#absynthe answers

[absynthe-mind]

I hope this doesn’t’ count as a request, but how tall are the Primarchs? I know they’re taller than normal humans, but is there official heights or your own headcanons?

Don't worry, a request is like a writing request for a fic/headcannons ect :)

In terms of primarch height? Tall, very tall - official/cannon heights are all over the place and vary from book to book, often getting changed with no rhyme or reason.

I tend to generally go with this image:

by Tim Remin (there's a human on the very right for scale)

However, I find it rarely matters to compare between them when for the sake of my writing it goes: human (regular) < space marine (big!) < custodes (BIG!) < primarch (HUGE!!)

Generally, the height of an astartes is recognised at 7-8ft tall, and primarchs are meant to be a class above that so take it as you will.

Hope that clears stuff up for you <333

[windvexer]

is hyssop safe to use as loose incense? i tried researching it and some smoke shop site claims its safe to inhale but they don't seems like the best source.

Hi, Anon. I have the exact same information set as you do, which is to say, I can also do web searches about it.

Since the only thing I can contribute is my search technique, here we go:

Do not get medical information from the smoke/herbal shops trying to sell you the product.

There are websites dedicated to medical information (like webmd.com) to help look up the possible medical effects of plants.

Make sure you know the scientific name of the plant. I don't think hyssop is much of an offender since I think most of the time, most people are talking about hyssopus officinalis. But if the source can't tell you the scientific name, I would decline to trust it as a scientific resource.

Be mindful of your personal medical risks. Since we can go on DuckDuckGo and quickly find out from Wikipedia that hyssop is used as a culinary herb, we can probably determine that, like, just touching it won't make you drop dead. In fact, apparently we can all chug some absynthe, of which it's a primary ingredient, and be fine (if not drunk). But apparently, even small amounts of the essential oil can give children convulsions and trigger seizures in adults. So if you tend to have seizures, maybe this isn't the plant for you.

If you have medical concerns, you can't ask a search engine or a blogger. You need to talk to your doctor.

Maybe someone on the dash has a resource or a book or something that can give you a definitive answer, but I can't. Best of luck on your searches.

[into-the-bugverse]

19

IM ANSWERING THESE SO SLOWLY,,,, But Im honestly going to cue the rest, since it'll make it daily posting even when I don't,,,,

♥ (19) How highly does your OC value love (platonic, romantic, or otherwise)?

This one is going to be fun for a lot of my ocs, so I might answer with quite a few

Absynth : Doesn't feel love for many people, but he highly values platonic relationships, especially with the other creator gods [+ Flip, but NOT jakk]. He rarely feels romantic feelings, so when he DOES feel them, he values them, but not highly bc he has a fear of commitment. Familial wise, he doesn't feel familial feelings at all, nor does he even have real family. Queer Platonic relationships r king to him- he loves those and values them greatly.

Jakk : Loveless for everyone except Flip, and even it's more a familial kinship with attachment and trust. He values his relationship with Flip above all else, and isn't particularly interested in any relationship asides from sexual stuff, which is usually one night stands. Has a extreme disdain for romantic relationships, though he has felt romantic attraction in the past.

Flip : HIGHLY values friends, familial, romantic, and queer platonic relationships. He views them almost on an equal level, but he has a strong love for his wife and his brother/literal other half. Generally isn't the most outwardly honest about his high value for his loved ones, but it's obvious in how he behaves and acts.

Emoc : Oh god...... he values love with his friends a little too much. He's a ride or die for his friends most importantly, but he's also extremely protective. He does get deeply preoccupied with his love for his friends- Best example is with his best friend, Samuel. He would do anything for him. Literally anything, minus a few things that go against the morals he has. He wishes rlly bad that he had a family, but Rodger's the closest thing he's got.

Samuel : He values familial relationships higher than all others, save for his close, and best, friends. Samuel has a lot of chosen family members [Noah, Charles and Rodger notably], but he also deeply loves his friends. He values all other forms of love over anything romantics- He does feel romantic feelings, but he views partnership as more of a transaction than anything 'real' if that makes sense.

Charles : He REALLY, REALLY values his loved ones, but doesn't particularly care about perceived "outsiders". Charles does think more highly of platonic relationships more than anything, but he does have a chosen father, being Rodger. He values him pretty highly too. Has a fear of romantic connections, but I think he would think the same of those relationships.

