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I felt like you guys will appreciate this

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The greatest mage of Breezehaven

Zephyrini doing what Zephyrini does best: Magic ✨

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Decided to doodle my D&D girls meeting!

Sveta is the tallest and most extroverted

Hakara would probably be the quietest

Sky is the youngest but also the most experienced. And the shortest

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What’s this? Another new character alert! Another half-dragon, at that!

This one is my crystal half-dragon archfey warlock that I’m gonna be playing during this summer, since I joined a group that’s technically part of a research study involving D&D. Her name is Sveta, and she’s basically a self-taught linguist.

Played my first session with her Monday morning, and so far she’s been a lot of fun!

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GUIDE: NAMING A TOWN OR CITY

This post was originally from a FAQ, but since the original link is now defunct, I am re-posting it here.

There are many things to keep in mind when naming the town or city in your novel:

1) Genre/Theme/Tone

It’s very important to consider the genre and theme of your story when choosing a town name. Take these names for example, each of which indicates the genre or theme of the story: King’s Landing (sounds fantastical) Cloud City (sounds futuristic) Silent Hill (sounds scary) Sweet Valley (sounds happy and upbeat) Bikini Bottom (sounds funny) Radiator Springs (sounds car-related) Halloween Town (sounds Halloween-related) Storybrooke (sounds fairytale-related) 2) Time/Place It’s also important to consider the time and place where your story takes place. For example, you wouldn’t use “Vista Gulch” as a name for a town in Victorian England. You probably wouldn’t use it for a town in modern day North Carolina, either. Vista is a Spanish word and would normally be found in places where Spanish names are common, like Spain, Central and South America, the southwest United States (including southern California), Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Florida. 3) Size/Settlement Type An isolated town of 300 people probably won’t be Valley City, but a sprawling metropolis of 30 million could be called Windyville, because it could have started out as a small town and grew into a large city. 4) Geography Words like gulch, butte,and bayou tend to be regional terms. You probably wouldn’t find Berle’s Bayou in Idaho, or Windy Butte in Rhode Island. Words like mount, cape, and valley are dependent upon terrain. Most of the time, you won’t have a town named “mount” something unless there are hills or mountains nearby. You wouldn’t use “cape” unless the town was on a cape, which requires a large body of water. 5) History Is there a historical person or event that your town might be named after? The Simpsons’ hometown of Springfield is ironically named after its founder, Jebediah Springfield. Chattanooga, Tennessee is named after the Cherokee town that was there first. Nargothrond, in The Lord of the Rings, is an Elvish town with an Elvish name. 6) Combination of Words

person name + geographical term = Smithfield, Smith Creek

group name + geographical term = Pioneer Valley, Settlers’ Ridge

descriptive word + geographical term = Mystic Falls, Smoky Hill

person name + settlement type = Smithton, Claraville

landmark + settlement type = Bridgton, Beaconville

Word Lists

Types of Settlements

Geographical Features

Place Words

Common Suffixes

Other Descriptors

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For Edge, it’s his unit. The people he fights with and besides and for. Over the course of his time in Nalindi’s Palm, he ends up deciding his new human friends are his new unit.

For Sky, it’s her father and the other people from her party. The people she cares for the most and who she knows care for her in return. Han and Avel she’ll readily describe as her brothers—by blood and in spirit, respectively. The others in the party she thinks of as some variety of cousin. Aoife is somewhere between a favorite crazy cousin and that one crazy aunt she actually likes. Xandra is biologically her cousin. And Aeon is…she’s that one cousin she avoids at family reunions but still begrudgingly considers part of her family.

For Hakara, at present (pre-campaign), really it’s only her mentor. The rest of her actual family is long gone, but her mentor was the one that basically raised her. Although the old apothecary and his wife from the town she and her mentor stayed at for a few months did become sort of like surrogate grandparents to the both of them, so there’s them, too.

What's your oc's definition of "family"?

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Sky’s Journal Masterpost

I will update this periodically as I post more entries! Check back regularly!

