#i've been wanting to write a discussion on Arcanists and Names for a while now and ch 5's take on it with numbers helps build it more

[schneiderenjoyer]

Another round of catching up on all the events before they go away and reading Chapter 5.

Not me vibrating on theories and concepts more and more. But I need to read through all of it before making a solid crafted theory first

[vasito-de-leche]

I haven't seen anyone request this and I've been,,,,really dying for more content of her but pretty please general dating headcanons with Tennant 😭 i keep imagining she'd be such an amazing lover and love your writing so much

;R1999 TENNANT - Relationship Headcanons

Compilation of headcanons about Tennant in a romantic relationship.

sorry for the late reply! I got a bit burned out from replying asks, but now I'm going back to writing here cause I got burned out from playing the game lmfao

Tennant is still one of my favorite characters to think about and analyze hohohoho sorry for the insane gender tangent at the beginning, I started thinking and the gears just kept on going and going

Okay, walk with me for a second. This might be a very confusing tangent, but I swear it's important for the romance later on in the post and I really really wanna talk about this! This also sparked an entire awesome discussion about gender within the game in our R99 server, so I might make a separate post about that!

Tennant's choice to act and present herself within a traditionally masculine role is very important to me; in my previous analysis of her character, I talked about how Tennant is an extremely grounded character due to the life she's led as a perpetrator, victim and witness to crimes of oppression. We also have her opinions regarding arcanist and human division within the setting of the game, along with her so called "lies"--the performance she puts on for the women she seduces and then profits from when scamming rich merchants--and all these things continue to put Tennant as an outlier, someone who doesn't conform to what is expected of her. In that very same post, I failed to bring up the importance of defying gender and embracing sexuality that her character also tackles to a degree. So I gotta do it here, man, I NEED to talk about it here.

The game puts a lot of focus on female identities, so the concept of gender queer fuckery that I love isn't explored as broadly as I'd like, but it's still there explored through many aspects of womanhood. And we do have characters like Medicine Pocket, The Fool, John Titor and Tennant (and many Awakened, like Lucy, but no one is ready for that conversation yet) who clearly do not conform to what's expected of them.

There is always this feeling of not fitting in within any of the options available, of picking the secret third option and so on--Medicine Pocket as an intersex character, is very vocal about not caring about gender. The Fool has a single voiceline which he states that he does not have any gender, which can be interpreted as his actual identity (being gender queer) or as part of his motifs about acting (playing female and male roles as an actor). John Titor has absolutely no comments nor voicelines regarding her identity, but we can gleam similarities to the queer experience through her appearance, her name being traditionally masculine, and the "otherness" presented in her backstory.

With Tennant specifically, this aspect of gender can be conflated with her entire theme of deceit, and while I respect people choosing to analyze and perceive their favorite characters in whichever way they want to, I feel like reducing Tennant's choice to present herself in such masculine ways as a superficial decision gotcha o7

or mindlessly praising her for being butch without analyzing the possible context behind it is just a huge disservice to the character. Especially considering she is one of the few charactes who has been explicitly mentioned as queer, making other women fall in love with her, unlike others that remain as subtext or heavy implications--Schneider and Vertin's kiss under the umbrella, or Matilda's crush on Sonetto.

Hell, we even get a voiceline about it from Tennant:

I don't dislike dresses. They are pretty, delicately embroidered, intricately sewed apparels. They are what I'm supposed to wear, not these trousers. Heh, destiny holds a different plan, doesn't it?

There is clearly an intent behind these choices Bluepoch has made in creating characters that defy gender norms. I don't think it's a coincidence that Tennant's era, the 1940s, is also when gender queerness in butch women started to be more apparent.

But also, gender is not as direct or straightforward; I personally like to perceive Tennant's masculinity the same way I perceive her lies--there is a Tennant that presents masculine as a personal choice, because it simply feels more natural, and a Tennant that presents as masculine because she is aware of how she can profit from the, at the time, dominant gender. We can find nuance in the way she exploits people looking to invest in the diamond industry, which she was part of and knows closely due, and there is a vulnerability or solidarity to be acknowledged in the way she doesn't hurt the women she seduces, she sells them a dream of love and carries on. Her queerness can also be found here, in the way she plays the role of gentleman for all the damsels in distress and whatnot, in times in which traditional gender norms had to permeate every aspect, whether they were welcomed or not.

