#v; bg3. ( a spark of magic )

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♔ — memes / accepting!

@radiaking said: “What the hell were you thinking?”

        “I was thinking you might want to hug your daughter again when you finally find her!” It was the only thing she could think of, when that old god offered her a boon for bringing them back from the dead. When she realized that divine intervention might be his only chance. “Why are you mad? Was I wrong?"

[heartsdefine]

@cenererisorta (wyll) — bg3 au lucy starter call / accepting!

        Lucy goes to find him by the riverside, when she hears from their fearless leader that Wyll is secluding himself from the party. She brings with her a half-empty bottle of rough red wine and two wooden cups. “I thought you might like some company.” And she smiles, radiating warmth in the cold moonlight.

[rowanisawriter]

my prompt menu

hi. send me a [character/pairing] + [a vibe and/or a prompt] and i will (eventually, probably) write something for you. the characters section is a mix of fandoms i write for but you can send me anything you’ve seen me reblog and ranting about in tags

1. characters

i write a lot of fandoms lol

bg3: dark urge/anyone

bg3: gale/shadowheart

dragon age (any): any companion/any companion, fahad/lucanis

cp2077: river/v

cp2077: johnny/v

hades: thanatos/zagreus

hades/myth: achilles/patroclus

ace attorney: phoenix/edgeworth

kcd: hansry or any of the other pairings

give me any pairing from a fandom you’ve seen me hollering about and let’s see what happens

2. vibes

i like writing vibes based stories with the barest skeleton of a plot. these are from the dictionary of obscure sorrows. you can send me anything from this website but below are some that stood out to me

falesia - n. the disquieting awareness that someone’s importance to you and your importance to them may not necessarily match—that your best friend might only think of you as a buddy, that someone you barely know might consider you a mentor, that someone you love unconditionally might have one or two conditions

fardle-din - n. a long-overdue argument that shakes up a relationship, burning wildly through your issues like a forest fire, which clears out your dry and hollow grievances and reminds you that your roots run deeper than you think

suente - n. the state of being so familiar with someone that you can be in a room with them without thinking, without holding anything back, or without having to say a word—to the extent that you have to remind yourself that they’re a different being entirely, that brushing hair away from their eyes won’t help you see any better

irrition - n. regret at having cracked the code of something, which leaves you wishing you could forget the pattern

ecstatic shock - n. a surge of energy upon catching a glance from someone you like, which scrambles your ungrounded circuits and tempts you to chase after that feeling with a kite and a key

zverism - n. the wish that people could suspend their civility and indulge the physical side of each other first—sniffing each other’s hair like dogs, staring unabashedly at interesting faces, reveling in a beautiful voice like a song on the radio

fawtle - n. a weird little flaw built into your partner that somehow only endears them more to you, in the way that impurities dissolved in water are what allow it to conduct electricity—if all the imperfections were removed, there would be no spark

foreclearing- n. the act of deliberately refusing to learn the scientific explanations of things out of fear that it’ll ruin the magic—turning flower petals into tacky billboards, decoding birdsong into trash talk, defracting a rainbow back inside its tiny prism.

on tenderhooks - adj. feeling the primal satisfaction of being needed by someone, which makes you feel that much more rooted to the world, even if the roots belong to someone else.

rivener - n. a chilling hint of distance that creeps slowly into a relationship

3. prompts

tarot cards (send me the name of any card)

touches prompt list

flower prompt list

indulgent prompt list

more tarot prompts

poetry prompt list

very cute dividers found here!

[lhs3020b]

Technology in Faerun

This is a) an extremely "me"-ish post, b) one you basically have to be me to care about and c) also EXTREMELY spoilery, especially for Act III of Baldur's Gate 3.

Still, this is a topic I've been thinking about, and you're reading my Tumblr (so sorry!), so here we go...

On the one hand, the tech level in BG3 does seem to be oriented more around "rule of cool" than anything else. But on the other, there are some interesting little details, and perhaps (while it's subtle) a hint or two in-game of a scenario that fits it all together.

First of all, for maximum whiplash, should you get into the prison underneath the House of Hope, you'll have a complex battle involving magic, bladed weapons, bows and so on ... and in the background you can watch the Saturn V-style rocket motors that hold the whole complex up in the air over Avernus. No, really, you literally can. Here's a relevant screenshot:

It even looks like the Saturn V engine, you know?

(Apparently Raphael - or perhaps Hope - has done some really interesting work on in-flight stability and fuel injection; the House of Hope has remarkably-minimal turbulence and there's no hint of any kind of asymetrical thrust issues. Anyway.)

Across most of the game, the technology level seems to be vaguely late-medieval/early-Renaissance, though with a few interesting oddities. (I can't recall seeing a single horse anywhere in the game - which, interestingly, may also explain why the lance is a weapon-class that's not present.)

