#I adore her so much but druid has been fun

[bardic-inspo]

Here's is my pink lady Durge. Her name is Iris and she's a circle of the moon druid. Being pink, unfortunately, doesn't hide her blushes or her thirst for violence from a certain vampire spawn. 👀

[mokeonn]

I started an honor mode playthrough with probably the cutest tiefling in bg3 and I fuckn got killed during the Phase Spider Matriarch, so I decided to continue my save with dishonor because my character was just so damn cute. Well for some reason or another the game didn't?? Switch it to custom mode?? It's still honor mode??

So I'm either going to get those golden dice in the most dishonorable way possible or the game is just pulling on my leg and It's just honor mode without the reward.

[floof-writes]

WARNING: this post includes some negativity about something you might love: D20’s The Seven, specifically choices made by Sephie about Sam Nightingale’s actions and backstory

TL;DR- (Disclaimer, I'm only to episode 5) The way Sephie chose to play Sam makes her seem aloof, toxic, disingenuous, and attention-seeking compared to the rich found-family themes of past Fantasy High seasons and to her fellow characters in this season. Less importantly but still frustrating, she doesn't follow the 'one leveled spell a round' rule. If she had all these flaws and was also funny, I might forgive her. But, alas.

Watching The Seven right now for FHJY and while I have countless good things to say about it, forgive me for instead ranting about the fan beloved Sam Nightingale. While I understand that many people love it, Sam/Sephie’s stage mom backstory gets on my fucking nerves. Especially the viral video thing in episode 5. Sephie blows up a bit (a bit in a comedy show! They're always doing bits!) into something big and then chooses to duck out instead of committing and resolving. I LIVE for emotional moments in D20, I seriously do, but whatever Sephie has been doing just doesn’t work for me. It feels cheap. D20 emotional moments have a ton of build-up through comedy/resistance, and I hate to say it, but Sam is not a funny character. I’m not saying she’s not realistic- she’s traumatized and is going through a lot, but Sephie is playing her in the wrong genre. D20 is a comedy.

Here's the thing: Ally also gets criticism for playing Kristen in a really explicit and overt way, trampling over other roleplay with her trauma, and that is true (sorry Kristen, ily!), but at least what Ally did is funny. Sam isn't. Sephie almost nailed it when Rebecca revealed she was getting divorced- her reaction was both real and comedic, but later when she called Penelope it felt forced/spotlighty/too soon, especially considering she didn't even have a mirror charge left. And that attention-seeky vibe isn’t helped by the fact that Sephie chose to play an ex-child actor: a real-life tragedy that almost always comes off as cheap when fictionalized.

But the parallels between Ally’s Kristen and Sephie’s Sam don’t end there! One of the biggest reasons people were annoyed by Kristen was Ally’s (and to an extent, Brennan/fellow player's), absolute ignorance of the rules about concentration spells, which made her really overpowered in season one. My argument against this as a newbie dnd player was always ‘rule of cool, it was fun to watch and fun to play so it doesn’t matter!', but as a more experienced player I finally understand that frustration even though I tried not to feel it. The same thing happened with Sam in ep 4- she casts two leveled spells in a single turn with Quicken Spell (Lightning Bolt and Fly, and again later with Enthrall and Suggestion), which makes her seem crazily overpowered despite the fact that she’s a 3/6 multi-class among a 9th level druid and a 9th level cleric. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love a good multi-class, but she shouldn’t be outstripping them so handily (Yielle also fucking slayed this fight though).

[A proposed alternate turn for her second mistake: Quicken spell to Enthrall and then use her winged boots and second action to attack the harpy and catch Penny (a ranged cantrip (LIGHTNING LURE) or a weapon attack if the DM allowed that to cause her to drop Penny, opposed strength with Danielle’s Bear Totem advantage if not). It would have been just as cool and displayed better teamwork, plus it was an opportunity to roleplay bonding and show gratitude for the Feather Fall that saved her fucking life.]

In fact, for me, there’s only three rather subjective reasons why I adore Kristen so much and find Sam super annoying: 1. As we've been over before, Kristen is funny. Sam is not. 2. I personally really relate to Kristen’s Overpowering Trauma (tm) and as an amateur actress, find bitter child actress plots absolutely inconceivable (Disclaimer:Jeanette McCurdy’s ‘I’m Glad My Mom Died’ made me fucking lose it). And 3. Kristen's story is about finding love (of herself through romantic but most importantly platonic relationships), supporting others, and understanding the world. Caring so much she self-destructs. Even her famous rule-breaking was usually caused by a conflict with Bless, a spell she cast every time to protect her friends. But Sam has thus far rarely displayed unselfishness, despite knowing the Maidens for nearly twice as long as Kristen knew the Bad Kids by the end of Season One. Kristen was self-centered in that Ally often drew the focus of roleplay towards their character's own issues and sub-plot, (or by being the purest form of the new player paradox and asking to do something crazy.) Sam is self-centered in that same way, and also in that she is literally selfish. Antiope says 'I have an opportunity' and instead of saying 'I get it, the pressure of having a parent who doesn't understand you changes everything, but even then a part of you still wants what they want for you' she says 'so you won't be there for me? How could you?'. Penny saves her life before being snatched into the air like a mouse to a hawk, and Sam is the only one who can fly but she plays the harp instead of helping her in return.

ALL the maidens lost months to more than a year of their lives. All the maidens are grappling with generational expectations, trauma, and pressure just like Sam. The big what-if at the end of highschool. I was only going to point out Antiope and Penny, but this actually seems to be a major theme of the season, since Ostentatia and Zelda also have overt themes of this.

Look, if you’re gonna play angsty, there’s a trick to it. There's this highschool level acting advice I've heard so many times: The worst choice you can make on stage is to be bored, because what is the audience to do except be bored as well? Similarly, if you choose to play disconnected, then how is an audience supposed to connect? In a group of people who have vocalized endless support for you, ‘I’m fine, I'm fine' (as shown in episode 5's viral video scene) is just dishonest, and it's honestly a betrayal of Sephie’s fellow actors who are working to improvise a history of openness and support with Sephie’s character, just so Sam can seem aloof and angsty. Break down in their arms, Sephie! Get flustered and run away! Either ‘I Kiss Her And Skateboard Away/I Burn Two Luck Points To Stop Riz From Finding Out’ OR ‘I Need Everyone To Dogpile On Me Right Now/I Kiss Everyone On The Mouth’ levels of teen angst are needed for this to be actually funny. Sam could've had something unique and iconic up there with Kristen and Fig's struggles with being known, but she isn’t cringefail enough. She's not relatable, and she claims to be bitter but really she's just mean. And again, I never said she isn’t realistic- real life people do the ‘I’m fine’ thing. Real life teenagers make a big deal out of something to tease out sympathy/curiosity over a Hidden Trauma and then duck out of an explanation for the attention of it all. But it isn’t funny and it feels OOC for a maiden who had a year and a half to become fucking codependent (/pos) with these other six girls.

Rant over, something positive to end the post: TaleSpire is so fucking cool! Physical battlemaps are awesome but you couldn't do a 700ft+ chase battle on the dome's tabletop. They really took advantage of using a virtual tool this season and did something they couldn't do otherwise. (Plus the fact that TaleSpire is treated like video game software and has a one time purchase fee instead of a subscription based model is fucking awesome!)

