king-of-dragons

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couldnt get the cropping to look right

next time

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Some flat color pieces (blurred for privacy) from my most recent commission! Thank you for choosing me as your artist, it was a pleasure to work with you on this character! :^)

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It's just you and stack of Kraft's American Cheese Slice Singles on a Friday night, it's time to lock in and eat it.

Pretty Pretty Please I Don't Want to be a Magic Girl by @kianamaiart

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I crave validation, here's a giant lady that took me 2 months to paint.

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||Commissión for @sweetmeatdale||

I love you 212 hours playing Fallout New Vegas

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When the zaza hits

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That’s how that went right

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hello yes i simply think the four of them should run off and become the most op rogue group ever together-

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Alex FIerro is an anime weeb, Alex Fierro is cunty, Alex Fierro is morally ambiguous, Alex Fierro cuts her crushes head off, Alex Fierro is a potter, Alex Fierro got a tattoo at like 15, Alex Fierro is a snake (literally, occasionally), Alex Fierro steals from her father sometimes, Alex Fierro is loaded as fuck, Alex Fierro is homeless, Alex Fierro's physical body is technically permanantly a wolf, Alex Fierro could be argued to be a furry for that reason, Alex Fierros mum is a man (sometimes),Alex Fierros mum is tom hiddleston, Alex Fierro travelled to another dimension on a big banana boat, Alex Fierro is extremely colour co-ordinated, Alex Fierro is in love with my husband but i dont hold it against her, Alex Fierro is dead.

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reading kane chronicles as a kid: this is pretty cool, not as good as percy jackson though

reading kane chronicles now: I need bast to divorce me

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magnus and alex doodles

and some close ups

and yes magnus has gold freckles

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Alex Fierro my beloved

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more healthcare/insurance execs should get shot in the street more of this please 🙏😁

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So, not that I want an adaptation of the Belgariad (I feel like it would not be done well at all), but I keep thinking about some small tweaks to the Merel x Barak storyline that showcase what I love about their story and to not do spousal rape.

I love this story arc because it's bitterness eventually giving way to reconciliation and love. And it showcases angsty Garion's emotional intelligence, not as much as his unwavering faith in Pol x Durnik, but he can still tell his friend is hurting and wants better for him.

BUT the narrative always states that Merel is the problem. Silk says she is a shallow woman. Polgara kind of gloats when she knows Merel is pregnant with a son and says "you had to grow up" when Merel says she didn't realize how sweet Barak is. Of course, the "not even a locked door could keep you out" (paraphrased) line. Yikes yikes yikes on spikes. The implication that Barak cheated on Merel with a lady friend in Val Alorn is also dumb.

So, the fix is actually in the scaffolding of the story. It's obvious to me that Merel was treated as a bargaining chip by her family. Her obsession with duty is because it's how she was raised as a noblewoman. She didn't have a choice in her marriage, it was a duty. Sleeping with her husband is what she is supposed to do. Barak is so in love with her, and once he realizes their marriage is nothing more than a responsibility to her, he is deeply hurt. And maybe she tried and got bitter through his bitterness, or maybe she could never hide how angry and hurt she was that her parents basically sold her off once Barak had political power.

But the thing is, I think she does kinda like him. As soon as Garion comes to Barak with information about the plot in Val Alorn, her coldness drops. What we see is a woman with a great political mind, a quick thinker who urges Barak to stop wallowing in self pity and is 100% behind him when they talk to the king. And sure, she falls back on duty almost immediately, but I think that's to cope with the fact that deep down, she likes Barak and they've been so mean to each other for so long that neither of them can admit that they actually have feelings for each other. I don't think duty alone accounts for the way she backs him, the way she immediately stops being bitter.

Also Barak explicitly trusts her with managing their estate, something that is a big deal in a v sexist Cherek, and that's not lost on Merel.

So, on to the actual fixes. If Silk still says Merel is shallow, Garion should realize that she's a deeply hurt woman used as a political pawn by her family. Sendars don't do arranged marriages that we see, so Garion says something about how lonely she must have felt, and he sees that she relies on responsibility as armor because that's all she knows, her own feelings and desires are so deeply buried. She and Barak are both deeply wounded, and whenever one of them tries to thaw a little, the other is still all hard edges so they never make any progress. I'd advise just talking out the random probably hooker in Val Alorn, but if you wanna keep her, have Barak say he's married now, turn her down flat.