My friend @evilpinkthing worded this point very well.

I like to think that Tennant is reclaiming herself, her identity, her freedom and all of these things through her masculinity, while also both profiting and being singled out as a result. It's the same three roles she's witnessed through her life; perpetrator, victim, and witness.

So with this in mind, I can now properly talk about relationship headcanons!

Contrary to popular belief, Tennant is a gentle and calm partner.

When it comes down to it, I think that Tennant would enjoy a more traditional relationship in terms of having a long-term partner--something more domestic and quiet, to be able to go on simple dates in broad daylight rather than sneak around in the dark and keep her relationships a secret from the world.

This isn't to say that she doesn't enjoy the thrill of her suave tactics and escapades, if her partner enjoys those, she would gladly indulge them once in a while! But Tennant strikes me as someone who would enjoy settling down and living that domestic bliss fantasy; on one hand because it's the type of life that was often denied to queer people, and on the other hand because she is a hopeless romantic deep down. I feel like this adds a fun dichotomy to her character, to be so unconventional and still yearn for someone to grow old with, to live in a quaint little house and provide for her partner, instead of a rollercoaster of emotions.

No matter who you are, she will insist on playing the role of gentleman. No matter how old you two are, she will always open the doors open for you, always make sure to gift you flowers every week, to insist that you two simply sit in the living room on a sunny afternoon and chat or go outside and have a picnic.

She dreams of the ideal way of proposing, to have a quaint wedding party only to surprise you by showering you with endless gifts from her previous thefts and scams, just so she can look at your reaction when she tells you about the time she got shot while trying to steal this ring in particular and so on. Tennant loves peppering these little surprises here and there, and would also melt whenever her partner goes out of their way to surprise her in return--it's just hard to tell because of her insane poker face.

Of course, these are all what ifs; if her partner wasn't the type to want this sort of life, she wouldn't raise any objections--but she wouldn't share her dreams either, knowing that they may cause a rift between you two. Instead, Tennant would simply stay with you for as long as you'll allow her and enjoy the ride, always focusing on her present with you. She's not a stranger to heartbreak, so she knows how to accept a break up with elegance and move on.

On the subject of Tennant's orientation.

Usually I never discuss a character's orientation when writing relationship headcanons about them since they're all left pretty ambiguously but, again, since Tennant's preference for women is made pretty explicit, I feel it's important to discuss it!

Given the themes of non-conformity within her character and how thoughtful she is, I like to think Tennant does have a preference for women but is ultimately open to any sort of partners, regardless of gender identity. She has led a very eventful life and thus would feel that sticking to one thing or another is too limited for her; why pick one diamond when she can just take them all? Why limit herself to wearing dresses and baking pies, when she can be and do much more than what's expected?

Most of the characters I've analyzed so far strike me as the type to not really bother with the struggle of identity--they've always known where they stand or simply do not care about the way they're perceived--but with Tennant, I do like the idea of her struggling with coming to terms with her own orientation and identity as a masculine woman. But rather than an outer struggle, it's more so an inner struggle. She doesn't care what the world might think of her, but she does have to get rid of those ideas and mindsets she might've internalized while growing up.

This also means that Tennant is one of the best people to talk to in regards to your own issues with identity and whatnot! Characters like Pavia or Diggers might simply brush it off with ease, since they themselves had no issue accepting their non-conventional lifestyles. Some others are still in the process of figuring it out themselves, and some are so repressed they will most likely scare you back into the closet on accident. But Tennant? She's attentive and understanding, never taking her partner's struggles lightly.

Round of cute things I didn't know where to fit in.

Tennant likes roleplaying, but not exclusively in bed or more private settings--I think she just enjoys lighthearted and playful roleplay as an excuse to brush up on her seduction techniques, pretending to be the perfect stranger at a bar to flirt with you, insisting that your husband doesn't have to know, while you play along and tell her that you're spoken for and waiting for someone else until one of you breaks character. It's straight up enrichment for her, and she really enjoys surprising you with these Wattpad sounding ass settings just to see how you'll keep up with her.

