#Dr. Will Caster

[questintheskies]

Just Samoa Joe looking like a boss in the suit...

[hanitje]

Who Attacked Jay White While Wearing A Devil Mask? (And Who Were The Cronies)?

Or do you have a candidate(s)?

[just-a-mod]

Kindred Voices

Never one

without the other

they will know us all

in time

[writer-and-artist27]

Or, this is the first chapter published since having to put this story up for registered AO3 users only (thanks to Elon Musk apparently investing in AIs to steal writing). 

This chapter (done in one afternoon, whoa, 3k in a day is a new record for me) was mainly inspired by two things: @the8thsphynx‘s artwork of their OC River and Romani (specifically the story where River helps Romani with his hair), and a talk I had with my dad today about some relatives in Vietnam he’s not on the best terms with. The most thanks goes to Sphynx, though, for the inspiration and letting me tag them like this. Everyone go check out their art - it’s great. :) 

FFN link here (with no restrictions on who can view at the moment thanks to FFN putting up Elon Musk defenses already). OST playlist also here, with the new songs included (as well as WIP songs for upcoming chapters).

[lghockey]

Tonight is for me...

I get The Acclaimed, Daddy Ass, Britt, Shida, BEST FRIENDS

[drabiukiblackmagic7]

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[sbnkalny]

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afloor

[bestwitchdoctordrmuchindu]

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[thepowerfulwitchdoctor]

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[theafricantraditionalhealer]

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[coinandcandle]

Paradigm Time! - What is a Paradigm?

TL;DR: Paradigms are how you make sense of magic and how it fits into the world in your experiences. They aren't right or wrong and they often change!

Paradigm: a philosophical or theoretical framework of any kind

Note: There are a few different definitions of paradigm depending on the field you're talking about. In the case of magic, we are using the definition above.

Paradigms are essentially how you make sense of the world around you. In magic, these paradigms are ways in which someone understands magic, how it works, and how it is used in the world.

Other people have used words like “framework”, or “beliefs/belief system”. Whatever you call it is fine!

Paradigms can and often do change over time, maybe you used to believe “xyz”, but now you’re thinking more “abc”. This doesn't make everything that you did while you believed in “xyz” invalid, it just means you understand it differently now.

Since paradigms are basically belief systems, they are not factual and are not “right” or “wrong” they simply are. One person may disagree with another, who may disagree with someone else, who may have similar but slightly different experiences than another. More than anything else, paradigms are fluid.

Furthermore, paradigms are fluid not just within ourselves but within communities too!

Here’s an example:

Say everyone in x community generally agrees that crystals hold power. However, some may believe that crystals only hold power once charged, like how a cup can only hold water once filled. While others may believe there is an inherent power within the crystal. Others in turn might believe that some crystals hold power and others don’t. Yet they all still believe the paradigm that crystals hold power.

Now let’s take a few paradigms about correspondences as another example.

In one witch’s paradigm, they might be used as ingredients that hold inherent power. -> “I am using the magical properties inherent to basil to power my money jar.” In another, the correspondences are spirits that you petition to help power the magical working. -> “I am working with the spirit of basil and asking them to help with my money jar.” In another, the correspondences are offerings that you give to a spirit that you’re petitioning. -> “I am using basil as an offering to a spirit to help with my money jar.” In yet another the correspondences are spirits that you don’t even need to petition, their very presence influences the spell. -> “I’m using basil in this spell because the spirit of basil will help influence my money jar.”

Here are some other examples of paradigms:

Spirit-Working sorcery, where spirits are petitioned for aid, and the strength of workings tends to depend on the depth of the relationship developed with the spirit, and/or success in evoking them in that instance.

Thinking or focusing on your intent in your head is fine, writing it down is better, but speaking it aloud is best.

Energy is the battery of magic. Magic is the change caused by whatever you’re doing but energy is what powers that change, be it a spell, prayer, whatever.

Gods can be called upon and petitioned for help with a spell, but the relationship between the caster and the god will determine the strength of the spell or their willingness to help. Otherwise, you can try to appeal to them with offerings to make up for the lack of a relationship, though their help will still not be as strong as if there were a pre-existing relationship.

Inanimate objects do not have spirits, but animals, plants, fungi, and humans do.

Again, these are not universal paradigms, they are just examples. I honestly don't think there even is a universal paradigm when it comes to magic and witchcraft.