[fiachrastudios]

Hello there! Many thanks for the follow, traveler~ I adore your traditional art! It's finely colored...makes me feel all nice and cozy! Have a lovely day 💙

And if I may ask one parting question about your dear Tav, Aelar Melianme; do you have any fun facts about his lore? Cheers!

!!!! Thank you so much!!!!!

(I had to redraft like this whole thing after digging deeper into Drow lore and learning that the reason I hate it so much is that the good stuff got buried to make Drizzt more special????? So it turns out my headcanons for them are closer to some of the established lore haha. Anyway.)

Aelar is a Moon Circle Druid who grew up in the Underdark as a Lolth-sworn drow. I hate the way Drow lore was originally presented to me as being super misogynistic and racist (shocking for D&D, I know) but after learning about Eilistraee I actually like the pre-Drizzt lore more than I expected. Personally, I see the Lolth-sworn Drow as being like, run by radfems and is only seeming like a matriarchy to outsiders, when in reality it’s still super gender-essentialist and transphobic.

Aelar grew up in Menzoberranzan but was always ostracized growing up in Lolth's cult. He was pretty sheltered and cut off from the outside world, so he could never really put into words why he felt so distant from everyone around him. His family forced him into an engagement he didn't want when he was in his 90s, and he finally had enough and ran away.

At first, he ran as far as he could without paying heed to where he was going. He just wanted to get away as fast as possible. When he stumbled across an exit to the overworld, he only took it to shake off his pursuers. He was struck by how beautiful the stars were as he stepped out of the cave that first night. His whole life he had been told that the surface was a disgusting place, so overbearingly bright that no drow would ever have a reason to visit, but instead he was greeted by the gentle cascade of starlight on a cloudless night. He was so entranced by their light that he didn’t notice the smiling drow woman observing him silently from the shadows.

After that, he spent a few years wandering south along the Sword Coast. He preferred keeping his own company, for the most part. The discrimination he faced from Faerunians certainly didn't help but there was something...else, nagging in the back of his mind. Besides, owls made better conversation mates anyway.

His conversations with the bees were really life-altering, though. Drow society is very binaristic and heteronormative, and hearing about the queen/worker/drone system was eye-opening for Aelar. At first, he was just fascinated by it all. Something he felt the first few times he encountered other trans people. But it took him a few decades to realize why he was so intrigued by all of this stuff : ). 

Eventually, he made his way into Waterdeep. The loneliness of the wilds had been getting to him, and try as he might, he could never fully connect with his animal companions. It didn’t help that they lived such short lives, even compared to humans. He worked in Undercliff for a while as a horse groom for the Amcarthras, but he grew sick seeing the foals he raised being sold off to the City Guard to be abused. He moved into the city proper and has been tending some shithole bar while gradually saving up for surgery for the last 60 years or so.

He’s never realized it, but Eilistraee has been silently guiding him since he left the Underdark. He ran across some of her worshippers in Waterdeep, but never gave them too much thought. Even though it’s been a century and a half, he still hasn’t really unpacked everything he internalized from his childhood, and in his mind followers of Eilistraee are still something really taboo. Not necessarily that he hates them, more that it was just never really discussed openly and he feels discomfort the few times he’s been approached by worshippers on the streets. He’s only now starting to notice her presence in his life over the course of the game, and I like to think that his post-game adventures involve her : )

(I have so many more thoughts about Eilistraee and him and Astarion, who I gave the Elistraee sword too, but that’s something I’d like to explore more in a comic or a fic than this post ; ) )

[ryttu3k]

BG3 update, exploring Reithwin, a new team member, to about midway through Moonrise Towers!

Little snippety bits, team banter, etc that I've smushed into one image because I have a limit here:

*eyeing that 'unknown elf' listing* Also I love how Astarion is genuinely bullshitting in the blood-taste bit because we know he hasn't been drinking thinking-peoples blood aside from enemies and, once, Tae.

Anyway. To Reithwin! Delightfully spooky, honestly, the atmosphere here is fun. Managed to talk three enemies to death - the tollkeeper (who reminds me of corrupted No Face in Spirited Away?), the absolute creep in the House of Healing, and, after the world's grosses drinking game, the bartender. More on the latter two later!

At the cemetery, we meet Arabella! Who has... picked up some new skills.

Of course she can stay at camp while we look for her parents!

Into the bar for the world's worst drinking game. Plus side, got a boatload of approval from Astarion, Shadowheart, and Lae'zel from it! And some... really nasty mental images!

"Really? Right in front of my drink?"

Stopping to camp for the night. Getting some much more genuine Astarion when asking if Cazador has other spawn. Larian let me hug him as a friend.

Karlach brings up the whole... Gale thing. Which I still feel bad about tbh.

On a more depressing note, telling Arabella about her parents hurts ;_; Apparently not everyone gets the scene that follows, so I'll include a Youtube link to it here! Man, given Withers'... everything, I have to wonder just what that destiny will involve!

Honestly, though, I goddamn adore him as a character. Even if he does warn Tae not to get distracted by Karlach XD;;

Not the only intriguing camp companion we have, apparently!

Speaking of companions, visiting the House of Healing and retrieving Art's lute allows us to progress with starting to end the shadow curse, and properly recruiting Halsin!

I really like when you can let companions speak for themselves, you get so much more lore, like letting Lae'zel speak at the creche.

Once Thaniel is restored, Halsin officially becomes a member of the Brainworm Squad, albeit minus a brainworm! The companions have assorted things to say about him (including Wyll calling him a 'thick hunk of an elf'), and Tae gets to know him better. He likes honey and knows it's funny! He likes whittling! He likes whittling ducks!

"I like ducks :)"

(Tae has officially decided he's their new grandpa now. The other companions have... less familial views, apparently!)

Back to the mission! Heading to the Thorm mausoleum, and oh dear, look what the cat dragged in...

After getting some good advice to skip the mausoleum until prompted to go there later, we turn back, and this time, make for Moonrise Towers itself! (Minus Halsin, with the narrator very helpfully reminding me that, hey, may not want to bring someone without a brainworm there.) Discover some... concerning cargo:

Yeah, we, uh, took the canister and now it's just. Sitting in the traveller's chest. What do we do with it?

Into Moonrise Towers, witnessing a group of goblins attempt to kill Ketheric and. Completely fail. That's concerning!! Tae is instructed to deal with the remaining goblins and opts to let them go, because who knows? Maybe they'll return the favour one day. Karlach hears from an old 'friend', Florenta the Garrotter, a cambion from her Avernus days, and gets given some soul coins (albeit with a story attached to each).

Lots and lots of concerning bits of evidence, all pocketed. Stuff on recruiting drow, shadow druids, goblins, et cetera, invasion plans for Baldur's Gate, and - what have we here? Collaboration between Ketheric Thorm and Gortash!

We meet Araj. We meet Tae's extreme urge to punch her in the face. We meet Astarion's genuine surprise and gratitude at someone giving him a choice on what he does with his body for possibly the first time in two hundred years I'm gonna fuckin' cry. Larian let me hug him as a friend, part two.

