#I LOVE MY MUTUALS SO FREAKING MUCH. you guys. you guys are awesome.

[lawlietscaramels]

I get really chatty at this time for some reason. it's like the very end of the day for me and very few people are active

[steadfastsaturnsrings]

Tumblr Fandom: A Year in Review 2023

No one tagged me but I saw @captain-hen do this and I thought it would be fun!

Top 5 characters:

Evan Buckley (911)

Eddie Diaz (911)

Bobby Nash (911)

Christopher Diaz (911)

Steve Harrington (Stranger Things)

Top 5 4 fandoms:

911

Stranger things

IT

5 seconds of summer

Top 5 4 OTPs:

Evan Buckley/Eddie Diaz (911)

Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson (Stranger Things)

Richie Tozier/Eddie Kaspbrak (IT)

Bill Denbrough/Stanley Uris (IT)

Shoutout to some new friends:

I joined tumblr early this year and there are too many people to count! :)

@thewolvesof1998 thank you so much for being my first 911 mutual and really helping me feel welcome in the fandom and also always tagging me in stuff and always being supportive of my writing! You’re fics are also so so amazing! I am so happy to call you my friend 💕💕

@pirrusstuff you are so lovely! I love everything you taught me about día de Los muertos! I love all of our conversations and seeing photos of your food and dogs. They are so cute. You always make me smile and you’re just such a lovely friend 💕💕

@aspecbuddie you are so awesome! I love talking to you about fanfic ideas and 911 and just about anything! You always brighten my day and I love talking to you through my day. You are an amazing friend 💕💕

@lover-of-mine Anna, you truly are phenomenal. Your gifs are gorgeous and heartbreaking in the best way possible. I love reading all of your speculations and theories about 911 and all of your insights. Our conversations are something I always treasure and they really help me appreciate 911 in a deeper way. I am happy to call you my friend 💕💕

@housewifebuck Cam, you are so awesome! I love all of your gifsets, I literally reblog nearly every one :) Your shop and job that you do are truly so inspiring. I love freaking out about 911 in the DMs with you. You are so awesome and I am glad to call you my friend 💕💕

@theotherbuckley I was so happy when we started talking because I LOVE your writing so much! It is soooo good! I love talking with you about fanfic and just 911 in general and anything and everything. I am glad to call you my friend 💕💕

@jamespearce9-1-1 You are so cool! I love talking about fanfic with you and learning all about NZ! I love your writing and you are a really cool and genuine guy. I love that you are so passionate about your job. I am glad to call you my friend 💕💕

Shoutout to some old friends

@msasterisk and @lildreamer32 you two are awesome and are always so supportive of me and my writing. You guys are so phenomenal and I am grateful to be able to call you two my friends 💕💕💕

Favorite creation(s) you posted this year:

my sole edit that I made (here) and my flickers of fate fanfic (here)

Favorite creation someone else posted this year:

I love so many creations I saw, please go check out my 12 days of fandom and all the honorable mentions. But it I had to pick just one, it would be this by @olisgifs (I explain why in the post :) )

People who brightened your year:

Once again there are too many people to count!

@hippolotamus for all the support on my writing and helping me navigate tumblr and being so friendly

@theplaceyoustillrememberdreaming for always sending me asks in ask games

@bucksbackwardcap for your gorgeous artwork and also sending me asks in ask games

@daffi-990 for being such a friendly and kind mutual and being so supportive of me and my writing :)

@buckaroosheart @wikiangela @exhuastedpigeon @eddiebabygirldiaz @disasterbuckdiaz @liabegins @eightpackdiaz @malewifediaz @aroeddiediaz @jesuisici33 @loserdiaz @cm1031sr @weewootruck @butraura @bucksbirthmark @elgascreamslikehell

@911hiatus and @epicbuddieficrecs for reblogging a couple of my fanfics thank you so much 🥹

Anyone who left me a note on my little Christmas tree, All My followers, everyone who has interacted with my posts and anyone else I forgot to mention (if I forgot you please just let me know and I will add you :) )

Anyone else you want to mention:

Special shout-out to the lovely @ronordmann for not only making me such beautiful covers but also being so patient and kind with me as I navigate being a fanfic writer and requesting things. Your work is phenomenal and I want to thank you again for taking the time to make me such gorgeous covers and for being patient and kind with me too as we discussed ideas for requests 💕💕💕💕💕💕💕💕

I wanted to thank @monsterrae1 for always being so supportive of my writing and navigating tumblr. And I wanted to give you a special shout-out because I really treasured our conversation about día de Los muertos. I learned so much and it was so cool. I am so grateful to be able to call you my friend 💕💕

@harringrove-cafe: I want to give you a special shoutout! Your idea is so so cute and spreads so much positivity. I appreciate all of the effort you put into running the cafe and it really makes me smile and always brightens my day. You really have thought of everything for it from the volunteering to the themed days. It must take a lot of work to do all of that and I want to personally express my gratitude for all the effort you put into it. You are seen by me :) I am so glad I found the cafe. It is so special and wholesome 💕💕💕💕💕

5 of Your Favorite Authors This Year:

@thewolvesof1998 all of their fics are good but I love their Morse code fic in particular and their dog tags fics as well

@jesuisici33 I am so excited for her heart fic

@theotherbuckley the way she writes Buck heals my soul ❤️

@aroeddiediaz I am super excited for her Martian AU!

@chaoticgremlinwholikescheese for your fanfic the bridge

5 9 of Your Favorite Artists/Gifmakers/Podficcers/Etc. This Year:

@lover-of-mine for all of your beautiful gifsets and edits

@housewifebuck for all of your beautiful gifsets and edits and your art too!

@gloomy-prince for your trans Eddie AU I love it so much

@try-set-me-on-fire your fanart is always so lovely

@ronordmann for your beautiful covers!

@loserboygator for all of your cool edits

@ashleyloob I love your OC art!

@bucksbackwardcap I love your art it is so beautiful

@harringrove-cafe for all of your fanart and work you put into running the harringrove cafe!

3 things you’re looking forward to in 2024

Finishing my fanfic there may not be meaning (so find one and seize it) snippets here!

911 season 7

Taking the new year as a fresh start :)

Tagging:

Everyone mentioned in the post and anyone else who wants to play :)

[aspenstarflare]

Hello There! I haven’t really had much interaction with the clone wars community much so I’m just gonna put all my head cannons out there and hope for the best. (By the way it is Ok to disagree with these I am just putting these out for the fun of it)

-I imagine that Anakin is like this “fun dad” to the entire 501st, all the clones look up to him as a mutually respectable general but also the guy who would fight tooth and nail to keep each and every one of them safe and cared for. He has definitely helped a lot of his men through medical emergencies and panic attacks due to flashbacks, and also done goofy pranks on Obi-Wan the 212th to help distract his men from the dread that washes over when traveling to the next campaign. This guy was made to just be a father.

- Biromanic Asexual Obi-Wan. This guy flirts with all his opponents, must I say anything else?

-I know there’s a lot of confusion on if Ahsoka and Anakin have a Father-Daughter or Older Brother-Younger sister dynamic. I honestly believe that they way they view their dynamic is shifting a lot and seen as different from the duo but I do personally lean the Father-Daughter side as Ahsoka was a living being that Anakin was given the role of looking after and taking care of.

-Ahsoka definitely has jokingly called Obi-Wan “grandpa” to tease him for being the oldest of the three and Obi-Wan definitely deflected but hid a smile at the “joke comment”.

-AroAce Ahsoka. Why you may ask? Because I said so. I don’t wanna see her dating anyone. She need no romantic partner, she got her little chosen family. Cough Her color theme for Mandalore arc is the one for the AroAce flag Cough. When Ahsoka told Anakin that she didn’t romantically get attachments he definitely celebrated the fact he didn’t have to hunt any potential romantic partners down.