———

Party Introductions pt 1

Party Introductions pt 2

———

Arc 1

[0.5]

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[5.5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

———

Other Writings with Sky

Home (Takes place sometime after Arc 2, either during the Interlude or after the eventual Epilogue)

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Sky’s Journal 9

(cw: discussion of murder)

———

Alden and Han apparently got good money for the job they took while the rest of us were out; took down a rampaging dinosaur in the bay. Although Alden was incredibly grouchy about having his common clothes stolen the other day. 

Regardless, once we reunited three days ago, we planned how to get to Māl-Súk: persuade someone close to him that he’s in danger. 

But first we needed to learn if Theome had arrived yet. The local newt population was our information network: in exchange for teaching them things, they’d find Theome for us. They’re…not very bright, but they’re eager. Rather cute, actually.

Today they found Theome. He’s frequented the Harorai library and apparently had booked a ship to leave in a couple days but it’s delayed.

Avel made Han invisible so he could stalk Theome; found his current residence in the slums.

Later Avel used his illusions to disguise himself as Theome to taunt the priest of Karsh as Theome and try and get him to believe the threat he poses. It didn’t work.

The priest has Truesight and was able to see through Avel’s illusion. Alden teleported the two of them out, then we all had to run as the priest roused all the dinosaurs in the city.

We ducked inside an abandoned building, right next to Theome’s, to wait out the stampede.

Theome eventually spotted us. He teleported into our building and…hugged us all? The madman still considers us “family”. He didn’t recognize Avel through his disguise, though. He then invited us to his place and excitedly told us his plan for tomorrow: he’ll kill Māl-Súk and take his Shard, with his “friends” running interference; then he’ll send three of the Set Beasts off on his ship while he takes the Wind Beast north.

I spent most of our “conversation” trying to not panic.

We excused ourselves, then went back to our ship for the night to plan. Apparently Theome’s “friend” is an adult red dragon—so now we’ll have to figure out how to deal with that tomorrow too.

Eventually Alden put on this magical mask he’d found in the Bazaar. It fused to his face. Now he’s deaf, mute, and blind save for apparently seeing lines connecting to souls. He has to communicate through Message and see through Puff.

He says he can “push” and “pull” on those lines, but when Avel let him experiment on his, he knocked Avel comatose. It took Alden over half an hour to disperse the freaky blackish crystals that formed around the two of them and wake Avel up. Neither of them have said anything about what happened during that time. 

They switched to having Alden experiment on summoned plants instead. Much safer.

Although Alden apparently can’t handle water anymore. Can’t even sense it or teleport over it. I had to Levitate him out of it earlier before he drowned.

I just hope it’s not going to make things worse for tomorrow. I’m terrified.

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Ended up taking this prompt in basically the opposite direction, but it was still inspired by the prompt.

This is actually a scene from my upcoming character Hakara’s backstory. (If you’re in my D&D group and you’re not the DM, don’t read this!)

word count: 699

CW: grief

Her Vow

———

Rain drummed against the cairn, heedless against Ari’s vigil. When she finally let herself open her eyes, she watched the trickles of water find their different ways down the rough stacked stones. A few sneaked down into the seams between the stones, and she imagined them as tears she couldn’t make herself shed. Tears trying to find their way to where her Lady was laid to rest. 

Ari shook her head. Of course they weren’t. They were just raindrops. Might as well be tiny water elementals, only caring about their own little world that only lasted brief moments.

A rumble sounded in the distance. Whether it was just thunder or a rogue elemental beast didn’t matter, it still marked her vigil’s end.

A beast…

Ari’s limbs wouldn’t let her move from her kneel. Not yet. Her conscious railed on her as hard as the rain on her back. She gripped the glaive in her hands—her mistress’s glaive—tighter.

 She took a breath, and her voice escaped shakily. “Mistress, I…They…Y’never had a chance to…” Her throat lodged until she cleared it and started again, “Y’were supposed to be victorious. Y’were supposed to find the beast. This…this weren’t supposed t’happen like this.”

Guilt weighed on her shoulders. “It’s my fault,” she whispered to the stones. “I…If I hadn’t tripped up…”

Familiar words, repeated across memories by her Lady, pecked Ari’s mind. Don’t just say your apology. Live it. 

But how?