We meet Steelclaw. Steelclaw I would die for you. ...Can we recruit her for the final battle?

That done, time for a prison break!

I don't like him much. Barcus sweetie you can do so much better. The tieflings are much happier to see us! (Lia: "Oh, you clever bastard. I could kiss you!" Cal: "Not in front of me, please. I've suffered enough.")

After the successful prison break, it's time for a rest. Is it weird to find, like, a 'realistic' place for them to rest? I used that office/tower in the middle of the prison, in the upstairs bit, where anyone awake could watch out for anyone approaching. Anyway, Gale has set up a hologram kind of... thing to invite Tae somewhere, finding him in a Weave illusion and in a... very melancholy mood.

Understandably.

Was definitely concerned this would lead more romantic. Thankfully, the game allows it to be played completely platonically, which is good as! Gale is a friend! A friend who's hurting and terrified and needs support and anyway Gale haters can fight me.

Genuinely beautiful scene, and I absolutely got misty-eyed.

Fight me, Gale haters.

Back to Moonrise. We do some more exploring, finding the third part of the tale of Orpheus. Lae'zel is... not impressed in the slightest. We also meet Ketheric's dog :( And private chambers. And stuff relating to his dead wife, and their daughter, who I have definite suspicions about. (It's Isobel, right? Isobel is Ketheric's daughter, right? Don't tell me either way, but that definitely seems to be the vibe I'm getting.)

We meet with Disciple Z'rell, and get a new mission - go to the Thorm mausoleum, and retrieve the artefact for Thorm. Now we can go! Also, at the least, she seems to trust us?

Back to the Last Light for some happy reunions! Alfira is ecstatic to have Lakrissa back (who proceeds to flirt with Tae, Lakrissa please their girlfriend is standing right there), Barcus is so excited to see Wulbren again... who doesn't appear to feel the same way.

Do you think Barcus would mind overmuch if Tae stuffed Wulbren in their pack and threw him back in a cell? Just saying.

Then back to camp for a rest, and a conversation with Astarion that punches me in the emotions!!

Full scene (including the initial confrontation with Araj) available here. The options I picked were, "Why has she upset you so much?", "Have you even enjoyed having sex, in these last decades?", and "You aren't a slave any more, Astarion, you're free."

Anyway that scene emotionally kicked my ass and I still couldn't even hug him. Larian let me hug him as a friend, part three!

[bosspigeon]

How is your Tav and Durges' relationship to the other companions? Are they close with any of them, other than their LIs? What is their dynamic like?

Bonus: Do they have any notable relationships among the other non-companion characters?

HELLO I AM FINALLY GONNA TRY AND ANSWER SOME OF THESE YEEHAW

As I love literally all the companions, bc they are all so messy and beloved to me, most of my characters tend to have that disastrous found family dynamic that I adore <3 but ye I think they've all got their own relationships with each other them

I think Pyre gets along really well with Karlach? Which I imagine surprises the others, somewhat. But they're both soldiers, at the end of the day, and there's a comfortable familiarity in that dynamic for both of them. Karlach, of course, is somewhat irreverent when she responds "Sir yes sir" to Pyre giving her an order, but he finds her energy and zest for life really refreshing? They both know what it's like to be a prisoner, after all, and to cherish the freedom they have, knowing what it's like to claw your way out of hell.

He gets along with Lae'zel for similar reasons in one direction, and Wyll in another. He and Lae'zel talk shop and strategy a lot, and she respects his shrewdness and forceful decisiveness, and he her focus, determination, and discipline.

With Wyll, once things come out about Mizora, there is definitely an uncomfortable familiarity for him, and it makes him determined to help Wyll escape the contract however he can.

I feel that Pyre feels much older than the rest of the party, save Astarion and Halsin, and it's sort of given him a reluctant dad vibe 😩 Well, he acts gruff and reluctant, but I think deep down he enjoys having this sort of close bond with them all. He's been alone for so long...

As for non-party members? He and Zevlor get along fairly well, even though I feel like it doesn't seem that way to most who see it. I can definitely see some history between the two of them, and I think they interact exactly how you'd expect two gruff old men to interact.

NOW FOR MOSS

With Moss, I think the rest of the party wind up very protective of him. He's so open and earnest, and also just... doesn't understand a lot of the intricacies of the world around him. He's very clearly completely lost, with no memories to speak of, not even a name at first. Still, he's determined to survive same as they are, and he becomes... terrifyingly loyal to them, very quickly.

They have to help him a lot with just becoming a functional person? And tbh I feel like some of them take that duty VERY seriously. Gale for sure. Especially bc Moss will happily listen to him explain magic things for hours on end just staring at him like 🥺. He and Shadowheart bond over that shared amnesiac trauma, and also later on the fun Abusive Parent situations. Lae'zel admires his power and brutality when it's necessary, and his struggle to resist that brutality when it isn't. Wyll just admires how honest he is about what he is and what he's feeling, and how empathetic he is when he has absolutely no reason to be.

Karlach has decided she's his big sister, even if he is A Good Bit Bigger Than Her. She cannot wait until it is safe to put him in an affectionate headlock and give him a noogie 😩

Halsin takes on a mentor role as a fellow druid because there's a lot about being one that Moss, oddly enough, doesn't really understand? Moss respects him enormously.

At the end of the day, Moss would tear out the entrails of any who dared hurt any of his friends and eat them bloody (ʘ‿ʘ✿)

[nochi-quinn]

legend of vox machina season 2 episode 8: echo tree OR more like incel tree amirite

sam is the "nice melons" npc bc of course he is

imagine the twins using their old tricks to duck the guards and it doesn't work bc that was over a decade ago

hello Elf Guard Matt

"we're his children" (derogatory)

"I've known many people with money and titles. They are definitely not worth you."

VELORA

the twins are not immune to velora and neither am I

"your father will be pleased to see you" I doubt that

"if you'd notified me you'd be gracing us with your presence" has this man never heard of an emergency

"if you've come for my money - or my goats - I don't have any!" wilhand

"real vestments!" I don't know why that's so adorable to me but here we are

"did you forget to eat??" eating is one of the three things grog actually knows how to do

"hi, pop-pop. I fucked up" me every time I call my parents

"what can syngorn do for you?" directed very specifically at percy, fuck everybody else

oh I just realized he's probably shitty about keyleth too, since she's also a half-elf

a second-generation half-elf, at that

my partner: does he not realize vax is wearing deathwalker's ward me: he doesn't care, that's human shit

"do you have any idea the burden your sudden arrival has caused my family?" I regret to inform you that this is in fact also your family

and now we know what role vex played in this emotional abuse hellpit

"you might just wanna avert your eyes" she literally confirmed that grog's dick didn't get acided off for him

if that's how scanlan 'works both ends' I am terribly sorry for any of his partners

it took me three watches to realize he's whistling Pull My Beads Of Love

percy spending that whole meeting trying desperately to figure out which House he could give to Vex without Cass shanking him

"what does 'fuck you' mean?" little pitchers have big ears

(didn't they on-purpose teach her the word 'shit' in the campaign)

if we get byroden flashbacks are they gonna be exu-compliant

"somehow I feel like it hurt me more" relationships! with! abusive! parents! are! complicated!

ew, tree gunk

he finally called her stubby, I can die happy

I knew where they were going as soon as he said "stimulation"

big "not a good enough reason to use the word 'penetrate'" energy

I enjoy Transition Frog

garmelie: don't submit to his voice vex, already extremely emotionally compromised: ✔✔

look, I don't claim to be a perfect parent, but I don't think I could look at something a child made for me with their own two tiny little hands and just casually break it in front of them

not even just my child. any child.

yeah, come to think of it, even vax doesn't Get It, bc he never wanted syldor's approval, or at least got over the want very quickly.