-No matter how awesome Ahsoka is at her job of being a commander, she definitely still is a child and definitely has some Anxiety issues to deal with. The order definitely ignored this and told her to “release these feelings through the force” and Anakin knowing better and being the good master he is keeps a extra bed in his chambers (on the cruiser and in the temple), bought her a tiny stuffed tooka for her to keep around when her “flight or flight was on at unnecessary times” (panic attack), and let her trail him around like a lost child when she felt like she couldn’t be alone. Rex and Fives definitely also found out and keep a eye on their little commander, inviting her to bunk with them and the men whenever they notice she keeps following the general around like a lost loath-cat.

-Pansexual Anakin. I don’t need to justify this. He loves everyone, he’s a guy who wares his heart on his sleeve. His most admirable trait is all the love he openly has to give.

-Sometimes when they’re on leave, Anakin and Ahsoka go visit Padme together just to simply have nights out or watch holonets together and just chill out and pretend to be a calm normal family for once.

-Anakin has PTSD. You cannot tell me that this man has been through so many freaking traumatic events in his life and does not have it.

I have so many more but I’m very tired of writing these so here you go for now, I wanted to speak more of the clones, I’ll probably do a second half when I get to it.

[wololo-01]

HAPPY NEW YEAR FOR EVERYONE!!!!

I still having creative block so I can't draw :(

Long vent

I'm not going to lie that I'm surprised to this day that I didn't give up of trying be an artist or being here in the internet, I got screwed a lot by things that happened in real life, with family and online, I developed strong distrust issues, my self-esteem always fell down, I moved away from people who was never done a thing to me but I was feeling like a Prague near them and I thought I would hurt them if I stayed close, I also ended up having problems on school for repeating grades and that's only made me felt more horrible thinking that now I would be nothing at all in life.

I'm very happy to have met so many incredible and cool people, I know I'm not a person who interacts here much but I want to say thank you all so much for being so nice and really enjoying my arts, I really love seeing each wonderful artist and art, each incredible fanfic and story that everyone creates about the characters, headcanon, analysis and au's so interesting and captivating that They make me freak out with joy

And I try, I always tried to improve but I just went back to square one, it made me very depressed and At that point I just wanted to give up on everything, but my biggest inspiration to keep going is a VERY special person to me, We always talked a lot, we joked with each other, this person was the first friend I had, this person means the world to me, And I am very grateful to this day for being them friend. But not only them but also this fandom is very special to me,I was never much of a person who stayed in a fandom for a long time and if I did, it was just to enjoy my characters...when I met Henry Stickmin my head exploded with joy, I couldn't shut up about this game And I wanted to go find more, I started posting on Tumblr again with my old main account and I didn't expect people would like my fanarts, silly stuff And that this fandom would welcome me so well!.

And also I wanna said, to all my mutual and non- mutual @bluetorchsky @androidcharles @lovelygirlnicole15 @flamingredanon @capturecharlesau @jaytoons7 @00lari00 and EVERYONE YOU ALL ARE THAT MOST WONDERFUL PERSON I EVER MEET AND SEE ON MY LIVE!!!! YOU GUYS ARE SO FREAKING AWESOME AND INCREDIBLES ON WHAT YOU ALL DOES WORDS CAN EXPRESS THIS BUT I JUST TO SAY, YOU GUYS ARE THAT BEST!!! ✨♥️✨🫂♥️✨✨✨🫂♥️♥️♥️✨✨✨🫂

And especially, for @ghostbunnyarts YOU 👊, you are the most amazing, beautiful,kind Spectacular and awesome person That life could show me, I love you very much, you are my bestie, you are a wonderful artist and Writer and don't you DARE forget that, thanks for be my bests friends!!

NOW LOVE GUN ATTACK >:D 💙💛💕💙💛💙💕💛💕💚♥️🤎💚💜🤍💙💕💘💛💗💕💛💕💙💕💜💙💓💞💝💘💝💖💙💕💟🤍🤎❣️❤️♥️💘💕💗💞💛💝💜💝💚💗💟💗💖💝💗💕💘💟💛💖💘💓💝💗♥️🤍❣️🤎❣️🤍❤️💖💝❤️💓🤍💞❤️💚💚💛💞💖💓❤️🤍❤️❤️❤️❤️💘💛💖🤎🤍💗💘💜💚💜🤍💝💖♥️❤️🤎💘💙💛🔫

[daylander1000]

Thank you so much for continuing this story!!!! Your Aemond is my absolute favorite and I will accept no other version of his character. These chapters were so entertaining to read and you nailed every single aspect. All the Hightowers absolutely slayed, Aemond and Rheana’s banter was awesome and the humor was to die for. I love all the details you put into this fic from the logistics of the traveling to Loreon favorite game. It really elevates this fic from most of the other hotd fics out there and makes the reading experience reallyyyy enjoyable.

Aemond and Rheana are such pookies I wanna cuddle them both, Aemond freaking out over having cock blood in his mouth was so funny and that’s exactly why I love your Aemond he’s just so adorable and sociopathic. Rheana telling Aemond she likes how he looks is one of my favorite scenes, she is absolutely right, Criston aged fantastically and no one compares to him.

Btw I am manifesting for the blood to dye Aemond’s hair pink

Lolololol, Loreon's game took so long to come up with. Idk, I wanted to just have a normal happy child with normal happy siblings playing a normal happy game the way children do, and Rhaena reacting like "Ugh, these weirdos." But I ended up reading a ton of children's books rhymes and games...

I laughed so hard at the "cock-blood" repetition.

There's another story I had where I wrote an attempted assault, and in that, the heroine is flustered and panicking afterwards, and I really didn't want to do that again. It gave me deja vu writing it, and I took a step back like "Huh. Why am I writing this same exact scene again, only in a medieval setting? Why is this stuck in my subconscious?"

After much introspection, I left in the assault attempt, (because it's Westeros), but decided I wanted to sort of flip it(?) and have Aemond be the one who's flustered and panicky. I wanted to try to shift it to where it's the guy who feels violated and dirty and embarrassed and needs a hot bath to get clean again, while the girl sort of has to take charge and be the comforter to tell him that he's alright and help him get that hot bath set up because he needs it more than she does because she really is okay.

I read a ton of romance novels and hurt/comfort fics, and while I like the guy rescuing the girl, I don't like how it sometimes comes off like the girl is so overwhelmingly grateful that she's like "You have now earned me and unlocked my vagina. Here is the key to my panties as a reward for your kindness." I wanted it to be more mutual. Mutual comfort? Idk.

And Aemond's such a clean little meow meow in the series, (especially when compared to Aegon who's rolling around in the mud), it didn't feel too extremely ooc to write him not enjoying the bloodshed of penile amputation.😅

[guard-en]

always lovely seeing ur stuff on my dash, WISH I DIDN'T HAVE SOOOO MUCH ANXIETY 'bout messaging cuz you are genuinely such a dear and i would love to blabber at you but Ooouh boy im not good at convos. But like i said i sit back and observe you like some manner of beautiful deer and do a little wii bowling jump whenever i get an interaction from ya. Much love :3

GRAAAHHHH I WISH TUMBLR WOULD SHOW ME MORE OF YOUR STUFF I HAVE TO SEARCH FOR IT AND SCOUR YOUR ACCOUNTS LIKE A FREAK OF NATURE YOU'RE VERY SWEET AND AWESOME FROM MY UNDERSTANDING AND I REALLY APPRECIATE. YOUR APPRECIATION. OF MY STUPID ACTIVITIES ON THE WEBS! IF YOU WANT TO MESSAGE ME GO RIGHT AHEAD THE ONLY REASON I DON'T GO AHEAD AND MESSAGE ALL MY MUTUALS IS OUT OF AN OMNIPRESENT HOVERING SHADOW ENTITY THAT HECKLES ME AND CALLS ME A BITCH WHENEVER I EXIST WITHOUT SOMEONE ASKING ME TO. love your word and phrase choice also very silly very lovely DO NOT FEAR ME i am some guy woman failbutch and I am so approachable. ignore your geiger counter come Closer

[regretisstoredintheme]

HI OMG!!! IT'S YOU I'VE BEEN TRYING TO FIND YOU AGAIN HIIII!!! You are so awesome I'm so happy you exist please continue existing argahhrhs I remember sending an ask a long time ago and you replying so nicely and making me happy and I have not forgotten about you since (I forgot ur username but also I forget my own birthday so like/lh) rahrah I hope that's not weird m sorry if it is I uhhh

Neeways for the asks thing!! If if you're still taking (idk when u reblogged it I didn't see)

what made you start your blog?

tell a story about your childhood

what’s some good advice you want to share?

