#Arthurian ask game

[taliesin-the-bored]

any platonic ships?

I like the wacky friendship between Galahad and the Grail Heroine. They’re both such weirdos (affectionate) that he thinks nothing of wearing a belt which she made of her own hair which she had previously been carrying around in a box because she had a prophecy. He needed a belt. She had hair. That’s just how they are. 

When it comes to not-canon-anywhere friendships in not-canon-anywhere timelines, I think that it would be entertaining if Galahad was also friends with Mordred but either Galahad strenuously denied it to himself until he couldn’t any longer or was somehow unaware of or unable to comprehend the absolute havoc wreaked by his friend.

[poparthuriana]

Arthurian Theme Song

Kay

“Angel on Fire” by Halsey

I think it relates to the shift in his characterization over time—he goes from being one of the greatest warriors (and having fire powers) to being a cantankerous member of the castle staff, often scorned and shoved to the side. This is Kay if he remembered who he used to be.

“I woke up to another mess in the living room

Broken bottles all around my feet

They came again in the night under crescent moon

Didn't wake me in my sleep

'Cause they talk and drink and laugh 'bout things

And fall in love in my backyard

I hide and cower in the corner; conversation’s getting hard

'Cause nobody seems to ask about me anymore

And nobody seems to care about anything I think

And nobody seems to recognize me in the crowd

In the background, screaming, ‘Everybody, look at me’

And I'm fading away, you know I used to be on fire

And I'm fading away, you know I used to be on fire

I'm standing in the ashes of who I used to be

And I'm fading away, you know I used to be on fire…”

[crownprinceknut]

Gaheris, Mordred and Lady of the Lake for the Arthurian asks :)

Gaheris: Do you have any regrets? What are they?

I regret letting other determine who I was.

Mordred: What is your greatest fear?

I am afraid of being alone, not in a physical sense but rather in a chronicly lonely sort of way.

Lady of the Lake: What is your most prized possession and why?

My most prized possession is my stuffed polar bear named Knut. (He's in my profile picture.) I've had him since I was about five years old and he was purchased with my own money.

[caer-gai]

Arthuriana ask game!!

bc why not

♘ Favourite Knight/King

🫅Favorite Lady/Damsol/Queen

💚 Favorite Quest/Story Arc

✒A Medieval Text You Like

📚A Retelling/Modern Work You Like

📽Recommend a book/movie/tv show etc

💛A Sibling Group/Dynamic That IS NOT The Orkneys

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿Okay Now You Can Talk About Orkneys

😤Your Most Specific Nitpick About Your Fave (anything from "Gareth would not have a beard" to "this is basically a different guy")

🥰An Arthuriana Headcanon

😏Gawain?

🥖Favorite French/du lac (Lancelot, Hector de Maris, Bors, Lionel, Galahad, ect)

👨‍👦Favorite Parent

🗡️Who Are You Betting On In This Month's Tournament?

🙏Pick A Grail Knight

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿Pick A Pelli Spawn (Percival, Aglovale, Tor, Lamorak, Aylane, Dindrane, Donar, ect)

💏Crack Ship (s)

🫂Platonic Ship(s)

[queer-ragnelle]

🫂 for arthur, 👽 for guinevere and 📓 for lancelot?

🫂Headcanon about Arthur’s friendships:

Arthur’s beloved but not many get to liking him. He’s an ideal, a symbol, godlike in such a way that the majority of people revere him and it puts up a wall that’s very difficult to surmount and develop close friendships. There are of course exceptions: Kay, who will always be Arthur’s no-nonsense big bro; Guinevere similarly, who always tells Arthur exactly what’s on her mind whether he likes it or not; Gawain and Yvain/Owain could fall here too, although they’re young enough to somewhat revere Arthur, there’s real trust there; last but not least is Lancelot who, again, worships Arthur, but there’s a mutual understanding which many of Arthur’s other relationships lack, and that makes them very close.