Rodger : Values all love equally, and holds his loved ones very near and dear to him. He is a family man in every sense of the phrase, but he is also fiercely loyal to his friends. He seemingly has a flock of chosen kids [Emoc, Charles, and Samuel particularly]. Rodger has always wanted children [more than his son, Kaz], so he really doesn't mind having a good handful of people seeing him as a father. It's actually really endearing to him, and he values those chosen kids like his own.

Zander : I KNOW YOU DON'T LIKE HIM BUT I GOTTA INCLUDE HIM........ He is almost entirely loveless, besides his husband [who he has known since he was four years old], and his little brother [who he practically raised]. It's really, really hard to get him to care or love someone other than those two. He is capable of it, don't get it twisted, but it's literally only ever happened once, and it did not end well. He only values his relationships with his husband and his brother, but doesn't otherwise value any other form of relationships.

Johnny : ZANDER'S HUSBAND, whom I adore. He values all love highly, but he has a special love for his husband. There's few things he wouldn't do for the man he's known for multiple decades. He has a lot of friends and he loves all of them very much. HOWEVER... Johnny does move on quick when it comes to losing friends, which doesn't happen often, but it has. If Zander left him, which he lowkey does in canon, he would be so fucking devastated.

Alec : ZANDER'S LITTLE BROTHER. Really values all relationships and love, but he's picky with who he chooses to love. There's an aspect of deciding whether or not someone is deserving of his love, but after everything he's been thru, he decides most people don't. Alec believes in a baseline, collective love for other people, going out of his way to help others, but that's more just the kindness in him spilling out. He loves his brother, but he thinks he has major issues. Like go to therapy immediately issues. Alec sees his brother as a father figure, but he would be the first to admit he's a terrible role model.

Donny : I have not talked about him yet, but he is another one of my beloveds. He's skrunkly. He values love highly, especially family [chosen or blood]. Donny is just a hard peanut to crack into. He's generally cold- not necessarily out of anything other than being mentally exhausted about 25/8. He really loves his identical sister, Rosa, because they've been together their whole life, but in canon they're kind of not in contact. Trying to find each other, but not there yet.

[mothimalspaces]

but everyone lost their sanity and will guilt trip and harass you if you even remotely something that goes against the party! im so done with liberals and having voting being the only answer yall geniuinely need rhino dick and absynthe

“vote blue no matter who” is pro-genocide rhetoric

[piningbeleg]

In answer to your tags, that Journey to the West adaptation is an Australian show (distributed in several places by Netflix) called The New Legends of Monkey. Tripitaka and Sandy are girls, and also there’s an evil overlord hunting for the scrolls and wild off the rails fight scenes in an Asiatic fantasy setting vaguely inspired by ATLA but featuring a shocking amount of white people despite this

thanks I hate it

[haleths]

So I have to ask - why do you think the theatrical LotR films are better? I think there’s an argument to be made here that you’re right but I’m curious as to your reasoning

oh lord, i knew someone was gonna call me out on this.... okay, here goes

i’ll start by saying that i have quite a critical brain when it comes to watching films. even with lotr, i’m viewing them as a film fan rather than a tolkien fan. of course my first impulse as a tolkien fan is to say “yes! have all the extra scenes you want, get as much lore in there as you can, make them each 6 hours long, i don’t care!”

however, i find that the extended scenes, while good, typically tend to slow the films down and/or mess with the pacing. each extended scene has value of course, but they ultimately don't add anything vital to the story - they are unessential, and i can 100% see why each of them were cut. i’m no filmmaker but if i was peter jackson i would’ve cut out the exact same scenes! i saw the extended trilogy in cinemas during lockdown, which was truly an incredible experience.....but i’m sorry i just didn’t have the attention span for it and they did drag a little

if the films are gonna be your first introduction to the franchise, as they were for me, then they need to be accessible for someone who is completely new to this world. i feel like pj did a good job of sticking to the essence of the source material and pleasing existing fans, while also adapting the stories accordingly to appeal to more general audiences, with the hope of drawing in new fans. if the extended cuts had been released - each of them a 4 hour long film packed with deep lore and world building - i think a lot of people might have been put off. to get given that much information in one go is overwhelming, especially when you have no context for what's going on. i think pj knew this and hence decided to cut out the extra scenes (the producers/film studio probably had input on this too as they actually had to market/sell the films!)

ultimately if i was given the choice between the two - like if planet earth was about to self destruct and i had to save it by destroying one version of lotr - then i would save the extended, just because those scenes are too valuable to lose forever, regardless of how much i feel they weaken the films overall

[voraciouslyindulgent]

The response was slow to come, but Tarn gave it little thought. Perhaps the current time was not conductive for a conversation. A Cybertron at peace had more allowance for light chats and the occasional casual word. The last he'd heard, Lieutenant's war had not ended. He could only hope the Empire of that universe has triumphed much like the world within which he'd chosen to reside.

