have the rizz factor going for us.” The blue hedgehog smirked and winked at his friend across the table. Amy rolled her eyes but he could see the faintest hint of a smirk on her face!

“Don’t ever use that word again. But yes. Sonic and I both have high enough charisma.-”

“Rizz.”

“To maybe convince the guards that Knuckles is telling the truth.”

“He’s telling the truth! My friend here,” Amy gestured to Sticks, who was still fuming that her hat had been taken - and it was taken for NOTHING! “Tried to stop the original thieves. But those guys had used some um…uh…”

“Some weird thing to make themselves invisible.” Sonic quickly tacked on.

“Yes! Exactly! Some potion or cloak to make themselves invisible!”

“Roll charisma. Both of you.”

Tails let a smile slip when both Amy and Sonic managed to roll high numbers. Both hedgehogs let out a cheer and high fived each other from across the table. All right, even Sonic could admit he’d been excited about that little win.

Both guards narrowed their eyes at the rag tag group. Clearly debating if what they could be saying was true.

“There has been reports of illegal invisibility potion use, you know.” One guard nudged the other. And that was enough to get them released. Sticks nearly took out Knuckles to get her hat back as soon as the cell door was open.

“Now about our things-” Amy turned to the guards. Both of them gestured towards an unlocked chest off in the corner.

“Over there. Only grab your things and go.”

With that, the group collected their items, Sonic stopped though when a perfectly intact lute was found next to his broken one in the chest. He glanced over his shoulder to look at the preoccupied guards before looking back down at the lute. Surely they wouldn’t take notice if he just took it, right? He was an innocent little hedgehog after all and whoever was the original owner was CLEARLY an actual criminal since they were still locked in a cell and he was walking free.

After another quick glance at the guards (And a decent enough sleight of hand roll) he took the undamaged lute and left his broken one behind. It had served him well and managed to damage at least one skull. He’d remember it in his final days.

They quickly scurried out of the cell area, upon getting outside, Sonic saw the bard he’d knocked out earlier complaining to some other guard about the attack. He narrowed his eyes at the undamage lute on the other’s back and another BRILLIANT idea popped into his mind.

“I put a lute in the chest so you wouldn’t have to waste more time trying to get one. Do you want to get thrown back in jail??” Tails groaned right after Sonic asked to steal that other bard’s lute.

“What would you need two for anyway?” Amy sighed.

“Backup lute. In case I need to hit somebody with the other one again.”

The guard seemed VERY uninterested in the complaining bard before him. The bard doing more yelling than actually explaining. Easy target for Sonic to just cut the straps to his lute and yoink it off his back. (Thank you high sleight of hand and low DC. Whatever the DC stood for.)

Another task taken care of. With that, the group made their way away from the prison before anything else could happen that could end up with them back in the cells. Journeying down the brick road of town and-

The door to their home was kicked open, the familiar voices of two robots arguing to get in first echoed throughout. Both falling to the floor before quickly standing up and straightening out. Orbot coughing into his hand to get their attention - as if he didn’t have it already.

“We have come to announce-”

“I knew it!” Sonic stood up and almost placed his foot on the table until he caught Tails giving him something akin to a DEATH GLARE out of the corner of his eye. Message received and foot placed right back on the ground. But he still made the effort to point and smile in victory “I knew it was a lie! There is no vacation!”

“Actually there was.” Eggman stepped in a moment later. Martini glass in hand with a drink he quickly finished off before tossing it behind him. “But! The length of my vacation was indeed a lie! A clever trap setup while I prepared my latest hedgehog crushing bot! The robo-chick-”

“My guy…you ruined the sanctity of the really’s.” Knuckles interrupted and shook his head in disappointment. Eggman almost looked taken off guard for a moment before he quickly regained his momentum.

“Forget about the really’s.” He waved off their words and took in the scene before him “I have come to…are you playing Castles and Creepy Creatures?” 

“Oh my Chaos.” Sonic mumbled under his breath as he slumped back down and buried his face in his hands.

“You…you know about it?” Tails blinked in surprise. Though his tone was almost giddy. Little buddy, no. Don’t have something in common with someone like egghead.

Eggman coughed into his hand and straightened himself out. As if looking more dignified made it seem less awkward that he knew about some roleplaying game “Erm, yes. I was there when the first edition was released. And-” All of them were surprised when Tails slammed his hands on the table and practically zoomed to be in front of Eggman.

“The FIRST EDITION?? Do you know how rare those are? Do you still have it??”

“Pah! Of course I do! Why would I get rid of something like that? It’s the best version of the game there is. Now there are just too many rules. Back in my day a dungeon master had more control.”

Sonic groaned and leaned against Knuckles “This is like the third most nerdiest thing I have ever witnessed.” Next thing they knew, Eggman was practically being strongarmed by Tails to come sit at their game table “Really? We’re just inviting anyone to play now?”

“You don’t understand!” Tails turned to all of them “He’s been playing since the first edition! He remembers back when the game was at its peak!”

Eggman looked far too proud of himself for that fact. As if it were some sort of badge of honor to be that big of a nerd. Sonic almost wanted to comment on it but kept his mouth shut, not wanting to accidentally insult Tails at the same time. Even if he and Eggman were at the same level of nerdom right now. Oh where had he gone wrong with his little brother?

“This was just a quick one shot campaign while you were on vacation. I had to change some things for the end since we were running out of time. But this is what I have so far!” Tails held his papers up to Eggman. The scientist taking them and looking them over like a teacher grading an assignment. Tails staring at him with bated breath.

“We’re really okay with this?” Sonic looked to the others at the table. His response was resounding shrugs.

“It makes Tails happy. And it’ll just be for today. Would you rather be fighting the robo thingy outside?” Amy questioned.

“Yes!” Sonic huffed and crossed his arms. He was absolutely ready to throw down with the metal chicken outside. He could hear the robotic clucking!

“You’ve got a good story here for something that is so short and stuck following the guidelines of the tenth edition.” Eggman spoke up and scowled “I swear, they add more rules every year to this thing.”

“I know! They really nerfed the draaaag-” Tails quickly cut himself off. Sparing the others a glance before he looked back to Eggman “They uh…nerfed the bad guy I have planned for the end!”

Knuckles smirked and nudged Sonic’s side as he stage whispered “Told you it was a dragon!”

Their DM chose to ignore that with a twitch of his eye. Looking still at Eggman for suggestions. The scientist smirked and Sonic almost expected him to pull out a mini robot to destroy the table with and crush all of Tails’ dreams. But alas, he did not. The only thing the egghead pulled out was a pen and started writing things down.

“If we make a few minor changes, still in line with the tenth edition, we could make this harder. Give a real challenge.” Eggman gave an evil laugh. Sonic narrowed his eyes. Amy looked on the defensive. Knuckles bounced in his seat - elated he guessed the end game boss correctly. Sticks started to eye the snack table again.

Eggman slid the paper back towards Tails, who gave it all of his attention. A wide growing smirk spread across the fox’s face and he gave an approving nod “This is perfect! Even better than what I came up with! I never would have thought of that! Did you borrow this from the third edition?” He pointed to something on the paper that the others obviously couldn’t see. Eggman gave an affirmative nod.

“Sometimes you need to mix and match from other editions just to add more flair to the campaign. When they brought out the second edition I-”

“Can we get on with this??” Sonic nearly brought himself to shout but managed to control his volume. Rather offended when BOTH Tails and Eggman gave him an unimpressed look. Excuse him for not wanting to experience another nerd event in the same week!

So they indeed did get on with it.

After leaving the prison ( “You bumbling animals got yourself put in prison?” ) the group continued on. Able to gather more information as they made their way out of town as to what great power had quite possibly brought a plague onto Cardovina. Trekking up hills and snowy mountains where the rumored beast was said to go when it needed to rest. If it even really needed to rest.

“That’s it? We just found it?” Sonic quirked a brow “No other fanfare you want to add?”

“We have limited time and I didn’t want our last session to be you guys just searching for information. So, I gave you a shortcut to the final battle. As much as it kills me inside as a dungeon master to let you guys off that easy.” Tails sighed.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say it’s that easy. Not with the monster they have yet to face.” Eggman smirked.