“I’ll do it,” she said. The words fell out of her mouth before she could catch them. “I’ll do it. Y’couldn’t finish your destiny ‘cause of me. So I’ll do it.” She gripped the glaive tighter and pried herself off the ground with it. “Mistress, I swear to ya.”

~~~

Ari went inside the little cabin her and her mistress had shared the past few months and headed straight to where her Lady’s armor rested. Untouched for months, a fine coat of dust blanketed the ornate bronze and steel plate. Resolve and grief drove Ari’s hands forward. The armor would be untouched no longer.

The chainmail rested along her body as if in agreement. Each plate snapped into place, one by one, the echoes being Ari’s judge. 

The armor fit her almost perfectly. Almost.

The plate skirt went slightly further down her thighs than it was supposed to. The chest plate had the finest sliver of too much room.

Those gaps screamed at Ari when she studied herself in the mirror. You’re not her. You’re not her. 

Ari tore her gaze away from the mirror long enough to reach for the last piece of her Lady’s armor. Her mask.

It was of similar make to the rest of her armor, but it had fewer scratches than the rest. A faint stain on the cloth strap from her mistress’s festering wound made up the difference. 

With a halting breath, Ari clutched the mask and turned back to the mirror. She almost raised the mask to her face, but she paused.

Her hair.

Her mistress had had light brown hair, the warm color of dry frontier soil. Hers was too light. And too long.

Ari set the mask down reverently, then picked up her own dagger. Watching herself in the mirror, she raised the dagger to her ponytail, already tight against her head, and sawed it off. One strand at a time. One guilt at a time.

The severed bundle of hair hit the wood floor with a dull thud. 

Ari frowned at herself. She’d figure out the color later. The old apothecary in town would probably have something; she could trust him.

But for the moment, she slid the dagger in its sheath and reverently picked the mask back up. Then slowly, heavily, raised it to her face like her mistress had done dozens of times before.

But instead of hiding a festering wound, like her mistress had done, Ari hid herself. She watched her reflection in the mirror turn into an echo of her Lady’s as her view narrowed through the two eye slits. 

Lady Hakara would live on. Whatever the beast of her destiny was, she would slay it.

And Ari—her mistake—would be hidden.

———

For this week’s prompt courtesy of @flashfictionfridayofficial!

Tagging: @jacqueswriteblrlibrary

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When a character is pretending to be someone they’re not

Pretending isn’t just lying, no, it’s becoming a version of yourself that feels easier to manage (easier to love, or control, or survive inside.) It’s a mask that starts out as protection and slowly becomes a second skin. One that’s hard to take off, even when you want to.

✦ They mirror the people around them without meaning to. Their laugh, their phrasing, the way they sit, it all shifts depending on who they’re with. Like they’re constantly adjusting, matching the energy in the room, trying to be what they think people want.

✦ They’re vague when things get personal, and not because they’re secretive, but because they don’t know anymore. Ask them their favorite song, and they’ll pause too long. Ask about their past, and their answers are half-finished, polished at the edges, like they’ve been told too many times to keep it clean.

✦  They over-prepare for conversations. They run through the dialogue in their head ahead of time. Rehearse their jokes, their exits, their answers. Everything feels a little scripted, like they’re playing the role of “themselves” instead of just… being.

✦ They always look put-together, maybe almost too much. Their clothes, their hair, their whole vibe is carefully chosen. But there’s a difference between style and armor, and this is armor. A version of themselves they’ve curated, down to the last thread.

✦ They panic when the script slips. Catch them off guard, and it shows... like, they freeze and fumble. The real stuff, feels dangerous. Being authentic means being vulnerable, and they’ve learned the hard way how risky that is.

✦ They shift depending on the room. One version of them at home, another at school, another with friends, like flipping channels. It’s not manipulation, no guys, it’s muscle memory, and they’ve learned to survive by adapting, and now they can’t stop.

✦ They touch their face or hair when they’re uncomfortable, like they’re checking to make sure the mask is still in place. A nervous habit that’s half-grounding, half-ritual, as if letting their guard down even physically would let everything else fall apart, too.

