#I just wanted to have a bit of fun with using fandom terms for numbers (and play off the stereotype of people who police “canon”)

[locusfandomtime]

The maths fandom is wild. “Real” and “imaginary” numbers? I think you mean canon and non-canon. You guys seriously go “this is my number oc his name is i and he is the square root of -1” when in numbers canon lore it’s actually impossible to square root a negative but sure whatever. “Complex numbers”? I think you mean a character x oc ship. “f(x) = 3x - 5”? That is self-insert fanfiction.

[atthebell-moved]

Updated QSMP AO3 Work Language Stats-- as of July 9th, 2023

Hello! Doing an update to my June 6th, 2023 QSMP AO3 stats post going over the languages QSMP works are tagged with, one month (approx.) later. Feel free to refresh yourself with last month's data, as I'll be referencing it throughout this post.

We're just going to start off with the plain stats, and then we'll do comparisons to a month ago as well as analysis. The analysis will probably be similar to last time, as I don't think a ton has changed. Long post ahead!

Fun tidbits at the start:

QSMP has 2147 works as of today (July 9, 2023)! That's a difference of 714 works from the original 1433 works, so about a 50% increase.

English is still the most commonly tagged language, and its percentage has actually gone up a small amount since last month. Brazilian Portuguese has also gone up to 3.07%, while Spanish has slightly decreased in terms of percentage.

Some new languages added to the mix! There's now one work written in Malaysian Malay, and French finally has some works.

Speaking of! There's now works in all of the four spoken languages on the server :D

I used the same methodology as last time, which was to manually filter by each language I expected to have works, then do the math to make sure I wasn't missing any. You can check the previous post to find that info as well as how I got my AO3 total works stats.

Okay! Now onto numbers:

Getting into the stats:

QSMP Works

[Image Description: A table with three columns; the first lists languages, the second the number of works, and the third the percentage of total works. For the languages column, each language is listed first in that language and then in English in parentheses, and English, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, and French are all color-coded to indicate that they are spoken on the server. End ID.]

The most commonly tagged language, like I said above, is English, with 1751 works or 81.56% of total works in the QSMP fandom tag.

The second most commonly tagged language is Spanish, with 317 works and 14.76% of the fandom. Next is Brazilian Portuguese at 66 works and 3.07%.

French has works now! There are 5 works, which is about 0.23% of works in the fandom tag.

And the next four are not spoken on the server, but several are unsurprising (discussed in the previous stats post, but reiterated below): Mandarin at 3 works and 0.14%, Russian at 2 works with 0.09%, Latin at 1 work with 0.05%, Esperanto at 1 work with 0.05%, and Malaysian Malay at 1 work with 0.05%.

Preliminary observations! English, like I said, has gone up a bit in terms of percentage, as has Brazilian Portuguese, while Spanish has gone down. It's not a huge percentage difference, but I'll discuss my limited theories as to why that change might've happened.

The only really new language this month, as French was expected to get works since it's spoken on the server, is Malaysian Malay. I don't know a ton about Malay in general, so I don't want to speak too much about it in terms of population, but if any Malay speakers or Southeast Asians familiar with it have anything to add, feel free! This work is a translation of an English work by the same author, which is rad; I'll talk a bit more about translations below. Otherwise I don't have any particular observations other than wanting to note that it's a new language and I'm happy to see it!

Across All fandoms

[Image Description: The same table as above, this time with numbers for all fandoms across AO3. End ID.]

The most commonly tagged language is English at 10,154,701 works and 89.31% of all works on AO3.

Spanish has 133,743 works and 1.18%

Brazilian Portuguese has 31,218 works and 0.27%

French has 53,917 works and 0.47%

Mandarin has 638,576 works and 5.61%

Russian has 241,121 works and 2.12%

Latin has 165 works and 0.0015%

Esperanto has 106 works and 0.00093%

Malaysian Malay has 119 works and 0.001%

I don't have a ton of new observations for this, as I don't think any changes were all that significant, and QSMP is so much smaller than the total works that comparison is more helpful in terms of indicating which languages are typically used on the site versus commonly spoken languages, which don't always align.

Changes Since Last Month:

[Image Descriptions: Two tables, identical to those above aside from the numbers in each cell. One is the QSMP numbers from last month, as linked at the top of the post. One is the QSMP numbers for this month, as displayed above. End ID.]

Like I said above, English, Brazilian Portuguese, and French have gone up in terms of percentage while Spanish has gone down.

Mandarin and Russian have both gained one work each, and Latin and Esperanto have stayed at one work.

New language! Malay has gained one work, a translation of an English work by the same author.

Time for analysis!

Analysis/Theories:

First thing I want to look at is the fact that Spanish has gone down in terms of percentage, and why that may be. The change is not wildly significant, and the fandom is growing fairly quickly, so I don't think it's a huge difference, but I still wanted to talk about it briefly. My biggest theory is just that as other languages have gained more works, Spanish has not grown quite as quickly in that time. Portuguese went up a bit, meaning its percentage has likely cut into Spanish's, alongside a few others gaining works. Remember that percentages work like a pie chart-- when one percentage increases, one or more of the rest must decrease. I don't have many other theories, and again, I don't think this is that huge of a difference.

French has works now! Honestly, this is completely unsurprising to me. French creators have had far more time to settle in, get involved in lore, and French fans have had more time to get interested in the server generally. Hope to see many more to come!

I don't have any significant analysis when it comes to the Malay fic, other than that I think the nature of QSMP will continue to encourage new fics in new languages. QSMP is about cross-cultural communication and encouraging people to speak their own languages as well as learn about others'; I think it makes perfect sense for people to want to write fic in their native languages, even more so than a typical fandom. Excited to see this continue, particularly in the case of minority and endangered languages.

Translation! I brought this up in the last post, so I don't want to carry on about it too much, but there are still plenty of works that are translations, which I think is very cool. Translation is a huge element of the server and of the fandom and I think it's really lovely that people took on the very arduous effort of translating theirs and others' works into other languages. Massive kudos!

Otherwise, I think my analysis from last time stands-- tl;dr, QSMP is far more likely to have Spanish and Portuguese works than AO3 generally because of the nature of the server, the server members, and the way that Spanish MCYT fandom in particular has grown in the last several years.

Last time I talked about Eng, Esp, and Prt-br speakers being really central to lore, and this time I would just add that I think several French members, namely Baghera and Etoiles, have made themselves significant within lore and just all-around fan favorites, so I hope to continue to see more works in French but also just more works about them in general. Cellbit is still hot, that hasn't changed, and I think the dynamics of streamer attractiveness aren't really something key to this kind of analysis, although they're certainly interesting.

Disclaimers, Conclusions, Final Notes:

I am not a statistician! I just think fandom stats are interesting. If I did any math wrong, please let me know. I also want to note that I'm not doing any particularly quantitative analysis here aside from turning work numbers into percentages, and that is partially intentional, as I don't think there's enough works at this time to do anything really strenuous, just to make some observations.

Going to copy-paste this note from last time, as well, as I think it's an important element about the multilingualism of the QSMP that is less common in other fandoms:

Due to the nature of the server, there is also a huge number of works that contain elements of multiple languages, ranging from a few works to a decent chunk of the dialogue swapping between languages. This is not completely unheard of in fandoms, of course, as there are many fandoms which provide the opportunity for multilingualism, but this is fun to note because it's so present in the canon itself. I would argue there's a decent number of fics that are themselves bilingual/trilingual/multilingual, and I wish AO3 had a way of tagging them as such. I'm not sure if there are any freeforms along those lines, but I have seen some folks noting in their tags that there's some amount of Spanish/Portuguese in them as well as English, and the same goes for the Spanish fics I've looked at.

^ I hope that continues to be a trend in fic, and I think that it continues the spirit of multilingualism both on the server and in the fandom.

Once again, here is the link to the stats as of June 6, 2023, and I hope you all enjoyed looking at these numbers!

[angelofthepage]

Okay, so lately I've been seeing a lot of mixed feelings (namely on Twitter) about the announcement of Bendy: Dreams Come to Life getting a graphic novel iteration. There is a LOT to talk about when it comes to this thing, and maybe I'll discuss it more another time, but today I wanna talk about the thing I've been hearing the most: strong feelings about having canonical designs for the human versions of some of our favorite characters.