Regardless of your stance on marriage, Tennant makes a point of gifting you a ring with a diamond she created--one that will not turn into coal nor ashes for as long as you two are together, as a token of her devotion. It's also extremely hard for others to notice whenever Tennant is in a committed relationship, but if you pay attention, you'll notice all the new different accessories and pins she keeps wearing on her hat or jacket that remind her of you, just subtle enough to pass off as yet another aesthetic choice of hers, but so obvious for the love of her life.

Insists that you wear her cologne; Tennant playfully jokes with you about this, saying that this way all of the world will know who holds your heart in her hands--but she's not joking. I do think Tennant has a possessive streak, one she keeps on a tight leash to avoid scaring her partner and whatnot, but you can just tell how much she covets and cherishes you in the way she looks at you. Sometimes she says things like "Oh, you're such a precious gem, I could just lock you up forever" while laughing and twirling your hair through her fingers, but she means it. Sort of kind of!

Tennant is the type of character who looks like she'd love to wear matching and custom tailored expensive outfits with her partner, but personally? I think she's more partial to whatever you want to have as your personal style, the more it contrasts her own the better. Tennant greatly respects anyone who has the courage to live as loud, proud and happy as they can be.

[elizabethrobertajones]

Saw you've been sucked into the MMO life in the form of FFXIV and I was wondering if you had any input into the debate I've been having about what class archetypes tfw would play. I think Sam would be most likely to tank because it requires a reasonable amount of leadership and is also more of a quiet, backbone type role compared to dps. Dean seems more the type to be singularly focused on the big damage hits tbh. He also tends to take more of the charging in and fighting role in their normal life with Sam being the one reading up on everything more carefully and being his backup. Which leaves Cas as healer which may just be me projecting because I play healer/support at every opportunity but literal angel healing aside I think that sorta fits too, he cares a lot for them and tries to keep them safe and shield them as best he can in their adventures? Idk half formed thoughts please completely contradict me if you want I'm genuinely curious about other people's opinions here

Heyooo :D It is less sucked into and more like I’ve returned to the warm cushiony nest of MMOs lol

If you’d asked me back when I was a WoW player I’d have fully agreed because you could only have one class per character and these are definitely the snap decisions that the fam would make when on the character screen. Dean would grab the sexiest DPS, Sam the stoutest tank especially as he’s the one who has read into the classes and strats beforehand, and Cas would ask what to do and be given the healer role because the other two in this scenario would know better about the game and sort of lump it onto him like, oh, we need a healer and you can do this.

(In my own gaming journey, this is what my friends and brother did to me, as they needed a healer to round out their party... I took druid because it was spoopy, and discovered in WoW that while you can’t change classes you can pay gold to respec your character’s role within that class... Promptly re-specced to a melee dps/tank feral druid instead of the healer one, and had a lot more fun :D)  

In FFXIV you can take all the classes on your character (which I have done, natch) and it’s a much more interesting levelling approach, especially seeing how my friends playing the game have gone when it comes to taking classes as they level and why they claim to have tried and then rejected others. It’s an enormous personality test, even for peeps like me and my brother who have all the classes up at max level, which ones we prioritised and which ones we sort of struggled with or found a bit meh. 

Hm so in the scenario that Charlie comes bursting into the Bunker demanding that she needs some friends for dungeons and raids and they’re all sitting on their asses scrolling the internet between a case, they can bloody well play final fantasy with her for a bit, let’s go for some headcanons :D Long because FFXIV has become my current obsession and I have the same in-depth feels about it as I do about SPN but I just never get to write about them with anyone... 