The four adventurers stood at the entrance to a large cave. Hearing the faint sounds of heavy breathing from within. Clearly belonging to a creature of great size. Readying their weapons, they stepped forward and ventured in. As they progressed they soon came upon a wide alcove where in the center sat the sort of monster that typically only plagues people’s nightmares - Craigoth the Undead Dragon!

“I knew it was a dragon!” Knuckles shouted, as if he hadn’t already declared that earlier.

“The dragon’s name is Craig?” Sticks spoke up next before letting out an ugly sounding laugh.

“CRAIGOTH!” Eggman corrected her, looking insulted. It didn’t make it any less funny to Sticks. 

“Little typical to be fighting a dragon isn’t it?” Sonic rested his elbow on the table and leaned against his hand. 

“I was going to do the Mind Snooper but that is a lot for one campaign. And Craigoth is a dragon meant for one shots. He’s sort of uh…beginner’s guide to dragons?” Tails explained, letting out a huff when Sticks laughed again.

“CRAIG!”

They really were about to fight something named Craig. He couldn’t imagine it would be that hard.

It was that hard.

Initiative activated. Weapons drawn and spells cast. Health low. A few hits were dealt to the mighty undead beast - but not enough to make much of a dent. Sticks on the verge of going down with Sonic following a close second. Knuckles and Amy still held strong with at least half of their health. But the two of them against one dragon wouldn’t be enough. They needed a plan!

“We’re losing to a Craig.” Amy sighed and ran a hand down her face.

“Ah, not as easy as you thought, is it?” Eggman taunted and leaned back. His smirk ever growing.

“You shush it before my in game hammer becomes a real one.” Amy glared at him, Orbot and Cubot letting out an oooo from the spot they made for themselves on the couch.

“Quiet, you idiots!”

“You two keep trying to hit the dragon with your lute and staff and aren’t using effective spells,” She looked pointedly at Sonic and Sticks “How many spell slots do you have left?” Amy ignored Eggman scolding his lackeys and looked to Sonic. The blue hedgehog grimaced and looked down at his character sheet thing. Ah beans on a chilidog, he was supposed to be keeping track of that?

“Uh, I think three?”

“Sticks, what about you?”

“I was supposed to be counting??” Okay, so it wasn’t just him. Good to know.

Tails glanced over his DM shield and looked down at his paper “You have two left.”

“I can work with that.” Amy took both Sonic and Sticks’ character sheets and looked them over.

“Hey, hey. You aren’t supposed to be making the decisions for another player.”

It was now Amy’s turn to look unimpressed, an expression she wore well when it came to Eggman and anything to do with him “Ah, ah. If you bothered to read anything passed the editions of old-”

“I HAVE read the other editions, you little-”

“You’d know that the tenth edition states beginners can help receive help from more seasoned players, and not JUST the dungeon master, when it comes to explaining the intricacies that come with their classes and spells.” Her unimpressed expression turned to a smug one and Eggman looked as if steam could come out of his ears any moment. Hilarious.

Egghead turned to Tails - who nodded the affirmative “She’s right. I mean she’s the most seasoned one here since she read the book sooo-”

“Pah!” Eggman leaned back again and crossed his arms “Rose giving you tips won’t help you defeat Craig, AH! I meant Craigoth!”

“We’ll see about that.” Amy huffed and pursued the character sheets once more “I already have a plan.”

It was Sonic’s turn next, using his lute to cast Healing Word on Sticks. It wasn’t a lot of extra hit points he could give her. But it was enough where she hopefully wouldn’t go down in the next hit if she was targeted. Popping a potion open for himself and restoring a few of his own hit points as well.

“That’s two actions! He can’t do that!” Eggman argued.

Tails tapped his chin in thought before shrugging “Some DMs allow it. So I will too.”

“Are you actively undermining me??”

Knuckles’ turn was next. He swung his mighty battle axe with his rage activated. Managing to make contact and land a critical hit to the dragon’s defenses! ( “How does he keep doing that?” “Don’t ask.” ) The beast roared in rage but it could not yet attack. 

With some pep back in her step thanks to Healing Word, Sticks casted Mage Hand. Summoning a mystical, transparent hand that she directed behind the dragon. Using a bonus action to tug at the dragon’s tail and cause it to become momentarily distracted.

With the distraction in place, the paladin of the group sprung into action. She raised her warhammer and brought it down upon the undead creature. Once again it roared furiously and tried to regain the sort of composure only a dragon could have.

“Divine Smite be upon thee!” ( “Thee? Seriously?” “You be quiet.” ) Another blow delivered upon the dragon. It almost looked taken aback that it was dealt so much injury after such a previously poor performance.

But ah, now it was the undead dragon’s turn. Using its time to bring fright upon the party to try and discourage any future attacks so that it would not face retaliation for its own. But sadly for it, only the paladin was struck. Falling to her knees and left stunned and frightened. The rest of the group stood, ready to continue to fight in her place and defeat the dragon before any harm could come to their heaviest hitter.

“Try dealing with two of these guys!” Sonic laughed and summoned a mystical hand of his own. Two hands were better than one - as they say ( “Boooo! Stick to your day job, fox.” ) and with one pulling on the dragon’s tail and the recently summoned one going back and forth in trying to poke the creature’s eyes, it was thoroughly distracted. 

“Eat FIRE, you agent of the zombie high order!” Sticks shouted and pointed to the dragon. The ring of tall bright flames circling Craigoth. No time for the creature to think as a beam of what seemed like pure radiant energy brought the undead more damage. Causing it to stumble and almost walk into the surrounding circle of flames.

“Since when can she cast TWO spells?” Eggman turned to Tails with a pout.

“Hellish-”

“Kids show, little buddy.”

“Heckish Rebuke has always been a cantrip. So she gets that for free.”

“And Eldritch Blast?? Back in my day that was a cantrip too!” Eggman argued. Back in his day? Seriously?

“In the eighth edition they made it a bonus action first level spell.” Tails explained, seeming to grow a bit smug as he had to explain something to EGGMAN “And even if Sticks’ cast it at a higher level for more damage, it’s still a bonus action. Damage was taken.”

Steam was DEFINITELY going to start coming out of Eggman’s ears. 

Another perfect hit delivered by Knuckles’ battle axe ( “Seriously?? Are your dice rigged?” ) Amy unfortunately left stunned on the ground and unable to render an attack of her own. And though Craigoth stumbled and looked nearly on the verge of defeat, it delivered one sweeping blow at the adventurers. Bringing its sharp claws down upon them. The party’s warlock and paladin hit while the barbarian and bard managed to dodge. Sticks was once again hanging onto life by a thread and Amy still unable to move and would no doubt go down as well if she took any more similar hits. 

“It’s almost defeated!” Amy shouted in a shaky tone of voice. She looked at Sonic and gave a firm nod “You know what you have to do! Hit it with the Thunderclap!”

The blue hedgehog slowly looked down at his lute. One more hit and surely the beast would be defeated and all of Cardovina would be safe again. One hit with a strong burst of thunder and the beast would go down.

…But what was the fun in that?

“I cast Vicious Mockery!” 

“You WHAT!” Amy shouted in despair “Sonic!”

The bard found his way atop a jagged rock. Lute in hand as he started to strum the chords. 

“I stand up. Confident.” He sang with all the flare and charm a bard can have “Atop the rockery. Blasted on this dragon is VICIOUS MOCKERY!”

With a final sweeping strum of his lute, magic crackled in the air. A bright blue rippling mouth was summoned and started to laugh. Insults thrown left and right at the once fearsome creature. The undead monster roared in pain and agony as the laughing and harsh words rang loudly in its ear slits. It could take no more, and with one final taunt, it fell to the ground.

Congratulations. The dragon has been defeated. Cardovina is safe once again.

“What a way to go,” Sonic let out a snort as he leaned against the game table. Tails knocked down the giant dragon figurine he’d put on the table earlier - signaling its defeat “Beaten by deez.”

“Deez?” Eggman questioned, looking to be both highly irritating and pouting like a child would.