In Dreams Come to Life, we have physical appearances from the following BATIM characters (that I can remember off the top of my head, I may be missing some):

Joey Drew

Sammy Lawrence

Norman Polk

Thomas Connor

Allison Pendle

Bertrum Piedmont

Wally Franks (this one I'm unsure on, it's been a hot minute)

This means that for the first time, we're gonna know what all of them look like as humans in the minds of the game developers, since, let's be real, if they're doing this thoughtfully, there is likely a lot of communication with the artist they got for this book. Making sure these characters fit their vision is a very probable priority.

In this fandom, we have had the freedom to design whatever the heck we want for the human versions of these characters. And that has been so much fun. You've had all sorts of takes, from characters mirroring their voice actors to completely original things that you never would have expected. Some things would pop up consistently in fan designs, and others would be an occasional pleasant surprise. We've seen a lot of things tweaked over the years, sometimes because we latch onto designs we like from artists we've met in the fandom and incorporate them into our own. Sometimes it's because we get new information in the canon, like Sammy confirmed to be blonde in The Illusion of Living (EDIT: I was extremely wrong on this, he is not confirmed blonde in this book, but he does have long and floppy hair that Joey thought should be slicked back more, and also Jack had some wild fashion), Allison is platinum blonde in DCTL, Wally having a hat as of his YouTube audiolog, Shawn and Tom wearing belts as of Boris and the Dark Survival, Tom being a wall of a man, Bertrum being a bear of a guy, etc. But even before Wally was confirmed to have a hat, a lot of us gave him a hat anyway, because the idea of him with a hat is fun! Bertrum being large, Tom being really tough! Heck, I saw a number of blonde Susies and Allisons before we got that bit on Allison, because it's fun to contrast their looks with that of Alice. That's the spirit of all of this, we make these designs because it's fun! You have characters all across the board in terms of race, sexuality, gender identity, age, body types, etc, because it's fun to imagine the possibilities for all of them with this cast that we love (and sometimes connect with them on a personal level), regardless of what's "canon" or not.

One of the things I'm hearing a lot is that some people don't want canon designs, and it sounds like it stems from a fear that they can't make their own designs anymore. And for those people, I'd like to ask, when has that ever stopped us? I mean that as a genuine question, I'm not here to mock anyone. Like, my first big fandom experience was over with Sonic as a teenager, and I never dreamed of deviating from the canon because I just, did not have any experience with that at the time. Bendy was really good for showing me that there's a LOT of ways the fandom experience can go, especially on this front. When Bendy and the Dark Revival came out, and we got two really major reveals for character designs: Memory Joey and Henry Stein. Henry, a character fans have been designing for YEARS, a character shrouded in mystery, finally got a confirmed design, and you know what happened? We started drawing this new design, but we didn't stop drawing our fan designs just because we got this new one. BATDR Henry has kind of been adopted into the fandom the same way we do designs for AUs, he's just another AU guy that happens to be canon to the sequel game. Heck, I love seeing art where fandom takes on Henry are interacting with BATDR Henry, it's really sweet honestly.

And that's exactly the attitude I have towards this graphic novel. It does not matter how these characters are designed, we are still valid and allowed to make whatever the heck we want. And if people really try to gatekeep it and scream that you're only allowed to draw the canon, I think that says more about them than it does anything else. Go draw what makes you happy (so long as it's not hurting anyone, obviously there is some nuance here but that is a whole other can of worms)! The only thing that this actually changes (or at least, what I'm guessing will change) is what's gonna fly when it comes to stuff like the fan art contests and challenges/what the devs might choose to retweet in terms of fan art. But that's only one part of the fan art scene. Otherwise, go fandom your way! No one is stopping you, draw what makes YOU happy. I am still going to draw a pointy blonde disaster of a music director however I please, even after we see Sammy in canon. Because darn it I like my Sammy, he is my strawberry blonde (depending on the world, sometimes it's more ashy) buffoon, and one new version of a book doesn't change my love for that.

That said, I am really curious how the teams behind this series imagine these characters. I feel the same way about it that I do my fellow fan artists. To me this really is just another AU, the DCTL AU. I think I'm less curious about the game characters and more about the characters native to this book, and that's got more to do with, well, I don't see a lot of people designing them! There's some, but they're not flooding my timeline like the game characters do. Like, I've designed the DCTL art department before for a Sims game, but I haven't gone much farther than that. I wanna know what Abby looks like, give me her fashion! I wanna see Buddy, Dot, and Jacob! I'm still keeping my Jacob design regardless, I love playing with him, but gosh do I wanna know what Jacob looks like in canon. Same with Dot. I have a lot of hopes for both of them, and I'm trying to lower my expectations so as not to be disappointed if it doesn't turn out that way. Like Dot has potential to be our first plus sized Bendy character given how she's described (also the first to wear glasses), of COURSE I want to see that! She's my writer girl that's super sus and incredibly interesting to me personally, I love her! And then I have more information to consider when I go to design my dolls (because believe you me, dolls based on the books have been on my list for a LONG time). I'm curious how much input Adrienne Kress will have here as the author, like I would love to know what's going on in her mind with these characters!

Whatever happens next, the most important thing to remember is that you're free to create whatever you like. Go make things that make you happy. That's all the devs are doing in the end, and if it's good enough for them, it's more than good enough for us. Bendy is made the way it is (hopefully) because that's what they wanted to make. Like why make an indie project that makes you miserable, you know? I don't know what to think of this new graphic novel, but whatever happens, I'm gonna take it with a grain of salt and keep doing what I always do: make my own fun out of what we're given. That's what fandom is, a place to enjoy a piece of media. And everyone enjoys this sort of thing differently. Find what works for you.

[blazehedgehog]

Would you claim that Sonic as a whole has more than just subjective personal merit, that it is more than just "a fun franchise to escape in from the troubles of life"? Does it have any "objective" meaning in the sense a great work of art has or is it just a fun blue hedgehog and nothing more?

This is going to sound rude, but: I don't care?

This is buried in my inbox a bit, but I remember there being a line of questions I got last year that seemed to be from someone who was either experiencing a crisis of faith with their sense of belonging within the Sonic fandom, or were trying to poke at me to see if I had any misgivings.

And this feels like another one of those asks from someone who is fishing for an answer along the lines of "Why do you care so much?"

In romance there's always this talk of "love at first sight." You see a person and you just know that your search is over, their the one, and you'll devote yourself to them no matter what.

I'd argue that happens for a lot of things. Not that you think of something in romantic terms, but that you find the right thing at the right time in your life and there's an instant connection. You can't really explain it because consciously you don't know. There's something deeper that feeds a part of your soul you aren't even aware of.

Like, I know food metaphors are really basic, but you know how sometimes you get an intense craving for something? That can be your body signalling that "hey, we're getting low on iron, could you eat, like, a big meaty hamburger for us?"

Your brain doesn't know that. There is no sign that lights up in your head that specifically says, in human English, "consume more iron." You don't know what's really going on, just that you can't stop thinking about a specific type of food that is rich in a vitamin or mineral your body needs more of. So while you, personally, in your head your only thought is "man that burger tasted amazing, I really needed that" the rest of your body is receiving a critical shipment of some vital element it needed for comfortable operation and technically you're none the wiser that the two were connected.

My point in all of this is not that you're an idiot and I'm somehow superior or that we should dig deep to discover the meanings of what our feelings are really telling us...

My point is that sometimes you want a thing, so you should have the thing. That's it. That's all. It doesn't have to be complicated. As long as you're not doing anything unhealthy, you should fulfill your needs, because they are needs for a reason. And sometimes, if you stop and try really hard to unpack and diagnose why you want the mysteries of your wants, you open the door to all kinds of other problems.

Let's go back to an iron deficiency. How do you detect that? With a blood test. You take a certain number of milliliters of blood, there's probably blotting paper involved, maybe a centrifuge, and you're given a blood cell count. You can't do that on your own.

If you try to self-diagnose iron deficiency at home, you could end up chasing shadows, getting it wrong, and never even know it. For months, maybe years, maybe your entire life. You need to see a doctor, and then the doctor prescribes vitamins or whatever.

You... can't... really do that with emotions. You can't go to a doctor, ask "Why do I like Sonic the Hedgehog? Is there a deeper meaning?" and get a medically consistent answer. A therapist can speculate, they can point you in directions, make suggestions of what it could be, and in the end they may even be correct. But maybe they aren't. And what works for one person might not work for another.

There is no Sonic the Hedgehog deficiency test.

I am of the type where, since it's not an affliction and is just fandom funnies, I don't think about it too hard. I just ride the wave, enjoy it for what it is, and let my brain indulge in the simple pleasure of going "wheeeeeee" without any consequences. It can just be what it is.

Is there a deeper meaning? Probably, yeah. Nature versus technology, kids versus adults, fantasy versus science, adrenaline versus sedentary. There's a lot of interpretations.