Thank you to @windvexer @friend-crow @stagkingswife and @rose-colored-tarot for your help in writing this post!

[cerastes]

As someone who hasn't touched it yet- how does IS4 stack up? How's first impressions been?

Ok, let me give my thoughts on IS4, now that it's been a week!

TL;DR -> This Rocks, I love it.

IS4 is far, far more polished than IS3. I feel a bit bad blasting and slamming IS3 so much, but the bottom line with it is that it's just very very flawed in ways that really make it hard to revisit it in the same way IS2 is always a fun romp.

If I had to point out flaws with IS4, it'd be that, on a personal level, I wish it had a few more Normal Arknights Maps. The vast majority of maps in IS4 are pranks and checks of some sort. This isn't necessarily a negative, but I do like playing some Tower Defense more frequently than what IS4 allows, since it's always got me worried about "oh god my team lacks X, Floor Y's Map Z checks X, if I get it, I'll D I E " so I try to go for my super tried and true team instead of daring to experiment all that much. This will eventually pass, but it's been a Thing for me.

Besides that, though? I just have a lot of good things to say about it. The systems feel like they were thought out this time: The Fordartals (sp?) system allows for a lot of player expression, agency, and just in general fun in a way the Light system of IS3 can simply never hope to compare to. About the only thing the Light system did right was the way it worked thematically: If you wish to confront The Corrupting Heart, you really, really gotta go in the dark, and for the best possible chance against, Izumik, Mizuki must find the Light again and be filled with hope. Yeah ok sure, thematically, these work, but the gameplay component sucks ass, because Light exists almost exclusively as a form of punishment and in basically no way as something you can use. It opens some roads, sure, but that Rogue Trader and Wish Fulfilled node are not worth having 9 out of you 11 Operators with Metastatic. Speaking of Metastatic, the single worst thing Arknights has done, even if you are maxed out on Collapse in IS4 and are packing four fully upgraded maluses, THAT STILL DOESN'T COMPARE to how bad Metastatic was. Let that sink in.

The endings are no longer RNG! Absolutely wonderful!

Eik is the first IS 2nd Boss I can say I think is good! Frozen Monstrosity was just annoying, Big Sad Lock is incredibly static, and The Last Knight, in my opinion, is the single worst and most boring boss in the entire game, not even just the game mode. Eik is like if The Last Knight didn't suck: Same principle, but done in a way that is actually not snooze-inducing. Mind you, the principle of the fight is still not something I enjoy, but unlike The Last Knight, that's wholly a me thing, as opposed to being an objectively awful and boring fight (like The Last Knight, the worst and most boring boss in Arknights).

Even though I said I'd like some more normal maps, the maps are good, to be honest! I can't think of any Fire and Water Unions or Out of Controls.

IS4 is the Smash of Arknights: (Almost) Everyone Is Here! Brush up on your gimmicks from various events, because they WILL appear.

The Midboss philosophy in IS4 is lovely, in my opinion: It's low HP bosses who can quickly fuck you up in their own way, be it stun, immense conditional damage, or simply supporting their team so well that you get overwhelmed. The Variant stages for the bosses are entire new maps, so that's also cool.

Collapsal enemies are congruent with the map design: Collapsals can be very quick, with a caveat: Normal Collapsal mobs speed up after they get hit, Casters speed up after not attacking for a bit, Aerials are fast but always have many loops and never directly go to the point until after a while. Shattered Champions are the exception, and they can either loop a while or just go straight for the jugular, making them apt Elite units for the faction.

There's much more I could say more concisely, but really, just try the game mode, get your ass kicked a bit, learn it, and then you'll see how coherent the design of IS4 is in terms of systems, maps, enemies, and features. Sorry, IS3, but you got your ass absolutely kicked like I did on my Waves 15 runs when you'd give my 2 main DPS units Metastatic on Floor 5.

[mylordshesacactus]

How I Run Wildshape

Listen, "wildshape rules are fucking stupid" is not a fresh or hot take. Level 3: You can transform twice a day. Level 19: You can still transform twice a day! But now you can stay transformed for longer.

(Because as we all know, "eight-hour strategy commitments" are the core of how most people play D&D.)