Pls have the greatest day and have a very good year this year (im manifesting it this is a threat/silly)

AAAAAAA YOU FOUND ME!!!! WELCOME BACK MY CHILD COME HERE!!!

Thank YOU for existing 😭😭 I’m literally nothing w/o you guys I love you so much — which ask we’re you if you don’t mind me asking??? :0 I don’t remember a lot of my works BFJBSJS

anyways! Answer time!

what made you start your blog?

I started it because I had been talking to a mutual on another account I believe? In any case @tmntxthings is a huge reason why I had the guts to post my stuff :(( ❤️❤️ they were a huge support and even gave me ideas for my first post: Leo x ShyFelineReader. They are AWESOME and you should check em out >:)

share a childhood story!

Ooo boy… which one should I pick? Alright. I don’t remember a lot from my childhood, but this one’s pretty funny in hindsight.

in 5th grade, I was definitely the “everyone needs to act their age” kid.. it wasn’t cute but anyway— one day when I was playing on the playground I noticed a little spider in the wood chips. I bent to look at it and a few girls surrounded me to see what I was looking at. They freaked out upon seeing the spider but I insisted I just wanted to help it and attempted to scoop it up.

just then, a shoe comes out of nowhere and steps on the spider (and, effectively, my fingers.)

now I have a huge respect for life, so my teachers pet looking ass stood up and shoved this girl. Not like pushed — like SHOVED. “That’s an innocent creature! This is his home! It WAS at least— how would you have liked it? How would you like it if I squashed you and left you to die!?” Looking back I was intense asf as a little 12 y/o but eventually I ran off after scaring the shit out of this girl.

I… ended up apologizing once my favorite teacher’s aid had us talk to each other but STILL BADASS FOR A TEACHERS PET WHO DIDNT GET IN TROUBLE FOR ANYTHING!

what’s some good advice you’d like to share?

honestly? For someone who’s just starting out as a writer, especially a fanfic writer, here’s what I got.

Write your favorites. Nothing quite like writing what you want to give you motivation. Have an idea? Go! Do it right now! Write the dumbest version! Build the skeleton that will build your life. It’s worth getting over the hurdle of just… starting.

Don’t do requests you don’t want to. take this with a grain of salt, but you’re never going to please everyone. It can be great to get out of your comfort zone and try new things with new characters, but if you’re just starting out? Stick to the ones that make you excited, the ones that make you think “that’s such a good idea!” Or “I know just the setting for that!” And take the idea and run with it!! Most tumblr users don’t even expect their ask to be answered.

[numetaljackdog]

what i'm listening to 4/5/2023 (song notes under cut!)

spot. link//yt link

Laura Les - Haunted: haunted. by laura les.

100 gecs - Dumbest Girl Alive: yeah there's gonna be a fair few new gecs tracks in here. dumbest girl alive is my favorite from 10k, i can't even express how much it just hits every time. i love the riff, i love the lyrics, i love the music video, i love the production, love it love it love it. i also included a minecraft parody i found when searching the video on youtube, you're welcome

Black Flag - Revenge: i've been trying to rediscover my love for some of my favorite hardcore genres, so i took it all the way back to the early days and reconnected with one of my favorite bands. i encountered this song in high school when trying to find clean black flag songs that i could put in a piece i was writing about the history of metal (which the band is not, but hardcore is significant in the history of the genre anyway). it's a great thrash-and-basher and apparently has not been in my playlist until now, which i was unaware of lol

The Beatles - Strawberry Fields Forever: once again i must admit to listening to the beetles.... alas. look it's a really good song, the lead-in to the chorus is fucking amazing, the instrumentation is really interesting and unique, it just washes over you like waves of sound. plus it's goofy as hell

Jaga Jazzist - I Could Have Killed Him In The Sauna: from the INSTANT i heard the intro of this track i was like ohhh that's going in the next WILT. i don't have a ton to say about it, just listen. it's good sounds to chew on. shoutout io

100 gecs - Billy Knows Jamie: i freaked the fuck out when i heard this track, no joke. which is funny, because i'm pretty certain they played this when i saw them last fall, but i didn't have any frame of reference at the time for whether it would sound the same on the record. i just kept thinking "they did this for ME. SPECIFICALLY" because like hello??? i'm the nu metal gecs fan!!! that's like my whole thing!!!! and this literally sounds like limp bizkit half the time!!!!! i honestly kind of wouldn't mind if the breakdown at the end had been a little more restrained, just to preserve the feeling that it's 1999 all over again, but whatever. it cums. it's also about violence and killing, so i even get a little bit of like juggalo vibes almost

Fiona Apple - To Your Love: this song sounds so sexyyyy like maybe this is out of pocket but when this came on shuffle on a singer-songwriter playlist i was browsing i literally stopped what i was doing and was just like 😳😳😳 it's insane. and like when her voice gets all growly at one point later in the track... anyway haha

Marnie Stern - Prime: found via that coolass video i reblogged a while back oh god let's see if i can find that. holy shit i can't believe that worked. i don't know anything about marnie stern but i should listen to more because prime knocked the wind out of me it's good

100 gecs - The Most Wanted Person In The United States: last gecs track... and it's more rap rock!!! kind of. did you guys catch that cypress hill sample? i sure did!!!! love itttt. plus there's more killing it's so awesome. i've already said most of this stuff to violet (hi violet) but for real i think "got anthony kiedis suckin on my penis" is one of the all-time greatest bars and i'm not joking

DJ Lycox - BILLIE JEAN (DIOR): a lot of music from people on here this month! one of my mutuals (who probably won't read this but if you do. hi :3) posted this track and i really love the original pop smoke song so i was like right what's all this then. it's good. that's what it is then

Bruce Springsteen - Born to Run: i was reading this article about bruce springsteen being a sort of icon for butch womanhood and that had me like wow i am feeling emotions right now. and so i went and listened to some springsteen and you know what he rocks. there's something so desperate and heartbreaking about his songwriting, it hits me in a real way. and i've never even been to new jersey

Ada Rook - 920LONDON: new rook album ooh yeah babey. not my fav record she's ever done but still really fucking good. this song kind of reminds me of everlong, which like. girl who's only ever listened to everlong by the foo fighters listening to her second song: getting a lot of everlong by the foo fighters vibes from this. but still it's about holding each other close and making the most of what we have in our rapidly passing time, plus the riffs are kind of similar in ways that i don't feel like fudging musical terminology to try and describe

Sarah Vaughan - Lullaby Of Birdland: cool jazz can be kind of whatever but y'know i'm a vocals girlie and sarah vaughan honestly probably deserves to be listed up there with the greats. her vocal control is insane, and the way she just drifts from her higher register to the lower and back again is hypnotic. good fucking song plus shows props to charlie parker

May Leitz - gODKILLER: another from tumblr, thanks to user bigbaywindow for directing me towards may leitz ^_^ i have been rocking with several of her songs but this was the first one i listened to and it's really good, the lyrics hit me in a certain way as well that some of you might guess. also while putting together the youtube playlist i discovered that may makes youtube videos including one that i've seen floating around my recommended page a couple of times?? so i guess i'll have to see what's goin on over there