And for me, I've mentioned it before, but my dad was a drag racer. I never knew him much for a variety of different (mostly sad) reasons, but he owned and maintained his own car named "Ol' Yeller" that he used to compete in local events (his was hot rod modded Chevy Belair). When it came to what he spent his money on, he put it into going fast. Which, even if he never could consciously impart that on me, seems to have manifested in other ways.

I have never been a fan of trying to coax meaning out of places where there might not be any. Sometimes you just want to go fast and bop a funny robot, and whatever urges that satisfies in my brain, I don't care much to unpack it, because I'd rather be going fast and bopping robots, you know?

[sflow-er]

🎁 💛 🎨 for the writers asks if you’re still doing them.

(If you’ve already answered any of these, replace with one you were hoping someone would ask!)

Hi! Yeah, I'm still doing them!

🎁 Have a piece of a WIP you want to share?

Well...sure! Here's an angsty snippet from the next chapter of my WIP, The real deal. I was actually hoping to get the chapter out this week, but I've been kind of swamped with other stuff, so I guess any readers hoping for an update may appreciate this.

[Context: Henry has just joined the Society. Walter is not happy about it.]

Walter has to stop there to quell the desperation that has not so much crept as it has rushed into his voice. He screws his eyes shut and hugs himself for comfort, trying to make it look like he’s just crossing his arms in frustration. The true meaning of the gesture isn’t lost on Henry, who soon reaches out to put his hand on Walter’s upper arm. “Hey. Are you okay?” Walter opens his mouth to say yes. What comes out is, “No. I’m really not.” Henry rubs Walter’s arm through the sleeve and hesitates a little before asking, “Would you like a hug?” “I’m not…in a hugging kind of place right now.”

💛 What is the most impactful lesson you’ve learned about writing?

Man, this is a tough one! There's always more to learn, and also so many things I have "learned" but not really taken to heart (such as "use a placeholder when you get stuck" haha).

I'd say maybe 'think of your readers as people, not numbers'. The writing itself has to be for me, because the worth of the story or my worth as a writer should not be determined by what anyone else makes of my writing. But I still think it's okay to acknowledge that I wouldn't be posting the stories anywhere if I didn't want to connect with people through them. The important part is not to think about it in terms of hits or even the number of kudos or comments, because that just leads to all kinds of self-doubt if the fic/chapter doesn't reach that many people (I am a niche writer in a small fandom, after all). I find it much more useful and joyful to think about it in terms of the actual human beings on the other side of the screen who have taken an interest in the story and let me share it with them.

🎨 - I already answered this one here. But since you suggested picking another one, let's do this (I tried to pick one of the yellow ones to at least match the colour):

🌻 How often do you read your own fics?

I write what I want to read, so I do reread my fics every now and then. Some more than others, but a couple of months ago I actually reread one that I had not revisited in ages, and I'm glad I did because it was better than I remembered.

Sometimes I reread for no particular reason, other times after a nice comment on an older fic. Or when I need to check something - just the other day, I went to check a minor detail in my magnum opus for my WIP (which is a prequel), and I ended up rereading the last five chapters... Oops.

(Sadly, rereading does often reveal typos or other little errors and fixing those does take me out of the story a bit, but I still enjoy it!)

Thank you again, @gulliblelemon! These were fun 💜

[Ask list for reference]

[letstalkwhump]

Let's Talk Whump No.15

Welcome to Let’s Talk Whump, a series of interviews that spotlight the amazing people in our whump community! I’m Malice and I’ll be your host today. 

Here today to talk all things whumpy is the fabulous @actress4him!

We’re thrilled to have you here, @actress4him! Let’s start with a non-whump fact or two about yourself!

I go by Jada! I’m a mom of two girls, ages 6 and 8, and it’s a blast watching them play all the whumpy things we did as children and wondering if they’ll grow up to be whumpers, too. When I’m not writing, I enjoy creating cosplay, occasionally drawing, and going on adventures with my family.

Let’s get straight to the point! What does the term whump mean to you? 

Anything where the character goes through a hard time, physically or emotionally, or ideally, both! And we’re actually allowed to focus on it and see the beginning, middle, and aftermath.

And how did you find the whump community? Anything specific that made you want to join?

It all started on fanfiction.net with the hurt/comfort tag, then led to AO3, where I learned of Bad Things Happen Bingo and first started seeing the term whump. That prompted me to create a Tumblr account, so that I could participate in all these whump events I was hearing about, and the rest is history!

Has your view on whump changed since you joined? Maybe your choice of OC vs Fandom?

When I first joined I was solely writing fanfiction, though I did write a series with an OC 

insert, and I had been writing original stories for most of my life. It took a bit of time and seeing how well other people’s OCs were received on Tumblr to get the courage to go back to writing my own characters and universes. 

And now everyone’s favourite bit: let’s talk whump tropes! Do you have nay particular favourites?

Lady whump, if that counts as a trope! Also captivity whump, restraints of any kind, especially gags/muzzles and stress positions, using whumpees against each other, playing on fears, whipping, stabbing, touch-aversion, even better when combined with touch-starvation…I could go on.

They’ve all got to be in my top favs too! Do you mind sharing a couple of your favourite pieces that you’ve written?

Oh my, that’s hard to decide. If I’m allowed to pick two, I’d first say Again, the opening piece for my series Obsession. The writing muse was just flowing that day and I always liked the way that one turned out.

Then from my favorite series, The Shadow of Death, my other favorite piece is I Will Punish Your Friend for Your Failure. That was a bingo prompt that I had way too much fun writing, there’s just so much pain all around for both the characters and so much angst to go along with it!

Damn, I love the lady whump in“Again”! So good. Do you mind sharing what your writing routine looks like?

I do most of my writing at night after my kids are in bed, usually between 10-11pm. I also sneak in writing time while they’re in dance class, though I do more rp during the day than personal writing. I have been known to get struck with a certain sentence that I don’t want to forget and quickly open Google Docs on my phone to add it, but most of the time I need to sit down with my laptop and get the words flowing to get much done.

And is there an easy thing for you to write? Or something you struggle with writing? 

Dialogue usually comes easily to me, especially when characters get angry. That seems to be when they have a tendency to take over the plot and do whatever they want! 

My biggest writing struggle is battle scenes, which is unfortunate considering the number of characters I’ve created that need to have physical fights fairly often. 

GIve us a sneak peak! Is there anything you're working on at the moment? 

Currently I’m putting the most work into the Soldier Boy AU with my OC Kamaria. I’m not entirely sure how it’s going to end yet, since it started out as a simple idea that I thought would only take 2-3 parts and I’m now on part 6, but it’s been a fun ride so far. 

I’ve also been having fun brainstorming, role playing, and writing a bit of Kamaria’s Royal AU, and am hoping that my brain will let me write another chapter of Liliana’s story sometime soon.

Is there any writing advice you’d like to share?

For me, what works best against writer’s block is having multiple series/WIPs so that I can bounce around to whatever is inspiring me at the moment. It’s when I try to force myself to write something that I’m not feeling that I start getting stuck and bored. And when the block still hits, I do a lot of reading - of others’ works and my own old ones! - and roleplaying and brainstorming with friends and searching for prompts to get inspired again. Most of all, though, just be patient with yourself when the muse is in hiding! It’ll come back eventually. 

Finally, shout-out time! Let’s hype some people up!

Shout out to @painful-pooch for being my best online friend and brainstorm partner and for bringing her OC Bruno into existence!

Also to @aprilwaters and @sableflynn for being so welcoming when I was first finding my way in the whump community, and to these fantastic people for being my ongoing rp partners:

@inscrutable-shadow

@peaches-and-dumbs

@ocean-blue-whump

@crash-bump-bring-the-whump

@whumpy-arts-and-crafts

And to everyone else on the Slices of Whump Discord server for making it a great place to hang out!

Anything you'd like to add?

Thanks for this interview, it was fun! And to anyone reading, I love chatting whump and meeting new people who share the same interests, so feel free to stop by my blog and say hello anytime!

Thanks so much for joining us today, @actress4him!

And to all you lovely folks at home, have a whump-derful day!

[profitsabode]

Anna Stats Meta 01 - FEH Numbers + Anna Comparisons

AKA the "Neku fumbles through Gamepress to understand how good base feh!Anna's stats are actually before he gives up and tries to narratively compare her stats to other playable Annas" meta. I'm obviously joking to an extent, but I feel like FEH will be more relevant when it comes to latter stat-related metas such as skills.