And instead of the locked door line, Merel should say something like "you didn't mind when I took my martial duties seriously your first night here. In fact, you were quite enthusiastic."

It's a very small change, but huge in the implications. One, Barak is not breaking in to have sex with his wife against her will. Two, while it's not the enthusiastic consent we are used to, it's willing consent. So maybe not great by most modern standards, but it's great in the world that's been built. It also kinda implies she initiated. Three, I think it could imply that Barak still loves her and she has some affection for him. That maybe they can get along long enough to have some fun, but then reality comes crashing down and their walls come back up.

Polgara is still amused by Merel's pregnancy, but isn't as smug about it. Then in Riva instead of saying Merel needed time to grow up, she says that the birth of a son tore down the walls they built.

The other thing I'd like to be addressed subtly is why their two daughters didn't thaw their attitude towards each other. The text states that Barak loves his daughters. So their births could have theoretically been a turning point. He's taken by wonder at both of their births, no matter the societal expectation that he needs a son. But Merel feels like she's failed in her duty, and she's afraid they'll be political pawns like her one day. (Barak would never let his daughters be married off unless they wanted it. But since they never truly talk, Merel doesn't realize this.) Merel recognizes Barak's gentleness with their daughters, and thinks kindly of him for it, but it's not enough to tear down those walls. So they are still stuck in this cycle of being standoffish to one another.

When their son is born, she feels like she's finally fulfilled her martial duties. When she asks Barak if she did well, he finally reassures her that yes, she did great, he's not defensive and can't hold back all the years of tenderness and love towards his wife. And that tenderness is so obviously genuine that she believes him. And they finally repair their relationship.

(There's already enough characters in this series, but I feel like Barak chewing out his in-laws would be fun, like if they were there when he first saw Unrak and made a comment about how he must be happy Merel finally fulfilled her duty to give him a son and he flips out on them)

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Nameless Raiders Suck (In RPGS)

You know the ones I’m talking about, the random guys in a game that only exist for you to smash, stab, and shoot. “Raider”, “Marauder”, “Psycho”, “Bandit”. Who are they? Why are they here? What do they want? What do they have to do with the story?

The answer is ‘nothing’ most of the time, but why?

I like video games, particularly role-playing games and, if we want to get specific, CRPGS: Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, Rogue Trader, and other notable inclusions. To start though, I want to hone in on Fallout 3 and 4. I’ve played every entry in the series outside of one (shudders), and there is a specific issue that Bethesda just can’t seem to escape: The Nameless Raider.

The Problem

They just litter the place! Guys with no names and an endless supply of bad Halloween decorations! They shoot on sight and do all sorts of unspecified crimes when you aren't looking, so it's okay if you kill them!

“It’s a first person shooter, you need guys to shoot!” I hear you cry. Of course you do! Radioactive wildlife, feral ghouls, and malfunctioning robots all serve as suitable, ethically unambiguous targets. Other people, though?

The problem isn’t that it’s impossible for people to turn to irrational violence, but that Bethesda’s Fallout assumes that they will, and in massive numbers! It’s myopic: humans are no better than monsters, waiting for the slightest chance to break the shackles of civilization and visit sick torture on anyone stupid enough to step outside. They all do it in exactly the same way too, for some reason. It is a world fundamentally afraid of strangers and one uninterested in exploring what actually causes violence, or how to actually stop it.

Some people are evil.

Killing them is the solution.

That doesn’t just open a moral can-of-worms that Bethesda prevents the player from meaningfully interacting with, it also serves as a grand and embarrassing series of missed opportunities!

See, there'd be nothing wrong with this if these games weren't sandbox RPGs, where the goal is to create a believable and interesting world to get lost in.

Why don’t the raiders form proper gangs with names and recognizable cultures? That could really make the setting feel put together! Why don’t they try to rob people through intimidation, rather than jumping straight to murder? What a neat idea for an encounter! Could some of them offer their services as bodyguards or mercenaries? I bet a well-heeled, unscrupulous player character would enjoy having a couple genuine goons at their beck and call.