✦ Their smile is always photo-ready. Perfect, pretty, practiced...But there’s something in the eyes that doesn’t match, like they’re smiling at you, not with you. Like they’ve learned what people want to see, and they’ve gotten very good at giving it.

✦  If someone tells them, “I like the real you,” they go quiet. Not because they’re shy, but because deep down, they don’t know who the “real” version even is anymore. They want to believe there’s someone underneath it all, they just don’t know how to find them.

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Welp. Finally got a response back from the illustration department at my uni about my portfolio application today

Didn’t get accepted. Ah well; can’t say I’m too surprised, given how competitive that major is.

Guess it’s time to switch my major to linguistics and do my art stuff for my own enjoyment and for my eventual self-published career goals, instead of having to worry about graded art assignments

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💀 Making Your Villain Make Sense (Without Making Them Right™)

("because if I see one more war criminal with a sad diary entry get a redemption arc, I’m gonna throw my laptop.")

Here’s the thing: your villain doesn’t need to be redeemable. But they do need to make sense.

And I mean sense beyond "they’re evil and they monologue about it." Or “they have a tragic past, so now they do murder <3.” Or “they were right all along, the hero just couldn’t see it 🥺.”

Let’s fix that.

─────── ✦ ───────

🧠 STEP ONE: BUILD A LOGIC SYSTEM THAT ISN’T OURS Your villain shouldn’t just be wrong, they should have their own internal system that works for them. Morally flawed? Absolutely. But coherent.

Ask yourself:

What do they value more than anything? (Power? Order? Loyalty? Vengeance?)

What do they believe about the world, and how did they get there?

What fear drives them? What future do they think they’re trying to prevent?

The villain doesn’t need to know they’re wrong. But you should.

Make their logic airtight. even if it’s awful. Give them cause and effect.

─────── ✦ ───────

👿 STEP TWO: STOP GIVING THEM THE BETTER IDEOLOGY Listen. I love a “morally gray” moment as much as anyone. But if your villain is making all the good points and the hero’s just like “no because that’s mean,” your arc is upside down.

If your villain is critiquing injustice, oppression, or inequality, make sure their methods are the problem, not their entire worldview.

✖︎ WRONG: Villain: “The ruling class is corrupt.” Hero: “That’s not nice.”

✔︎ RIGHT: Villain: “The ruling class is corrupt, so I’m burning the city and everyone in it.” Hero: “So you’re just… committing genocide now?”

Your villain can touch a real issue. Just don’t let them be the only one talking about it, or solving it with horror movie logic.

─────── ✦ ───────

🔪 STEP THREE: GIVE THEM POWER THAT COSTS THEM The best villains lose things too. They’re not just untouchable horror dolls in sexy coats. They make bad choices and pay for them. That’s where the drama lives.

Examples:

They isolate themselves.

They sacrifice people they love.

They get what they want, and it destroys them.

They know they’re the monster, and choose it anyway.

If your villain can kill a dozen people and feel nothing, that’s not scary. That’s boring. Let them bleed. Let them regret it. Let them double down anyway.

─────── ✦ ───────

🧱 STEP FOUR: MAKE THEM PART OF THE WORLD, NOT OUTSIDE IT Villains shouldn’t feel like they were patched in from another genre. They should be part of the world’s logic, culture, class system, history. They should reflect something about the setting.

Villains that slap:

The advisor who upheld the regime until they decided they deserved to rule.

The noble who’s using war to reclaim stolen legacy.

The ex-hero who thinks the system can’t be saved, only reset.

The priest who truly believes the gods demand blood.

They’re not just evil, they’re a product of the same world the hero is trying to save.

─────── ✦ ───────

👁 STEP FIVE: SHOW US THEIR SELF-JUSTIFICATION You don’t need a tragic backstory™. But you do need to show us why they think they’re right. Not just with exposition, through action.

Let us watch them:

Protect someone.

Choose their goal over safety.

Justify the unjustifiable to a character who loves them.

Refuse to change, even when given a chance.

A villain who looks into the mirror and goes “Yes. I’m correct.” is 1000x scarier than one who sobs into a journal and says “I’m so broken 🥺.”

─────── ✦ ───────

🧨 BONUS ROUND: DON’T MAKE THEM A HATRED MEGAPHONE Especially if you’re writing marginalized characters: don’t let your villain become a mouthpiece for slurs, abuse, or extremism just to make them “evil enough.” That’s lazy. And harmful.

You don’t need real-world hate speech to build a dark character. You need power, consequence, and intent.

─────── ✦ ───────