Part 1: Trying to Decipher FEH (and Fail)

As mentioned above, I used Gamepress to get a quick peek at her stats, with the fortunate additional benefit of directly comparing her stats to the entire roster. (Or at least as far as GP itself is updated, as I have just learned they stopped updating the site quite some time ago. These images should still be acceptable for my current goals, though.) I also threw in New Years Anna as a bonus, which is in the second image.

It is interesting to see Base Anna's base ATK be this "low" in comparison to most of the cast (it does get up to 45 with her weapon at least), although it is nice to see New Years Anna have a relatively high RES even if it comes at the sacrifice of some DEF. Also...it's neat to see both feh!Annas share a similar HP stat? Above-average SPDs?

...yeah, again I kind of knew from the start that trying to compare gacha stats alone wasn't going to be the most informative.

Part 2: Hypotheticals ft. Playable Annas

Which is why we're going to scrap this and move on to comparing Anna to her interdimensional sisters! For each stat, I will be judging if feh!Anna would be bad, good, or great at said stat on both a base stat and growth rate level.

To keep this section simple and concise, just know that I used Anna's Fandom Wiki page to go over Awakening, Fates, and Three Houses (3H for short) Anna's base stats and growths. Playable Annas only. (Looking at you, Destroyer of Worlds DLC Anna boss.) I could've used Engage as well, but I'd rather compare feh!Anna to similarly-aged adult counterparts. Sorry kid.

HP: GOOD BASE, SLIGHTLY ABOVE-AVERAGE GROWTH

Both Fates and 3H Annas have a 35% growth with starting HPs in the 20s, while Awakening Anna has a pretty hefty base 36 HP and 80% growth. Do note that Awakening Anna is going to cheat a bit here, as she is a pre-promote at base. However, I feel that feh!Anna can be compared to a pre-promote of sorts as well, even if she technically "starts" with your team in FEH. Not to say she's a Jagen-archetype in terms of stats.

As a commander, Anna must hold the frontline in order to be a dependable leader. In that sense, her stats should reflect more on the bulky-end, resulting in a good HP endurance and the ability to endure more through experience. Still, I think it would be cute for her to hold some similarity to the frailer Annas, so a HP growth of 45-55% might be good.

STR: MEDIOCRE BASE, MEDIOCRE GROWTH

All 3 other Annas share a pretty similar STR growth surprisingly enough, as well as base STR in the 9-12 range (Awakening Anna obviously being the upper end at 12). While it is tempting to make feh!Anna a walking powerhouse in her military role, I will actually take notes from FEH and say her STR game is pretty middling, or even potentially below-average.

Anna seems to be more of a person that finds her strength in numbers rather than impressive power. Merchants themselves rely on words and number-crunching to make their points. Keeping to the theme of feh!Anna being the defensive, commanding force, her physical strength is only a supporting factor of herself instead of the entire package. If you want specific numbers for the growth, imagine 25-35%.

MAG: BAD BASE, BAD GROWTH

Now here is a stat where I am going to take my own headcanon more than the stats of other Annas. feh!Anna is a weapon-focused fighter, and I really want her to have a weakness when it comes to magical prowess. It will also be a fun comparison to the other Annas, as their own MAG-related abilities are either equal to or even better than their STR-related stats. In this sense, they are more flexible than feh!Anna, at least when it comes to the art of magic. She'd just rather stick to the art of war, like she trained for.

SKL/DEX: GREAT BASE, GOOD GROWTH

Between the 3 Annas, their SKL stats are pretty mixed between the 40-60% in terms of growths. As feh!Anna takes on the role of a very experienced warrior, I believe that she would have a pretty high SKL from the start and even surpass Awakening Anna's 60% growth. Compared to the merchant Annas, feh!Anna focuses on the axe, a heavy weapon that takes great skill to reliably wield. This should give her an edge in the competition to have great accuracy in her attacks...at least, great accuracy in terms of a FE axe-fighter.

SPD: GOOD BASE, GREAT GROWTH

SPD is a stat all of the Annas have a pretty good hold in, perhaps a reference to their cunning business plans. While feh!Anna does not match them in terms of shop profits, they can still hold similarity when it comes to speed during a battle. This is something that FEH seems to agree with as well, so I am comfortable having a good hold in SPD, although she would be slightly lower in it at the start in comparison to her counterparts.

LCK: BELOW-AVERAGE BASE, BAD GROWTH

Another stat that I am going to base more off of headcanon and straight comparison to other Annas, and wow it's another one she'll suck at! The seasonal paralogues in FEH are obsessed with feh!Anna never catching a break in failing to make an easy buck, with the summer ones even having the other Annas ripping her off! Needless to say, it is easy to imagine feh!Anna having a bad time when it comes to natural luck, where she'd have an even lower growth than 3H Anna's 45% LCK.

DEF: GOOD BASE, GOOD GROWTH

As bow and sword classes, the merchant Annas are usually pretty squishy on the defensive-end, and that shows in their middling DEF growths. As stated before, feh!Anna actually serves as a more bulky wall to the army, she will differ from other Annas by having a much better hold in DEF. Not much to add here, girl actually brings some armor to the fight what do you expect.

RES: GREAT BASE, GOOD GROWTH

One more note that I will actually take from FEH's stats is feh!Anna being at least good when it comes to resisting magic attacks, even if she fails to dish them out. This is another similarity she has with the other Annas, or at least Awakening and Fates Annas. Fates Anna in particular has a radically high base RES that I doubt feh!Anna would compare to, but will still be similar to.

BONUS - CHA: GOOD BASE, MEDIOCRE GROWTH

This is a small aside since this stat would only be comparable to 3H Anna, but I think the two would be somewhat similar? I'm unsure what really counts as "great CHA" for 3H-standards, but as a trained leader, feh!Anna should at least get a decent score at the start. 3H Anna has a 50% CHA growth, which I can see feh!Anna having a slightly smaller number for.

SUMMARY

feh!Anna obviously holds some major differences between her interdimensional versions, but that doesn't mean their stats have to be entirely different! Mainly, feh!Anna would have better defensive stats compared to other playable Annas, but much worse luck. I'm actually surprised by how relatively similar I ended up seeing feh!Anna compared to her alts, seeing as they are in pretty different spots even if they share a merchant gimmick somewhat.

[incorrect-koh-posts]

Which is your favorite Baldwin ship? Like with an oc Or a male character . My favorite is him and Saladin lol.you know enemies to lovers shit . I didn't even consider this ship at first but after reading a long torturous sorrowful fic, this ship just hit the right spots. Anyways, do tell us about ur thoughts.

To be quite honest, I am capable of shipping just about anything as long as you sell it to me well, lol. But all right, here are my two cents on various Baldwin ships I have or have not encountered in the wild:

Baldwin/Saladin: This is very intriguing, but it's difficult to make into an actual romance in the canon universe simply because they meet so rarely. But I agree, they have great chemistry, and in a canon divergence fic I could absolutely see them have a sort of soft, reasonable enemies-to-lovers arc in a "We met five times in our lives yet always felt a special connection" kind of way. There are some very nice fics for this pairing that really managed to make me ship them a little, so yeah, anon, I feel you.

Baldwin/Balian can also be good, depending on how you sell it, though I'm sometimes not sure if I headcanon Balian as painfully and irrevocably hetero or not. What I'd personally find interesting would be Baldwin/female Balian - I haven't yet seen a gender bend for Balian, but I think that could be fun.

Baldwin/OC really depends - I'll admit my Baldwin headcanons lean a bit more in the direction of him being gay (and possibly asexual?), but a female OC can totally work, too. I suppose I just kind of dislike it when the OC is overly dramatic, since to me Baldwin really seems like a low drama sort of guy and surrounding him with shrieking or perpetually giggling female OCs isn't a thing that works for me personally. But generally speaking, YES, give me all the OCs of every conceivable background or gender (though now I really want to see Baldwin/male OC). They're one of the reasons why I love the KoH fandom so much - in other fandoms OCs are often reviled and looked down upon, while in our little niche they're basically standard procedure.

Baldwin/Tiberias: I love the concept in theory, since the dynamic of young forceful yet gentle king and world-weary yet totally devoted older knight really ticks the right boxes for me (yes, I am weird). I've read some lovely fics that featured subtle variations of this, but anything that is a bit more heavy on the romance and/or the more physical things between them usually isn't my cup of tea because at some point I tend to remember that they're related and I somehow cannot see past that.

Baldwin/Sibylla: Now this is definitely too much incest for my taste, sorry.