(fun fact, every time I type or say "syldor" I have to force myself not to say "isildur"

look at this. this is insane. I'm obsessed with this shot.

the feywild is using all of percy's black powder, he better hope victor survived.

I'm glad we got the "if I could pull the blood of him from my veins" line but it was so, so good when she was yelling it at her dad

vax now is not the time to ask keyleth to touch your butt

"dear broken vex'ahlia" if the word 'broken' is literally in your proposal there might be something fucked up about it mb

vex: my heart is someone else's percy: oh? do I know them?

incel tree saundor

"how do you fight a tree?" with a druid

I reluctantly admit him making the arrows out of his palm is pretty cool

I also love a good upside-down arrow shot

vex Jungle Sliding for her life

god I love keyleth so much

the way it springs open inside the stab wound is A+

mala: of course it survived, bc percy 100% expected her to stab a man with it

"he is who he's always been" "I know. and so am I." I am foaming at the mouth over this, at vex knowing she needs to work on parts of herself before she can actually confront her dad

there is SO MUCH nuance and middle ground between "still being actively abused" and "full no-contact" but it's more viscerally satisfying to show the Salt The Earth Behind You fight instead of the long, slow, painful work of attempting reconciliation

tl;dr reconciliation is a thing and I wish more stories used it even though it's complicated and subjective

"I usually hate the theater"

"how did that appear? how did tvs just appear? and really old tvs, based on the make and the year?"

this motherfucker

"he killed me with them" grog backstory GROG BACKSTORY

westruun is my favorite arc okay, I apologize for nothing

[shadowshrike]

If anyone's been wondering where I've been, the answer is playing Baldur's Gate 3. Vague spoilers ahead for those interested in how my playthroughs went:

I just finished my second run. The first was a 'normal' run, as I would likely play at a table, with a Druid Tav being as good and moral as possible and doing no romances. My second was a power-hungry/manipulative Bard Tav where I ascended Astarion, kept Shadowheart with Shar, made Lae'zel leader of her people and indebted to me, and became the new dark lord's consort who gets anything I ask for and has Halsin as a nomadic FWB that I encouraged at every turn to hate the evils of civilization (since we'd be making ourselves rulers of it to 'punish the wicked' in a shadow tyrant sort of way).

Honestly, having done both, I enjoyed the evil path more. I played evil as not muderhobo or horny, but instead as telling people what they wanted or needed to hear to make them love me and forgive me anything. It took surprisingly little save scumming. I eventually got their approval high enough that I could do whatever I wanted in end game and they would still adore me. Heck, after I ascended Astarion with Halsin in the party, Halsin approached me the next possible night to be part of our thing. I was surprised that the majority of the choices felt evil but not 'bad', and that by the end it seemed like a satisfying, true to character ending for everyone because I had mostly not interfered with their will except where necessary for my own power (e.g. making choices for Wyll to make sure he'll be out of my way when I conquer Baldur's Gate one day, and removing the aasimar/harpers from play while still uncursing the shadow lands with Thaniel and saving the druids so the wilds are friendly to me).

To my surprise, even though I always play good characters as a default, I particularly enjoyed both Shadowheart and Astarion so much more after their evil choices. In Astarion's case in particular, I was nervous going in that I wouldn't be able to do it, but after I met the first Gur I was able to piece together a hc for who he was before he was turned (basically a racist, self-serving noble who's always looking for power and a way out of consequences for his actions) that made him both easier to manipulate and the whole thing of encouraging him to embrace power so satisfying. It put the few heart-to-hearts I got in a different light, since even the more sincere lines came across as him trying new ways to manipulate me when he briefly thought I was a bleeding heart...which I turned right back on him until we were openly scheming together to solve his problems. A match made in liar's heaven. Add in the timing of Ascension in my game, it really felt like a 'good for him, bad for the world' ending in my playthrough, which is exactly what I was going for.

Meanwhile the blind 'good' playthrough was only satisfying as far as being allowed to do good. I didn't really expect any of that good to be lasting - heck it barely lasts between acts - and the fact that any companions who changed did it only for me (note: Shadowheart left in this run) left a sour taste in my mouth because I expect them to revert or get even worse as soon as I'm out of the picture. It also felt more sad in tone since I had done as much as I could and still lost so much (I failed to find the House of Hope, so it was particularly bad) while the evil ending had me smiling the whole way through since I sacrificed pretty much nothing/no one I didn't want to and it felt like it could lead directly into a super fun evil campaign of reshaping Baldur's Gate and the surrounding wilds afterwards.

In conclusion, very very fun game that I will likely keep playing with friends, though I may gently help them find a few of the critical encounters to make sure they get the ending they'd be happiest with. I honestly have almost no narrative complaints other than the final choice before the end, which is not just unpleasant (sign me up for "You can't get everything you want without sacrifice" stories any day) but also nonsensical given the character motivations we know. Otherwise, my advice to gamers, especially if they want to do a playthrough where they try to shove aside the player-sexual implementation, sex scenes, and characters-bend-to-player-morality systems in game so it feels more like playing at a table with other "real" people, is to ignore all of social media and just have fun. There are no bad choices, just ones that some people (loudly) find more personally satisfying than others, especially when they assume the game is being played as a romance sim. Your experience in game and therefore your characters and goals will not completely match anyone else's.

Finally, if anyone wants a little character analysis from my non-murderhobo/non-sex-focused evil playthrough (since those seem to be rare atm), please comment or send me an ask. I'm happy to talk about it more!

[sharkneto]

any random hcs/thoughts you have that dont fit in your JT/HT fics? something you think is cool but cant explore or dont have time for?

Oh boy, I have lots of little odds and ends that don't fit and probably won't turn into anything.

Lots about Rob and Sarah (some of these details can be found HERE) as I've figured out their backstories and history together. It's turned into quite the tooth-achingly sweet romcom.

Outside of general Rob and Sarah romcom, I think about random scenarios that just don't fit into HIT canon all the time. Amanda meeting our Five (touched on HERE). A fun one where Amanda gets kidnapped with Five (JT Five - Number), Five gets drugged heavily to keep him from doing anything, and Luther and Diego save the day through unwilling team-work while Five is drugged-up but actually pretty pleasant deadweight. Generally, more mixing and matching of siblings with Rob, Sarah, and/or Amanda are things that are thought about regularly.

And then there's the HIT canon stuff that just didn't make it. I should write a little one-shot or something sometime of Amanda running into Five at a house party before the whole Alley Incident because I've only written him when he's a sad, angry drunk but when he's just letting loose he's a chill, fun drunk. He drinks to not think and he is Not Thinking.