“Deez nu-”

“Sonic!” Amy quickly cut in with a scolding tone yet again “Kids show! Remember?”

“Right, right.” Sonic waved her off “Either way, imagine dying to some mean words. Can’t relate.” He tugged on his neckerchief, the smug look would not be coming off his face for a long while.

“You just…why would you…Knuckles did most of the damage!” Eggman argued and pointed to the red echidna.

“As the leader, that was my job.” Knuckles stated proudly, the indignant sound and shouting of Amy going “I was the leader!” completely ignored “Smash as much as possible and then let my teammates take some of the spotlight and earn their place by beating the dragon. It builds morale!”

“Sure, big guy.” Sonic gave the other a pat on the shoulder before turning back to Eggman “So about that robo hen or rooster or whatever kind it is.”

“You don’t get the honor of fighting Henrietta until tomorrow! I need an aspirin…” Eggman groaned as he got up from his spot at the table. Giving Tails one last look as he motioned for his bots to follow him “I can’t believe you allowed half of that. Back in my day-”

“As rare and cool as the first edition was, a lot of the rules were restrictive and lacking. No one had fun, that's why they came out with the second edition.” Tails took off his cloak and tossed it onto the couch. Officially out of dungeon master mode “Buuuut, I can still come see the book some time in person? Right?”

Not even Eggman could be immune to the little brother big eyed stare. He at least pretended to be at first by rolling his eyes “Fine. Whatever. Maybe. Get out of my way.” He grumbled all the way to the door. Orbot and Cubot carrying some bags of snacks in their arms for the road. Sticks almost went after them with a shout until Amy pulled her back down.

“You went off plan.” Amy huffed before she began to help Tails clean up the game table. Knuckles and Sticks made sure to get away as soon as they could to avoid offering such help. What was left of the snack table reclaimed by them.

“Eh, sometimes you need some spontaneous action,” Sonic shrugged. “Still won, didn't we? And it was kind of fun to see egghead’s head spin from being corrected the whole time.” He looked to Tails, still maintaining a bit of a cocky smirk “When are we playing again? Next time bring old Eggman over from the start. See if we can’t make his whole bald head turn red by not doing it by his old man version of the book.”

Tails eyes lit up in surprise “You’d…you’d want to play again?”

The blue hedgehog’s smirk softened into a fond smile before he put an arm around his little brother “Sure. Why not? Besides, you really seemed to be getting into it at the end there.”

Tails gave a nervous chuckle “I like playing the dragons. And I’ve never had someone play a bard that actually sang a part of their spell outloud before!”

“Consider me the first. And the best.” He tugged at his neckerchief again, that time a bit more haughtily. Soon being dragged into clean up duty by Amy before he could ever hope to escape. 

And with that, Cardovina fell into relative peace once again. How an undead dragon could cause such an uproar and increase in chaos, no one was sure. But what they did know is that they had four saviors to thank. The townsfolk cheered as the adventurers entered the town that had once looked at them in shame and disappointment. Treating them like the heroes they now were. 

And with that, their tale was drawn to a close. At least until the next vacation.

[elwensa]

WUFF 🐺

don't worry about the dragon making canine sounds, it also has a sparkle-wolf oc, lol

You seem to be pretty known for your Outer Wilds fan works -- which I totally agree, your art is super great!! I love your solid grasp of line weight and bold blocks of black for shading, which... I mean, lol. I guess that kinda comes with the territory of making comics. 😛 Also a big fan of how you draw the Hearthians' scrungly faces, haha. BUT ALSO I am also immensely interested in your Pity the Pittie project! 💖 If you can share a little more about it, I would be interested! But I also totally understand if it's under wraps, haha. Stay cool! 😎👉👉

First of all - Thanks!! :D Oooh OC question... me likey!! So, to be honest, I really don't have much content about Pity the Pittie. I have the overall idea, and some specific scenes, but I have barely drawn anything about it! But the project has an interesting story, so I'll tell it here! First of all, during the early days of the pandemic, I started to watch a LOT of videos about pitbulls, especially rescue stories. And I fell in love with those dogs. I find them very expressive and sweet looking, and I thought it was a good idea to one day create a story about a pitbull. Fast forward in 2022, I'm in my last year of art school, and I have to create a comic book as my end-year project. The teacher asks me to submit two story ideas, and choose one of them. One was about WW2, and the other was the story of Pity the Pittie. I ended up choosing my WW2 idea, but my teacher really liked the Pity project, so I kept it in a corner of my mind. The overall project was heavily inspired by a french comic book called "Crapule", a story about an office worker and her mischievous black cat. I really liked their dynamic, so I wanted to keep something similar. But to this, I wanted to add a dynamic where the dog is hidious but very sweet, and the owner is pretty and mean. I remember watching a video of a girl saying that black pitbulls with cropped ears are the least likely to be adopted. Even more if they used to be in the dog fighting business... and that's exactly what Pity is! She used to be a fighting dog, and now wants nothing but give love and attention to a new family! Priscilla on the other side, is a narcissistic mean girl. She uses her pretty face to her advantage, and can't help but bring drama to herself. She's a wannabe influencer who only cares about getting attention. So one day, she gets the great idea of rescuing a dog in need, a dog that no one else wants to adopt at the local shelter! A great way to get some clout! And while she expected to get an old, ugly crusty dog that would probably die in two weeks... she ends up with a big, scarred black pitbull. This story is a real challenge for me, since the main character is a horrible person. She's the embodiment of everything I dislike. But the goal is to show how much a dog's love can change your life. A big story about redemption and self care, and a story to show pitbulls in a good light! If you have a specific question about these two, please ask! :D

Here's a sketch of me trying to draw a pitbull for the first time in 2022

[ottpopfic]

“Hey, you remember how I've been wanting to get my Legion tattoo covered?” Uncle Jason asks

---

god dad fluff

It's a fall Friday afternoon and Katie is done with class

She's cuddled up in on a couch in the library with the fairy lights on, two Cocoa Puffs curled up on her and a brand-new sci-fi novel that Uncle Jason brought her when he came to camp this week. He is coming over for dinner after he's done with his priestly duties for the day. She thinks Dad is making a fall chili if the cornbread mix and the squash she had to hull up from the last grocery order says anything 

Things in her novel are moving out of the character and world-building and into the meat of the story when she hears a knock on the window. She looks up unphased, because with her life it could be anyone, and sees Uncle Jason. This is pretty typical for him and she gets it, if she could fly Katie would also be entering every building like a Ninja Turtle. 

She has to detangle herself from Puffs and blankets to let him in, both hellspawn complaining the whole way like she didn't place each on their own pillow. The spider-looking one grumpily climbs the wall to fold into a shadow at the corner of the ceiling. 

“Your early!” Katie greets excitedly as she throws open the window and screen “I don't think Dads started on dinner”

“It's cool,” he says as he climbs in “How's the book treating you?”

“Good so far!” she gushes excited, Uncle Jason has always been awesome about letting her infodump “The zinophysiology angle has been really interesting, I'm looking forward to where they're gonna take it” 

Katie pops back on the edge of the couch and the Cocoa Puff clambers back into her lap vibrating for scratches that she happily provides. Uncle Jason sits down next to her

“Hey, you remember how I've been wanting to get my Legion tattoo covered?” he asks

“Yeah?” 

They have been talking about it for a while. Katie has a friend from Hecate who's been working in enchanted tattoos and it got Uncle Jason thinking about getting his old SPQR tattoo covered. She doesn't blame him, it's filled his whole forearm for most of his life, and it's never suited him either. Not like her dad's tattoos, which were personal and felt natural on their bodies. Uncle Jason's has always felt like a barcode, or a brand

Katie and Uncle Jason have always enjoyed talking about art, whether it's what they were working on or something they have seen when they're out and about. Uncle Jason is a modest artist, but his work with the temples speaks for itself. And Katie has a lot of good memories sitting with him as he sketched, parallel play at the max. 

“I got the design, you want to see it?” but he's already pulling out the folded printout from his inner jacket pocket to give over to her excited grabby hands.