What I haven't yet seen is Baldwin/Imad, which could potentially be a good match in terms of personality. They're both calm and collected men, probably share a number of interests, and I just think Imad would fit rather well since he's not as uptight as Balian, nor as unapproachable as Salah ad-Din, nor as creepily related to Baldwin as Tiberias and Sibylla. But yeah, as you see, I only need the thinnest of pretexts to come up with a total crackship. Which brings me to:

+ My personal, oddly specific crossover crackship: Baldwin/Rebecca of York from Walter Scott's Ivanhoe. Do yourselves a favour and don't ask.

[chimaerakitten]

New Tag Game: Rec Your Own Fics

ok so I'm starting a new one of those tag games. Because they have to start somewhere and I want to.

Rules: If you’re tagged, make a rec list of your own fics that you’re most proud of. The ones you personally want people to read because you know they’re good. The ones you get extra excited when you get comments on them because people are responding to what you know is your best work. As part of the list, say why you’re proud of them! Participant’s choice on how many that is and where you draw the line on pride, but the more the better. Bonus points for fics that you like to reread yourself or fics that have low engagement because they’re in a small fandom or an unpopular ship/trope. Then tag however many people you feel like to continue the game. (If you want a guide number, try for seven or however many fics you listed)

Secondary rule: If you get tagged and you’re not a fic writer, consider doing the same for art you’ve done or meta you’ve written that you’re proud of.

Tertiary rule: This is the time to be the opposite of humble! Hype your own stuff! Share why you’re proud of something. Do some self love! And please give the game a chance even if you haven’t written much or are just starting out etc etc.

I’ll do an example list to get us started:

Leaves and Shells Fandom: Avatar The Last Airbender

This one is about grief—it focuses on adult Zuko dealing with Iroh’s death. It’s not a light fic, but it is a soft one. I’m proud of it in part because it’s 3 years old and I still like it as much as I did when I wrote it, and also because I think I captured the core emotions well.

Numb Fandom: Batfam

This one is a Cass and Damian bonding fic, where they try to come to terms with having hurt and killed people. I’m proud of this one because it’s not super common to get these two paired together, and letting them interact dug up some thoughts I didn't even know I had until I started writing, and the epiphanies show.

With Friends Like These Fandom: Young Justice

On the intersection between the friendships of Artemis and Robin, and Artemis Crock and Dick Grayson. I’m proud of this because it fills in a missing bit of canon very neatly, and the selection of moments shown give a good impression of their dynamic. (It’s also the oldest fic of mine on this list)

And The Gods are Silent (when you ask them why) Fandom: The Queen’s Thief

Eugenides and the loneliness of immortality (AU)—in which Gen is dosed with the water of life at the end of Queen of Attolia, and we follow the AU from there. I’m proud of it because it shows the whole spectrum of emotion, from grief and tragedy and major character death to reunions and joy in the happy ending.

them born with the dangers Fandom: Tangled, The Queen’s Thief

Tangled TQT fusion. Eugene Fitzherbert is a descendant of the thieves of Eddis, and it’s 100% canon compliant (to the movie, if not the show). This is the most recent work of mine on this list. I’m proud of this one because there was so much I was able to weave together in very few words when it comes to continuity nods and even a tiny smidge of action.

Logs, Letters, and Other Lost Things Fandom: The Murderbot Diaries

Grief again. This time ART’s grief after losing Murderbot to the machine equivalent of old age. I’m proud of this one for similar reasons to the last; I captured a lot of emotion—and a very bittersweet vibe—in a very compact little story. I’m also proud of it because when I posted it it caused complete carnage in the discord and that was really fun to witness.

Example list complete! Tagging: @audreycritter @lurkinglurkerwholurks @preciousthingsareprecious @imbecamiel @trash0falltrades @grammarpedant ​ @sequintial @blessphemy @broken-risk-assessment-module @uovoc @starknjarvis27, everyone I forgot to tag, and literally anyone else who thinks this might be fun! 

[schumigrace]

This looks fun! Okay so unpopular opinion(s): - the cars have much more to do in the terms of who wins than they used to - the wave of new fans has as much pros at is has cons (maybe even more cons) - F1 was better back in the day (like the 90's, that was crazy) - Some "fans" started to treat F1 like reality show and they don't see the drivers as real human beings - Bringing fandom content into real life is creepy and people should stop (I'm not talking about having blogs or writing fanfiction, that is okay, it's what we all do, just about treating fan content like it's the reality and forcing drivers to see/acknowledge it - especially the shipping)

This got a bit long so gunna read more it:

- agreed to an extent, but I think since 2009 it's primarily been about the car, and I started watching in 2010 so my knowledge on prior seasons is purely from rewatching races. So I don't feel like I can comment loads on this, but I'd agree that it seems closer in years prior to 2009.

I personally don't mind too much, part of the charm of F1 to me is that the car is so vital, its one of the very few series that doesn't have equal machinery, so it lets me nerd out about car development more than anything else.

- I don't believe new fans are the problem at all. I wan't new fans, F1 needs new fans. the problem is how liberty media and FOM are handling the influx of new fans, and how disillusioned people like Domenicalli are with how we consume media nowadays. F1 started to lose fans in the early 2010s because Ecclestone refused to utilise social media, which is where the majority of people now consume media and the news, so liberty media has been vital for the exposure of the sport - but then it just stopped listening to what fans wanted. Thats the issue, not the fans themselves. I'm not about gatekeeping.

- Again, i'm not massively into commenting on the sport being better at any particular point in time, because I wasn't watching in the 90s. I agree certain aspects were better. The tyres, for a start (bring back bridgestones!) and the reduced calendar was definitely better. But I enjoy how the sport is now, for the most part. For me, 2010-2016 was when it was at its peak, but that's my opinion.

The last two points I agree on 100%. Number one rule, leave the drivers alone. I hate when people discuss personal lives, unless the driver themself has discussed something (i.e. in a book or an interview). The whole taynando situation still makes me want to throw up

[riallasheng]

Happy holidays!! I hope you had a greay day 🫶

If you don't mind me asking, what are your headcannons of the Tracy boys, or Thunderbirds in general?

Happy Holidays, hope you have a great day as well, and a kind year to follow ^^

ohhhh, so many. XD

Granted, a lot of my headcanons are more me taking elements from one continuity / variation (like from the novels, or comments from the creators, etc) and applying it to The-hodge-Podge-Mostly-Based-On-The-Novels-And-Comics that it my ficverse XD

Also a lot of headcanons and cherrycanons to make the various Supermation shows fit more cohesively together as a whole (characters having past interactions, changing up parents or kin a bit, etc. And not always the way one would expect - for example I've got it where Gordon never really knew Troy which is the common headcanon in fandom but instead it's Scott that knows Troy, via a pre-existing friendship Scott had with Phones. ...Cause the 5 year age gap between Troy and Gordon is actually REALLY BIG in terms of officer training at the WASP Academy, plus the fact that Gordon was apparently on Bathyscapes while Troy was Combat Subs. BUT I also have it where Gordon knows Holden / Captain Grey and Fisher - having it where those two served on the same boats he did.)

hmmm, let's see what are some fun ones...

....

Okay, I actually went over the word count limit before I even finished The youngest 4 characters, let alone the Thunderbirds and IR... XD

I'mma just link to my Timelines, as I've got all my headcanons for the characters and plotting and stuff in it.

Link: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Adw1Cx1dLIzG4TfMKCm_953pjiFk_7xn?usp=share_link

but some small headcanons to put here:

The Thunderbirds are numbered in order of construction completion / first time used on a rescue

What makes a rescue craft a Thunderbird is nothing more or less than the fact that it's the personal craft of one of the active rescue personnel. That's why 4 is a Thunderbird, even though she's technically / would otherwise be a pod vehicle.

TinTin designed the Mole and if / when she switches from Support to Active Rescue then the Mole would be reclassed into a Thunderbird. (the same applies to the Firefly, which was the craft that Brains considers to be 'his personal' craft

Grandma Tracy gets her confirmation name and Maiden surname from Joan Hughes, stunt pilot for Thunderbird 6 and actually a rather amazing woman just on her own. Her Maiden Name of Hughes also does double duty of tributing Howard Hughes, famous aircraft designer and business man Like the real Joan Hughes, Ruth was a pilot from the age of 15, and was one of the first people accepted into the World Air Force, and served as a ferry pilot (ferrying / flying aircraft all over the world), flying everything from fighter craft, to scout craft, to bombers. Much of her 'Globe Trotting' was done during this time, and she served (in her mid 40s) in the first Global War in the 2020s-2030s. Ruth was a stunt pilot in her youth, and quite skilled at flying both modern stunt-planes and vintage planes. Her pride and joy was a vintage Tiger Moth, which she kept in pristine condition and taught all of the boys (and TinTin) to fly, and is indeed the first aircraft Jeff flew when he was young. It was brought over to Tracy Island alongside the rest of Ruth's personal effects, and has a pride of place in the 'Operation: Coverup' hanger. While Ruth doesn't trust herself to still fly the plane (or any plane really, due to vision problems and arthritis) the Tiger Moth is still flown on occasion, and Ruth has (living)willed it to Alan, and gave it to him as his 21st birthday present, who adores the craft and flies it the most often out of anyone.