TL;DR: Good villains don’t need to be right. They need to be real. Not a vibe. Not a sad boy in a trench coat. Not a trauma monologue and then a sword fight. They need logic. They need cost. They need to scare you because you get them, and still want them to lose.

Make them dangerous. Not relatable. Make them whole. Not wholesome. Make them make sense.

—rin t. // thewriteadviceforwriters // villain critic. final boss consultant. licensed chaos goblin

P.S. I made a free mini eBook about the 5 biggest mistakes writers make in the first 10 pages 👀 you can grab it here for FREE:

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Sky’s Journal 8

(cw: blood, temporary insanity)

———

I wish we’d never taken that job from the local Hunter’s Guild.

It was about reports of aberration sightings about a day’s sail up the coast. Avel, Aoife, and I took that job while Alden and Han took a different job for the week to get more party funds. 

The three of us basically tripped on the ruins of an old city. A group of bandits had already set up camp in the middle of the area, so we set up in the ruins of a nearby building for the night instead.

Only for Avel to wake us up because of whispers he’d heard. I tried detecting any thoughts, and…I’m not exactly sure. Avel and Aoife say I started acting “off”. So after Avel came back from scouting, he had Aoife pick me up and take me into the jungle, where he’d found an invisible boundary. They say I was instantly back to normal once we crossed the boundary. 

Avel made us a shelter outside that boundary instead.

In the morning we managed to distract the bandits from the main temple, only to realize after we entered that it was trapped. Fortunately the bandits had already blown a hole in the wall that we were later able to use to escape. 

We found plenty of evidence of cult activity, including far too much blood at the bottom of the temple. The cultists were clearly woefully underprepared for whatever they released.

Avel and Aoife both went mad while we were investigating. Avel started babbling absolute nonsense and Aoife…I’m not sure what happened to her but there was definitely something off about her. So I panicked and dragged the both of them out into the jungle until we crossed that boundary and they went back to normal. They didn’t believe me at first that they were the ones that went mad, not me.

Eventually we found doors hidden under the pool of blood in the temple. Avel went through one first and almost went mad, but cast Lesser Restoration on himself to shake it off. And spotted something. He had Aoife come with him to investigate further, and they found some sort of once-human abominations.

This morning we realized that whatever was haunting the place would drive us mad to keep us from finding it. So, much to my chagrin, we returned to the temple once again and used Avel and his detection magic as “bait” to lure out and gradually eliminate those once-humanoid abominations.

Once we did that, Avel disguised himself as a bandit to investigate the collection of statues the bandits had set up. Only for this massive centipede statue to move and attack, making more of those humanoid abominations in the process.

I used Shatter to destroy the statues every time the centipede abomination hid in one, and we managed to eventually kill the thing. Then we escaped.

We’re sailing back to the city now. I just pray Alden and Han’s job went better than ours did.

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(USAmerican) Tried a Welsh cake for the first time. Oh my GOD you guys know what you're doing with those. I could eat a dozen.

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Tw (pranking):

Keep reading

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Dragons and dwarves sharing a symbiotic relationship. Dragons needing large tunnels and treasures, and dwarves already enjoying digging for treasures coming to a mutually beneficial arrangement. The dragons keep the dwarves safe and protected from invaders and in return the dwarves help keep their combined hoardes preserved. Imagine dwarves being the only ones able to ride dragons. They know how to polish swords and dragon scales so beautifully they look like treasures themselves. Dragons lending shed scales to give dwarves fireproof armor. Dwarves maintaining dragon egg chambers and bonding with a dragon from hatching, mutually respecting one another from the start. Dragons calling their personal dwarf rider by a gem name in reference to them being part of their treasure as a form of endearment and respect.

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Psyche Unleashed: Fade into Daydreams

Pathfinder Psychics get this ability (stance? Is that what it’s called?) called Psyche Unleashed, and they get specific things they can do while in that mode, based on their Subconscious Mind.

For Säde’s Subconscious Mind, Wandering Reverie, that ability is called Fade into Daydreams.