👽Headcanon about Guinevere’s weird quirk:

Guinevere was raised in nobility, a pampered princess. but she’s perceptive. Maybe it’s her giant ancestry, maybe she’s just got the same special something which makes Arthur and Lancelot so good at what they do, but she puts it to great effect while at her seat of the Round Table. She’s not easily intimidated, she can sniff out her “opponent’s” weakness quicker than they can formulate a rebuttal. She’s informed and lethal. It makes her a trusted ally and even friend of Kay. Gawain refers to her as “politicking assassin.” He also has this ability, but Guinevere’s a natural. She unnerves people. Mrs. Pendragon has claws and knows how to use them.

📓Headcanon about Lancelot’s hobbies:

Lancelot loves long horseback rides with no destination. Usually in accompaniment with someone—Arthur, Guinevere, his kinsmen, Gawain, Gareth. It suits him best when adventure finds him, he just has to be in the right place for it. He doesn’t wait around for people to come knocking on Camelot’s door. He searches for the call for aid. Aside from that, he does love a good game of chess with Guinevere. Arthur can play too but it’s like facing an apprentice, the King’s just not a real challenge. Lancelot should probably be letting him win (the way Owain does) but the Queen’s Champion has never been very good at social cues…

[roimargot]

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿?

It's Percy I think he was the first knight that I was interested with. I have a bunch of random sketches of him here he's a golden retriever boy

[trisshawkeye]

Would love to hear about Gawain and the Green Knight retelling and Sad Bi Astronauts if you are still sharing WIPs!!

Yeah! So, Gawain and the Green Knight retelling is... not exactly fanfic in the sense that I'm approaching it like I would ofic. But the gist is that, due to a friend misremembering how the story goes and thinking that Lord and Lady Bertalik were the same person rather than Lord Bertalik and the Green Knight, I then thought to myself, well, what if they all were the same person, offering to Gawain something like a challenge and a courtship?

I then wondered about the aftermath of the story, when all is revealed, what if Gawain were inclined to accept that bizarre sort of courtship visited upon him, but only if he could set a challenge—if this genderfluid fay could stand to be a regular ordinary guest at King Arthur's court and play along with the ritual there. And it ends up overlapping a bit with the Dame Ragnelle and Pulzella Gaia stories, only there's more gender and queer desire involved. As well as old and new religion, the romantic ideal of Camelot versus the reality, what it means to be insiders and outsiders to a space, and growing beyond your own bounds while still staying true to the core of your identity.

Anyway, this WIP is still mostly outline, though a lot of that outline is quite detailed, but I haven't figured out the details of how it's going to end yet. If I set it down, though, it's probably something I'll see if I can float towards professional publishing rather than AO3. We'll see!

--

Next up, Sad Bi Astronauts is where I'm keeping my Space Brothers rarepairs, which is a hilarious situation to be in when the fandom itself is so tiny and there are hardly any fics at all, let alone depressing queer minor character ones.

There's two WIPs in there right now. One is for Jason Butler/Ronald Cooper, two very closeted astronaut candidates, one the backup for the other and who later drops out of the program due to trauma from a plane crash, wrecking their relationship beyond repair. Seriously—while Jason is a fairly regular minor character, Ronald only shows up in like one episode when we learn more about his backstory. This fic does not end happily for them.

The other is Pico Norton/Vincent Bold, which is the more obvious old-man-yaoi ship in the show. Their whole deal is that they were part of a childhood trio who wanted to go into the space industry, but they lost their friend Rick young to a car accident. They both go on to become a space engineer and astronaut and gain large amounts of baggage over that time. The fic is about them hooking up over the years but always feeling kinda bad about it because there's one of them missing. Sad!

These will get finished eventually, but only because I know there's at least one person in the world interested in reading them, which is my housemate.

[pendragaryen]

Just wanted to say that I love your url! It's a good name

Omg, thank you!😮😍🫂 That's the first time since I founded this sideblog that someone said this!!! (And that was literally 8 years ago (or even more)!

Means a lot, mate! I'm grinning all over my face.😁😘

[i-dont-know134]

💏

💏- crack ship (s)

Uhhhh… Galahad+Mordred 🫢 they’re narrative foils

I’m not much of a shipper let alone crack ships :/ But thanks for the ask!!!