This one is less a headcanon and more a frightening fact that hails from two facts about Thunderbird 1 that I just really want some characters to realize and freak out over in a story XD She can reach speeds of over Mach 19 She carries high density spears Combine those two facts... and Thunderbird 1 is capable of precision K-STRIKES.

[sapphicsandscience]

20 questions for fic writers

Not going to lie - no one tagged me in this lol - but I am doing it .

1. How many works do you have on ao3?

47.

2. What's your total ao3 word count?

322,829.

Crazy number for me. I know some have literal millions but I can’t believe I’ve written that much in like the last two or three years??

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Currently Star Trek (TNG/VOY/PIC & some DS9). ER and Criminal Minds more so in the past. But ER I’ll never leave you.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Aster

- my labor of love - no pun intended.

- i WILL finish her (manifest it pls).

A Flame In Your Heart

- going to be honest writing post s3 isn’t something that interests me the most.

- however, this is a cute story and i wish i had some more ideas for it as i feel like i lack direction.

I Should Have Moved Moons For You

- ahhh.

- a fic I really should have pre-written before posting but i do have fun with it.

- i am half confident she will be finished in time but it stresses me out thinking about it and my outline lol.

- but like most of my WIPs the chapters are all outlined and i do have semi-concrete endings for them or at least know the main plot.

A Lot Of Things Can Happen In Two Months

- like the concept but i think i could have written it better ?

- feels a bit messy but also there are a lot of feelings in it.

- but happy i got it finished !! and i am proud of it overall.

Eighteen Minutes

- ngl I forgot I wrote this lol.

- the only one-shot here.

- def benefited kudos wise from being posted after the second episode aired.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes! And I love to give comments regardless if I get a reply from the author. But personally, I like to reply back as the commenter has taken their time to do this. And you can have some really lovely and funny interactions in the comments haha … I just love talking about fic.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Well…it would have to be either of the ones I killed Beverly in - Last contact or Too Late.

Not sure which is more angstiest?

However, as for a multichap ending that ends the most angstiest and wasn’t written to be a character-death-fic - maybe - A Lot Of Things Can Happen In Two Months. Which sucks cause it’s pretty much canon compliant LOL.

Hmm now I am tempted to write another multichap with a less than happy ending…

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Most of my fics that have an ‘ending’ are WIPS that I haven’t finished yet lol.

But maybe Our Turn - it’s just Beverly and Jean-Luc enjoying everything wonderful in their lives <3

8. Do you get hate on fic?

Not really - I doubt anyone cares enough lol. But I am ‘fortunate’ that some of the more ‘controversial’ ships I may write have had writers come before me and take the brunt of any crap :(( but they’ve created a lovely sandbox for the rest of us to play in <3

9. Do you write smut?

Not often but I have yeah…and *deep breaths* … I have no idea if I am even acceptable at it LOL. It’s definitely something I sometimes want to add to my fics and lately I’ve been giving in a little.

Okay, someone tell me if I am terrible and I will stop.

10. Do you write crossovers?

It’s not my go to thing but yes I have. Including the fusion ER/TNG fic that three people have probably read (but three people I love).

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No but that would be cool as!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes! With my lovely and supportive ER fic buddies ❤️

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

Not sure how best to answer this. It is very dependant on my current hyperfixation and I am one of those sapphics that very much is into the woman more than the man in terms of interest in f/m ships…

However, at the moment it’s Beverly/Jean-Luc and I can say I am definitely more invested and interested in Jean-Luc’s character than I have been with other men in f/m ships. So that’s another reason.

But I love to read/write Crusher/Janeway ❤️ and LOVE those characters. Kerry/Sandy too is special to me.

Can honestly say apart from helping me give Emily Prentiss a baby in my fics I never cared that much for any of her ships I wrote (sorry 😭).

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but probably won't?

Probably better I don’t answer this. It stresses me out cause I want them all to be done 😭

I’ll answer with a WIP I never posted which was a dystopian AU with Kerry and Sandy. Field medicine, babies (it’s me so ofc) and friends trying to survive together.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Hmm - I think I can come up with some good ideas. I can be good at description and introspection … probably more than dialogue.

And I am very strong in the art of giving Beverly Crusher lots of babies. And also making her go through angsty stuff. But I make up for that with the babies I think.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Long intricate plots ? I would love to be better as balancing many themes and plot points in one story. I struggle with dialogue sometimes as well.

Also I am very word count preoccupied at times which is a hindrance as a writer. I sometimes really struggle to get anything out in a session then can overcompensate later by writing too much? But honestly either way I just let myself go with the flow these days otherwise I stress about it.

Yeah and I probably need to edit better.

And smut.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

Is this controversial?? I don’t have any issue with it.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

(redacted)

20. Favourite fic you've written?

These are both not what I would consider my best work (idk what that even is) but probably Gone (Ice)fishing or It Takes A Village.

Both were written as gifts and out of my comfort zone (for different reasons) but I am really proud of them both.

But I also love some of my Kerry/Sandy one-shots I did here on this blog. And Aster is definitely a personal accomplishment in terms of length as a writer. I love it too ❤️.

Oh, also - To Build A Home - cause it’s tragic & angsty but also BABY🥹 - it’s just my brand.

—————————————————

Okay -I’ll shut up now.

Anyone feel free to do this and tag me.

[atthebell-moved]

QSMP Language Stats on AO3 (as of June 6th 2023)

Hey hi hello. I just spent 3-4 hours working on this and I'm a little bleary-eyed so forgive the text of this if it makes little sense.

So, I decided to look into the statistics and percentages for QSMP works on AO3 and what languages they're tagged with, to see how multilingual the fandom on that platform is, as AO3 is far easier to do stats on than elsewhere.

Some fun tidbits from the start/tldr;:

QSMP has 1433 works as of today (well, as of checking this while writing it, it's actually jumped up to 1438, but for the data I collected earlier, let's stick with 1433).

English is the most commonly tagged language, at 80.04%, which is a smaller percentage than the percentage of all English works to all works on AO3 (more details for all of this below).

Though the top three languages are spoken on the server, French has no works on AO3 currently.

There's a decent amount of works that are translated into several languages, which is very rad! Doing stats on that would be an entirely different post, with a bit more work involved, but I want to give a big kudos on this as translation is very difficult and is often a passion project in fandom that goes underappreciated.

I got a lot of these numbers just by going through the QSMP tag and filtering by language and then checking manually, but for the larger AO3 numbers I got those on the Languages page, which shoes all languages supported by the Archive.

Now onto the numbers! Everything is below a cut because trust me, this post is long. Viewers beware, you're in for a stats dump.

Numbers, Stats, Percentages, all that fun stuff

QSMP works

[Image Description: A table with three columns; the first lists languages, the second the number of works, and the third the percentage of total works. For the languages column, each language is listed first in that language and then in English in parentheses, and English, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, and French are all color-coded to indicate that they are spoken on the server. End ID.]

The most commonly tagged language, like I said above, is English, with 1147 works or 80.04% of total works in the QSMP fandom tag.

The second most commonly tagged language is Spanish, with 254 works and 17.73% of the fandom.

Next is Brazilian Portuguese at 27 works and 1.88%.

And the next four are all much lower: Mandarin at 2 works and 0.14%, Russian at 1 work and 0.07%, Latin with 1 work at 0.07%, Esperanto at 1 work with 0.07%, and French with 0 works and 0%.

I included French because it is the only spoken language on the server without any works, which I find interesting and will talk about further in my notes/analysis later on.

Some interesting trends to note! First thing: English, as one would expect, is the most used language, with 80.04%. I am also unsurprised that English and Spanish are at the top, as I know there's sizable MCYT fandoms for both languages. I think there's a few reasons why these numbers shake out the way that they do, which I'll get into later, but for now I think most would agree that these are what one would expect, aside from perhaps the languages that do have works but are not spoken on the server.