The International Sweethearts Of Rhythm - Vi Vigor: am i like. crazy. i would have SWORN that i put this in a previous WILT but i can find no evidence of that being true. in any case this is a cool kinda bebop-inspired jazz piece by an all-woman jazz ensemble who i wanna listen to more of. there's some really great sax work on here especially, so if you're into that def check this one out

Girls Rituals - Hole/The Used: okay funny story on this one. this was the first song i ever heard from any of devi's projects, it was before i even really knew who black dresses was. this song appeared in my release radar and i was like "who the fuck is this" and i'm convinced it only happened because the title is the names of two bands which i WAS already listening to at the time. and i listened to the song and said "this is really bad, and i don't understand why anyone would listen to this." and then i mostly forgor about it. skip forward to recently - i am obviously a big fan of devi's work and plenty of other projects adjacent to this. i get a big new batch of songs in my playlist (hello again to violet shoutout violet) and this song is in here. i listen to it. it's good :) take that, me from two years ago

The Buggles - The Plastic Age: the mandatory Todd Find™ for this month. i was watching the one hit wonderland episode on these guys and honestly didn't pay attention too closely bc i was busy but this song stuck. you guys know i'm all about that campy futurey cyberpunk-adjacent shit. it would be a stretch to say this fully gets there but it's still a fun song either way

Cage The Elephant - Cigarette Daydreams: lame song honestly but the chorus is super catchy plus there's a story. when i was working my old job there was a supervisor i liked a lot who played a wide range of tunes on shift. sometimes it was chill instrumental stuff, sometimes it was metalcore, and sometimes it was like this sort of radio alternative shit. this song specifically would play a lot, as you can imagine, and at the time it annoyed me, especially because of how catchy it is, it would make me think of work. but now both that supervisor and i have left, and so now it just reminds me of vibing with them and making the most of being on the clock. a cigarette daydream indeed

Jason Segel & Walter - Man Or Muppet: i don't know, man. i've had this song stuck in my head since i was eight years old and one day i randomly thought "i wonder if that's on streaming" and it is

[ghosts-and-blue-sweaters]

are you. are you still doing the mutual ask?

Bia. Oh my friend. I was hoping you’d send one of these heck yeah.

WELL WOULD YOU LOOK AT THAT. MANY BINGOS! (well technically one bingo and a few nearly-there-bingos but STILL)

Slight older sibling vibes. Ever so slight.

Hehe harasses you with. with the gifs. of. of wilbur… soot. harasses you-

SHARED INTERESTSSSSSS!!! Fellow DSMP fan who is Christian :D Fellow person who does not like Wilbur and Techno as twins! Fellow person who loves sandduo! Fellow person who writes fanfic! Fellow person who likes AJR!

c!Phil is Your Guy, 100%. Blorbo. When I think of you I think of c!Phil. Messy birb guy.

EATS YOUR WRITING OH MAN EATS IT DEVOURS ONNOMNOM. The excitement I feel when I receive an email stating you have posted/updated a fic is unparalleled. Like. Oh my gosh. You write the best fics ever. ALSO APARTMENT 238 MY BELOVED <3

Listen, I love Phil, but I am also judging him a little bit <3 Just a bit. Still love him though. Messy birb guy.

I LOVE IT WHEN YOU SPOUT OFF YOUR VAST KNOWLEDGE OH MY GOSH YOU KNOW SO MUCH ABOUT SO MANY THINGS YESSSSSSSS

Mutual chaos >:D We made the Man Or Muppet edit together, I’d say <3 You are chaotic and I am crazy we do well together *nods*

Free space: WE MUST GO ON A ROAD TRIP AND EAT GUMMI WYRMS AND GO TO GAS STATIONS AND SUCH! WE MUST! Meeting up irl would actually be so much fun oh my goshhhhh

I LOVE IT WHEN YOU SEND MESSAGESSSSSS it’s so much fun!! I absolutely love getting harassed by you XD And despite the Cursed-ness, I do enjoy when you tag me in horrid Cars AU’s lol. We harass each other. It’s the circle of life.

Met on tumblr, yep! You were the second DSMP friend I ever made :’) And also the person who helped me navigate the DSMP fandom lol I was so confused about Everything back then-

I consider you one of my best friends <3 Not many people could stay up until 5am talking to each other OR argue for 40 minutes over Doomsday and still be close lol. Our bond is strong, my friend.

I DO THE SPINNY THING A LOT WHEN I CHAT WITH YOU YESSSSSSS!!! Especially when we vc :D I remember you telling me that Ghostbur was “like the boyfriend I just don’t see the potential in” and my brain did spinny things because I loved the way you worded that lol AND ALSO you and other-discord-friend were talking about Minecraft and how neither of you were good at combat/fighting within the game, and that you were holding me up to “Technoblade levels of fighting” once I get the game XD It was so awesome and I wrote that quote down because I loved it so much alsgaksgaksgajg

Still to this day I kinda freak out whenever you interact with me XD AND WE HAVE KNOWN EACH OTHER SO LONG!!! WELL OVER A YEAR!!!

Heh I shoved The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty in your face, I did I did. And also Lovejoy.

What are friends if they cannot shake each other violently /pos? <3

I love getting to chat about my fic ideas with you but I still get nervous over doing it :’) Not even specific with you, but with anyone 😅 I guess because I’m so quiet irl, I have a hard time… bringing myself to share ideas with people? I don’t know, I’m trying to work on it :) But yes, I looove getting to chat about ideas with you, Bia!!

[you-have-been-frizzled]

25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end. Spicy addition: Questioner provides the passage.

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

For writing asks?

25.

that Kesler and Juline watch X files, it wasn’t relevant to the fic it was in, considering the age group of the kotlc fandom, i doubt anyone other than me and the one kotlc/X files mutual has watched it (though you guys should because it’s awesome). but it’s important to me

18.

there’s this passage in Two

-

Keefe’s going to die, one voice said

“no, he’s not. They need him alive if they want him to be useful.’

his mind will shatter said another

“no, it won’t. He’s not useful with a shattered mind.”

they will make him go numb

“‘no, he’s not,”

they will horribly hurt him as punishment

“no….”

they will break him. They will crush that light that he has, they will kill the boy you know, the boy you love will be dead

“NO!”

-

i deal with intrusive? thoughts (my brains a asshole) and will literally do things like this to me constantly especially late at night, it didn’t change the ending but i’m pretty sure this passage is going to effect my writing style in the future as i’m planning to use this same way of writing in my wip.

17.

ok i’m trying not to talk to much about my Kesline wip just to see if i can, so i’ll go with the original story i come back to a lot, it’s barley an idea atm so bear with me

basically an massive emp from a solar flare knocks out all of the electricity in the country for six months or more. the main character is a young mom and her two kids, they already have a place to live during the mini apocalypse and the story would be focused on building up their home and gaining members of their little survival gang. less doomsday more nature coming and taking over, also featuring the government being completely useless, tons of found family, ASL, and traumatized kids that where traumatized pre apocalypse

i have a whole list of dystopian clichés and tropes that i hate, and want to avoid at all costs, literally every disabled person dying, getting a home just to have it destroyed, people dying but there’s no actual reason for it even in a apocalypse setting, freaking cannibals every time, the kids doing dumb stuff and getting killed when it would probably be the teens, that weird thing where it goes from realistic end of the world to freaking sci fi out of nowhere the list goes on

*gestures to quiet place* i like end of the world stories like that better (other than the farm being destroyed)

anywho…i don’t actually like fantasy much (reading it or writing it) i really prefer sci fi and dystopian, Kotlc was enough of a mix of the three i was willing to read it

[fractallogic]

Feeling kind of crappy and I know it’s because of the immune response and sore arms from getting two vaccines at once and having a chomped-upon finger and being stressed and probably also because of the KFC-induced heartburn but like. CMON.