The first hint that this wasn't the entire situation came in, of all places, the hospital in Reithwin. You find an elevator there that's strongly-implied to be electric. It's located in an area where the shadow curse is strong enough to put fires out, which also would presumably prevent steam-driven systems, but it still works, and it even has glowing lights on it. Also, and I guess this is the money shot, if you look closely, the machinery emits sparks when it's in motion. Like badly-maintained electrics might. Also, inside the operating theatre, if you look carefully on top of some of the bookcases, there are things that look remarkably-similar to early, crude electric filament lamps. Granted they might not be that - none of them are operational, anyway - but, it's an interesting possibility.

But there's more. If you explore far enough in the Underdark, you'll find an abandoned wizard's tower. In the basement, there's a machine canonically-called a generator; feed it sussur blossoms and it powers up the whole building. You actually get treated to a cutscene of all the lights coming on and the elevator waking up. You can also find a note in the building referring to the work of one of its former occupants, and their "lightning inventions".

Well. Lightning. There we have it - they canonically do have electricity at least in a few places in Faerun. The means by which it's generated, at least at the tower, in interesting. It's not quite spelt out, but the most notable property of the sussur tree is its anti-magic field, so this kind of implies that the generator is somehow using this to produce electricity. (It also implies a connection between electromagnetism and magic - Faerun's physics model must be "fun"!) Elsewhere in the Underdark there's also something that looks suspiciously like a railway line, albeit one that's inoperative. Later on, if you explore far enough into the Underdark, you'll find the Grymforge, which while obviously at least partly-magical in character, is also clearly a rather-advanced piece of machinery.

The biggest surprises, though, come in Baldur's Gate itself.

Inside the Steel Watcher factory, you find things like this:

Wiring, pipes, cybernetics, glowing bulbs, spinny vaguely-dynamo-ish things ... while the vibe is all "dark and Satanic mills", it's also kind of turn-of-the-20th-Century too. This isn't medieval technology here. This is stuff that's not so far removed from what we use.

And interestingly, it's not just restricted entirely to this location, either. If you find your way into the Counting House vaults, you can find a note warning against using "devices powered by bottled lightning" inside the main vault, due to flooding. Bottled lightning - OK, so the bank apparently has power too! But then, the alarm systems in the main area do look suspiciously-electrical in some ways ... now, if only they could get their plumbing sorted out!

However, the pockets of semi-modern technology do seem to be quite localised. Most of what there is seems to be either highly-experimental (a powerful wizard's personal science project) or associated with powerful and wealthy institutions in the big city. And even there, the most advanced systems seem to be associated with the Gondians and their work. There also seems to be a suggestion that these innovations are quite new, and there doesn't seem to be have been many attempts to scale or mass-produce the equipment. The one exception to this pattern might be Reithwin, but the game strongly suggests that pre-curse Reithwin was a prosperous place, and on a main trade route to Baldur's Gate too, so it's entirely-plausible that the local elite might have been able to benefit from new ideas in the metropole. Perhaps the House of Healing in Reithwin was able to acquire a few very early prototypes from the Gondians' workshops, just before the curse fell? That could explain the elevator, and what I suspect are filament lamps?

As for the lack of wider advancement in Baldur's Gate itself, honestly I think we can pin the blame for this one directly on the city's horrifyingly-toxic politics. Gortash is a devotee of the God of Tyranny, so of course he doesn't want to share his toys. The city is allowed to have just enough advanced industry to support his plans for his dictatorship, but of course he's not going to share that power with the wider population! (The Counting House is presumably a special case for this rule - I wouldn't be surprised if there's quite a complex dynamic of power-balancing between Gortash and the financiers, but it is in his interests to share some things with "the money", if you will.)

Lastly, another factor might be that most of the actual R&D work seems to be happening either with the followers of specific gods - such as Gond! - or various wizards. What we see of their world is rather mixed - many wizards are awful (hi, Lorroakan!), though there are exceptions too (overall Rolan is, ultimately, a decent person). They don't seem to tend to work together, and as far as I've seen, there doesn't seem to be any equivalent of a university system or public education system. If a wizard dies, it seems quite possible their research might die with them, which is surely going to put a crimp on development! Meanwhile, with regards to the more "industrially-minded" gods like Gond, who knows how willing they are for their devotees to share their work widely? (Let's face it, a lot of Faerun's deities kinda suck - Gale has a point when he warns against seeking divine intervention, I think.)

Anyway, food for thought...

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a random bg3 au starter for @radiaking

        It's one of those rare occasions where their fearless leader has elected to bring Lucy along, and she's managing to hold her own...mostly. The Shadow-Cursed lands are just exactly that, and every so often the darkness takes shape and strikes out at her and the others. She's distracted trying to keep an eye on the shadows when a possessed Harper leaps forth and knocks her to the ground. She looks up, wide-eyed, as the dead-eyed corpse hefts its weapon high to strike you down.