With these, I'm actually not surprised either. After English, Mandarin and Russian are the next two top languages in terms of works on AO3 (numbers below), and for Latin and Esperanto, creating works in those is something that happens often enough in fandom that I don't find it surprising, although with how small QSMP is (in terms of works on AO3 at the moment) it is interesting regardless. I talk a bit more about Esperanto in my notes at the end, but for Latin, as a language people often take in school but rarely use and a language with a lot of cultural hype surrounding it, people who took Latin in high school or even studied it in college with sometimes write or translate fic into it.

Across All Fandoms

Okay, with those numbers at the ready, let's compare to total numbers across all fandoms on AO3. I did this comparison using the same languages as above, but I will also add another table showing the percentages for the top 15 languages on the site, as I find that kind of stuff interesting and I think it's somewhat relevant.

I don't have a confirmed number on the total number of works on AO3 as of when I did these numbers, but according to the AO3 welcome page, they're at approximately 11,220,000 works right now. I'm going with this number, as I know its an updated one probably at least as of June 1, and complete accuracy is not necessarily possible in this instance.

[Image Description: The same table as above, this time with numbers for all fandoms across AO3. End ID.]

The most commonly tagged language is English at 10,021,982 works and 89.32% of all works on AO3.

Spanish has 130,024 works and 1.16%

Brazilian Portuguese has 30,549 works and 0.27%

Mandarin has 621,505 works and 5.54%

Russian has 238,699 works and 2.13%

Latin has 149 works and 0.0013%

Esperanto has 99 works and 0.00088%

French has 52,904 works and 0.47%

Okay! Lots of numbers this time, and some similarities and differences. First thing I want to note is that the total number of works on AO3 being over 10 million means these stats are far more meaningful and show more significant trends than those for QSMP. QSMP also only has 1433 fics, which is MINUSCULE compared to the total number of works across fandoms on AO3. You also have to consider that the number of people who write fic for a fandom versus the number of people who speak it is very different, and you also have to consider platform differences between different fandoms. There are other fanfiction websites in various languages, and that might impact these numbers to some extent.

Going to get into analysis now, as I think discussing how the data compares will get into that pretty quickly anyway.

Analysis:

Disclaimer! Much of this is just my personal opinion, or stuff I've noticed but don't really have numbers on or too much info on myself. I would love to hear from folks in the Spanish, Brazilian, and French communities (as well as any others!) about what they're like, especially as regards MCYT. I am lightly familiar with Spanish fandom because of Karmaland and now QSMP, but it's still not wildly familiar to me, and otherwise my fandom experiences are pretty English-centric.

The biggest thing to note here, in comparing the data between QSMP specifically and AO3 broadly, is that the percentage of Spanish fics is far smaller-- it's gone from the near-20% in QSMP to around 1% for all works. This makes sense, considering how many QSMP members speak Spanish, how much Spanish MCYT fandom has grown in the last several years, and the fact that the server is themed around multilingualism and cross-cultural expression, meaning fans who speak multiple languages are more likely to write in not just English and also generally incorporate more of the various languages into their writing.

The difference here is also in terms of audience, like I said. This fandom is far more likely to attract Spanish speakers than Mandarin or Russian Speakers, at least at the moment, so it makes sense that Spanish would have far more works. In comparison to French, also, Spanish has more than double the amount of speakers than French and from my knowledge Spanish MCYT fandom is far bigger.

For Portuguese, I'm not familiar with the fandom, but there does seem to be a decent MCYT fandom going on and I'm impressed with the number of works in Portuguese. I know it seems small, but again, the total number of works really is not that many.

The biggest reason so far that I think English, Spanish, and Portuguese are at the top, aside from just that the first two were on for much longer and the latter for at least a month longer than the French (and aside from the fact that English is so present on AO3) is that those streamers have made themselves much more central to the narrative and to lore than any of the French speakers have, at least so far. The Brazilians showed up and immediately became so involved and so beloved, and while fans obviously like the French speakers, they're not doing quite as much RP nor are they as involved in the Federation lore that much.

I also think one thing I haven't really seen people acknowledge is that Cellbit is very attractive, which of course begets fan attention. His lore is incredible and I think he's a very talented RPer, obviously, but he is also really hot, which means people are more likely to create fanworks about him. For Spanish and English speakers, obviously there are also creators who people are very into (I'm not even going to name any because it's quite a long list and you're all well aware). For the French, not so much. This is not me calling any of them ugly, I'm just saying that I have not seen really any thirsting over any of them aside from a few people talking about Baghera. I'm not going to get into the logistics of fan attention and attractiveness of creators, I just wanted to acknowledge that that is definitely doing Cellbit some favors and is likely making interest in Portuguese and Portuguese fanworks more popular.

Okay I've reached the point of writing this post where I think I've been working on all of this for at least 3-4 hours and I need to stop thinking about it so. That's everything I have for the moment, but I would be happy to hear what other folks think about this. If i said i would talk about something but forgot please just shoot me an ask or something and i'll add on.

Here's some extra notes:

There are a few (not many, but enough to acknowledge) fics that are written in Spanish but are tagged as being in English. I'm not sure if the same is true of Brazilian Portuguese.

Due to the nature of the server, there is also a huge number of works that contain elements of multiple languages, ranging from a few works to a decent chunk of the dialogue swapping between languages. This is not completely unheard of in fandoms, of course, as there are many fandoms which provide the opportunity for multilingualism, but this is fun to note because it's so present in the canon itself. I would argue there's a decent number of fics that are themselves bilingual/trilingual/multilingual, and I wish AO3 had a way of tagging as such. I'm not sure if there are any freeforms along those lines, but I have seen some folks noting in their tags that there's some amount of Spanish/Portuguese in them as well as English, and the same goes for the Spanish fics I've looked at.

Similarly, there's a decent amount of translations! Which is super cool! Translations are usually only done as passion projects by really dedicated fans, so it's really cool to see a (relatively) small fandom (for AO3) with a decent amount of them. I want to stress that translation is very tough work so major kudos to folks doing translations, either of their own work or other's.

The one Esperanto fic is a translation of an English work! Also, if you're unfamiliar, Esperanto is a conlang (constructed language) created in 1887 as an international language meant for anyone from any background to be able to learn. It never picked up much global steam, as lingua francas are far more common and it's still fairly Euro-centric in the language systems it pulled from, but it is likely the most spoken international auxiliary constructed language, and translating into it is often done as a nod to the importance of translation and cross-cultural communication. I think it's very fun that someone translated a work into it for QSMP :]

Also!!! here are the top 15 languages used on ao3 and their number of works. They're not in a spreadsheet bc i got really really tired sorry

english: 10,022,162 mandarin: 621,520 russian: 238,700 spanish: 130,692 french: 52,904 italian: 33,962 brazilian portuguese: 30,549 indonesian: 29,030 german: 22,755 polish: 17,215 ukrainian: 11,041 cantonese: 8,878 filipino: 8,664 vietnamese: 6,565 czech: 5,168

[archivalofsins]

Hmm, for the ask game: Amane: 5, 11, 12!

I've answered one of these questions in other asks~ So, I'm going to do something really fun! I'm going to pull up a random number generator and generate one new number for this to give you a unique non repetitive answer along with putting the answers I've given before here.

Thanks for asking!

milgram character ask game ! send the character + the questions

Momose, Amane/ Amane Momose

5. favorite voice drama line/moment?

My favorite voice drama/voiceline moments are when she points out that what's going on here is technically a crime but she won't judge us, when she says emotions and logic are two different things, and when she tells Es to get up in her second voice drama and calls them out for using we as well.

11. what are your favorite points about their story and the narrative surrounding them?

I really love the aspects of adultification around Amane along with how her mother's parental abuse was handled over the course of the story. I also enjoy how she's shown to be a consistent and comforting presence withi the prison just as Mahiru is. Having her consistently talk people through their emotional issues. It really highlights how older people have children due a great deal of emotional labor in their social interractions with them.

It was also cool to see her try to get help with studying from the other prisoners over the couse of trial one and see her land on just having casualy discussions with Mikoto and learning that way.

12. what do you wish would be discussed more often about them in the fandom?

I wish that people would highlight the care and consideration Amane displays towards the other prisoners whenever they're having a hard time regardless of what's going on with her. I think people greatly overlook how considerate Amane is.

21. do you have any similarities with them/relate to something in them?

I grew up with an abusive mother even though my relationship with her is alright now. The only reason that happened is because my grandfather died (her father) and I anted to go to his wake and you can't really keep avoiding someone under those circumstances.

