surlyalpaca

[surlyalpaca]

Last comic strip for a while.

[surlyalpaca]

My set of Heavensward illustrations is now complete! 

I hugely appreciate all the positive feedback I’ve received over the last couple of months for these - I’ve now made them available as prints so if you liked them please consider checking them out here! ✨

[surlyalpaca]

i like him a normal amount

[surlyalpaca]

DnD Ability Scores Explained!

[surlyalpaca]

“Moonlight drowns all but the brightest stars”

[surlyalpaca]

I made a meme for today

[surlyalpaca]

The staff unanimously agrees to post this without further comment, in that no further comment is necessary. This piece is by Daniel Hashimoto (@ActionMovieKid), in a reworking of an original piece by Jon Hoffman.

[surlyalpaca]

improving your ao3 experience

As a site, AO3 has a lot of functionalities built in. But it can’t do everything. That’s where user scripts come in handy. 

User scripts are a kind of browser extension or plugin. They work inside your browser, be it Chrome or Safari or something else, and they add functionalities to existing websites. Think Xkit here on tumblr. 

In the AO3 FAQ, there’s a page where they list a ton of different user-created plugins to improve your AO3 experience. These plugins can do a lot of the things that people regularly ask AO3 to make a part of the site. If there’s something you wish you could do on AO3, check that list. You might find what you’re looking for. 

A small selection of the things user scripts can do for you:

save your filters so you don’t need to enter them every time you search

save your searches and then track them so you can run all of your searches at once and find updates or new works 

blacklist terms and hide works that contain those words so that you don’t see them

hide creators or terms - the AO3 version of tumblr saviour

add a download button to the blurb page (the page of search results or tag results) so you can download without clicking into the fic

There are a lot more available on that page and people are creating more all the time! Just recently, @starrymeta created a user script to make commenting with reaction gifs easier.

Most mobile browsers don’t allow for extensions and plugins, so these will be more useful for desktop users. But if you have an Android device, Firefox allows them while Chrome does not. 

If you have favourite AO3 scripts, please share them in the notes. And if you’ve made one, please link it!

[surlyalpaca]

Voting motivation from Cap to start the day!

[surlyalpaca]

Aymeric the Blue

[surlyalpaca]

so a dragon mount now, huh

[surlyalpaca]

I love the namazu so fucking much. look at this idiot. head full of empty. nothing in there but the wii shop music on loop and one brain cell bouncing around like a dvd screensaver. they’re perfect

[surlyalpaca]

Drawing my favorite Bozja moment; Lilja Spots Your WoL

[surlyalpaca]

Ishgard is fun so far, but I have questions

[surlyalpaca]

19. Where the Heart is

(Warrior of Light x Estinien. Immediately post-5.1)

They had spent a brief night in her room above the Rising Stones, departing well before any of the other Scions realized they were still present. They had tumbled their way down into Gridania whereupon she revealed she had a house. A house.

“I haven’t spent a lot of time here recently,” she said when they entered. He could see dust motes whirling through the stale air when she started opening windows.

It mattered not. They spent most of the following day in her bedroom.

Eventually he emerged and got to look around a bit. Books were scattered around everywhere, precarious piles of tomes despite the fact he knew she still struggled with reading. Even more abundant were the blueprints. They occupied most every surface and more than a few of her walls, scratched up with her questionable handwriting detailing out an impressive array of crafting projects.

(There, on the wall leading down into her lower level crafting room, a blueprint for a set of matching bookshelves with motifs to Saint Valeroyant etched into the woodwork. Upon reading a note in the lower right said it was a birthday present for his foster father he promptly moved on and tried forgetting about it.)

The only tidy place in the whole house was her kitchen which was cleaned and organized to a level that worried him a little. Not for lack of use, though, which was his initial thought. She insisted they dine in for dinner. Watching her cook was a bit like watching her train. Speaking wasn’t her strong suit but she revealed a great deal about herself by how she worked. The precise way she diced the vegetables, the slight smile on her lips, the focus in her eyes as she patiently leaned over the pot while waiting for the dumplings to finish steaming.

It was fascinating, as always, watching her do something she clearly loved to do.

On the second morn his thoughts started nagging him. He hadn’t lied when he fled the Rising Stones, he did have his own tasks to look after now that he had completed Tataru’s commission. He needed to get started and they both understood that their time together was always fleeting.

And yet: there she was, asleep on her Doman-style futon, snoring gently, and for once the lines on her face were smoothed away. Nothing worried her in her dreams, apparently. A far cry from her waking moments when the world tugged at her in a hundred different directions until she retreated inside the mantle of Warrior of Light.

One more day then.

[surlyalpaca]

I love how legitimately depressed Zenos is at the end of 5.3 and I almost feel bad for him.

[surlyalpaca]

18. Panglossian

The Aery.

The very aether of the sky itself crackled when Nidhogg roared. Dark clouds rapidly unfurled as lightning ripped through them. The flashes of light revealed the broken architecture upon the floating island beneath, a testament to a better age long since dead.

A day for wicked deeds and terrible violence.

In the shadows of one of the broken spires, the dual Azure Dragoons stopped to get their bearings before the next assault.

“I think we found him,” Reshene shouted over the din at her companion.

Estinien spared her a backward glance. “Any other brilliant deductions?”

“Yes! He’s angry!”

Somehow there were muscles left on Estinien’s face to deepen his already present scowl. They were used.

Reshene’s grinned like the battle-happy fool she was. She leapt over the rock and into the open where any and all could spot her from malms away. “Don’t worry, sourpuss. It’ll all work out!”

“What did she call me?” he muttered as the Warrior of Light leapt away, laughing.