And then of course: Level 20: INFINITE WILDSHAPES! You go from "2 per day" to "UNLIMITED! YOU GET A SQUIRREL AND YOU GET A SQUIRREL AND YOU GET A SQUIRREL, EVERYBODY GETS A SQUIRREL" and that's insane.

Tl;dr: The core appeal to me of playing druid at all is the shapeshifting. I would, genuinely, prefer it if the druid class was a half-caster that focused heavily on the shapeshifting mechanic--and before you all pile onto me in the notes, I know there's barbarian subclasses that bring in some shifter flavor, but that's not really what I'm talking about. I want to play a druidic shapeshifter.

So here's how I house-rule Wildshapes at my table (if, of course, the player is interested--I'm not out here forcing OTHER people to play THEIR characters the way I prefer, come on now) and then, just for fun, a couple of wildshape variants I've thought up but never had the chance to really play with, that DMs might offer as optional druidic feats.

If anyone with more experience and skill than me at putting together subclasses ever wants to yoink these, please do. Please. Someone fix this.

Core Wildshape

The no-frills replacement to RAW wildshape, just a 1:1 replacement.

You have a number of Wildshape charges equal to half your Druid level, rounded up.

Each Wildshape charge allows you to take one animal form, with restrictions as listed on the Beast Shapes table, for up to one hour.

There are no "partial charges," so transforming for five minutes uses the full charge just as if you'd transformed for a full hour.

Charges can be chained together seamlessly; if you choose to remain transformed past the first hour, you simply expend another Wildshape charge. You can also move directly from one Wildshape form to another by expending a new Wildshape charge. (This isn't Animorphs; you don't have to "re-transform" between charges.)

Wildshape Variants

Variant: Feral

(Prerequisite: Druid level 8)

Your communion with nature has made you as comfortable in the form of animals as in your own skin--if not more so.

You have a number of Wildshape charges equal to your Druid level. Beginning at level 12, your Wildshape forms can have a CR equal to 1/3 your Druid level, rounded down.

Variant: Druidic Avatar

You have achieved deep congruence with one of your animal forms, such that it has become tightly associated with you. Choose one wildshape form of size Small, Medium, or Large as your avatar.

While in this form, you can cast spells as normal, replacing verbal components with appropriate animal noises, as long as any necessary material components are physically present (being absorbed into your wildshape form when you transformed counts).

You can choose to alter your avatar when you take a long rest. Once you have done this, you cannot alter it again until one month has passed.

Variant: Deepwoods Shifter

Your travels in the wildest and most remote woodlands have given you a deep understanding of many forms of life beyond simple beasts--forms of life that are, to you, no less natural.

You have a short list of Deepwoods forms. Choose one non-humanoid creature, of no higher than CR 1, of a type other than Beast, to begin this list. Every time you are given the option of an ability score improvement (applied retroactively), you may choose another non-Beast, non-humanoid creature form with a CR of 1/3 your Druid level, rounded down, to add to your list.

These choices can be altered whenever a new form is added to the list.

[plounce]

y'shtola and urianger are suuuuch effective foils for each other, whenever i want to think about one i compare the other and i go Ohhhh and then i become The Comprehender. like for example, in shadowbringers, y'shtola goes to the nights blessed, far from more industrial society - a culture with deep and intricate spiritual beliefs that arose after the flood (an interpretation of light and dark that is a folk belief rather than the establishment's), along with a proximity to distantly ancient ruins for her explore. meanwhile urianger goes to the bookman's shelves, full of books from just before the flood from the established civilizations of the first, seeking to learn more from those more recent establishment scholars. which falls in line with y'shtola being a field agent while urianger stayed in the waking sands basement

y'shtola left behind established sources of knowledge to seek out her own - master matoya, distrustful and disdainful of the state authority that will not tell her the whole truth, goes to live in a far off cave. urianger does not - he tends to bend more easily to others' will (minfilia, the exarch, etc) (enabler! enabler!!). urianger has a character arc where he grows out of that, fully shrugging it off after the exarch's plans fail. in endwalker he's basically always out in the field instead of in sharlayan or at the rising stones - the most similar he is to his early self is electing to stay on the moon, which really reveals more about how he has learned to reach out and connect with others and extend compassion + understanding.

and it is really brought out in ultima thule, where y'shtola stands in defiance to an "authority" on truth and knowledge, declaring that she wants to discover knowledge on her own and for herself, and urianger's sacrifice is all about how supportive he is of his friends. i cry.