Also I kind of want to blame the blah-ness of today on my nightmare last night (which tbf kinda freaked me out when it was still dark and I woke up from it, and also still weighed on me in the morning so I spent extra time sleeping and comforting myself on my phone, so it really did make a very slow start to the day), because that’s what happens when I die in a dream, which is BELOW because EVERYONE loves to read about other people’s dreams (and I’m on mobile, so no cuts) (sorry not really sorry, I think j and k still work to skip to the next/previous post)

It started off as a department potluck (like a prospie party, but also some kind of celebration for a small seminar class?) and got going when one of the dude profs goes “hey who wants to go to [restaurant I can’t remember the dream name of]?? Dinner’s on me!” and for some reason when I decide to go he takes me aside and is like “just so you know it’s all like, hunted meat, like game and stuff” and I’m like yeah that’s fine, I really like venison and rabbit and elk and stuff, and he’s like “okay great! Also don’t forget to bundle up; it’s very cold.” And I’m like well I was going to anyway (but I can’t find my HEAVIEST coat, which I thought in the dream was fine because my irl winter coat is warm enough, but man, if the RUSSIAN prof is saying that, he fuckin KNOWS about winter), so …yeah?

A bunch of us go for a walk and in dream fashion we arrive at this restaurant, which is kind of shabby, dark, poorly lit mainly with lanterns and very dim lights, and was not only previously in an old house, but also still very much decorated like an old house that oop—happened to have a long table set with questionable-looking meat and side dishes with flies around them. I was like well. fine. I guess I’m glad I already ate at the potluck because… this game was hunted and then apparently not refrigerated. Russian prof is like “oh yeah let me take you on a tour! But stay close, it’s a weird place.”

Turns out what he means by that is that the house exists in several different dimensions and when you go through a door once, it leads one place, and when you go through the same (or identical-looking!) door, you could also very well go in another direction. At this point I’m feeling very perturbed, but I keep following the group and stay close to the prof because he clearly knows where he’s going. Everyone is silent.

At some point we come across a guy with long shaggy blonde hair, who alternates between looking like the townie I had a huge crush on in college (and also a very mutual and enthusiastic fwb thing) and the blonde guy specifically in his first-season character in American horror story. I am delighted and am like “hey!! You live here?! Why haven’t I seen you around?!” And he’s just like “eh, you know me, I hang out at night, like always.”

In dream time it’s been a truly bananas amount of time to be “gone for dinner”, which I recognize and absolutely do not care about because I’m chatting with everyone and have lost track of most of the group except for blonde guy and maybe four other people. At some point I go “wait where’s Russian prof??” And someone opens a door and is like see? He’s at the dinner table, he’s fine. And indeed, he’s eating, chatting with some people I don’t know, looks like he’s having a great time. I had been starting to feel edgy and still don’t feel awesome, but calm down a little.

Another few dream hours pass and I’m like listen, it’s day out, I definitely have to get home and take care of the cat—also why don’t I feel hungry? And blonde guy has left, and the other people in the group are like oh yeah huh, we should probably leave. They’re talking about splitting up to find a way out, which I do NOT like. I stay with the larger part of the group, which is a couple other people and me. We have a well-put-together dream montage of us going up and down stairs, opening doors, crossing some water at some point, going through backyard and stuff, and we never seem to get back to the front of the house. I DO NOT LIKE THIS. There seems to be blood on the walls and the house gets dirtier and dingier as we keep going.

Eventually we get to the front room, where the food still looks intact, like no one ate it, but is definitely rotting. Blonde guy, breathless, runs up to us and asks us what we’re doing. We’re leaving, we say. He’s like, well, that’s not going to happen. But listen, follow me.

He takes us to the backyard, which is shaded by HUGE trees. He does something that makes us realize that he himself can’t leave, and he gets hurt pretty badly if he tries to go out of the shade. I joke and ask him if he’s a vampire. Not quite, he says, but it’s not all that far off.

Time passes; the other two or three people in the group are gone, and it’s just me and the blonde boy. I’m resigned to it somehow and am like okay, so it’s us now?? I have some clothes back at the potluck house, so can I have them here? And he’s like oh yeah, you should hang them up. And suddenly I have a bag with six shirts and three pairs of jeans, and one of the trees has actually been fashioned into a closet. The catch is that I have to pass slightly out of the shade to get the clothes. I do this without thinking, but notice that I get very tanned, kind of like the skin on a rotisserie chicken.

Blonde boy looks angry. He hangs up all my clothes for me silently and brusquely. I ask him what’s going on, and he’s like “I told him not to fucking do this, you’re not supposed to be here”, and I’m like wait, what do you mean, are you mad at me?? And he’s like “no, not at you, I’m mad at him, I can’t believe he just brought you here and didn’t tell you. You need to follow me right now.” The dream sense tells me that Russian prof is watching and is Not Happy that he’s been found out.

Blonde boy tells me to trust him, even if it seems strange. He walks very quickly in a straight line, backyard to what would be a front door if the house were a normal house. I follow him, trying not to get left behind. I notice I’m going faster and faster, just like he is, but not out of breath. I also notice that we’re walking through mesh that starts out chain-link-fence-sized and gets smaller with every iteration, and I’m cartoonishly chopped into cubes by the mesh that imperfectly reform as I keep walking (and also dream-sensibly know that blonde boy isn’t being chopped into cubes). He tells me “one more, that’s it”, I feel Russian prof closing in behind me, I walk through colander-sized mesh, I hear blonde boy say “oh shit”.

I realize that this was the last one for me, whatever way the blonde boy meant (dream-sense told me that it was basically like a screen door exiting the house—if I got through it, I was free), because I wasn’t reforming. I was instead sort of a mass of goo free-falling through a long hole and realized that this was death, and could also feel a parting between my physical self and my consciousness. I landed at the bottom of the abyss, just for a second, and could feel the parting of my soul and body. I could only feel the body after that, but it was completely limp, relaxed, and the last sensation I had was sheer contentment and peace. I noticed the weight in my limbs and zoomed out to a third-person view, where I could see a sort of pixelated pile of like, red top half (shirt) and blue bottom half (jeans) and some skin-colored parts. I stayed in that third person view for a few seconds/minutes(?) of complete silence and stillness, and then I woke up.

So it was WEIRD while it was happening, to go from terror to suddenly a release and peacefulness and “oh okay I’m dying” to like… “yeah there’s just nothing, just a container, a broken body”. While it was happening, I really remembered and felt the sudden peace and relaxation and silence, but when I woke up, all I could feel was the mounting terror and sense of doom. I was able to get back to sleep by remembering the peace and contentment, but that impending doom stayed with me for hours after I finally actually did wake up.

I have very mixed feelings about it, because usually the interpretation is that you’re feeling like there’s a huge and inevitable change coming, and in this case, I probably feel okay about it, but also CAN I PLEASE STOP DYING IN MY DREAMS??? The other time I died and it felt this real was when I was sixteen, and it was so vivid that I ended up writing a novella based on it for my creative writing classes. It was terrifying and I was being killed by my abusive bf.

But also maybe it’s me just mentally preparing myself for my mom’s death. I imagine that it will, in fact, feel like a sudden feeling of contentment and peace and departure from anything negative she’s feeling. While I was falling down the abyss, I realized death wasn’t something to be afraid of, just that it was a sudden absence of everything else around you, and it could be very pleasant. It was a relief after the uncertainty, anxiety, and terror I was feeling leading up to it.

At least it aligns with how I feel about death in my conscious mind. There aren’t really any surprises there, except for how my subconscious just decided to fucking demonstrate it for me.

NOT FEELING TOO KEEN ON GOING TO SLEEP TONIGHT. In case you were wondering.

[alexas-fandom-and-random-blog]

Give me 10 reasons you ship Strixxie

Ohohohooo! You don't come to my askbox drop this and expect me not to go ballistic I hope!

You asked for it so you shall receive!

1) Aesthetic!

Yeah really. They look so good together. Striker is hot, Moxxie is a cutie. The height difference. Their whole similar but also very different design.