Random specific headcanons... - Sarah doesn't want kids and is bad at them, not a maternal bone in her body. She does her best but she just has no clue what she's supposed to do with them. This does extend to pets and she doesn't actually like Mr. Pennycrumb much outside of that he's good for Five and Five adores him. She thought she had a kindred spirit in Five with all this until he fell head-over-heels for his silly little dog. Rob is actually pretty good with kids but doesn't feel strongly about having any and he's a little... just this side of clinical when hanging out with them. How brains develop and kids figure things out is just so cool. He at least has experience with them with his nieces and nephews. - A tangent of the above is Rob's family. Sarah is an only child. Bam, easy, done. Rob is the youngest of three (brother 10 years older, sister 7 years older), and those siblings started having kids when Rob was in high school. Those kids are now starting to grow up and the first one now has a kid of her own. Christmas with Rob's family is A Lot and includes Rob's parents, his siblings and their spouses, his siblings' kids (two and three each, respectively), and his brother's first grandkid. The niblings all think Rob is Super Cool because he was Cool, Young Uncle Rob when they were little and that doesn't just go away. Rob's mom loves all the grandkids (and the great grandkid!) but would really love to have some grandkids from her youngest. Sarah is already overwhelmed by being surrounded by Walters and does not appreciate this pressure and how the Children Conversation is a conversation that somehow happens every time they see Rob's mom. Shout-out to @non-plutonian-druid for the deep dive we went in on this lol. There is a fun potential holiday fic somewhere in here. - Rob doesn't like classical music. It's on constantly at the hospital psych ward and at his office's waiting room for a Calm Mood and he's sick of it. I haven't actually thought about what music he does like. Sarah does 80s rock, but Rob... I like the idea of him listening to Dad Rock (despite not being a dad), but it could also be some truly random 90s stuff from his college days (of which I am not very familiar with despite being alive then because I was young and my dad was partial to the 70s and my mom was partial to classical). - Rob and Sarah broke up exactly once while they were dating, for three weeks. Sarah did the breaking up because she realized Rob was probably the Real Deal after they'd been dating for a year and a half and she Panicked. Rob was crushed but tried to respect her decision and space and hope she'd come back. She did in the form of falling off her bike and getting a concussion and Rob was still her hospital emergency contact. He takes care of her until someone else can come because he's still in love with her and their life is a romcom. Sarah cannot actually remember why she broke up with him because she's concussed. In trying to figure it out, trying to tell him he can be a little overwhelming in how there he is all the time, she says she broke up with him because he's "too Midwestern". Rob is understandably upset that they only broke up because he's from Iowa. They figure it out. - That post went around a bit ago about "what does your blorbo's phone look like" and that legit got me out of a no-words-funk thinking about Five's phone. I think it has exactly one catastrophic crack across the screen from when he first got it, went "I don't need a case", and was good without a case for like a week until he got too drunk and did drop it and it immediately cracked. It now has a Really Good Case - dark blue and slim but was really expensive so that you can practically drop it off a building and it will be okay without being obnoxiously bulky.

That's probably enough for now. I can ramble about my silly little blorbos forever lol

[ichiwashername-o]

I’ve been on a heck of a DnD kick lately and had an insatiable urge to draw ALL THE DND THINGS. Some of these characters you may have seen before, others not! But in any case, I thought it’d be fun to put all my characters in one spot for future potential games. Some I’m using in games I’m currently playing, like Thelus and Haratu, others are ones I’m really eager to try out.

A quick recap of the characters:

Haratu: Followers from deviantART will recognize this big adorable lug as I participated in an OCT with him. Big heart but unfortunately cursed with lycanthropy. Makes up his lack of intellect with his big burly muscles.

Ellana: A shy, timid druid I played in a Pathfinder game a couple years ago. It . . . did not go well. Combat was incredibly difficult and overwhelming and I never felt like I could do anything. I was absolutely miserable in battle which, ironically, fed into Ellana’s feelings of inadequacy.

Willow: A cleric I recently thought of. I’m still working on her personality and background, but I just wanna play a sick-ass plague doctor character.

Peterson: Ah, Peterson, one of my favorite OCs, who has an absolutely hilarious origin. Ever been so scorned by a piece of media’s treatment of your favorite fictional character that you go “no, FUCK YOU! I’m taking him and I’m going to do him PROPER justice!” That’s Peterson. Suave, flamboyant, dramatic, and just an absolute blast, his brain is as clever as his mouth. He’s a skilled spy and assassin, using his powers of persuasion and subterfuge rather than brute force.

Thelus: You all know him and love him. I repurposed him into a paladin and I’m currently playing a campaign with him. It’s been great fun.

Thalia: A character I played in a homebrew game. Versatile and a fierce fighter, she empowers her blades with magic to deal devastating attacks. She’s . . . rather intense, but she means well.

Lachesa: Probably the oldest OC of the bunch. She has by far the most developed backstory and character. I haven’t shown her off very much but she holds a very dear place in my heart. One day I hope to utilize her to her full potential, but for now she’s basically my fantasy self-insert. I explore a lot of my own, um, issues through her. Human and Dragonborne variation because I can’t decide what race I want to play her as.

Hope you guys enjoy!

[ciitrinitas]

baldur's gate 3.

100+ hours later, and i survived baldur's gate 3. it partly took me so goddamn long to finish because i got to the end of act 2 on my first character...only to find out it wasn't just me and that minthara is likely bugged (or has an insane amount of cut content, but i'm on hopium here). so i decided to restart on a second character as the dark urge to complete the story on whilst i await a minthara fix.

so, yeah. that was a choice i made! 🫠

to preface, however, while bg3 isn't a game i'm keeling over in sheer love for or a new favorite for me, i had a fucking blast playing it. any flaws or personal issues with the game aside, it is genuinely a ton of fun and full of shit to do.

long, scattered thoughts below the cut.

"huh, i wonder why there's so much grumpiness about the ending." ohhhh. i get you all now. the lack of ending cards or epilogues or any kind really stings when it's such a standard for wrpgs of this type. the main plot lost momentum for me early on when the urgency and desperation surrounding the tadpole infection slowed down, so i was vibing well enough with the ending until the lack of any epilogue hit. that is a weird oversight for a game like this and a sequel to games like bg1-2 and spiritually following games like dao.

biggest plot complaint with the ending: i choose to free orpheus because it's what my girl lae'zel wanted, so move aside, squid. in response, the emperor...skedaddled to join the fucking netherbrain????? what. i don't remotely understand this. did i miss some stuff about the emperor's motivations...? regardless, this was a bit of whiplash for me before i popped orpheus out then left him with no choice but to...abruptly turn into a mind flayer because...sorry, but my beautiful boy's skin isn't going to be sacrificed...nor karlach's despite her offer...and gale shut up about the damn nuke.