When the answer did come, the tankformer had already turned away from the view of the top deck, opting to return to his chambers for a few hours of recharge. He paused in his steps as he perused the texts from his friend. Lingering in the hallway of elevators, he read the messages again, and took a moment to consider what to say in return.

Lieutenant did not sound pleased to hear from him, and he was rather unsure what there was to explain, as he hadn't thought it necessary to reveal the exacting details of his work.

[text] Garden strolls and a shared drink of absynthe need not be a mirage of ages past. There are several crystal gardens in New Kaon now, and I would not mind at all to treat you to another vintage bottle.

[text] I am admittedly surprised so much time has passed for you. How fares the Empire? It reigns victorious, I hope. Pardon my ignorance, my friend, but I am bewildered by what I am expected to explain. I do not think I've hidden the nature of my work from you. The Decepticon Justice Division has always hunted traitors of the Empire and executed appropriate punishment. That has not changed, even now that I am in a world of peace.

Tarn.

How time has gone by. Had the message emerged when they last spoke, a response would have been swift. However, life times had passed by and not the name had far more meaning than simply a dear friend. There had been two others that bore the same name and likeness of which Lieutenant would gladly like to never see again.

This one is different. He knew him before his universe implemented their Decepticon Justice Division. In fact, he recalled that being one of the last conversations he had with the mech prior to the drop in communications. Informing Tarn that he would be attending a rally in a few months-- a rally in which Megatron revealed these five monsters that would be set loose upon the Decepticons who dared to think of turning away from the cause.

Those five would end up killing his former crew for the crimes of leaving the Decepticon cause and harboring a double agent, Lieutenant. A guilt that, over the years, hasn't fully ever healed.

The other Tarn was a threat by a petty rat bastard to come for his Conjunx. Regardless of the outcome, it nearly ended Lieutenant's Conjunx-ship. That trepidation made the mech's spark casing knot up. The guilt and fear surrounded him as he spent his time pacing around with the text message left seemingly unread. Hands wrung together as Lieutenant's mind was a cloud of what he should do. He knew this mech. He knew this version of Tarn was unlike any of the others.

In honesty, he yearned for a friend.

He would first have to speak to his Conjunx about it to avoid the medic finding out and assuming the worst of things. This would delay Tarn's answer, but he would send a response.

[[txt]] My, it has been ages since I have heard from you. Memories of the crystal garden walks and drinks of absinthe feel like faded fingerprints on an abandoned handrail.

[[txt]] Your tardiness is forgiven as I have not kept up communications for the past hundred thousand millennia and then some myself. Much has changed in your absence, which would be far too much to discuss over mere messages. After all, you have some explaining to do, as I have a better understanding of your Decepticon Justice Division since last we spoke.

[eldarya-no-lorraine]

Hello, I just re-registered and started re-playing on my french account. I was just wondering, is there any way to change our guard please? I just finished Episode 3 of Origins and got put into Obsidian, which is the one I like the least. The episode also said I would be given a companion egg, but I didn't receive one (I got Corko in the test). Is this normal? I can't remember from playing originally. Thanks :)

Hi. 

Sorry I am late. 

Once you finish episode 6 and unlock the market you can switch to Season 2 ( but that one uses mana ) and in the second episode, I think, the game lets you choose a guard again. Then you have the option to stick with Obsidian or take the test again. Even after you took the test you will be given options to go with the result or choose the desired guard. 

That’s the only way I see. 

The companion thing:  I’ve played the 6 episodes of Season 1 and I assume I didn’t get my Becola since I already had an active companion (Chiromagnus) and even Kero told me to go take Chiromagnus to find shears and catch Crylasm for Mery. I just think they did so because people would use their own companions from the old shop anyway.  Maybe if no one has an active companion they actually do get the starter egg.