It's just pleasing to the eye 🤩 Plus I got a thing for demons and tails and there are so many ways that's been showcased in fanart I'm quite the happy shipper here 😊

2) Protagonist/Antagonist.

Almost all of my obsessive ships have had this dynamic. I don't know why I'm so drawn to it but I am. Crazy potential for witty dialogue and forbidden sexual tension in that category too. I thrive in this problematic shit!

3) I’m onto you.

The ship ticks this one more special box for me of a charismatic villain playing the entire cast even for a little while but there's that one smart person from the group that sees through their act and antagonizes them from the very beginning. Moxxie was onto Striker's bullshit from the moment he started talking to him.

Like look at him giving funny looks here

“Wtf? No touchie. Who gave you permission?”

“Is something off with this guy? I can’t put my finger on it..”

Acting stubborn right after and wanting to prove himself might have been for petty reasons, insecurity and everyone giving him shit but his “instant dislike” (to quote Moxxie himself) for Striker didn’t openly start before this point. Which brings me to:

4) Mutual antagonism.

 Again right after this we get this sequence (sorry for bad quality)

Striker hasn’t truly provoked anyone up until this point. He’s been passive aggressive towards Millie and playing dumb on not knowing what freelance is(yeah right). He’s been very respectful to Blitzo and I believe these are some genuine emotions as he recognizes him like someone similar to him and then there’s this.

Moxxie starts challenging him. He processes it in for a moment and then we get the first nasty quick smile from him and a glimpse of his true colors as he becomes openly antagonistic. Now it’s a game, and not only does he want to play and win, he revels in the challenge. He knowingly pushes for it further afterwards.

“Don’t worry little one. You never stood a chance.”

Still playing his act, showing off and provoking all at once, with double meanings in his words attached. Nasty ass fucker I love him!

And of course Moxxie isn’t one to back down easily. I love the fact that Striker is the one who brings this quality of his out so prominently.

Like look at my sassy boy (old edit of mine)

And also love the crazy smile Striker gives as a response to this. And proceeds to provoke him even further without caring much about the gun or that he’s at a disadvantage and cornered by him and Blitzo at the moment.

It’s not plain anger. There is glee in it too.

Like he wants this challenge to go on even if it gets dangerous for him. Winning the game is more important than safety at the moment.

5) Nemesis stuff going on, recognized by canon.

This one kinda ties with the previous ones but its also something that gives me content and it’s awesome! Like this

and also the freaking title card of the episode itself. To quote some things I’ve said about it before:

Millie is looking at Moxxie concerned and a bit confused.

Blitzo is smiling obliviously at Striker.

Moxxie and Striker are the only ones openly antagonizing each other here!

Striker's hand goes above Blitzo's head and reaches for Moxxie.

It's not subtle.

And honestly Blitzo has enough nemesis already. Moxxie deserves one of his own!

6) Things in common.

Other than pleasing aesthetic both are smart, capable on their profession and as mentioned before antagonistic. It’s one of the reason Moxxie doesn’t buy his bullshit. Also they have common knowledge, gun expertise and being in the same wavelength in their thoughts.

 It’s ominous when Striker cuts off Moxxie when he’s accusing him of the real reason of having the gun but it’s also fascinating how they basically complete the thought process of each other. Moxxie stutters but keeps up with it and Striker doesn’t correct anything. If anything he looks pleased that his plan is being recognized for what it is before going for the throat.

7) “Complementing” opposites.

Sooo many!

Good Guy/Villain

City boy/Cowboy

Refined/Crude

Honest/Liar

Sentimental/Cold bloodied and Calculating

Moral Code/Very much lacking

Physical Strength/ Lack of

Confident/ Insecure

Close range combat/ Fighting mostly from a distance

Robust/Agile

Playboy/Faithful and simping for his girl only

Smooth talker/Awkward

The list goes oooon.

8) Fluff potential.

The whole I can fix him angle. Or reluctant gravitation towards a certain quality of the other since they are opposites in so many ways. Teaching the beast to love, supporting the unrecognized badass assassin Hell seems to constantly belittle. Go batshit crazy or reel it back and be happy. There are many possible scenarios.

9) Dark potential.

I’m a fan of both so this ship really speaks to me. I don’t think I need to say much here. Their whole entire one on one battle is deliciously just that. Anxiously problematic and heart-stopping. From Striker’s sadism and obvious hard on he gets from preying on Mox to how physical and dangerous it got, the first real oppressive scary thing to happen on the series.

It was a threat for Moxxie but still a game for Striker and a way to prove his dominance. Lots can be done with that.

10) Oh damn ten already? I could go on but lets wrap it up.

Striker’s essentially villain, vain, pay-attention-to-me, song specifically dissing and having Moxxie’s name in it. I love shit like that!

Freaking yikes!

😂😂😂

[thedeadhandofseldon]

The Anti-Mercer Effect

On the Accessibility of D&D, Why Unprepared Casters is so Fun, and Why Haley Whipjack is possibly the greatest DM of our generation.

(Apologies to my mutuals who aren’t in this fandom for the length of this, but as you all know I have never in my life shut up about anything so… we’ll call it even for the number of posts about Destiel I see every day.

To fellow UC fans - I haven’t listened to arc 4 yet, I started drafting this in early August, and I promise I will write a nice post about how great Gus the Bard is once I get the chance to listen to more of his DMing).

Structure - Or, “This is not the finale, there will be more podding cast”

So, first of all, let’s just talk about how Unprepared Casters works. Because it’s kind of unusual! Most of the other big-name D&D podcasts favor this long, grand arcs; UC has about 10 hours of podcast per each arc. And that’s a major strength in a lot of ways: it makes it really accessible to new listeners, because you can just start with the current arc and understand what’s going on!

And by starting new arcs every six or seven episodes, they can explore lots of ways to play D&D! Classic dungeon delve arc! Heist arc! Epic heroes save the world arc! Sportsball arc! They can touch on all sorts of things!

And while I’m talking about that: Dragons in Dungeons, the first arc, makes it incredibly accessible as a show - because it lets the unfamiliar listener get a sense of what D&D actually is. (It’s about telling stories and making your friends feel heroic and laugh and cry, for the record). If I had to pick a way to introduce someone to the game without actually playing it with them, that arc would definitely be it.

And I’d be remise not to note one very important thing: Haley Whipjack and Gus the Bard are just very funny, very charismatic people. Look. Episode 0s tend to be about 50%(?) those two just talking to each other about their own podcast. It shouldn’t work. And yet it DOES, its one of my favorite parts, because Haley and Gus are just cool.

And a side note that doesn’t fit anywhere else: I throw my soul at him! I throw a scone at him - that’s it, that’s the vibe. The whole podcast alternates between laughing with your friends and brooding alone in a dark tavern corner - but the laughs never forced and the dark corner is never too dark for too long.

Whipjack the Great - Or, the DM is Also a Player!

I think Haley Whipjack is one of the greatest Dungeon Masters alive. The plots and characters! The mechanical shenanigans! The descriptions!

Actually, let’s start there: with the descriptions. (Both Haley and Gus do this really fucking well). As we know, Episode 0 of each arc sees the DM reading a description - of a small town, or the Up North, or the recent history of a great party. And Haley always strikes this tricky balance - one I think a lot of us who DM struggle with - between giving too much description and  worldbuilding, and not telling us anything at all. She describes people and events in just enough detail to imagine them, but never so much they seem static and unreal - just clear enough to envision, but with enough vagueness left to let your imagination begin to run wild.

While I’m thinking about arc 3’s party, let’s talk about a really bold move she made in that arc: letting the players have ongoing control of their history. Loser Lars! She didn’t try to spell out every detail of this high-level party’s history, or restrict their past to only what she decided to allow - she gave them the broad outlines, and let them embellish it. And that made for a much more alive story than any attempt to create it by herself would have - but I think it takes a lot of courage to let your players have that agency. Most Dungeon Masters (myself included) tend to struggle with being control freaks.