        And then its head just...explodes.

        Lucy is covered in blood and corpse gore that's definitely going to take several washes to get out of her hair and clothes. But there is a familiar silhouette striding out of the darkness, as though the Shadow-Curse doesn't even phase him. “It's you...” She scrambles to her feet, hefting her crossbow and aiming it between the Ghoul's eyes.

        The last time Lucy saw him, she did him a kindness. She's not entirely sure if he's come to return that favor or not. “What are you doing here?”

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@clawsextended said: “don't bullshit me. you're limping. when did you start limping?”

        “i didn't say i'm not limping. i said it's not a big deal.” but you are limping, a little bit. ever since that last fight, there's been a shooting pain emanating from your twisted left ankle, running all the way up your leg. and this late in the day, you don't have any spells left to fix the problem. “or it won't be, once we find a place to rest.”

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every bg3 companion, including probably withers, knowing that coop is in love w/ lucy except for lucy, and like all of them independently deciding to just sit back and let that unfold naturally, is the funniest concept ever to me rn…

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@radiaking said: “you aren't my prisoner.”

        “maybe not anymore,” she replies, curtly. “but i wasn't talking about now, i was talking about before. you know, when you put a leash on around my neck and made me march across the wasteland, dehydrated and possibly concussed?” 

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@chaos--mode said: “you've brought me right where i need to be. i have no right to ask more of you.”

        “i helped a little,” lucy says humbly. when it comes to brewing potions and making explosives, she's very good for the team—not to mention, she's not half bad a cook. still, she thinks the others did far more of the work than she. even the ghoul has done a better job keeping her alive than she has herself. “and you're not asking, i'm offering. besides, i'll still need some help getting my dad back, right? you count on me now, i'll count on you then.” 

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lucy getting mad enough to take 1d4 radiant damage shoving the ghoul:

the ghoul:

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@the-d20-files said: “And that is the last time there will be levity.” — Gale Dekarios

        “I certainly hope not,” Lucy teases. “Your sense of humor makes up such a large part of your charm.”

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        lucy chuckles softly, shaking her head. “keep your coppers. we can play with these. plus it's not really gambling if it's pretend, right?” her eyes crinkle at the corners with a smile as she counts out half of the ball bearings into each of their hands. “best to keep them in a pocket while they're not in use,” she adds while tucking her share into one of the pockets on the front of her leather harness. “they like to roll around and escape.”

        settling in opposite ylfa, lucy listens carefully as the girl explains the rules, nodding along. “sounds simple enough to me. we'll play by those rules. i'll shuffle first.” she takes the cards in her hands and separates them into two piles, fanning them together and then arcing them further into place. “your grandma sounds like a real hoot. i'd have liked to meet her, i think.” after a few shuffles, she offers the cards back to ylfa. “you deal.”

❝ oh, they work great! because i don't have any money. well, i have, like, five copper. mostly 'cause i found them on the road. ❞ it's probably a good idea for her to gamble with something that isn't money, anyway; ylfa's only twelve, and she doesn't really care about it anyway. she just wants to play. wants to do something that seems like it might be something close to normal, for a little while, as though she can pretend she's back in grandma's cabin instead of this camp with a bunch of near-strangers. but they're not so bad. lucy's really nice. ylfa likes her a lot.

she sits cross-legged and shuffles the cards. ❝ you're trying to build either groups of the same number, or a sequence in the same suit. each turn you take from either the stock or discard pile and then you gotta discard one of your cards. that's how we played it, anyway. i dunno if it has different rules in other places. sometimes grandma got a bit loosey-goosey with the rules. in general. she'd let me drink caffeine after noon and everything. ❞

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@the-d20-files said: “What's the point of magic if you can't rewrite destiny?” — Gale Dekarios

        “I don't know about destiny,” Lucy says, blinking thoughtfully at the question. “But we certainly can use it to write our own fates poorly, if we're not careful.”

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@crimesought said: “could you just tell me what really happened?”

        Lucy stopped, a confused furrow forming between her brows. “I am telling you what really happened,” she said. “I really did marry a stranger and he really did stab me the same night.” Perhaps it was the casual way she talked about it, as if it was not a terrible thing to happen to somebody. “And, well—that really is how I got this scar—”

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@maestrojax said: “stop it. you're having a party. it's nonnegotiable.”

        “A birthday party? Here?” Lucy gestured around at the current residents of Last Light Inn, most of whom were just happy to have escaped the Shadow-Curse for a little while. “I'm just not sure it's entirely appropriate...” And she hadn't shared that her birthday had already come and gone during their little adventure in order to fish for some kind of celebration. It was simply...on her mind.

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@radiaking re: bg3 au lucy letting Volo poke her eye out for science,