At the top is a mandala-style design of the big window at the Way Station. Below it there are two trees; one is obviously Aunt Thalia’s tree, the shape and golden fleece make it indistinguishable. But the dragon in its branches is more serpentine and made of metal, a stylized Festus if she's ever seen him, raising his head up towards the window motif. Katie doesn't recognize the other tree off to the side of Aunt Thalia’s , smaller but equal in the composition. Between them sleeps Grandma Lupa, regal as always, underneath a night sky with the trees as a frame. She thinks she recognizes the leo constellation front and center in the rich starscape.

“It's great!” Katie tells him, impressed, “Did you do it all yourself?”

“I did most of the planning and a sketch,” Uncle Jason says “But the tattoo artist I found did the final drawing. I'm into the city tomorrow to get it”

“What's with the second tree? Just to help cover more?”

“No, it's a poplar tree” and Uncle Jason is watching her face “A balsam poplar”

“That's me” Katie breathes, touching where she and Aunt Thalia’s branches merge and overlay in the picture. They had figured out what kind of wood she was made of last time she was at the Way Station for her quest. 

“Is that ok?” Uncle Jason looks a little worried, rubbing the hair at the nape of his neck “I wanted to get my whole family in it, but I don't want to overstep-”

“Of course it's ok!” she laughs, throwing her arms around his neck. The Puff squeaks in her lap “It's wonderful!”

Uncle Jason hugs her back, warm and solid as always. Big arms and a wide chest, pulling her in tight and safe, the greatest of hugs. He smells like heat lightning and smoke from the offerings, he's the absolute best and she loves him so much

“Would you like company,” she asks him after they separate “When you go to get your cover-up?”

“I would love that!” he tells her all smiles

[here-be-descriptions]

Boris the dragon, from “My Father’s Dragon”. Written by Ruth Stiles Gannet, and illustrated by Ruth Chrisman Gannet.

“"I've never seen a dragon," said my father. "Did you see him? How big is he?"

"Oh, yes, indeed I saw the dragon. In fact, we became great friends," said the cat. "I used to hide in the bushes and talk to him when nobody was around. He's not a very big dragon, about the size of a large black bear, although I imagine he's grown quite a bit since I left. He's got a long tail and yellow and blue stripes. His horn and eyes and the bottoms of his feet are bright red, and he has gold-colored wings."

"Oh, how wonderful!" said my father. "What did the animals do with him when his wing got well?"

"They started training him to carry passengers, and even though he is just a baby dragon, they work him all day and all night too sometimes. They make him carry loads that are much too heavy, and if he complains, they twist his wings and beat him. He's always tied to a stake on a rope just long enough to go across the river. His only friends are the crocodiles, who say 'Hello' to him once a week if they don't forget. Really, he's the most miserable animal I've ever come across. When I left I promised I'd try to help him someday, although I couldn't see how. The rope around his neck is about the biggest, toughest rope you can imagine, with so many knots it would take days to untie them all.

"Anyway, when you were talking about airplanes, you gave me a good idea. Now, I'm quite sure that if you were able to rescue the dragon, which wouldn't be the least bit easy, he'd let you ride him most anywhere, provided you were nice to him, of course. How about trying it?"

"Oh, I'd love to," said my father, and he was so angry at his mother for being rude to the cat that he didn't feel the least bit sad about running away from home for a while.”

“By now the dragon realized that my father was coming to rescue him. He ran out of the bushes and jumped up and down yelling. "Here I am! I'm right here! Can you see me? Hurry, the boar is coming over on the crocodiles, too. They're all coming over! Oh, please hurry, hurry!" The noise was simply terrific.

My father ran up to the dragon, and took out his very sharp jackknife. "Steady, old boy, steady. We'll make it. Just stand still," he told the dragon as he began to saw through the big rope.

By this time both boars, all seven tigers, the two lions, the rhinoceros, and the gorilla, along with the countless screeching monkeys, were all on their way across the crocodiles and there was still a lot of rope to cut through.

"Oh, hurry," the dragon kept saying, and my father again told him to stand still.

"If I don't think I can make it," said my father, "we'll fly over to the other side of the river and I can finish cutting the rope there.””

“As my father and the dragon passed over the Ocean Rocks they heard a tiny excited voice scream, "Bum cack! Bum cack! We dreed our nagon! I mean, we need our dragon!"

But my father and the dragon knew that nothing in the world would ever make them go back to Wild Island.”

[kyarbrougharts245-02]

Blog Six

For this week's readings, we were assigned pages 34-58. A reading with a generous title of “Anatomy, Size, Classification, Families, Big Families, Designing Typefaces, Logotypes, Screen Fonts, Bitmap Fonts.” Of all the readings we’ve had in the semester, I found these pages to be the most visually interesting. I’ve always really liked fonts, especially super fun, dynamic ones. This week’s reading was plentiful in examples as one of the major topics focused on designing type. 

On page 57, the audience is introduced to the Bitmap, a geometric, pixelated font. I always associated cubic fonts like Bitmap with old platformer games though usually I prefer when fonts are a bit more bold. Here the pages to succeed Bitmap shows multiple student-made prototype fonts for the font.

It’s a similar assignment to what we did this week. But before I delve into that, I’d like to describe what works for me from these student examples. Out of all of them, I took to Wendy Neese and Bruce Willen’s prototypes the most. Both have clean, cubic fonts that give an almost Futurist, sci-fi vibe. I think the dynamicness of the prototypes sticks out to me more as opposed to the others which feature more solid and bold designs. While I like a certain boldness on some fonts, here I realize the preference doesn’t always work for some designs.

That being said, I do believe Joey Pott’s design would be the most faithful prototype to what would be Bitmap in this hypothetical situation. The other designs are much busier than Bitmap and would have to be simplified to a drastic scale if one is to image these prototypes to result in the final font we have today. At least that is what I believe.

Brendon Mcclean’s design would most likely be the second most hypothetical prototype as opposed to James Alvarez where the fins on the stem lead me to believe a lot more simplification would be needed or result in a font entirely different from Bitmap.

Aside from that, I liked the two logotype features on page 53 (top right). The curves and loops I find to be visually engaging in both, though I will admit I find the red example to be a little hard to read (I have to work on my cursive distinction). Castaways (on page 49) was also a fun font to discover with an interesting little history under its belt to share. 

While I found everything to be quite interesting, I will admit the poster of the dinosaurs was a bit of a jumpscare. The fonts were bubbly but the image was very unexpected. Glad I didn’t accidentally read this one in public or near my family, I’d rather do without the side-eyes. That and, as hard as I tried, I could not for the life of me understand what the poster was trying to promote. I think a bar, though I’m not so brave as to search the internet for the reason for including the two dinosaurs screwing each other. Maybe in another timeline.

To shift away from that fascinating section of the reading, I’ll now circle back to our project. We were tasked to design two letters, one serif, and one san serif. We’d give them both a name and a place in the Alphabet. I quite enjoyed this one. It was much less nerve-wracking than our last projects and I especially liked all the designs I was able to come up with.

Naming them was my favorite part. My two final letters I named Rhael (pronounced rail) and Qr’ax (pronounced cure * ax). Some of the sketches I favored more than others also got names. You can find some named Magma, Ramma, Sümra (pronounced soom*ra), Hydra, Wyrm, and more. Some letters were just given the first sounds I had off the top of my head like Sümra. Others I based on appearances like how I found both Hydra and Wyrm to resemble dragon variants.

Rhael is guilty of being an example where the first thing that came to mind became its name. I just slightly changed the spelling to make it more interesting. Now I am no longer lazy. Qr’ax was initially going to be named Serys (pronounced series) but I was informed Qr’ax fitted it better. It was also initially going to be spelled Q-rax but I thought Qr’ax made it seem more interesting.

Credit honestly goes to Game of Thrones, inspiration-wise. There are some wicked cool names in the book. For example, Serys just came from a character named Viserys. I also had another letter I called Tesserion (pronounced tes*e*ree*on) inspired by one of the dragons named Viserion. In other words, if it sounds cool it is cool. As such, me will be taking it!

(Here be Rhael and Qr'ax, respectively.)