And the plots! Yeah, arc one is built of classic tropes - but she actually uses them, she doesn’t get caught up in subverting everything or laughing at the cliches. And it’s fun! In arc 3, there really isn’t a straight line for the players to follow, either - which makes the game much more interesting and much trickier to run. And her NPCs are fantastic and I will talk about them in the next section.

Above all, though, I think what is really impressive is how Haley balances mechanics, and rules as written, with the narrative and rule of cool - and puts both rules and story in the service of playing a fun game. And the secret to that? She’s the DM, but the DM is a player, and the DM is clearly having fun. Hope Lovejoy mechanically shouldn’t get that spellslot back, but she does, and it’s fun. The changeling merchant in Thymore doesn’t really make some Grand Artistic Narrative better, but wow is it fun. And she never tries to force it one way or the other - the story might be more dramatic if Annie didn’t manage to banish the demon from the vault, but it’s a lot cooler and a lot more fun for the players if Annie gets to be a badass instead - and the rules and the dice say that Annie managed it.

Settings feel like places, NPCs feel like people, and the narrative plot feels like a real villainous plot.

Anyway. I could go on about the various ways in which Whipjack is awesome for quite a while - she’s right, first place in D&D is when your friends laugh and super first place is when they cry - but I’m going to stop here and just. Make another post about it some other time. For now, for the record I hold her opinions about the game in higher esteem than I do several official sourcebooks; that is all.

Characters - Or, Bombyx Mori Is Not an Asshole, And That Matters

Okay, I said I would talk about characters! And I will!

Just a general place to start: the party! All of the first three parties are interesting to me, because they all care about each other. Not even necessarily in a Found Family Trope sort of way, though often that too. But they generally aren’t assholes to each other. The players create characters that actually work together, that are interesting; even when there’s internal divisions like SK-73 v. Sir Mr. Person, they aren’t just unpleasant and antagonistic all the time. Listening to the podcast, we’re “with” these people for a couple hours - and it isn’t unpleasant. That matters a lot. (To take a counter-example: I love Critical Role, but the episode when Vox Machina pranked Scanlan after he died and was resurrected wasn’t fun to listen to, it was just uncomfortable and angering and vaguely cruel).

All of the PCs are amazing, and the players in each arc did a great job. If you disagree with me about that, well, you have the right to be incorrect and I am sorry for your loss. Annie Wintersummer, for one example: tragic and sad and I want to give her a hug, but also Fuck Yeah Wintersummer, and also her familiar Charles the Owl is the cutest and funniest and I love him. And we understand what’s going on with Annie, she isn’t some infinite pool of hidden depths because this arc is 7 episodes and we don’t have time for that, but she also has enough complexity to be interesting. Same with Fey Moss: yeah, a lot of her is a silly pun about fame that carries into how she behaves, but a lot of how she behaves is also down to some good classic half-elven angst about parenthood and wanting to be known and seen and important. (Side note: if your half-elf character doesn’t have angst, well, that’s impressive and also I don’t think I believe you).

There are multiple lesbian cat-people in a 4-person party and they both have requited romantic interests who aren’t each other. This is the future liberals want and I am glad for it.

Sir Mister Person, the human fighter! Thavius, the edge lord! Even when a character is “simple,” they’re interesting, because of how they’re played as people and not action-figures. And that matters a lot.

In the same way: the NPCs. There really aren’t a lot of them! And some of them come from Patreon submissions, so uh good work gang, you’re part of the awesomeness and I’m proud of you! The point being, the NPCs work because enough of them are interesting to matter. It’s not just a servant who opens Count Michael’s door, it’s a character with a name (Oleandra!) and a personality and history. They’re interesting. Penny Lovejoy didn’t need to be interesting, the merchant outside the Laughing Mausoleum didn’t need to be interesting, but they ARE! And Haley and Gus EXCEL at making the NPCs matter, not just to the story but to us as viewers. I agree with Sir Mister Person, actually, I would die for the princesses of the kingdom. I actually care about Gem Lovejoy of all people - that wouldn’t happen in an ordinary campaign! That’s the thing that makes Unprepared Casters spectacular - and, frankly, it’s especially impressive because D&D does not tend to be good at making a lot of interesting compared to a lot of other sorts of stories.

And, just as an exemplar of all this: Bombyx Mori. Immortal, reincarnating(?), and described as the incarnation of the player’s ADHD. I expected to hate Bombyx, because as the mom friend both in and out of my friend-group’s campaigns, the chaos-causer is always exhausting to me. And yeah, Bombyx causes problems on purpose! But! She is not an asshole.

And that’s important. Bombyx goes and sits with the queen and comforts her. Bombyx gives Annie emotional support. Bombyx isn’t just a vehicle to jerk around the DM and other players; Bombyx really is a character we can care about. To compare with another case - in the first couple episodes of The Adventure Zone, the PCs are just dicks. Funny, but dicks. Bombyx holds out an arm “covered in larva” to shake with a count, and robs him of magical items, but she also cares about her friends and other people! She uses a powerful magical gem to save her fertilizer guy from death! Yeah, Bombyx is ridiculous, but she’s not just an asshole the party has to keep around for plot reasons; you can see why her party would keep her around. And one layer of meta up, she’s the perfect example of how to make a chaotic character like that while still being fun for everyone you’re playing with, which is often not the case. And I love her.

The Anti-Mercer Effect - Or, “I think we proved it can be fun, you can have a good time with your friends. And it doesn’t have to be scary, you can just work with what you know”

The Mercer Effect basically constitutes this: Matthew Mercer, Dungeon Master of Critical Role, is incredible (as are all of his players). They’re all professional story-tellers in a way, remember, and so Critical Role treats D&D like a narrative art-form, and it’s inspiring. Seeing that on Critical Role sets impossible standards - and people go into their own home games imagining that their campaigns will be like Critical Role, and the burden of that expectation tends to fall disproportionately on the DM. And the end result, I think, of the Mercer Effect is that we get discouraged or intimidated, because our game isn’t “as good as” theirs. (And I should note - Matt certainly doesn’t want that to be our reaction).

So the Anti-Mercer Effect is two things: it’s D&D treated like a game, and it’s inspiring but not intimidating. And Unprepared Casters manages both of those really freaking well. Because they play it like a game! A UC arc looks just like a good campaign in anyone’s home game. They have the vibes of 20-somethings and college students playing D&D for fun because that’s who they are (as a 20-something college student who plays a lot of D&D, watching it felt like watching my friends play an especially good campaign). They’re trying to tell a good story, sure, and they always do. But first and foremost, they’re trying to have fun, and it shows, and I love the UC cast for it.

And that’s the other half of it: it’s inspiring! It’s approachable; you can see that Haley and Gus put plenty of work into preparing the game but it also doesn’t make you feel like you need hundreds of pages of worldbuilding to run a game. Sometimes a cleric makes Haley cry and she gives them back a spell-slot from their deity! That’s fantastic! It’s just inspiring - listening to this over the summer, when my last campaign had fallen apart under the strain of graduation, is why I decided to plan and run my new one!

That quote from Haley Whipjack that I used as the title for this section? That’s the whole core of this idea, and really, I think, the core of the podcast.

The Mercer Effect is when you go “that’s really cool, I could never do that.” But Unprepared Casters makes you look at D&D and go “wow, that looks really fun. I bet I can do that!” And I love the show for it.

And I bet a lot of you do too.