[taliesin-the-bored]

💔 for Mordred if you will?

I have a headcanon that Mordred is a little magical, like Gawain and some of his other relatives. I don’t think he’s been trained to use magic, at least not in any grand capacity, or he’d use it in plot-altering ways. Magic is just something that happens to him, like when he doesn’t drown during the May Day massacre. 

Where does the angst come in? I headcanon that his powers, which aren’t really within his control, have a dark edge—the shadow to Gawain’s sun. Being around Mordred for too long can do weird things to people, and his presence makes them a bit queasy, even if they like him. Everything around him dies a little. It’s always been that way, he knows it, and it’s part of what drives his arc down: if he acts like a monster, well, some part of him always thought he was one, anyway; and if he’s doomed, well, given what he does, it’s only fair.

[poparthuriana]

Theme song ask game:

Mordred 💙

I was hoping someone would ask that! I have a lot of songs for Mordred, but I’ll go with this one, since it’s the most recent one I’ve found:

“Dinner at Eight” by Rufus Wainwright

Some lyrics:

“But why is it so That I've always been the one who must go That I've always been the one told to flee When in fact you were the one long ago Actually In the driftin' white snow Who left me

So put up your fists, and I'll put up mine No runnin' away from the scene of the crime God's chosen a place Somewhere near the end of the world Somewhere near the end of our lives

But 'till then no, Daddy, don't be surprised If I want to see the tears in your eyes Then I know it had to be long ago Actually In the driftin' white snow You loved me…”

[leondegranced]

9 People You’d Like to Get to Know Better

Tagged by @the-tenth-arcanum (on my personal account but I'm posting here instead hello something non-merlin related)

Last song I listened to: I watched Camelot last week (the 1967 film version) and the Guenevere track has had me in a chokehold, so that's been on repeat while intermittently being interspersed by the rest of the OST (very good movie, very good music, would recommend)

Currently watching: I'm slowly catching up with the new season of It's Always Sunny, along with Dead To Me and Five Star Chef (really I'll inhale any decent competition show)

Currently reading: The Committee by Sonallah Ibrahim. It's… a strange one, and not a book I would've picked up myself, but my aunt gave it to me for my birthday last year and I needed a short read after getting through Idylls of the King so I figured why not give it a go (I should finish it by tonight and then I'll start reading Inferno by Catherine Cho)

Current obsession: All things Arthuriana, I'm compounding the brainrot bby 😎

Tagging (no pressure): @gardenbastard @feuxx @groundbreakingdot872 @gargoylewithcottagecheese @kitmarloweki @anamericanwerewolfintraffic @tamaha @agapantoblu @kuronnii

[marcvilha]

🌟- For a secret wish or desire of theirs

Conseguir o comando da Briar Productions. Não é um desejo difícil de entender ou deduzir, mas Maravilha dificilmente vai admitir por vontade própria. Foi relegada a permanecer nos bastidores desde cedo, e considerando o nível duvidoso de algumas produções da Briar… Ela adoraria poder por as mãos na empresa e realmente fazer a diferença, algo além de reescrever os roteiros e ser mera faz-tudo. Maravilha gosta de pensar que é questão de tempo até assumir o controle, já que nenhum dos irmãos faz questão, mas nunca se sabe…

[queer-ragnelle]

Character asks: Lancelot!

🧸 he grew up in a lake, what was that like?

😺 cat person or dog person?

😶 any headcanons that are wildly off-canon?

🧸 Headcanon about childhood!

Personally while I do think the Lady of the Lake meant well in how she raised Lancelot, his natural anxiety was exacerbated by his atypical upbringing. He did have his cousins Lionel and Bors with him to socialize with, but they also had the benefit of starting out on the surface, whereas Lancelot was raised underwater from infancy, and those early years in an otherworldly atmosphere does things to a guy's mind. This is why he relies on his mother to coax him out of his madness at times, he's literally not acclimated to surface living, and she has to "reset" him.

😺 Animal related headcanon—cat person or dog person?