[arofili]

I actually AM curious to hear your mixed feelings on soul bonds, not least because you’re the first person I’ve ever talked to in the fandom who didn’t think they were incredibly awesome with zero downsides and I love hearing different perspectives. Also your meta is incredibly well done even if I often come to different conclusions? So. Consider this an excuse, I guess, to call out soul bonds?

i do think they are generally really cool and fun!! and my mixed feelings really comes down to an extension of my mixed feelings on shipping in general? being aro does that to ya.

i think, sometimes, soul bonds are written too similarly to soul mates for me, and i have a Known Thing against soul mate stories. the idea of relationships being “meant to be” rubs me the wrong way and i feel like soul bonds can (not always! but sometimes) confirm that narrative.

the intricacies that get me, too - are soul bonds confined to marriage? if so, that’s always going to feel weird to me as an aromantic person, even if it’s internally consistent within the story and otherwise “unproblematic” and that’s entirely a personal thing. but if not how do you distinguish? what counts a relationship “real” or intense enough to warrant a soul bond? can you choose to be married and not soul bond? once you establish a bond, can it ever go away? what happens when the person dies? what happens if you don’t want to have the bond anymore? what happens if you want to bond with someone else? (these aren’t questions meant to discredit the idea, just things that i think about and don’t see explored often.)

i see people talk about soul bonds and adjacent concepts (like mind melding or body sharing) in contexts of “it’s like True Love but even more” and any sort of relationship hierarchy is always going to be a turn-off (haha) for me. i already feel like i’m not going to be able to access True Love, and adding more exclusivity on top of that is making me..hm, less likely.

also, i saw in your response to my comment that started this conversation that you saw soul bonds as differentiating between mortal and elvish marriages - and i think that my take on elves is often a lot more human than yours! maybe that’s a failing in my own writing, but in trying to relate to tolkien’s elves i think i project human relationships, feelings, and processes where they needn’t be, necessarily. the inhumanity of elves is really cool, but i think my focus in that area is more biological than cultural.

but in general, the idea is really neat and i do enjoy reading about it, quite often! i like the concepts of being connected to someone telepathically, and being able to open/close that bond at will is especially interesting. but in my own fic i might shy away from it (or get into weird exceptions) because of my own hesitations.

so yeah, not so much of a meta calling out soul bonds but more of a personal squeamishness when it comes to placing incredibly high value on one specific kind of relationship. oops!

[absynthe-mind]

Request List

Current Inbox: Closed

Message here to be added to the taglist!

Vulkan x reader x Dorn Oneshot

Horus x reader x Sanguinius headcannons

Childhood friend of vulkan

All requests are being spread out in publication so that I can get on top of kinktober promts :)

[timelordthirteen]

The original book Dune iirc isn’t much better; I genuinely don’t recall if I’ve read it or not but I’ve definitely heard this exact discourse before. It’s disappointing that the adaptation didn’t really change or challenge that point.

I sort of disagree? Herbert did try to show the dangers of following so called charismatic leaders, of empires, and of planetary ecology. That said, there is a strong undercurrent of Islamaphobia and of trashing and reappropriating Middle Eastern culture, which is indefensible even for the mid-60s. It is definitely a novel of its time, and like anything has as many good elements as problematic elements. My point in my post is the same as yours, that we can and should do better NOW. An opportunity was there to use a BIPOC actor in a dismantling of those bad tropes and it was missed. The result is another White Savior trope we didn’t need.

I’m still absolutely watching the movie though, do not get me wrong. My love for Dune is deep and everlasting and I’m here for how hot Oscar Isaac looks as Leto. ;)

[hermitmoss]

Finduilas of Dol Amroth for the ask meme?

Finduilas of Dol Amroth: no dialogue? no problem!; the popular fanon is 100% wrong; it feels like I see them differently than everyone else

The thing about her is, there seems to be this urge to retroactively girlbossify her, which I'm always opposed to anyway (because I'm a Professional Woman and having femininity forced on me is an utterly hellish experience and also 'girlboss' seems to be synonymous with 'upholding the regime' and so on and - anyway. I'm getting off-topic.)

My point is, the thing about Finduilas of Dol Amroth in fan perception is that she textually had a serious chronic illness and people seem to not know how to deal with that, or quite possibly the fanon isn't wrong at all and I'm just misinterpreting because I'm very touchy about that sort of thing, but I see a whiff of girlbossification and the possible suggestion that it's somehow a negative sexist character trait to be, you know, sick, which. Yeah.

