starpolemic

[starpolemic]

Very Brief Guide to [tumblr], for Reddit refugees

Shit You Must Do Right Fucking Now:

Change your profile picture, blog header, and title to something other than the defaults. Do it right now. You will be mistaken for a bot otherwise, and blocked.

Go into Settings -> Dashboard, scroll down to Preferences, and turn off the options in the picture. This will get rid of most of the algorithmic stuff.

Turn off Tumblr Live. You have to snooze it once every 7 days for some stupid reason. It's hosted through another company and will steal your data if you use it.

Go to your blog settings (under the little person menu) and turn off these two settings:

Turn off infinite scroll (lags the site) and turn on timestamps on posts, in the same menu as Preferences.

Basic Features of the Site:

Reblogs drive the entire site. If you'd upvote something on Reddit, you'd reblog it on Tumblr. You can add text, images, or tags to a reblog, but you're not required to.

The dashboard is the equivalent to your Reddit feed, and contains the posts of all the people you follow, with the newest at the top

You can send an ask to someone, and it'll appear in their askbox for them to answer. You can receive them too, or turn off the settings if you don't want.

Tags aren't actually used for finding stuff (search function is dogshit), but are more for categorizing. People also talk in tags. Because Tumblr is weird, you can't use quotation marks (") or commas in them without fucking it up

You can filter both tags and phrases under Account Settings; doing this will put a filter over a post that contains them, which you'll have to click through to see the post itself. Useful for avoiding hate speech or blocking out annoying stuff

You can make polls in posts. Here's one now.

Likes are useless. They literally do fuck-all except send a notification to the OP.

Stuff Tumblr Does That Other Sites Don't:

Very old posts (I'm talking from like 2012) often circulate on this site. There's no such thing as a post being "too old" to reblog

Blocking is highly encouraged; you can block someone for any reason. Even for just being annoying.

If you and someone else are following each other, you are mutuals. Mutuals are fucking awesome and are treasured like friends. Mutuals are a thing on other sites but Tumblr treats em differently.

You can screenshot someone's tags if you like them and add them to a reblog. This is called "peer review"

Sometimes someone will find a blog and go through it and like/reblog a bunch of posts. This is totally fine and not "creepy" like it is seen as on other sites.

Tumblr jokes often rely on Continuing The Bit and a "yes, and?" attitude. Goncharov is probably the best example of this.

We are fucking infested with bots. They will either have totally blank profiles or be filled with porn. Block and report on sight.

Censorship is pretty lax here. I can say "I want to brutally stab Elon Musk to death and watch him bleed out in front of a crowd" and nobody gives a shit.

General Etiquette:

Don't try to do epic clapbacks here, you'll probably just get laughed at or blocked. If someone is bugging you or spouting bigoted bullshit, block them.

Reblog art!!! Artists often struggle to gain traction on here; reblogging will give them a boost.

Not every reblog needs a comment or tag in it

You can go all out with tagging your stuff to organize it, or you can just leave it all blank. Someone might ask "hey, can you tag these posts as [x]?" and you can decide if you want to do that or not. It's generally polite to oblige, but "no" is still reasonable.

Avoid discourse like the plague. Filter it, block people who start it, scroll past it when you see it. Just don't get involved in it. Ever.

Don't put fandom tags or jokes on someone's posts about serious matters or personal shit

You're responsible for curating your own dashboard; if you complain about constantly seeing stuff you don't like, that's probably on you. Don't be afraid to unfollow.

Follower count doesn't matter much here and you don't have to make yours known if you don't want to.

Reblog, don't repost. Reblogging keeps the credit and doesn't "steal" engagement like Twitter retweets.

If someone likes something a LOT, they might reblog it like 30 times in a row. This is normal

Having a post blow up is actually kinda a bad thing, since it floods your notifications. There's a sort of in-joke about how having a big post is awful and people jokingly try to stop their own posts from blowing up, often in vain.

Tips:

Get XKit Rewritten if you're on desktop, it's a really helpful extension

In the little drop-down menu next to the 'Post now' button you can either save a draft, schedule a post, or add it to your queue. The queue lets you post things in order at a certain interval, which you can change. It's good for spreading stuff out over time.

You can use Shift+R to quickly reblog stuff and Shift+Q to queue!

Filter your notifications under Activity - you can also see some neat graphs

Find each other! If you want your old Reddit communities to stick together, seek out other refugees and follow them.

Have fun on [tumblr], everyone!

[starpolemic]

Some stuff I’ve drawn during my absence in the past two years, no bias whatsoever...