So, I greatly sympathize with her circumstances and her reaction to them is a bit cathartic to me. Especially since many people react to abuse by either putting the blame on the child for doing something that would pprovoke the parent into acting that way regardless of how out of line their parents reaction is or just don't want to address at all. I especially sympathize with the consistent pressure for her as the person victimized to let it go and be reasonable not stoop to their level and be the bigger person or be viewed as just as bad as them.

Which is super funny considering no one wanted to say what her mom was doing was bad but suddenly when she behaves that way to defend herself people can see the many problems with that sort of behavior. It's just that illustration of what a lose/lose situation being a victim of parental neglect actually is because most societies go suck it up think of your abusers feelings and circumstances far before ever saying that's a shit thing that person did to you.

It's always yeah but why did you make the situation worse and to put it simply she made it worse because no one else stepped in to make it better. Yet, it's really dififuclt for people who don't really have those experiences to come to terms with that sort of thing.

[17yearslatewithlattes]

Okay so I knew going into this that since I don’t have anyone to talk to I was going to need to find people to listen to or else I would drive myself crazy. Unfortunately I found three I really liked all at once and now am spending a truly concerning number of hours on spn content. But I do appreciate the content they make so shoutout to them:

1. Imon_Snow supernatural reactions on YouTube

She does episode reactions, and is watching the show for the first time without much foreknowledge, and I’m enjoying seeing how the show plays to someone who goes in basically blind. Sure sometimes she makes a comment that makes me want to give her a lore dump for context, but genuinely watching her see the nuances unfold is one of my favorite parts.

She’s thoughtful, sweet, and engaged. She tends to focus on theme and character in her discussions, and not infrequently pulls out insights that I’m really impressed she caught onto so early in the show. She has a very endearing crush on Dean and is also extremely fond of Sam, and her coming off as a sweetheart is entertainingly counterbalanced by her occasionally having The judgeist reaction to something a character does before catching and laughing at herself.

P.S. For some reason the playlist I linked only includes her reactions up through 1x16, but last I checked she was well into season 3.

2. @escapingpurgatorypodcast

This is an episode-by-episode deep dive by two friends who have watched the whole show, hated the end so very much, and have stayed as stuck on the show as Tumblr has. I don’t know if/how much they’re involved with online fandom, but this definitely has the most Tumblr-fandom vibes of the three. They try to avoid full-on spoilers, but their watch is very much informed by the show as a whole.

They’re longtime friends who have a very sweet and fun dynamic with each other and scratch that itch I always have after an episode for someone to rant about the implications and emotions raised by ‘x’ episode in context of the Everything to come. I definitely find myself agreeing with them the most, and while that’s not a ding against the others I’m recommending (the different perspectives is part of what I appreciate about them), it’s very nice to have a channel that consistently vents about the same things that got my emotions spinning while also adding insights I missed.

They also make smart comments about filming choices, and since one is watching the dvds and the other is watching on Netflix, they also compare notes on the music changes Netflix made. So yeah—if you want really in-depth discussions from long-term emotionally invested fans, I highly recommend this one!

3. Just Us supernatural reactions on YouTube

This was the last one I stumbled across, and I really didn’t mean to add a third accompaniment. But then I watched Faith and was still reeling after watching/listening to the usuals, and I decided to watch one more reaction for just that episode—and was unfortunately very entertained and endeared.

This channel is four friends, two of whom have seen all or most of the series, and two of whom had never watched an episode before. Their dynamic is boisterous and they rib each other mercilessly but in a way that makes you go ‘aww, they’re friends ^^’. If you’re bemoaning the absence of Sam girls in the other recommendations, Cameron has got your back, with support from Nathan. Davion is holding the fort for the Dean girls. Cameron has a notebook and it somehow becomes the best ongoing bit in the series. Divek has previously watched through season 13, and is the cypher of the group. He spends most of the episodes hood up slumped down poker face on, and he does say things—sometimes passionately—yet I’d have a hard time confidently recounting any opinion he has in the show. It’s a Wild energy to bring to an entertainment platform built around giving opinions/reactions, and it’s frankly fantastic.

Davion and Cameron—the ones watching for the first time—are brothers, and something about their teasing/affectionate/annoyed interactions in response to what is currently The Brother Show is really the key to how delightful the reactions area. Also Davion and Cameron (especially Davion) have John pegged pretty darn quick, and for that they have my respect.

A heads up though: they all have moments in how they talk about the women in the show that make me cringe, and some of them can go uncomfortably hard on no-homoing their (frequent) comments on how attractive Sam and Dean are. For me it’s not enough to outweigh the elements I really enjoy, but ymmv.

[jrow]

Fic year in review

@calaisreno and @raina-at both tagged me (and Raina said some really nice stuff!) so I figure, why not do this? For the record, I’ve stolen Raina’s format ;):

I am pretty happy with my fic output this year. It’s been a busy, stressful one in the non-digital world, and I was very glad to have fandom to unwind in. Things are getting busier and far more stressful in my offline life (work, volunteering I’ve started, young kids, stuff) but keeping some time aside to write/edit is pretty important for my mental health. Sometimes it’s just a couple hundred words a week (with millions of imagined words in my mind) or betaing a few pages, but it’s still very needed.

Total number of completed stories: 5

Total word count: about 110k published, but I know I wrote about 20k of that in 2021. Plus there is probably 10k or so words in WIPs (that may or may not see the light of day)

Fandoms written in: BBC Sherlock

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d expected?: Probably about what I expected. If I had put money on it, I would have said 100k. I’d make the same guess for 2023...

What’s your own favorite story of the year? Depends on the day....potentially Jam, because I’m pretty proud of the epilogue. But I suspect that The Man in the Cartier Frames is the one I’ll reread the most.

Did you take any writing risks this year?: I participated in FTH which was a little nerve-wracking, but it turned out really! I am not sure I would have overcome writer’s block if I didn’t have those pieces to work on. I like a bit of pressure sometimes. In terms of writing, I took fewer risks than I would have liked, but the alternating perspective in Jam certainly felt like a risk.

I also started beta’ing this year, which was a bit of a risk, I suppose. It also worked out really well though. It’s something I think I’m good at. It’s also easy when you are beta’ing for people whose stories you really, really like! And for the record, a co-worker of mine suggested earlier this year that I make an easy shortcut for em-dashes (I use them a lot in my work) and it’s honestly changed my life. It’s why I’m so quick to insert/correct them when beta’ing now! I do love an em-dash.

Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year?: Post at least a part of an AU. So far, all of my posted works have been basically in canon. I have a handful of AUs sketched out or, in two cases, partly written. But, I have a lot more trouble sticking with them. I think it’s the world-building aspect (something both @calaisreno and @raina-at are amazing at!) and fear that what I develop won’t read true. I do a ton of research for all my fics, regardless of when/where they take place (I like to be accurate when I can), but world building is a step beyond researching. The reality is, that (at least some) of the AUs I want to write won’t be as popular as my regular stuff...I am fine with that most of the time, but sometimes there’s a worry you will be writing for no one but yourself (which shouldn’t matter, but some days does ;) )

Most popular story of the year?“ Hmmm...in terms of kudos and general love, it’s definitely The Man with the Cartier Frames. People love parentlock and I do think I write it well (it helps that my kids are good ages to model Rosie). But I got a lot of love and really amazing comments on Blue Plaques too.

Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion: I’m not sure anything this year was under-appreciated. Possibly 5mm (a very short (and fluffy established relationship fic), but it’s the third in my That Time of Year series, so I expected small numbers.

Most fun story to write: Blue Plaques. Figuring out a ridiculous mystery that would give the ending I wanted (I knew the solution before I knew anything else), and researching about blue plaques and random spots in London was a ton of fun.

Most unintentionally telling story: Oooohhh. That’d probably be The Man With the Cartier Frames. There is lots of my daughter (M) in Rosie in this story. This includes a freak accident that made my partner (M’s father) an absolute mess at the hospital (that Sherlock sobbing scene was inspired by real life). M was totally fine (I still don’t know how but am so thankful) but that moment was the seed that led to this fic.

Biggest disappointment: Probably that I didn’t post an AU? But honestly, I am not really disappointed with this year’s writing or reception.

Biggest surprise: The engagement I got from some of my favourite authors (including art!!) this year. It’s a real honour when people whose writing you admire start commenting on your stuff. It’s worked the other way too, I have started reading people’s because they comment on my stuff and it ends up being amazing! I was going to tag people here, but I’m afraid of forgetting someone...if you’ve commented on my stuff and you write, I’m probably talking about you!

I’ll nominate anyone who wants to reflect on the past year :).