yshtola doesn't have (/hasn't yet had...?) a character arc where she has to grow and change - she's extremely secure in herself. i think dawntrail, which seems to be all about forging ahead to new things, has potential for more stuff for her - here's hoping!

tl;dr the secret to understanding them is that they are caster dps vs healer

[ponett]

Was rereading your FFXVI article the other day and I got curious to know why you don’t like Bravely Default and Octopath. I agree that Octopath is a tedious dumpster fire, but I quite liked the Bravely series apart from That One Bit of Default (and also the entirety of BD2, which plays a lot more like Octopath and is therefore dogshit). I’d be interested to hear your thoughts in more detail, if you’re willing to share?

I will definitely say that I liked what I played of Bravely Default 1 (the only one of the Bravely games I've touched) better than Octopath 1. It's not the worst. I can see how people who are more patient with it can get a lot out of it. I think most of my problems with it mainly come down to pacing. The story takes a long time to go anywhere, and the writing along the way didn't grab me. (Ringabel's constant womanizing certainly didn't help.) You unlock additional jobs slowly. It felt like I had to stop and grind a lot, either to level my jobs or just to have enough gold to buy shit. Compared to the whirlwind pace of the classic FFs it was riffing on, it felt like I was making very little progress during the time I played

But the thing that really bothered me is that, even in the early game, bosses are massive damage sponges with tons of HP that take forever to fight. My casters would run out of MP halfway through the fight, and because of how rare and expensive ethers were I'd have no way to restore their MP, so I'd just limp along to the end of the fight without magic. It was miserable. Most old school JRPGs are also pretty strict about MP recovery items, sure, but in those games boss fights tend to be MUCH shorter until later in the game, and they're generally designed so that going in with a full HP/MP party already puts you at an advantage. Those games also have items like tents so that you can restore your party at save points, whereas Bravely seemingly just expects you to turn off encounters and walk all the way back to the nearest inn. These are VERY strange design decisions in a game that's trying so hard to be accessible and low-friction, to the point that you can just turn off random encounters whenever you want. This balancing feels like the worst of both worlds when it comes to classic and modern JRPG design

I can pinpoint the exact moment in the story that was my last straw, though, about six hours into the game. I took a photo of it. It was this:

In a better story, I could roll my eyes at this line and move on. But I was already having a generally unpleasant time, and the story felt like it had barely gone anywhere in six whole hours. (By that point in FF6 you could be nearing the opera!! In Chrono Trigger you'd probably be in Magus' friggin' castle!!!!!) So I decided it was time to cut my losses

I took this as an opportunity to just go and play FF5, rather than a modern game that's imitating it. I still need to actually beat FF5 someday (I am terrible about finishing long games because ADHD etc. etc.), but god, I loved what I played of it, and it really just highlighted how much better it is than Bravely Default. WAY better story pacing, way better bosses, you unlock the jobs way quicker, the party is way more likeable. It was still a game where I found myself grinding, but in FF5 it felt like I was actively making the choice to invest time in my character builds because I was having fun with those systems, rather than feeling forced to grind for gold or whatever

TL;DR the moral of this story is that everyone should play FF5

[shuttershocky]

Did Roman have to go through college as he was reborn too? Did Marisbury pay for his education?

This is the funniest thing ever. Imagine this normal ass guy with no considerable achievements who had his documents, his education and his job provided for by the wealthy magus in charge of Chaldea. People probably got all the wrong ideas.

You're not the first person to have thought of that but I really didn't want to remember that while they were building a massive base in the South Pole at least one UN representative has got to have theorized that "Dr. Roman" who was suddenly born into the world at the age of 30+ years old complete with a doctorate was some billionaire's boytoy.

Anyway, I doubt Romani actually had to go to school. While he did lose all his powers, he knew enough about magecraft to run Chaldea and to discreetly contact the next Grand Caster for help without alerting Goetia, so he probably still retained some of his knowledge if not his powers.

If so, putting him through school in the Clock Tower would have been pointless, and hilarious. All the Founders of the Clock Tower were King Solomon's students, including Zelretch and Brishisan, who are both still alive. If Roman actually saw what certain Clock Tower members got up to in the few thousand years since King Solomon died, he would throw a fit.