Lancelot is a Cat Person and also prefers cats as pets ;^)

😶 Random headcanon—any wildly off-canon?

It's hard to say honestly Lancelot has so much page time and been adapted so much I'm not sure what's left to do that hasn't been done. I think the biggest thing would not only apply to Lancelot but a lot of the "best" knights in that they compartmentalize the violence they commit to cope with it. I don't really think Lancelot revels in combat but neither do I consider him opposed to it, if anything it's a chilling neutrality which has been walled off inside him to prevent interference with his day-to-day functionality. It's when that seeps through he requires the Lady of the Lake's help.

[amewinterswriting]

Happy Storyteller Saturday! Are any of your characters themed after a certain fairytale or myth?

Well, for Magic's Servant, Morgana and Myrddin are the characters from Arthurian mythology and a large part of the subplot is that they've never let their old grievances go. A few other characters from that source show up as well, but saying much more would be verging into spoiler territory...

Within that universe, though definitely in a future story, I do have a sapphic re-imagining of an immortal Robin Hood and Maid Marion, though I'm still a little unsure of what part they might have to play in the plot. Mostly I just liked the idea of genderqueer Robin using magic to pass and later using magic to artificially prolong the life of the Major Oak (real oak tree in Sherwood Forest, really old) as a symbol of not letting the past die. And talking about that sentimentality, they definitely preserved the souls of the Merry Men, too. At this point, I have a small cast of undying characters kicking around in Sherwood Forest looking for an actual plotline!

[theresattrpgforthat]

Do you have any solo ttrpgs that deal with like being a bodyguard or someone's knight? It's something I've had rattling around in my head for a while

Theme: Solo Knights

Hello friend, no luck in the bodyguard department but I sure do have some knight games! Let’s take a look.

Frog Errant, by ManaDawn Tabletop Games.

It’s a deadly and brutal world out there, and it is not too friendly for a lone frog. But if you embrace your quest and heed the omens, you may just be able to make a name for yourself. And if you wander long and far enough, you may be remembered in the songs of both frogs and mice.

Frog Errant is a solo, or GMless, game mode for Mausritter or other Into the Odd based games. In Frog Errant you will take up the role of a wandering frog knight-errant, seeking adventure, looking to fulfill a Quest - all while avoiding you prophesied Doom.

If you are familiar with Mausritter, then this game will be pretty easy to pick up. The game builds in some story that isn’t present in Mausritter - primarily the Quest that has been given to your frog knight, as well as a Doom that has been prophesied to overcome you. It looks like you can use a lot of the items and monsters from Mausritter, but Frog Errant has plenty of new pieces too!

Misericorde, by Andrew White.

Misericorde is a game of knightly romance, pining, unrequited love and confronting the expected behaviours of your social class. You play as a squire serving under a knight on a great quest, without your assistance they surely will fail and yet, as a squire you are obligated to remain in the background, forgotten and not commented on. However, you have developed feelings, perhaps unrequited, for your knight. The actions of the game focus on this struggle, between your Duty and your Desire. Will you hold back, hew to your duty and rank; or will you break free and open your heart, no matter how your beloved may respond.

You’re not exactly a knight in this game, but rather a squire to one. Misericorde is completely unlike the other games on this list because it focuses on devotion and desire, rather than the actions that a forsworn duty drives a Knight to do. You play the game by setting up scenes, asking questions, and rolling dice on an Oracle to figure out what happens next. This is an interpretive game, so while the Oracle will point you in a direction, you determine what exactly each result means.

Chalice, by Monkey’s Paw Games.

Chalice is a solo journaling role-playing game where you chronicle the perilous journey of a Grail-seeking knight in Arthurian England. During the game, you will tell the story of your Knight’s physical and spiritual descent as they quest for, and ultimately fail to find, the Grail. Your Knight’s quest is doomed. Their chivalric virtues will be surely undone by their fatal flaws and moral shortcomings.