First off, Sam of course has deep nerdery about it and will ask Charlie a ton of questions about what the right class to play is and do the same thing as we’ve already discussed and go for Paladin (which starts as gladiator), and also take all the crafting and gathering side classes because he’s a nerd and you learn nonsense lore while doing it. He’s also in the same starting zone as Thaumaturge which transitions to Black Mage and I BET he’d be tempted to have a little safe witch!Sam emotional release on the most un-Sam class. It’s the big unwieldy spell caster whose literal class quests and stuff make fun of how you’re small and squishy and will be standing in a very bad spot debating whether to finish a long-cast spell and get hit or stop DPS and run for safety. I think he could do with the perspective and learning to be selfish either way to blow off steam from tanking and also learn to prioritise himself IRL :’D Also the paladin quest is WEIRDLY pro-cop from 30 onwards for some reason until the writers saw sense and just. stopped. doing paladin stuff and went back to the Gladiator storyline for the class quests, so idk if he’d enjoy that or start to question other things. Whatever it is he’s getting challenged XD

At 60 he grabs Gunbreaker because it sounds more cool and is thankfully way less emotionally stressful tanking as it’s entirely about being a badass bodyguard and sick flips. This is far more aspirational for Sam, especially as he could just tie a knife to a sawn off shotgun and do these moves for real in his day job. He won’t, but like with black mage, the thought that he COULD is very emotionally satisfying to him.

He might also have decided to check out scholar to see how healing is but idk if he would be able to handle Dean teasing him for having a fairy follow him around so he’d only dabble with the nerd class on the side :P  

Now, Dean can’t take ninja until level 10 or machinist (gun shooty DPS class) until 50, so his start point as DPS would either be pugilist (eeeey brass knuckle class!) or the other DPS classes to start with are Thaumaturge/Black Mage, Arcanist/Summoner, Archer or Lancer. Now. He’d probably think the first two are sissy because magic is for girls/arcanists literally only have a book as a weapon. Archer becomes bard and I think is ultimately a place he’d be very happy as it is a very supportive class to the whole party and basically the mom friend class. But I would love if he went lancer/dragoon because the level 50 class weapon is (folklore inspired name) “Gae Bolg” and every time I equip it I can’t help giggling at the name even though I know it’s a real thing and I shouldn’t. But. Like. It’s the class about waving enormous lances around. It’s got Implications, and Dean is drawn to those. 

He’d probably, however, take rogue/ninja as soon as he could because stabbing things with knives, and the class trainer is the kinda guy who’d have wild gay tension with him while they both try to boast about women to each other, were they to meet irl. Ironically, the rogue trainer (a womanising charmer) and the ninja trainer (an intense, honourable guy bad at social cues even among his own people who ends up falling from grace and choosing to stay in the vicinity of said rogue trainer) are an interesting pair of NPCs to teach Dean about where to stick knives. :) 

He’d go back and power-level dragoon once he starts Heavensward though, because Aymeric is also super intense with messy dark hair and big blue eyes that see right through you. :D He’s getting that gae bolg for him, you know? 

If they’re going to bully Cas to be their healer, he’d probably get really dedicated to the discipline especially as he can stay up all night to play and doesn’t need to take breaks to pee so he’d probably level conjurer/white mage (nature healing) and scholar (ancient book lore with a class quest which mixes ancient curses on a whole people, family drama and a bit of interspeciesish love) and then also pick up astrologian, which is good because it’s spooky star and making your own fate magic. The storyline for that is garbage in the sense that it’s really weakly written, but my favourite character randomly picks up AST in the latest expansion, and has an absolutely fucking wild subtextual romance with another character, including SPN level adopting of a random child who matches Jack in many respects, with said character. And in many respects emotionally they’re Cas and Dean but without any of the personal baggage between them specifically so they really are just chill and married, whatever else they’re stressed about (I say, dreading the next patch is going to finally bring up some questions about what is going on with them as it’s getting weirdly conspicuous while still utterly unsaid). So I would hope if Cas started projecting onto an astrologian character it would be him :P 

Cas also would get into summoner as the other branch of scholar because honestly those two classes are about as close to the random sigil drawing and reading things from books etc analogy to his own occult magic, except you can summon cool dragons and elementals to fight for you. 

they’d buy Jack a boost to 60 and he’d pick up dark knight and white mage probably just to subtly fuck with Dean 

(I am still not over Dean trying to test him to see if he was evil or not by whether he chose devil or angel cake)