[howlinchickhowl]

It’s that time of the month again and I am so happy that it is, @whatwouldmickeydo you always know exactly when the time is right! Also tagged by the precious and beloveds @gardenerian @energievie @catgrassplantdad @xninetiestrendx @squidyyy23 and @sleepyfacetoughguy 🖤 Thank you all so much for thinking of me. Here is my list of pleasures small and great:

Joy List 💫

Coming home from my trip to be greeted by my dog who was excited to see me for 12 seconds before rushing off to get a toy because obviously her excitement was less about me and more about have someone else in the house to play with 🙄 I love her so much. 

being universally beloved by all animals as was proven during my trip to visit all my friends and meet their pets who all thought I was awesome and snugglable 😊

the mutuals-to-tumblr-crush-to-actually-dating-pipeline (MTTCTADP for short) and those who are on it, I don’t want to be weird but you should all know i ship it, and I am invested 👀 in a totally normal and not at all creepy way.

the possibility of a future long hoped-for

making things, especially making things for pals

the tumblrinas and this space where I get to be a total freak about 2.5 seconds of a tv show and no one thinks I’m weird. I had a conversation with one of my pals while I was away about a show we both love and I mentioned a scene I really enjoy to him and he totally thought it was odd that I a) remember that scene so specifically because he does not and b) think of that as one of my very favourite moments because it really has no bearing on the plot or the show at large. I forgot for a moment that people outside do not think like we do and it made me feel very grateful for here, and for y’all.

My own bed 

hot water bottles

cooking. taking a bunch of organic matter and some heat and chemistry and coming out with a whole new thing with the power to reaffirm the entire human experience? unparalleled tbh. 

david suchet. really glad that dude exists. my little guy. 

hanging out with my friends’ parents and feeling like I am part of a family again 

podcasts about books so I can feel like I still read things

grapes! 

getting organised

the theatre! Two shows in a month this month it’s like the last two years never stopped me! <3 

Ok we got a bit long, sorry gang! Feeling splendid today. Anyone who wants to please make your own list! I’m tagging a few folks but this is an including but not limited to kind of situation ok? Cool. @shewantsthe-youngamerican @okaydays @milligar @iansw0rld @ianandmickeygallavich @gallavichsbitch @buffymilkovich @bravemikhailo 

[a-very-tired-raven]

I don't really know how to start this off but.. I just wanted to a few things. So..listen up!

I know for like..half of you it's already new year, but I've got the struggle of the EST timezone, so it won't be new year untill tonight lol

2020 and 2021 has been really hard on me. On everyone! All of us! We've been stuck home, bored out our minds, some of us have lost loved ones, some of us have love ones that are going through...very difficult times right now. I joined tumblr late 2019 right before covid hit because I heard there was more content for fandoms I'm in. I wadnt signed in, and I silently scrolled and laughed and read through all these different posts and creators. Its..kinda hard not being signed in in tumblr, you can't say anything, or like posts or join events but I was happy. Late 2020 i signed in. I made my first asks to some of my favorite creators on here, extremely EXTREMELY nervous.

I mean..,what if they though I was weird? Did I send an ask in right? What if i got blocked?

I'm not exactly an anxious person but I tend to over think things. And..I just wanted to say hi to these creative creators y'know?

What I didn't expect however, was the sheer amount of kindness, reassurance, and over welcoming responses. These people..you all..you welcomed me into this community, into your blog with a smile, with jokes!

I've been lonely y'know? And ...2020 and 2021 have made me feel the most alone I've felt. Sure, I have an amazing and supportive family but..I needed more.

And my goodness, you all have helped so much with that! I've never been hooked up on a platform before. And...You've made me feel..almost complete? not a single day goes by that yall make me laugh.

Anyways, after a got comfortable talking to these creators I eventually got the feeling to write. I wanted to make a blog but I was nervous. But..all these creators..you inspired me so much, you gave me that final push, to be able to make this blog.

And the amount of welcoming responses i got from you all? My followers? Being able to reach 100 followers in a year is crazy! Heck, I'm still freaked out! You guys are so entertaining, and funny! Smart and cool, nervous and kind! All these different personalities, it-it's just crazy!.

Thank you for..accepting me so well. And for liking my content and sticking by my side.

Thank you for the positive response and goof offs, and most importantly, thank you all for giving me new friends, new people to look after! Something to look forward to!

I've thought more then I ever have this year. I've joined more fandoms, seen more content, drawn so much more..and...half of it is all because of you. So...

Thank you?

Thank you so much, @let-love-run-red for being my first friend and mutual on here. Thank you for being so freakishly funny, and putting up with me. Thank you for the angsty writings, for your hilarious work stories, and being an over all amazing person. You make me feel less lonely, and you get me! You gave me that final push to start writing. You've listened to me and my problems. Thank you

Thank you, @ratsoh-writes for welcoming me to your blog so easily! for putting up with my hyper but calm self. For entertaining my dumb jokes, letting me participate in amazing events. Thank you for showing us your writing.

Thank you @shimmer-lamp , @icelingbolt ,@a-gods-somewhat-mortal-form and @treesaap for also being some of my first mutals. You've made me laugh so much its..it's crazy! Your all so funny and entertaining, you draw so well! You know how to make me feel better..and you check up on me often. Thank you

Thank you @und3rwat3r-a5tr0naut for showing us not only your awesome writing talents but your freakishly good drawings! Thank you for exchanging puns and stupid jokes with me, for making my days so much more lively! You've made me laugh and smile so hard my cheeks hurt! Your a good friend to me. Thank you..

Thank you @ivyprism for being your hilarious and kind self! I know I have n't talked to you a lot, but your really cool! And nice..your writing is so unique and it's inspiring how you manage to write so many characters and remember how to portray each and every personality!

Thanks @puppetcl0wn for entertaining me with your crazy and funny tiktoks! I swear, you've literally made me cry laughing broski. Your hilarious, and your personality is amazing! heck, you've left me shocked with the fact you've even mentioned me in your tiktoks!

Thank you @blankspaceintime for being so kind! Your art is amazing, and it made me feel pretty good when you say you liked me art. Thank you for entertaining me with editing some stuff, for being so chill. I'm glad I'm your friend. You've been a long time supporter with my writing and I thank you.

Thank you @kuvvydraws @fruitsnackart @mmhinman @cinnimani for your amazing art, funny jokes, and wonderful personality!

Thank you, @jaychirps for being kind to me, and brainstorming ideas with me

Thank you @recordzz for your AMAZINGLY funny personality! Your freaking hilarious! I love your art, thank you for drawing my Addison boy Remix, thank you for all the compliments and amazing art, thank you for all your crazy shenanigans and wonderful ideas

Thank you @brightgoat for your awesome art, especially with you how show all the characters emotions, and your funny humor

Thank you @fconvicted for your hilarious content, and the upbeat vibes. Your seriously awesome!

Thank youuu @angsty-teacup for your beautiful and soft art! I love your style and your so inspiring! and kind! Thanks for talking with me and thanks for your beautiful art!

Thank you @glitchysquidd for all the aggies, all your jokes and wonderful art. You have a crazy good aura and vibe with it

Thanks a lot @xspidergutsx for your funky character designs and radical art, and freaky vibes!

Thank ya @lover-of-skellies for ur awesome writing, ocs, and freaky incorrect quotes

AND SO MANY MORE! I've ran outta time, but thank you all!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

[way-to-go-lad]

I'm back!!

Happy New Year my loves, I hope it brings you all only wonderful and amazing things. May all of your dreams come true 💚

I really want to thank all of my mutuals and friends that i met here for just being here. I smile every FREAKING time I see your posts and I love the way we share love over music. I love you guys so so much 😭😍

A special thank u to: @superkayzee @awesome-pizza-88 @myownparadise96 @theweightofstardust for sticking with me through the tough times and not letting me fall. I love you all 💕

People I absolutely adore: @dannythedog @idk-maddie @greta-flanveet @stardustdanny @ageofflowerpower @ageofmachines @ghostly-luck @prettyxvenomx @jakiszka @amouratomique @prettyintopeerpressure @jakeycalledmefat @gretavanhoney @jaakey @ageoffeet @lightmyluv @obetrolncocktails and so many more. Thank u for sharing your love for the music with all of us and just being here 💕💕💕