#im babbling dont mind me. utterly fascinating stream for planetlord enthusiasts

[aroaceacacia]

thinking about last night's girl talk w zam and planet again. (zam stream, jan 23)

c!planet has always stood out in the lifesteal crowd as one of the few players who doesnt seem to take part in lifesteal's characteristic distrust and cycles of revenge. in season 4 alone, planet's only main channel video so far - "breaking survival minecraft to get revenge" - doesnt really contain any real "revenge" at all. planet and his teammates are routinely knocked down by other, stronger players; used as bodies in a war they dont have much of a stake in (besides the thrill of having duped hearts), imprisoned, killed, spawn trapped, banned, etc etc. their bases get found and used. but it doesnt really bother planet, at least not in any lasting way. planet doesnt hold grudges, he was able to stand with three heart trio and say he didnt think zam was a bad person, even after zam pointed out repeatedly all of the ways he had wronged planet, bacon, and jaron personally

part of it is just who planet is, I think. they're not the kind of person to get too fussed about the sides and conflict. they routinely make light of it when they abruptly pull out a sword on bacon and start monologuing about how they were "working against him this whole time". during the latter part of girl talk w zam they bemoaned how zam wasnt "besties" with mapicc and ro anymore - even though zam was evil when he was with them, to planet, they had been friends, and friendship breaking up is sad!

planet sees that zam is scared and tries to help talk him through some of it, puts him through a series of bizarre "scenarios" to test zam's trust - up to and including begging zam for over an hour to let planet into the new eclipse base, to which zam eventually complied - all of the scenarios are things which, had the player been anybody but planetlord, may have been actual traps or threats to zam's life. planet does care, but on some level just doesn't fully understand the position that zam is in.

zam has been harassed*, stalked*, and threatened* by mapicc (*in a video game) for months now, and planet - who is on good terms with just about everybody, including mapicc - cant really understand why zam cant just let it go. planet themself has let a lot of things go, but zam has never been afforded that privilege - mapicc refuses to forget him.

as a result, a lot of planet's advice and thoughts for zam, especially in the "therapy session" part of girl talk, seemed to lean a lot into toxic positivity. just stop being scared and you wont be scared. mapicc doesnt care about you as much as you think, etc. it's all about mindset! I think some of that advice is helpful (especially during this week - cc!mapicc is recovering from surgery and unable to be online, and ro is unlikely to do anything without mapicc there, so there isnt really any reason to be afraid of mapicc logging in) but a lot of it is not constructive for princezam long-term. and zam even said as much at one point!

I think planet is like this in part due to their more easygoing nature, but also because planet has never really been afforded the privilege of being in the position to enact revenge in the first place. their team was named "three heart trio" for a reason! of the three of them planet is the biggest grinder and usually has some extra hearts stashed away, but overall they dont have anywhere near the kind of resources other teams might have: team shades are basically all on 20 hearts, the eclipse federation has subz' grindset and firepower, and team awesome is stacked with both the hearts and power to succeed, with the addition of their abuse of the pearl and gapple glitches and leftovers from the duping war.

compared to all of that, theres no way bacon, planet, and jaron can match up. that doesnt mean they dont try, because they do! they try to fight anyways, and they take some Ws now and then! they keep grinding and they keep hanging in there, refusing to give up. but I think, when you're that disadvantaged in a server that's unforgiving as lifesteal is and can be, on some level they let stuff go because they cant afford to hold a grudge.

at the start of the APO vs team awesome war, planet, bacon, and jaron had to decide what they wanted to do. they had received an offer from team awesome to join them, with the promise of a lot of hearts for each of them if they did join. bacon expressed his misgivings by saying that (paraphrased) "team awesome did all this bad stuff to us. it wouldnt really make sense, character wise, to join them now". but they joined team awesome anyway, and they set aside their hesitation and the memories of an obsidian prison and bloody knuckles, and marveled at the feeling of a healthbar on 14. how powerful it made them feel.