[s3899602]

Blog #8 - Week 7 and 8

Tuesday 29/08

Showed the reviewed version of my test for The Upside Down People project.

Notes: 

Colour - colours are better, yellow is basically orange in Pharos Designer, and orange is almost red. I got to go down and trial the colours so I know what yellows and oranges are nice. Yellow is green until you put a lot of red in it.

Timing - The timing was okay, I just need to fix one of the transitions because it looks very clunky. The birds at the end run a little long.

Twinkling lights - they end oddly so I will need to fix that 

Tuesday 05/09

Meeting with Sara for UDP

She was really nice and was very passionate about her work which was awesome. I'm very excited about this project and I think it will be great. She is coming down on Thursday so we will show her the lights we have done so far and get some feedback on it. I will fix the transition between the beginning of a sunrise and the sun on the ceiling so it's a bit smoother. I will also ask about sound design and if she’d like me to do anything. 

Thursday 07/09

Upside Down People

It was fantastic to meet Sara in person, she is so inspiring and I feel like she will be an amazing person to collaborate with. 

When looking at mine and Mai Han’s lighting she notes that the walls were more effective in producing the kind of effect she wants, so Mai Han and I will adjust the lighting accordingly. I think the ceiling lights were definitely a bit too overpowering in the space, and there was another lighting piece that Sara really liked because they utilised the walls to make twinkling lights which lit up the space less.

Sara wanted us to work on a candle flickering effect for the Dragon Tree Story so Mai Han and I will work on that on Tuesday as well. Sara also talked about sending me bats and a voice over so I can figure out the levels for her. I might send an email next week if she hasn’t said anything about it. 

Notes:

Crickets and birds in the morning and blue fading into green in the sunrise

Sara said to minimise light pollution that bursts the fantasy. She really likes the use of negative space in lighting and wants us to reduce the intercity of the brightness and the colours. Sara also mentioned that the side lights are much more effective for keeping the theatre dark rather than the upper roof lights which overpower the space.

I am going to time my sunrise to the opening sequence to see what it looks like

Call if you want a quick response

The Dragon Tree Story lights may only be used for the beginning and end of the story so it doesn’t overpower so it would be good to make 2 versions with Mai Han to show Sara. But she said she wants it to have an ‘old-timey story telling by candlelight’ feel so I’ll see how we can balance the lighting to achieve that. We have a little while to complete this because the section hasn’t been filmed yet. 

Kingdom Dance 

I have almost finished the lighting design for Kingdom Dance, I will show Darrin on Thursday in the Black Box to see what he thinks about the colours, I should have had it done by the 7th but I lost quite a bit of work on Tuesday when Pharos crashed and it really set me back, but all I have left to do now is the dancing sequence before I go through and make sure all the colours and consistent or the right shade (I know what the good shade of orange is now) so that won’t be too hard, getting the timing right is a majority of the work anyway. I might even tone down the lighting more at the start so it has more of an effect later, but at the end of the song I have a few big flashy showstoppers so I think that will be quite effective. 

All I have left work on is the dancing sequence at 1:16-1:40

Notes:

Footsteps start orange with small flash and go to light yellow/white

Change back to orange when the green light starts and transition to red/pink/purple maybe? 

1 pair at 1:16

2 pairs at 1:22

4 pairs at 1:28

Third Project 

Jo from class asked me to make a 2 minute piece of ambient sound that is focused around the ocean and the sun and other natural sounds so I will create something for her to give her options by Thursday. I unfortunately didn’t get her email so I could ask more questions before giving her a snippet, but I will create some options for Tuesday or Thursday that she can have a listen to and see what’s more her vibe/what she was going for. It would be great to collaborate on a project like this because she is working with AI and digitally produced images which is something I haven’t personally looked at before so that’s very interesting to me. I found some ocean and water sounds and will create something with them for her very soon. 

Research 

I will hopefully have more time for research next week. I want to do a deep dive on ASD. I have researched it before in my own time but there’s always more to learn and there is so much more information about ASD in the past couple of years. For now I found a couple of websites to look into:

https://www.autismspectrum.org.au/about-autism/our-research

Autism Spectrum Australia are constantly researching and finding out more about the autism spectrum and have many different studies going on right now, such as ‘Exploring loneliness of Autistic adults’ and ‘Aspect Self-compassion Program for Autistic Adults (ASPAA)’ which is about teaching autistic adults to be more self-compassionate. 

This is the Autism Research Institute and they have been operating for nearly 30 years. They seem like a very good resource when it comes to understanding autism and I will look at the website further next week. 

:)

[blackbird0blog]

Avatar Fanfic Rec

In which the rumour mill is thriving, Zuko is ready to give up, and Toph won’t stop laughing.

Also, the citizens of Caldera City might be a bit concerned about how quickly their Fire Lord is apparently going through partners.

A snippet from my favourite chapter, chapter 4:

It's funny, Zuko thinks, how a single letter can ruin your whole day.

In this case, the letter is a piece of unassuming yellow paper, with the words To Fire Lord Zuko written on it in a neat, formal script. It looks like something a noble would write, except it's not tied with silk ribbon or sealed with wax—it's tied with simple brown twine. And the hawk definitely isn't Fire Nation; it's a mottled brown-and-black, with darker eyes than the hawks Zuko's used to.

He opens the letter and immediately chokes.

Dude. 

Did you fuck a dragon? 

xoxo your favourite bounty hunter 

p.s when you send a reply, send it to the blue moon inn in Garsai. It's where I'll be staying for the next few weeks. 

What. The fuck.

How—?

He glances down at the baby dragon snoozing in his lap. Out of all the unexpected things that have happened to him, and there have been a lot, Druk might be the most unexpected. Zuko kind of wishes he could go back and tell thirteen-year-old Zuko that, in twelve years' time, he'd be Fire Lord with a baby dragon at his side, because apparently the baby dragon had imprinted on him when he grabbed its egg by mistake.

That...is what happened, right? Like, Druk's just imprinted? He's not Zuko's biological kid?

Oh, spirits, now Zuko's starting to doubt himself. He didn't sleep with Ran and Shaw, did he? That whole day is kind of a blur. Do dragons have the power to hypnotise people? Do they have the power to erase certain memories?

"Hey." Aang nudges him in the side, startling him out of his unwanted reverie. "Are you okay? Was the letter bad?"

Oh, right. He's at a dinner. With his friends. 'Friends' includes Aang, who was at the temple with him and knows what happened.

"Aang," he says, mentally steeling himself for the onslaught of teasing, "you know that day, when we went to visit the dragons? I didn't, um. I didn't fuck them, did I?"

All conversation dies, immediately.

Aang stares at him, his eyes so wide Zuko can see a full ring of white around the grey pupil. "What."

Zuko closes his eyes. "Please tell me I didn't sleep with one of the dragons. Or both of them. I don't know how dragons work."

"I—why would you—?!"

"So I didn't do it, right?"

"No!"

"Oh, thank Agni." He lets his head fall forward into his hands.

"Dude," Sokka says, "you've got issues."

"Zuko fucked a dragon?" Toph asks, sounding entirely too gleeful about it, that little shit. "Is that why he has Druk?"

"I didn't fuck a dragon," Zuko snaps. "I think we've just established that."

"You shouldn't have to establish that!" Katara looks more than a little disturbed. "Why would you even think you did it in the first place?"

Zuko waves June's letter. "It's from June. She asked me if I fucked a dragon."

Toph snatches it out of his hands. "What's it say?" Sokka asks, leaning over the table.

"How many times do I have to say it, Snoozles? I'm blind."

"Oh, right." Sokka takes the scroll from her and clears his throat.

"The letter says, 'Dude, did you fuck a dragon'," he declares. "And...that's it." He looks at Zuko. "That's it? That's all it took for you to start wondering if you fucked a dragon?"

"I don't know!" Zuko defends. "Maybe I did fuck a dragon and I just don't remember it!"

"How do you not remember fucking a dragon?"

"Dragons have been almost extinct for a hundred years, Sokka. For all we know, dragons have the ability to erase memories."

"I think we're all ignoring the big question here," Suki pipes up. "Which is: why does June think you fucked a dragon?"