This looks like the most immersive game for Arthurian mythology as a solo game. The game itself is designed to look like a manuscript from medieval times, calligraphy and all. Your Knight has benefits called Passions, key relationships called Bindings, and a fate determined by drawing cards from a tarot deck. Throughout the game, you will draw more cards that serve as prompts, which will give or strike through your Passions and Bindings, and play happens over the span of years. Each year is measured in two parts: the deed, which will be what your character accomplishes, and the Chanson, which is evocative recording of your character’s deeds. When you are unable to fulfill a prompt given to you, your story end

Pilgrimage of the Sun Guard, by Amanda P.

Quests in King Arthur stories are about ideals, conflict and temptation. 

Pilgrimage of the Sun Guard is a solo prompt-based journaling game where you create a Sun Guard and travel alone on a quest, attempting to hold to your Code until you reach the end, facing trials and complications along the way.  

You are the last Sun Guard. Will you take up the mantle and ride the ancient roads?

Pilgrimage of the Sun Guard follows a cycle of play. You will start by travelling to a new location, and follow the directions according to each location’s prompt. This may involve using or acquiring resources, accomplishing great deeds, and writing a record of what happened with each step of the quest. When you run out of all of your resources, you can choose to either end your quest there, or break your Code to continue. If you like the story of Gawain & the Green Knight, this game might be for you.

Sanctum Guard, by Bulger007.

Sanctum Guard is a 20-minute pen-and-paper solo game about protecting a powerful magic artifact against a horde of night terrors. In this game, you are a lone guardian of a secluded sanctum built to protect the Obsidram, a powerful artifact that can potentially destroy worlds if it falls into the wrong hands.

You live in peace and harmony with the Obsidram while it is hidden in this secret and desolate domain from power-hungry minds. But one night, someone or something finds the way and you see a glimmering portal from which a horde of monsters descends upon you. Will you manage to protect the Obsidram?

This game runs like a tower defense game, and requires a sheet of graph paper to play. You will build your Sanctum randomly, then roll against generated monsters with the hopes that you can take them out before they utterly destroy the Sanctum and take your sacred relic.

This game doesn’t detail who you’re guarding the Obsidram for, although I think you could also substitute the relic for a person, if you want to be guarding someone instead of something.

Falling Kingdom: The Last Knights, by Purple Robed Wizard.

“The lands are shattered, the gods that once held our hand are dead and the beasts are upon us. Our King. killed by his own flesh. All of us, but waiting to follow. But we still stand, we hold our ground as we rot, we are the Last Knights, and we will stand until we last draw breath.”

In Falling Kingdom you control the last Knights of a realm threatened by a great, corrupting and unstoppable force. There is no great victory waiting for you at the end, no songs to be heard. There is only struggle, corruption, betrayal and death.  The Kingdom will Fall, but this story isn’t about that, it is about the heroes that face this imminent fall, the Knights of the realm, normal men and women elevated to a position where they will fight for their homelands against all odds.

This is a map-conquering game, with randomly generated missions, a Great Battle that could turn the tides of the war, and a stages of battles depending on how much territory you win or lose. You can accumulate corruption as you play, which is helpful in getting successful rolls, but accrue too much, and your knights begin to die. If you like a game about strategy, tragedy, and abstract warfare, this might be the game for you.

Sentinel, by Meghan Cross.

You are the lone guardian of a place of great power - known to you only as The Sanctuary. Many years you have kept vigil in this place, guarding what is kept within from any and all who come to disrupt it or steal it for themselves. 

Sentinel is a solo journaling game about a solitary guardian and the place they are charged with keeping safe. It is a deck and dice based game in which you will create your guardian and the sanctuary that they protect before reliving the memories, facing threats, and finding interesting objects while time passes around you. And then, when the time has come for your watch to end, find out what happens to The Sanctuary when you are no longer able to guard it.

This is a journaling game that uses cards to determine what kinds of actions your character can take. Hearts summon memories, Diamonds grant you items, Spades bring threats, and Clubs pass time. If you draw a Joker, the game is over and the story ends. At the end of the game, the final roll determines whether or not you are successful in your quest. This is a great game for folks who like journaling and world building.

Games I've Recommended in the Past

5-Min Knight, by enui.

Fetch My Blade, by Ethan Yen.