[patheticlizardman]

I think everyone should have their personal encyclopedia. doesn’t matter in which form - google docs, notebook, your notes app, random tissues that you are collecting in a shoe box. i’m having a document where I always take a few notes on things I researched (in the least academic meaning of the word). Once I heard a song about absynth and I wasn’t sure what exactly it was so I opened wikipedia and wrote down a few of the things I had just learned and that I found need. Now it’s a little mini-encyclopedia of all the things I asked myself and answered in retourn. Nothing specialised, nothing in real detail (unless I want to) but just to collect my little findings about this strange little earth. (also, this way, you keep these little facts for longer than just flying over them once)n

[haleths]

The only and most obvious case of F/F queerbaiting (as opposed to subtext) that I can think of is the American TV show Rizzoli & Isles, a buddy cop show about two women - unlike other F/F canon ships or properties with sizable sapphic fanbases, I distinctly remember the cast and crew making jokes about the relationship and being clear it wasn’t gonna happen but teasing it in-universe anyway. It’s usually way more common for an F/F ship to be briefly canon before one or both of them dies (think Buffy the Vampire Slayer with Willow/Tara, The 100 with Clexa, Atomic Blonde) instead of both alive and sustained queerbaiting to get the audience to keep watching. Funnily enough, sapphic romances that are considered good usually have ambiguous or tragic endings too - even Portrait of a Lady on Fire ended with the main pairing unable to be together.

hmmm interesting, i've never seen rizzoli & isles but yikes any show that has the audacity to hint at a queer relationship in-universe and then ridicule it outside of that is already in my bad books

and yes i feel like it's quite common for f/f ships be rather short lived and/or end in tragedy!! these examples all sound like takes on typical queer tropes like bury your gays, or just queer storylines ending with the characters sad or broken up. honestly i'm not sure what's better, short lived queer relationships that end badly or deliberately drawn out queerbaiting?!?

[yavieriel]

Tagged by @anghraine <3

Favourite colour: I'm really bad at answering this! It's all contextual. I do wear a lot of winter whites and grey though. My general color palettes are a) white and grey with optional navy or deep reds; and b) sage, cream, and brown. I'm also a really easy sell for things in white-and-gold or distressed gilt. Bright colors, especially multiple bright colors, tend to stress me out.

Currently reading: Day to day I read a lot of NYT articles and lately I've been hooked on Best of Redditor Updates. As for novels, I read and loved the Rivers of London series over the past year and highly, highly recommend it. I'm planning to pick up Piranesi next.

Last song: “Let Me Drown" by We As Human, thanks to @absynthe--minded. I really appreciate finding Christian rock that unapologetically engages with faith as a way to process suicidal ideation, that's my jam. "There's a time to be born and a time to die, and somewhere they collide" is a great line. Also just great melodic hooks.

Last (TV?) series: Currently watching Clarkson's Farm with @simaethae, because dumb low-stakes farming shenanigans with great music and beautiful cinematography is A+++ and exactly the level of emotional bandwidth we have these days. Jeremy Clarkson is the butt of 90% of the jokes and he knows it.

Sweet, savoury, or spicy: Up until the last year I would have said sweet, all the way! Lately I've been all about savory foods, though my favorite still is savory+sweet combos like meat and/or cheese with fruit. For dinner tonight I'm making a ham, asparagus, gruyere, and orange frittata. It'll have orange zest mixed in with the eggs, be topped with slices of oranges fried in ham fat, and I'll sautee the asparagus in the ham pan as well and then deglaze with orange juice. I like a little bit of spiciness to certain things, but I'm pretty sensitive to it and don't like when it hurts.

Currently working on: The b-plot of the original novel I'm cowriting with @absynthe--minded, I'm having a lot of trouble getting a firm grip on the emotional stakes of it. Like, we have notes neatly written out about what those emotional stakes should be, but trying to translate that into a cohesive emotional hook is proving difficult for some reason. I'm getting there, though. (The A-plot is 80% hurt-comfort and pining so I had that on lock from the get-go.)

Additionally, I'm listening to the Old Gods of Appalachia podcast and enjoying that so far. I've been all up and down those mountains and lived on the upper edges of Appalachia for most of my life, so it really resonates. Very nostalgic-spooky.

Tagging @simaethae, @absynthe--minded, @elwing, @kareenvorbarra, @nikosheba

[arofili]

12 and 24 for the fanfic asks?? and happy new year :)

12. favorite character to write about this year

Well, apparently I didn’t write about Maeglin at all this year (at least not on AO3) but I sure THOUGHT about him a lot, so I’m going to say him!

24. favorite fic you read this year

I mean, Blessed Hands Will Break Me by @absynthe--minded is the obvious answer! If you haven’t read this fic already, what are you doing?? absynthe’s attention to detail and incorporation of semi-obscure canon, fanon, and headcanon into one cohesive narrative is astounding!