Zuko points at her, inadvertently jostling Druk. "Yes! Thank you! That's what I—"

He doesn't get to finish his sentence, because Druk does not like being woken up before sunrise. He makes this very, very clear, by climbing Zuko like a goddamn tree and tearing his outer robe to shreds.

"Hot," Suki says, as the tattered remains drift to the floor. "You should show off more, Zuko. You've got a sexy bod."

"Fuck you all," Zuko announces. Druk curls up on top of his head.

Toph grins and leans back in her chair. "Nah. That job's reserved for the dragons."

[sheliesshattered]

RRD cosplay update! The whole dress, all 10 panels plus sleeves, in one picture! Finally!

Since my last post, I've been slowly pinning together as many seams as possible: pinning the side panels to the four back panels I'd previously sewn together, pinning the side fronts to the center front panels, and pinning the sleeves to their organza lining pieces. All of them are wiggly and difficult, for completely different reasons, so it took a lot of pinning and a lot of patience.

Today I finally managed to sew all those seams (and narrowly win a game of thread chicken lol -- see the previous post in my #my sewing and #my cosplay tags) so now the whole overdress is sitting in three pieces, plus the lace-on sleeves. Just a few more seams and this thing will officially be dress-shaped!

Next up, I need to press all these new seams flat, then press them open, then press the black silk organza so it encloses the raw edges of the seam inside, ready for sewing down later. I've got a lot of pressing ahead of me, but thankfully that's something I can do quietly, here and there as time allows during the work week.

For the sleeves (which are the darker bits on the outside of the above pic), I sewed the black organza lining to the red fabric along the top edge that will eventually get lacing grommets, the wrist edge, and the few inches just above the wrist that will close up with hooks and eyes, so I can get my hand in and out of the fitted sleeve. I left the section that will eventually be the back seam open, so I can turn the whole thing right side out. I'll need to press all those stitchlines on both sleeves too, then turn them right side out and press the finished edges flat.

Work has been even weirder than usual, so I really have no idea what to expect out of this next week, but hopefully I can work my way through all that ironing over the coming days. Once that's all done, the next step will be sewing the sleeve seams shut, and sewing the two front panels to the six panel back and sides section.

At that point the dress will be in one big ten panel piece, and I'll seam up the center front to turn it into an actual dress. Then I'll be able to move into sewing down all those organza seam finishings, to keep everything tidy and strong inside, and sewing the shoulder seams together. Past that point, it's all the many many hours of finishing -- facing the neckline, leveling and sewing the hem, adding the grommets to the sleeves and center back, and sewing on the narrow trim along the seams and the wide trim at the neck.

A lot of that final phase will be done by handsewing, but thankfully I still have 15 weeks and a handful of days until Dragon Con. There's still a long, long way to go on this project -- and plenty of time to get it all done -- but it's fun to see it start to come together into something actually dress-shaped. I'll post another update when there's more progress to show!

[steampunkenglish]

Craft, Crafting, and the Merge of Multiple Lines of Artistic Pursuit

What I've Done on My Spring Break

This week I've been at home enjoying Spring Break like every other person who is attached in some way to the academic community. Some of my friends and colleagues have taken lovely trips, visiting friends or finding beaches. I stayed home with my cats.

I also crafted and went outside as much as the somewhat cranky weather here in Georgia would allow me to do.

Handcrafts are as important to me as my writing in a lot of ways. They sustain me. They challenge me. They allow me to explore and learn new things and develop new skills.

So I crocheted baskets and got out my sewing machine to try my hand at making something that I may wear if it turns out nice. f

One of the things I have noticed about a lot of my writer friends is that they often are like me. They do more than just write. Some play and sing in bands, others sew and create complete cosplay outfits from scratch, still others 3D print dragons and sell them, and still others are like me and do fiber crafting of all types.

How Does Crafting Connect with Writing Craft?

The silver thread through all of this is the drive to create, make, and build. That drive doesn't stop with telling stories though. I'm pretty much a tiny bundle of "Oh hai, let's build something cool!" If you provide me with materials and some instructions, I'm probably going to make an attempt to do something with those resources, even if it ends up looking like something a 3rd grader put together during art hour.

I'm not saying that every writer is like this. There are probably plenty of writers who don't have side crafting going on. Hollywood would have us believe that all writers do is sit in our houses or coffeeshops and get neurotic about not meeting deadlines (okay, I am neurotic about that, but when I get too neurotic, I usually go pick up my crochet needle and crank out about 15 bookmarks or make baskets or something) or plot the murder of our agents. I'm also not looking down on those writers who don't craft. Every person has a different thing and a different approach to creativity.

What I am saying is that often, at least in my experience, crafting has opened my own creativity and taught me techniques I apply to my writing.

Techniques I Have Gained from Hand-Crafting

Breaking things down into smaller pieces: Every project starts off seeming HUGE! You look at the picture on a pattern or the photograph of that cake on the cookbook page and it seems impossible. That's the finished product. What we forget is that those products come from a series of small steps taken in order that lead to that final product. Our culture doesn't allow us to understand this. We are a final product people. Everything is a series of smaller steps. Crafting allows us to learn this fact over and over again.

Allowing for mistakes: I am a perfectionist. I want things to be perfect the first time. This is a problem for a novelist. It means there is little room for accepting that the story might not work well during the first draft or even the tenth draft. It also makes it hard to hear when someone else says, "You know, this story is happening in a white room..." (This really happened to me with a story I wrote and LOVE with my whole heart. It was made harder by the fact that the person who said this is someone I respect and also love with my whole heart AND was completely right). Handcrafting forces you to be honest and accept that you are not going to be a master right away--and that's okay. I started knitting eleven years ago. It was a huge learning curve, but it taught me that those mistakes I made were not a big deal. I could tear them out and try again. Writing is the same. I can tear those mistakes out and try again. That white room got torn out and filled with pine trees, a lake that smelled funny, a small brick church, and a rotting, green dock. Substitute perfection for a polishing rag.

Being open to instruction and guidance: Crafting has taught me that there are others who know more than me. When I need and want to know more, I have to go ask. This is another thing I struggle with. Ask the questions. Go find the experts. Don't assume to know the answers. One of the things I love, love, love about crochet and knitting is that there is always one more thing to know. During the pandemic, I decided that I wanted to learn a new crochet technique. I settled on mosaic crochet. I couldn't go take classes, so I used ye old YouTube and found an expert from Iceland, Tinna Thorudottir Thorvaldar(https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCLETbuS9Y_v1o2BpSjj-oA). I also found she had a Facebook group. I learned, asked questions, and started working mosaic pretty regularly. Now it's my favorite style of crochet. I often am reminded as I do this work that asking questions and taking the advice of others is important.

Expand Your Creativity

My message this week is this: expand your creativity. Don't be afraid to spread yourself out a bit and find other creative things to do. Crafting can be a great way to feed yourself creatively and open yourself and your writing. You don't have to master the craft or sell anything. You just have to find joy and maybe gain some insights along the way. Or maybe just make a few fun things along the way.

Y'all have a great week!

#creativity #writingcraft #writing #writerslife

[dramarising-replacement]

responses to: /post/694126265196773376/

Like what if a pair you nested had 5 babies? Doesn’t that ruin your plans more than receiving your pair back

...No, they get the extras. Is this deal really that confusing for people? To reiterate: this project is for one specific color combination. Literally any dragon that isn't that, isn't mine to keep. The breeder keeps them for their own profit so no, it wouldn't ruin my plans if they had a 5 egg nest.

I still feel like this shouldn’t ruin your plans. You knew your den/lair space was limited yet didn’t think to keep some extra spaces somewhere incase something like this happened? What if a nest had more eggs than you could take?

I did, that's the thing. I had everything planned so this pair wouldn't be an issue for at least two months. The allotted space I had was for another pair that the other breeder's been really understanding about. (Big thank you to them! I can't name you, but you're awesome!) As for why I didn't simply expand...

I guess I just don’t understand why you can’t expand your lair/den and/or den 2 dragons. 