on villain side, i was disappointed with how little we saw the chosen. ketheric is introduced for a single scene earlier in act 2, but we only see orin and gortash by the end of it and then they aren't as present in act 3 as i would have hoped. ketheric is...fine (imo, i found his voice delivery kind of flat), and i appreciate the hammy glory that is aylin, so thanks for bringing isobel back, i guess. orin's design slaps, and her va's performance makes what could have been a too-much script really work. she's a bit more interesting if you're playing dark urge and have that backstory connection with her. gortash...i got a little caught up in shipping him with my dark urge half-elf boy in that coronation scene because of what good old murder pals the two used to be! but gortash gets killed by the netherbrain just because even if you side with him, so eh. better to let karlach have her revenge on his shady ass.

on my first character, i was initially set on romancing shadowheart until i learned about minthara and then was wildly divided between them. then i met minthara in person and next thing i knew, i had slaughtered refugees and druids and was married. 😌❤️ it really broke my heart a little to learn that she is (HAS TO BE) bugged when i turned my entire playthrough on its side to nab her. no regrets because she is easily one of my favorite characters, but a bummer. the crazy hot cultist lady exterior drew me in, but it was her intriguing character on the interior that got me to stay.

if it weren't for the whole "violently slaughtering the grove" thing being necessary to get minthara (unless you go out of your way to not do things or glitch it afaik), she'd be my default pick over halsin all the time, every time. halsin is deeply boring to me. he talks about nature...and then some more about nature...and more about nature. jaheira is more involved in the main plot than him, so an odd choice to cram a second druid in when he's much duller than minthara or jaheira.

jaheira, jaheira, jaheira! oooh, i adore jaheira! i'm familiar with bg1-2, so i knew the basic deets in jaheira. i really hope larian wrote her as a natural extension to her classic self because while i planned to play bg1-2 eventually, the urge is now truly powerful because jaheeeeeeeiiiiiira, my beloved. cool hot older woman who is just so good. that she partly has some batman in her with her four adopted kids is adorable... her house is so cute... that she has a keepsake from khalid, too... i want jaheira to be happy. 😭

UNLIKE ASTARION. look. i was pleasantly neutral with his ass until after visiting jaheira's home, he thought he could make a catty remark about jaheira being a horrible mother. i'm happy his final appearance in the good end of the game is him sprinting away as he burns and screams in the sun and gale weirdly comments that this will probs be the last time they all see him. fucking bizarre writing choice, but a victory for me. don't be mean to jaheira!! (in all seriousness, astarion is a perfectly fine character with solid writing. he isn't the type i tend to latch onto, and i was salty when he made such a bitchy comment about jaheira.)

gale gave me my favorite line in the game. if you're slutting it up, mr. wizard can hit you with one of those ultimatum conversations. if you pick to simple leave without a word, he says you are being a very cone of cold. i keep subjecting xofi to references to this. it's my favorite line. gloriously dweeby, and gloriously wizard-y. oh, gale. i can tell you don't have friends that aren't your magical flying cat, a very old man, and uh...your divine ex, i guess. he's like you transplanted a bard's personality into a wizard. he was fun to have around!

lae'zel...my abrasive darling. you know what, i'm glad she's inspiring "discourse" (aka "women wasn't 100% nice to me :(((") because it exposes the weaklings. if lae'zel is too mean for you, then thank you for letting us know. we must cull you so that we won't waste resources on you. the winter is harsh, and only those warmed by good taste will be able to endure. i'm happy for where my ending had her: orpheus went mind flayer and then i politely knifed him when he asked, so lae'zel was asked to carry on his torch in inciting her people against vlaakith's tyranny.

shadowheart is my meow meow. the eight-or-so hours of early access that i played two years ago had her as my favorite by the end and that was carried over into the full release. she and minthara are the favorites. my only real quibble with shadowheart's arc is that binary dnd god morality does not spark joy for me. worship of shar being so bluntly evil took me out of a bit. nice to see viconia, though!

i...honestly forgot wyll until a second ago. there's an interesting conceit to him, but he's woefully dull. he and halsin are just boring. i feel kind of bad that i'm so bored by wyll. there's a missing bite from him that i vaguely recall from early access. i get that the devs wanted a companion that is, like, good, but oh, wyll, buddy...idk what the hell they did to your writing.

minsc isn't a terribly deep character, but he's enjoyable when i view him as a charming addition to jaheira. i'm going to try and get him earlier in future playthroughs because i nabbed him terribly close to the end on this one. orz

karlach...i think here arc was my favorite of all the cast. in act 3, i had swapped lae'zel out for her for a bit and lae'zel ended up kidnapped by orin, so my defaulat party just ended up shifting to gale, shadowheart, and karlach. i'm pretty happy it ended up this way. i ran into some interesting conversations for her, and her reactions to things like my dark urge signing raphael's contract surprised me in their passion. she's effective at keeping up her cheer until the latter end of act 3 when the unfairness and shittiness of her situation come to head in some gorgeously acted scenes. her fury and despair at the tragedy someone else thrust her into is really fucking good. i'm not even mad about her ending. it can feel odd in the greater context of bg3, but for my tastes, i was fucking there for her having to pick between dying or return to live in a place she loathes.

this is a "era has personal preferences that don't align with the game's goals" thing, but i kind of wish the dark urge was the protagonist. i like even customizable mcs to have a bit of an arc built in despite that impacting the scope of roleplaying lmao. the dark urge stuff had me wishing there was more than what is present, though. i wanted it to be dug into deeper, but i did still like what is there. the temple of bhaal was really fucking good, and i love that the dark urge turns out to be the architect of the absolutist cult.

[zydrateacademy]

Current Activities in Baldur's Gate #2

The game CTD'd so here I am talking about it.

As promised I was going to outline my experiences a bit more specifically.

Well currently, I have 92 hours on it and every minute of that has been spent in act 1. Only just now is my warlock about to go through the mountain pass, before getting distracted by yet another quest to save a duke. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

On the evening of release I of course rolled Dib, a dragonborn rogue, very quickly followed by my scant-clad warlock. Over time I found the rogue to be rather clunky. It's difficult to get mid-combat sneak checks when there's five goblins and two wargs looking straight at the party. Her stealth is very high but the chances to actually pass a hide check against seven mobs is very low, so it's more of a boss-killer than anything. Sneak attacks don't work like on tabletop, when an enemy has to simply be engaged with another target within five meters... But in the game you can ONLY get sneak attacks if you have advantage on the attack. I spent so much time slinging various disabling spells but you only get advantage on attacks under very specific conditions and I haven't nailed them all down. I know being prone is one of them. After falling out of love of rogue I went on to roll basically one of each class with some exceptions. I have no real interest in the sorcerer, paladin, cleric, druid, or ranger. Wizard is growing on me, notably the divination spec. I discovered that a few characters in with Gale. He can basically force rerolls on enemies, silence areas, and counter-spell. He's become a permanent fixture in most party compositions, so I might roll one for myself some day. Sorcerer to me just seems like a less interesting wizard.

I might make a ranger some day.

I've enjoyed the rest of the classes to various degrees. I'm even directly playing Karlach in one of my save files, because barbarian is fun. Big weapon go smash.

However I absolutely adore the warlock, but not overly fond of their limited spell slots. They can only pop off two big spells per combat encounter. As "eh" as that is to me, it's rarely been a problem. It can be recharged on short rests, but it's still irritating when you pop off a large spell that gets resisted or something. That said, eldritch blast is hilarious, does competitive damage, and can hit multiple targets. I can't wait to get to 10 so it can hit a third bolt.