This problem is persistent in Bethesda titles (Skyrim’s bandits and Starfield’s space pirates), but also in other CRPGs. The Outer Worlds tries to make something of its unnamed marauders in the “Peril on Gorgon” DLC, but even the non-marauder ‘outlaws’ riddling the base game are decidedly lacking in purpose and definition.

The Why

Why do this? If it’s such a great opportunity, why do studios continuously manufacture unnecessarily sentient target dummies?

As simply as I can tell? It’s cheaper, it’s quicker, and it’s what the average player has come to expect. That is to say: most people will ignore it. That’s not good enough for me though, I think they can do better.

The Solution

Bethesda isn’t the only game in town when it comes to sandbox CRPGs, and some studios really work to justify their baddies!

Rogue Trader’s ‘Anver’ gang slots well into the ecosystem of their home station, Footfall, and the chaos cultists you fight throughout the game tend to be involved in larger plots, serving the strategies of your vile enemies (or allies, you filthy heretic).

The Great Khans of Fallout: New Vegas are united by a hatred of the NCR and a kick-ass biker aesthetic. The convicts in Primm are a splinter faction of the better-organized Powder Gangers, and even the small groups in the south, the Jackals and Vipers, are given gang names and spawn within defined territories.

Wasteland 3 delivers a cavalcade of bandit factions of varying sizes and complexities, but they are all named and granted a defined culture: The Dorseys, Los Payasos, The Gippers, The Godfishers, and more.

The How

That's a lot of examples, but how do they do it? There are many factors when it comes to defining a raider faction in a CRPG. Let's examine one in detail:

Fallout New Vegas, The Fiends.

Just to the west of Vegas proper live a group called The Fiends: too poor for the strip, too violent for Freeside, and too wild for The NCR. These dispossessed stragglers have clung together under a small number of tough, cold-hearted, and downright cruel leaders. Strength is power, and the only way for the members of this group to survive is to exercise that power by robbing travelers, stealing what they can, and killing what they can't. This is their uniting purpose, their shared history.

They fashion armor roughly out of whatever they can find, mostly old fabric, scraps of metal, and rubber. The aesthetic is unified by a cow-skull on the helm of each warrior meant to signify their brutality and indicate their belonging in the group. This is their uniting appearance.

Their fortresses are repurposed from the old world and decrepit, ill maintained. you won't find a fiend outside of their stronghold of vault 13 and a handful of outposts, plus the regions surrounding. This is their defined territory.

Combining these factors, (faction purpose, aesthetic, and territory) it becomes clear to a player when they are fighting fiends and when they aren't. Their crimes are known, their sins are tallied. Quests which take aim at The Fiends are unique from quests centered on other outlaw factions, and this clarity makes contact with The Fiends special. Crucially, this attention has been paid to every outlaw faction in the game, and you get a unique encounter no matter who you're fighting.

The end result is a world that lives and breathes. Even if you choose to play as a righteous justiciar who puts down marauder scum on-sight, never interfacing with these groups except at the barrel of a rifle, the subtle differences give weight to that decision. After all, who cares how callous or vengeful your character is when your targets are just that? Targets.

So What?

That's just it! Games like these, sandbox RPGs, thrive on having worlds you can fall into! The bigger story matters, the style is important, but the details are what create that sensation. Raiders can just be targets, most players won't consciously notice the wasted potential, but imagine if they weren't. Imagine getting out-played because you didn't realize you were up against a more elite gang, or winning out because you did your research and came prepared.

Imagine pitting two tougher groups against one another so that you could pick through the wreckage, or joining a weak gang to build it up into a real powerhouse. Imagine softening one group into upstanding mercenaries, or smashing them and driving them from their territory.

Imagine what these groups could be like, and then imagine making them that way.

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Thank you for reading! If you liked this essay and want to get more of my thoughts, follow me on Tumblr or Ko-fi, or wherever else. and if you want a say in what I talk about next, join up as a Bunker Goblin for just a buck a month!

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