I ran out of gem slots ages ago and my remaining "free" slots all require expensive items like genes or eggs. I've been spending my currency on gene projects that need to get done for this Halloween instead as that's more time sensitive. (Not that space is a problem anymore, thank you Undel!)

Not sure if losing this specific pair would've been worse though. It's a semi-rare color combo, yes, but I'm confident I could find more to breed down the line. It's the miscommunication (explained below) and messing up my plans that angered me more than the threat of losing them.

My only confusion is would you rather have had them go inactive with your dragons?

No, of course not, but he didn't tell me it was urgent nor did I know he'd have to stop playing. I found all that out after he denned my dragons. If he had just said that from the start, "Hey man, an emergency came up and I gotta stop playing for an indefinite amount of time," I'd be like "okay, I have no room but I'll work on it" and make room as quickly as possible, but, initially, he just said I needed to take my dragons back. When I said I didn't have room, he told me to take my time before getting angry & denning less than 24hrs later. I get now that he was just being polite, but that doesn't seem like the thing you should say in a crisis.

This just sounds like a cautionary tale to not embark on more than one breeding project at the same time if space is an issue.

Yes, well, with breeding projects taking weeks to months, sometimes even years (my record is nearly two years,) I don't have that luxury. Plus the issue was the other person bailing suddenly then being coy as to why it had to happen. It's never happened to me before so I've never had to waste spaces on emergency scenarios like this. Either way, it's happened and thanks to some lucky circumstances, I'm no longer in crisis myself. I still regret the way I handled things but 🤷 c'est le vie

As someone who host nests a lot, I probably wouldn’t accept this job as you described unless this pair was really likely to give out what you’re after. 2 stacks of food only lasts so long and depending on how likely it is to get what you’re after, someone could be breeding long after the dragons have eaten through those stores and now into what I’m personally having to pay for. Regardless of how many dragons I got from this, I don’t have the time to grind and level them. I can’t see this even braking even on my side in the end.

And that's totally okay. ❤️ I get that not everyone has time for exalting, but even if you were to sell them as fodder at 7g, that's anywhere from 7-35g per nest. I don't think I've ever seen anyone charge that much for a nest rental so there's profit to be had if you ever consider it.

As for the food situation: I know they don't last forever so I offered to buy more food stacks later down the line, they just needed to tell me when they need it. I try to be conservative with what I offer because I don't want to waste 5+ stacks on a miracle first timer or something like that.

[andilovetowrite]

Really in Love? 🔥

Leo Valdez x Reader (Athena Cabin Reader)

Summary: Leo didn’t know what went wrong. One minute, he had a smashing goddess girlfriend and an equally awesome best friend. And the next? One of them in the Apollo cabin, and the other one in the Apollo cabi- well, infirmary.

Warnings: mentions of dying, cheating and some blood. Also some elusions to smut and making out. A lot of angst. That's all I’m gonna say.

Word Count: 1.6k

Masterlist and Prompt List ;)

100 Follower Sleepover

My requests are also open in case you have any more ideas and prompts!

Life for Leo Valdez had been going good. He had just gotten back from helping Apollo, or Lester, and things had been going well. Calypso had just come back from her camping trip, and she and Leo were inseparable.

Which made things a tiny bit hard for you. You were Leo’s best friend, and right now, you and him were tasked with making the new Big House for the camp. Normally, Chiron would call Annabeth, but since she was out of town with Percy for god knows what (you knew what, he was going to propose to her), he had put you in charge of this project. And since you wanted to make the new structure a bit more technologically advanced, you decided to call Leo in.

And the progress had been going well. Until Leo’s entire attention was given to Calypso. Nowadays, you couldn’t even get a minute alone with your best friend without his annoyingly beautiful and mean gf next to you. And off the record, you had been starting to like Leo a bit. When you both were in the quest, and the only two single ones on the ship, you kinda felt like there was something growing between the both of you.

Turns out you were wrong, because in a few months, after your best friend allegedly “died”, he came back on a flying dragon and a goddess in his arms. Too bad you couldn’t find a boyfriend to take your mind off Leo.

So, life was awkward, but fine. Well….until you got shot in the stomach by an arrow. Yeah, it wasn’t your best moment. It was the day after you had had your one-on-one with Calypso, and you had managed to avoid her, but whenever you tried to get Leo on his own, she just happened to be there. So you decided to get him by himself when you both were working on the project. But before that, you had archery. And least to say, you were quite sufficient at it. So were the rest of your classmates, or at least the people at the training room.

So you knew you didn’t get shot by a fluke. The question was that, who would shoot you?

And you knew the answer. Austin Lake. The only guy in the feild who had some sort of resentment towards you. Why? Because he was your ex. Your breakup wasn’t the smoothest one. There was a whole lot of screaming and yelling. Oh, and a couple of threats and slaps. But you would’nt think that he would shoot you. Where you could potentially die.

So for the rest of the day, while you were in the infirmary with Will, you racked your brain thinking of a reason. But it wasn’t until you saw Calypso walk in that you finally understood. She had come in around the time that Leo would be in his Bunker, banging out dents and marks in his newest projects, with everything else out of his mind. It would be the perfect time to sneak away. At least it would be for Calypso.

You had suspected that Calypso had been cheating on Leo for a while. But you had never had a chance to prove it. Until now, where you had a perfect sight of Calypso and Austin holding hands as they made out at the back of one of the beds.

The sight made you sick to the stomach. Surprisingly, it wasn’t because of Calypso kissing your ex. But rather your best friend’s girlfriend kissing Austin Lake. Your mind went to the hurt look on Leo’s face when he would find out, and you could feel the pain radiating off him.

But you couldn’t keep it from him, so you decided to tell him as soon as possible. Gritting your teeth, you tried to stand up for yourself, pushing your hands against the bed. The pain in your stomach intensified by about a 100x, but nevertheless, you tried to ignore it.

Suddenly, you heard a gentle yet cruel laugh. “Oh Y/N, what do you think you’re doing?” You whipped around to see Calypso standing above you, with Austin at her side, and with one pointed look, he took out an injection, filled with green liquid.

“I’m going to tell Leo-”

“No you aren’t. Because you will not get up to ever tell him”, she said maliciously, as you watched in horror. Austin grabbed your arm, and even though you were stronger than him, the pain medication didn’t allow you to push him back. He brought the needle to your arm, and growled at you, his face turned up in a deep frown. With a slight pinch, he pushed it in harshly, the needle cutting through your flesh. Instantly, you began feeling drowsy, as your vision started swimming.

“Y-ou wo-won’t ge...t away with thi….sss”, you tried to say, but all that came out was strangled mutters.

Calypso laughed, swiping her hand on your fingers as her nails dug into your arm. “Oh sweetie, you can’t possibly think a child of Athena would beat a goddess that’s been around for millenia, right? Otherwise, you would be even more stupid then I thought you were…”

And that was the last thing you heard before you drifted off into a inky black darkness.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Leo’s POV

Leo walked around the Bunker back and forth, confused on where you were. It was almost 6, and you still hadn’t shown up. Worried, he grabbed his tool belt, tying it around his waist as he left his workspace, going over to the Athena cabin.

“Hey guys”, Leo greeted, trying to spot any sight of you. Malcolm came up to him, his face etched with worry.

“If your looking for Y/N, she was in the infirmary. Apparently, some jackass shot her in the stomach with an arrow. We tried to find who did it, but nothing so far, so we are just waiting for her to wake up.”

As he heard that, he practically started running out the door but he stopped when Malcolm called him back.

“Visiting hours are shut right now. But Austin was the last one to see her, maybe check in his cabin?”

Leo nodded, and although he didn’t like the blond, muscular camper, he still wanted to see how you were doing so he made his way there.

And boy, did he wish he would have gone to see you instead. Because when he walked through the Apollo cabin door, he didn’t expect to see his girlfriend half naked with a shirtless Austin.

“Leo!”, she yelled, covering herself up.

“You-”

She tried to come near Leo, hands reaching for him, but he stepped back, as if her touch was burning hot. “Leo, I didn’t mean to…”, she trailed off, as she began to see the little sparks of fire starting to burst out from his fingers.