I tagged this post as mature so I can post these now.

I'm dreading finding actual gear upgrades so she'll eventually lose this 'look', and I don't think they'll ever introduce a transmog system because they didn't in DoS2. But once she's done saving the duke, she'll be moving onto act 2 properly. Edit: I did not know the Duke was in act 2 to begin with.

Right now her setup is herself and gale on the backline while Lae'zel and Karlach both wade into the fray. Personality wise Selina is kind of an asshole but still a bit of a hedonist. To fuel a hedonist lifestyle she needs money. People give you money when you do things for them, and sometimes she'll extort and take it. So her altruism despite the dialog options is still a bit self-serving. And since Karlach isn't as goody two shoes as Shadowheart, the relationship meters with both are still creeping upwards. Karlach likes shows of strength which my warlock does sometimes, but just isn't as anti-everything as Shadowheart is.

Shadowheart is weird, man. Talks up altruism but worships a god that wants to end the world. Cool.

[tsaritza-mika]

The Main 6 Play D&D

Because I am a major tabletop nerd who used to read the Monster Manuals for fun XDDDD

Asra

Dual Class: Wizard/Sorcerer

Race: Yuan-ti Half-breed

Totally manages to get Lucio to fight a gazebo by convincing him it was a mimic

Somehow never rolls a Nat 1, but always manages to roll over 11 when the stakes are high

Made a special ‘Friend’ character sheet so Faust could join in the game too since his character has the ability to speak to snakes

Often uses her coils to contain his dice rolls

Game Night Snack of Choice: Takoyaki. No one’s sure where he gets a literal bag full of it, but he refuses to play without it

Asra’s Dice: Purple Glitter Astrology

Nadia

Class: Artificer

Race: Elf

Didn’t think she’d like the game as much as she does, but came around to it while playing

Likes that she can take her love of engineering and puzzles with her when she plays, and that often times such things are obstacles that need to be solved

Was the one to start the joke about how Lucio once killed a whole group of Mind Flayers simply by talking about himself for an hour. Lucio still doesn’t get why it’s funny

Loves providing the sarcastic commentary when the story and setting allow for it

Game Night Snack of Choice: Chocolate Covered Strawberries

Nadia’s Dice: Celestial Artificer Golden Gears

Julian

Dual Class: Rogue/Bard

Race: Half-Elf

Oh, how he has awaited the day when he could put his love of theatrics with his love of adventure and be with all his friends at the same time

Adored the character creation process, as well as everything put into making a character for the campaign

Makes sure to have his violin handy so he can actually play a bit in the background when the game calls for it

Once had a game session where he failed ALL of his skill rolls and almost died multiple times, one of those nearly being by Gelatinous Cube. Portia and Asra still joke about that night all the time

Game Night Snack of Choice: A box of Fig Newtons. Figs are his fav, so of course he’d love having such a travel handy and tasty version with him whenever possible

Julian’s Dice: Antique Iron Silver Pirate

Portia

Class: Fighter

Race: Dwarf

Was in love with the game when she rolled a Nat 20, making it so she could do a backflip axe throw into the face of an enemy

Was really tempted to be a hunter so she could have a giant Pepi, but then backed out cause like hell she could put her precious little angel in danger like that!

Has totally been keeping a kill count because nothing is more satisfying than showing her many kills stacked against Lucio’s few. The size of your monsters doesn’t matter, it’s how many you take down

Game Night Snack of Choice: POCKY!!! ALL THE FLAVORS!!! POCKY FOREVER!!!

Portia’s Dice: Yellow Pink Glitter

Muriel

Dual Class: Druid/Monk

Race: Human

Only agreed to join the game if he could A.) not have to be there in person, and B.) be able to mute the stream whenever Lucio speaks.

Will still not show up via stream if his display tablet is anywhere other than between any combination of Asra, Nadia, or Portia. If the tablet is next to, or too close to either Julian or Lucio, he will not play

Was also given a complimentary +3 to Strength and Dexterity whenever it comes to holding back/incapacitating Lucio from just going off on random NPCs because they’ve never heard of his character

Game Night Snack of Choice: Celery Sticks and Peanut Butter

Muriel’s Dice: Druid’s Forest Dice

Lucio

Dual Class: Barbarian/Fighter

Race: Tiefling

Tieflings don’t catch fire easily. The race choice was simple after learning that fact

Wanted to be super knowledgeable about all the world’s monsters until he found out it would involve a ton of reading. Now he just wants to be famous for killing a Terrasque. He still doesn’t know what it is, but eventually something he kills will be one, then he’ll be famous

Has totally done a table flip or two if a roll went especially bad. It didn’t help that Julian then played a sarcastically sad tune on his violin with a completely shit-eating grin about how badly things just went

Game Night Snack of Choice: Red Hots. Doesn’t matter that he can’t handle spicy shit, he’s a Tiefling, and Tieflings can handle spicy foods!! IT’S IN CHARACTER DAMMIT AND HE’S STICKING TO IT!! ...but please someone pass the water, his mouth is on fire and hasn’t felt his tongue in forever

Lucio’s Dice: Gold Swirl Metal Dice

[nerdynuala]

First off, I just want to say I LOVE YOUR WORK! Especially the Pictionary series.

As for ideas, what do you think each vet’s D&D class would be? Lol

First of all, thanks so much!

Secondly, I feel like I'll let you down with this but...how do I put this without feeling ashamed of myself? *holds breath* I'm not that familiar with D&D. There. I confessed.

Brief excursus on my life so I can excuse myself on this one: I grew up in an environment that didn't really encourage geeky stuff. Like, I've always been the classroom's ultimate geek all the time, but all I did was actually just watch anime, read mangas and draw stuff. So yeah, I couldn't properly develop my geeky side. Then my SO and his lil group did enjoy rp games, but I met him when they were already trying to adult so I couldn't join in the hype. I've only ever played Pokémon and Magic cards tbh.

I suppose you're asking this because I actually put a D&D reference somewhere in my comics, and that's because I'm obsessed with the alignment chart xD but other than that I don't know the game that well.

BUT I'm all for research and learning new stuff so I looked everything up and here's my take on it, based on the information I got and the vibes I get from the classes and the vets:

Mike

Barbarian most of the times, he occasionally chooses fighter as well but barbarian is his favourite.

It's fairly easy to play, strong and brutal, doesn't even need armor because it's strong by composition. Very offensive, quick and practical. He also can defend the team and loves it.

Nanaba

Druid. She's all for support, she doesn't enjoy offensive characters or overly complicated spells and strategies. She really nails the druid and when paired with Mike playing barbarian they're unstoppable.

Levi

Levi has two favourites he alternates: Warlock and Rouge.

He nails the Rogue and he finds it familiar and fun to play. He also loves the aesthetics and he loves to be stealthy. As for the Warlock, he really enjoys to customize it and he finds the class very practical. Loves the abilities and is very good at customizing them.

He never ever chooses anything else beside these two classes, he's so used to playing them that he doesn't really want to step out of his comfort zone.