[starpolemic]

Where I’ve been, once again

It’s been almost two years since my last post on this site. A lot has changed, and reading the preceding. While there’s probably nobody active still following me who cares (feel free to reach out!), I feel it’s worth making this post, at the very least for myself

Firstly, I made a Twitter account - https://twitter.com/starpolemic. I’ve been significantly more active there, on Twitch, and on Discord, and admittedly kind of abandoned this blog. But like a lot of people, with the recent news regarding Twitter, I feel that it might be worth returning to Tumblr - at the very least, it can serve as a backup blog in the case where Twitter stops working completely.

I’ve gotten better at drawing - while grad school has prevented me from seriously investing time into art, I obtained a proper drawing tablet and it is interesting albeit a bit embarrassing to compare my old art on this blog with my current art. Even just drawing regularly and getting feedback from people is good for gradual improvement. Likewise, I went through a whole phase on Twitch following and watching art streamers, some of who I’ve learned a lot of lessons from, though I feel that I’ve sort of stopped doing so as much as of late. Subsequently, my standards for my own art have gotten significantly higher. I attempted Inktober twice - first time (2021) I completed it on schedule, second time (2022) I had to abandon it on the 17th due to time constraints.

I’ve also fallen into the Arknights hole while my interest in Fire Emblem and Granblue Fantasy has greatly diminished, so expect my posting to follow that pattern instead. At one point in 2021 I was kicked/banned from my GBF crew Discord, which I can honestly understand because I was acting like a dickhead more often then not. So coming to terms with that, and resolving to do better, was a painful but honestly quite a nourishing experience. Additionally, I started making mashups - you can find them on my Youtube account (unsurprisingly the channel title is starpolemic). It’s been an interesting experience though the quality is still somewhat garbage.

What’s most important, I think, is to periodically reflect, introspect and analyze how one can grow as a person.

[starpolemic]

❤️ NEW THRACIA BANNER!!! ❤️ Strangely, I’m most hyped about the fact that KEMPF MADE IT TO HEROES YAHHH🔥🔥🔥

Let’s keep “In America” alive… 😏

[starpolemic]

Love your art! Lorenz is a true noble.

It’s been so cold & snowy & gloomy lately that all I want to do is stay inside and drink hot tea 24/7 ~ 🍵🌸

(jpeg ver. here~)

[starpolemic]

I just wanted to say that I admire your dedication to this blog

December 2nd, 2019

if natasha doesn’t get added to heroes by the end of this year im suing intsys

[starpolemic]

Where I’ve been

Mainly I’ve played FEH less as I realized how terrible IS is at running the game. I still do play it but mianly out of obligation.

I’ve also picked up GBF (perhaps to my detriment) and they have a very active Discord community (as well as my crew Discord). So I’ve honestly neglected Tumblr a bit.

I intend to draw digital art seldom until I buy myself a drawpad and find the time to draw more often. Prior to that, it’s just going to be sketches and scribbles on paper.

[starpolemic]

[starpolemic]

Jill: you know that “Fire Emblem Heroes” thing? Suddenly, I don’t want to go there anymore...

[starpolemic]

Sorry for not having much motivation to finish drawings recently ( ; ω ; )

All I can offer is this smol.

[starpolemic]

Should have been natasha over marisa

March 18th, 2019

the spring banner trailer dropped today! im happy with all the units on it, though im particularly interested in palla and marisa!! though that free loki is uh. something

and of course, no natasha, as expected

[starpolemic]

Update: I finally got Thea! about 150 orbs in but at least she has good IVs. Klein is no longer lonely.

I don’t think I’ll be pulling for a long while seeing I don’t really care for any of the bunnies this banner.

Reddit leak: The banner will have Lugh, Sure, Rutger and Idunn!

Me: Not Thea? Oh well, I guess I can spend orbs now.

One legendary Roy later:

IS: SURPRISE IT’S THEA

Klein I have failed you

[starpolemic]

Update: 0 orbs left and one Ninian 

Reddit leak: The banner will have Lugh, Sure, Rutger and Idunn!

Me: Not Thea? Oh well, I guess I can spend orbs now.

One legendary Roy later:

IS: SURPRISE IT’S THEA

Klein I have failed you

[starpolemic]

Rutger is a godamn liar about how he has to work alone and shit…esp since his A skill is dependent on him relying on his allies…so basically he’s an accurate depiction of an edgy teen boi

[starpolemic]

Reddit leak: The banner will have Lugh, Sure, Rutger and Idunn!

Me: Not Thea? Oh well, I guess I can spend orbs now.

One legendary Roy later:

IS: SURPRISE IT’S THEA

Klein I have failed you

[starpolemic]

Edit based off of this

[starpolemic]

Innes is a cocky fucker.