She stepped back, and for a second, you could see Leo calm down, wondering if he scared her. But when she reached for Austin’s hand, as she enlaced their fingers together, you could see the fire build up in Leo again.

“How could you-”, he shook his head, not believing it, “I-I was the one who got you off the island” He looked furious, but then his face crumpled as he stared at her. “I lied to my friends. Acted like I was dead for weeks. Just so I could save you, so I could get you off that prison!”

She didn’t say anything, as she just kept looking down at the floor. Half of you hoped that it would just swallow her whole.

“I literally gave my life, and you cheated on me?! You-you knew I had an issue with him-” Realization struck his face as he pieced two and two together. “Th-that’s why you didn’t want me coming with you to the infirmary, did you? Because he would be there. That must be your little get-to-know-you times, huh?”

She tried to shake her head, coming closer to Leo, but he ignited his hands again, this time making them burn bright. “You can’t possibly think that’s why-”

“Oh no, don’t try and make me think of something different. I’m a freaking mechanic Calypso! I wake up if I hear the faintest of sounds, and you wouldn’t think that I would find you sneaking out every night?”

Calypso stared at him, vision swimming with tears, but her face hard. Leo tried to find some bit of her left in there, but gave up, turning around to look for you. “How is-”

“Oh Y/N, I wouldn’t go to see her. Unless you wanna see her bod-”

“What the hell?”, Leo asked, his voice firm, as his mind went into overdrive. “What did you do Calypso?”

“Nothing much..”, she said, but he didn’t hear another word as Will Solace burst into his cabin.

Out of breath, and sweaty, he looked at Leo. “Y/N needs you… she is close to dying”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That was it, the first part! I’m sorry I didn’t get to the second part, but I think the cliffhanger may add to the storyline, so let’s see if that works out. Thanks so much for requesting this, and I hope you enjoy it :)

[juiceboxman]

Advice for New DMs

I’ve been lucky enough to have DM’d a weekly game for over a year now and I’ve had conversation with people irl and online about how they think about DMing but aren’t necessarily too confident in their own ability or don’t even know where to start. So here’s some things I would suggest to get started, things to keep in mind and advice about general stuff. Here we go;

1) Familiarise Yourself with the Rules. You can read the DMs Manual or the Player’s Manual for rules. You can find rules explained everywhere online from Roll 20 to DND Beyond. But if you don’t like reading, and I get that cause the thought of reading a 200+ page instruction manual on how to play a game does sound daunting, I would suggest watching or listening to Actual Play Shows. If you watch like a few episodes of Critical Role or Dimension 20, you kind of get the basics of DnD. That’s really all you need to start DMing, just the basics like “what which Dice do”.

2) Know your Players. DnD is a collaborative game and all good collaboration necessitates some base understanding of who you’re collaborating with. You don’t necessarily need to know the people you’re playing with very well, but just enough to get where you can decide whether these people are chill to play with. So say if you’re gonna be playing a horror/scary campaign and you know one of the people in mind for playing isn’t too into horror- maybe don’t have them play cause it will make them uncomfortable. That example is perfectly fine but it delves into extremes when you’re dealing with people who are just difficult. You can look up online and find tons of stories relating to bad dnd experiences with just rude, shitty people. I would like to clarify that by saying that these experiences aren’t a DnD problem- it’s a social group problem. If you hang out wih a shitty person they will inevitably do shitty things, and honestly its better that a shitty outburst occurs at a controlled environment such as a DnD Game than say a house party where all sorts of shit could happen. So know your players. If they’re cool people, they’ll make cool players. If they’re kind of shit heads, they’re going to cause a lot of issues and not the fun kind. Know the difference between “shenanigans” and “open disrespect” because you as the DM put a lot of work into the game, if the players don’t respect that- maybe don’t play with them. No dnd is better than bad dnd 

3) Know Your Game. This rule helps a lot if you are familiar with lots of DnD shows, which gives you a frame of reference for the type of campaign you wanna run. If you wanna go big dramatic epics with a lot of strict survivalist rules, Critical Role is a good place to reference. If you wanna go for balls to the wall humour with a lot of heart and emotional moments, NADDPOD is a good place to reference. You want a proper scary campaign, watch Sophomore Year from Dimension 20- it is primarily a comedy show but when they do drama they do DRAMA. Knowing your players allows you to know the game better. It took me quite a while in my own campaign t realise “Oh I’m not running a CR game, I’m running a NADDPOD game” and ater I realised that I was able to play it better. Know the game, know the genre, know what you and your players like and enjoy and try to maximise that fun.

4) Preparation. DMs do a lot of preparation whenever they intend to run a game. I would argue that the amount of preparation you want to do should be equal to the amount of time you’re willing to spend. Sad fact of life is that DnD, and other activities with friends, are all dependant on IRL scheduling. A campaign can fizzle and die out at a moments notice, not all stories get finished and if you wanna start any creative process that’s a reality you have to accept. I’m a creative person, I do quite a lot of writing and stuff on the side so when I do prep for DnD I don’t want to spend too much of my creative juice on a project that only six people at a table will know about compared to one that would feature a larger audience. Also if you have a busy schedule you might not have time to worldbuild, so short cuts help. So in those respects I don’t see anything wrong with being lazy. There are plenty of websites online where you can randomly generate maps, towns, characters- you name it. You don’t need to spend hours on end developing streets of a city that no one will walk down or lore behind businesses no one will ask about. You just need to be familiar enough with the history or your world, its vibe and tone in which you can effectively improv the rest. I’ve been DMing a game now for well over a year, I spend less than an hour a week doing prep. I write a few bullet points for stuff to bring up in the session, I make a brief map for encounters, I’ll look up monster stats, maybe draw up some homebrew and heroforge pictures of the NPCs- that’s it

5) Improv. I think 90% of DMing is pure improv. Depending how well you know your players and their characters, you can predict certain behaviours. So if you have an NPC say or do something that you know will gaina certain reaction from a player, that’s something you are certain about. Everything else however can be improv based. Players will surprise you. They’ll do weird dumb shit and they will do really cool game breaking shit. You have an NPC who was supposed to be a big villain? Well the PCs all teamed up and with an effective strategy, that NPC is now dead. It’s the lay of the land. The goal with prep is to have enough prepared that you can effectively pull stuff out of your ass with no issue. Improv isn’t necessarly difficult, all you really need is to listen. When a player responds to something and you feel its worth rolling for, have them roll for it. If tey roll well, tell them they did the thing. If not, tell them they didn’t. If the thing they asked for is impossible, tell them it’s impossible. You can come up with all sorts on the fly

6) DND isn’t like TV/BOOKS/MOVIES. DND is a weird medium of entertainment. Its a collaberative game where you all make a narrative, but a lot of strange stuff happens in between. Like if youre watching a movie or a show or reading a book you might think to yourself “why is this character spending twenty minutes talking to this waiter that genuinely isn’t that interesting?” or something like “why did the main villain die five pages in?” DND doesn’t follow a beat structure or format. Plot armor doesn’t fit here, it’s all decisions and luck- that’s it. Don’t be dissapointed in your work in regards to storytelling. Don’t worry about plot holes or inconsistencies, just focus on player engagement. If the players are having fun, then you’re playing the game right. You as the DM have to make sure that everyone is playing fairly and having fun. Treat your players equally, don’t be a dick, don’t be a pushover. You have to know what your players want, but also know what they don’t want. If your players like a weird NPC, have that NPC show up more cause they enjoy it. If your players discover an ability ot a magic object that left untouched will alter game play (e.g. one of my PCs recently gained an ability in which they gained the breath weapon of an ancient red dragon) that if used effectively could elminate all threat from any boss fight ever- don’t be afraid to NERF that. You need to be considerate about your enjoyment and the players enjoyment, its all in the balance.

That’s the main six points I have so far. If I have anymre I’ll be sure to add them. If anyone has any advice, feel free to add below. Hope this helps! Also; Brennan Lee Mulligan has a good podcast giving DM advice called Adverturing Academy. Has a lot of cool guests. The episode featuring Carlos Luna from Roll 20 is actually good career advice and gets me motivated just thinking about it. Definitely worth checking out!