Hange

Artificer is definitely her favourite and the one she nails the most. She loves the artifacts, she loves that she can be an alchemist, build a rifle and even have a robot following her. Also adores the aesthetics of the character.

She also plays often as Ranger as well.

She doesn't mind choosing other classes though, she has fun with all of them and she just goes "today I'm feeling like a Wizard" and chooses the class. She's a good player regardless of the classes and their difficulty. Hange really can adapt to anything.

Moblit

Don't ask me why, but Moblit gives me Bard and Monk vibes.

He particularly likes playing Bard, he finds it fun and he loves how everyone have weapons and stuff while he's in the back playing his lil guitar. He actually loves how powerful and supportive the Bard can be and really nails team work.

Erwin

Like Levi, he has basically two classes he always plays and it's either Paladin or Mystic.

Particularly loves the Mystic. It's just... powerful. And he can put strategy in it and he has a lot of customized subclasses and he just loves to be prepared.

Really enjoys playing as Paladin too. He's really good at roleplaying it and really nails the whole "following the oath" aspect. He gets really really powerful.

There, thanks for the ask anon, I enjoyed learning some basics about dnd classes, and I really hope this is okay and if it's inaccurate forgive me, I did my best as a non-player lol

[whalesims]

hello can you pls share some facts about firbolg?? i adore them

ok so, this has been sitting in my ask for forever bc no executive function and i wanted to answer it nicely but im caffeinated so here's 5 (kinda) fun facts about her

1. shes a middle child so she ran away from home because she couldn't connect as well with druid magic as her sisters could, and felt like a failure bc of it (she isn't a failure and her parents love her very much, shes just like 17 in firbolg years)

2. mint (our dragonborn artificer, he has an actual long ass name but its too long to remember) is starting to become like a father figure to her and we had a fun 'where were you young lady' after she disappeared to talk to Cow

3. she is the worst person to ask to name things, as firbolgs don't use names, they just refer to things/people by their relations, so Cow is a fey creature polymorphed as a cow to hang out in the world we're in, her horse is named 'horse', and the little mushroom that tried to kill us but also saved us from dying by making us taste bad is named 'mushroom'

4. in our second arc our paladin died and her tears and confusion about death were very real bc the human person playing her (me) was also bawling when it happened, when his player was just like,, force-ghosting there laughing at us having our moment

5. despite being a barbarian and having a special boxing power (homebrew from our dm) she cant fucking hit anything. i hate roll 20 and it hates me equally

i should really write out a google docs for her w all the cannon campaign stuff but oh well

[scatterpatter]

Critical Role Characters by someone who knows next to nothing about CR

Under the cut because Aye

So context: I really wanna start watching Critical Role, albeit I'm intimidated by the sheer length of it, but I realized I've been spoiled to... Almost nothing about this series or the characters, so why not joke around and guess as much as I can about the Mighty Nein ;D

This is Caleb!!! I forgot his name earlier but I HAVE seen content of him before. He's the edgy one. He has some kind of tragic backstory and I think caused his parent's death or something? Definitely has to do with his fire magic. Cat person. Like seriously he's the token edgelord from what I've seen. Probably the "You look happy? Who are you and what have you done to Caleb" character. Probably needs a nap. And therapy. Definitely therapy if your fanarts are anything slightly accurate to the plot.

I thought it was Fyord but turns out it's Fjord. I'm good at spelling pls believe me. I think this one's the "I CAN kick your ass if I want to, but I have social anxiety" one. Like the big sweetheart trope. Big dork. If I'm wrong this'll be awkward but I'm sticking with it. Probably a fighter or barbarian? I want to hold his hand.

I have never seen this person before in my life but apparently she's one of the main characters? "Beauregard", according to the wiki. Well I can't recall any fan content so I'm gonna make assumptions from this image alone: looks like a monk from the art, and boy HOWDY radiates bisexual energy. Cocky, sometimes TOO cocky. Def has that "I can fend for myself" energy. Probably struggled to make ends meet growing up or something like that.

I forgot her name but "Nott"!!! I've seen fanart of her before, and I'm love. Big "I'm going to cause problems on purpose" energy. Often depicted with bandages so I think she had some kind of tragic back-story. Actually if I remember fanart right, didn't she used to look something more human-ish and was like? Cursed to be a goblin or something? Had something to do with drowning maybe??????? Don't hold me to this. I was gonna guess rogue but this gear looks more ranger-esque. "I cause problems but I DO adore my friends more than anything" energy

JESTER!!! One of the few whose names I didn't have to check the wiki for! Baby girl baby! WILL fuck you up if you deserve it but prefers to take a more peaceful route energy. Ray of sunshine. Probably a cleric. I want to protect her with my life. If I get into this series and find out she's secretly evil I WILL ragequit. I want to platonically date her so much oh my god she's so CUTE

"Yasha", I've seen her name before but didn't remember. HELLOOOOO LGBT COMMUNITY. This is the one that wlw's go feral over. And I can see why. Pretty lady. Strong lady. 11/10. Probably some type of warrior- maybe a barbarian or fighter?... Fjord is one of those two and she's the other, is my guess. Looks scary but probably a big softie. Probably has some kind of curse with those wings- probably necromancy related. Probably raised in a tribe or community with strong warrior-aspects, judging by how combat-expert she looks and her tattoos

"CADUCEUS"!!! Sorry I forgot your name. THE CONFIRMED ASEXUAL HI!!!! Beautiful boy, 11/10. I adore him with all my heart. Looks like a druid. Transition goals. Didn't show up in the very beginning I think. I actually know nothing about his personality. I mean c'mon there's no way you're NOT a big dork if you dress like that. Has big "I've known the Mighty Nein for 10 minutes but if anything happened to them I'd kill everyone in this room and myself" energy. Maybe. Idk he's just perfect.

WHO THE FUCK IS VETH AND WHY ARE THEY ON THE SAME WIKI PAGE AS NOTT-... Ohhh. Oh I was right about remembering something about Nott being cursed, wasnt I? This is pre-curse Nott isnt it? Welp! Still has that "im going to cause problems on purpose" energy andhdjanxnc- i was about to guess that Nott fell through a sheet of ice and that's how she drowned(?), but then I realized this art is specifically from a "winter" series oop.... Prediction: Veth took the name Nott after probably not wanting to show her face around her family(?) once she transformed into a goblin. I Just Think She's Neat

THIS IS THE TIEFLING THAT LIKE DIED OR SOMETHING BUT IN RECENT MONTHS CAME BACK... OR SOMETHING. IDK. ALSO DRIVES THE LBGT COMMUNITY WILD. YOU GO "MOLLYMAUK" I BELIEVE IN YOU. They are... So cute wtf. I don't even know what to say. I can see why the LGBTs love them. Heck.

Fun fact! I know NOTHING about the plot! Other than the fact that there was not once but TWICE that the Mighty Nein ploymorphed something into a turtle but that turtle was also v threatening so they had to change it into something else. Beautiful.

Why are they called the Mighty Nein? The heck if I know! Cuz there sure ain't 9 of em so that pun doesn't add up! Probably something plot related. Who knows. I've been told my haircut sometimes looks like Matt Mercer's and I'm not sure if that's a compliment but I'll take it as such.