#I started watching d20 actually

[ewwww-what]

It probably won’t (it will)

[goldrushzukka]

(propagandise in the notes or my inbox if you wish)

[justalittlebluetiefling]

Every day something happens that makes me so happy that I started watching Dimension 20 stuff.

[septembermonologues]

pausing my one dnd show (critical role) that's my daytime programming to watch my other dnd show (dimension 20) while i eat dinner get ready for bed

[satturn]

truly late with this but anyway. it was a year

[patheticmenscuffle]

i was writing some gilear propaganda but he is so pathetic that there was so much and my phone died so here are the greatest hits

-last night he couldnt get to sleep so he tried to jack off last night but was too sad so he stayed up all night eating expired yogurt

-his car got repossessed by the rideshare app he works for

-the most divorced man in the realm. cucked in his first marriage by a demon from the nine hells called gortholax the insatiable who was trapped inside a ruby at the time

-passed over for guidance counsellor at his daughters school for a drug dealing werewolf named jawbone

-jawbone was objectively better at the job than gilear ever would be. and also later got with his ex-wife

-(trying to talk to a woman hes interested in) "sklonda i'll level with you: i recently found out that one of my shoes is so filled with mildew from a leak in my apartment that i have this new kind of foot fungus, and my doctor says..." "thats a nat 20 charisma?"

-gortholax the insatiable later got with sklonda also

-got hired as the lunch "lad" instead. his daughter fig set up a tip jar to try and boost his moxie but all he received was written cruelty

-somehow became vice principal

-soon fired as vice principal and demoted to "intern" on fig and her friends' spring break quest

-"gilear do you want some elven whey bread?" "ah, no id better not i cant afford it." "im giving it to you, its a gift." "i know, but if i eat it then ill remember how it tastes and i wont be able to get any of it later"

-died no less than 4 times on said quest (maybe more i cant remember)

-the first time was after having his face used as a launchpad by his stepson fabian to get advantage on an attack roll. fabian "got advantage from jumping but also got disadvantage, cause its gilear, so it cancels out"

-fabian wants to kill him. his mother (gilears girlfriend) makes gilear sleep in the garage

-the second time was upon taking ambient damage from a rain of hellfire immediately upon following his daughter to the nine hells ass moral/legal support

-the third time was after a sarcophagus he was hiding in was shot from a canon

-last time was when he clipped the tip of his penis putting on the armour of the sin of pride. he almost survived because he has no pride but then he started feeling good about how he was doing and immediately died and his body was spat out naked into the forest of the nightmare king. hes hung btw

-(unprompted) "mm, this yogurt tastes exactly like potatoes!" "gilear thats potatoes" "what?" "youre eating mashed potatoes" "ah.. another 'own goal' for gilear faeth..."

-got all jammed up in the wheel well of a van while "trying to do a little trick for himself" and let his bare foot touch the morning dew while reversing very slowly and eating an apple at the same time

anyway. gilearsweep!!

God they're really jsut throwing this poor fuck into the washing machine over there huh?

-Mod Knight

[gaybearwedding]

hi i haven’t posted on this blog in literal years but i’m thinking of possibly repurposing it as a play it by ear/dropout/off book/zach and jess blog. not sure yet stay tuned for updates

[artific3r]

TOMORROW

FANTASY HIGH JUNIOR YEAR TOMORROW

I FOUND FRESHMAN YEAR IN JANUARY OF 2020 IT HAS BEEN EXACTLY 4 YEARS SINCE IT CHANGED ME FOR THE WORSE AND NOW HERE'S HOPING WE CAN DO IT AGAIN

[vulturereyy]

THEY'RE DOING FUCKING WHAT FOR A CROWN OF CANDY????

[zincbot]

i somehow housed every season of dimension 20 and adventuring party starting with unsleeping city 2 WITHIN the time that neverafter has been releasing

[romijuli]

i don’t have the braincells to start this tonight but new liveblog tag incoming

[3minutehug]

does anyone have a link to a court of fey and flowers episodes? I'm too broke to sign up for dropout :')

[llycaons]

finished unsleeping city! what a fun finale. everything came together super well in terms of satisfying character interactions and closing up plot threads, especially when it came to kugrash-esther-gabrielle-wally. I left off season one feeling very warm towards everyone :) I don't think I had one favorite bc I genuinely liked all the players and characters so much except for the obvious one I couldn't stand lol and even for her I'm like whatever at this point. I'm partial to lou and ally and zac as comedians and they were all really funny at one point or another but sofia and kugrash were great, they might have been my favorites overall. and I was glad wally had a nice ending, too, that he was still himself but is going to be surrounded by excitement and happiness and affection for the rest of his life. and of course brennan did just a phenomenal job. I may fundamentally disagree with some of the worldbuilding choices and find the attempts at social commentary inadequatebut he sure did build a hell of a magical new york city and I DO love urban fantasy

[mephestopheles]

I need to get involved in a fandom again, I need to find a ship that will rot my brain the way bagginshield and destiel did. I miss the days when my brain was lost in that loop. The absolute closest ive come to feeling that feral about something was last year's A Court of Fey and Flowers. I mean I feel like I'm about to explode every time I listen to an episode of worlds beyond number, but I don't feel the need to add my mark to it, I want the story they're telling (as in the whole cast), and maybe that's because their story feels like enough right now. I have ideas on where it might go, and there is an entire world out there to be discovered, but I can put my trust in the cast to do well by the narrative and each other.

I suppose the stories I have in my head for my dnd characters could be considered headcanons, since they deviate a lot from the expected stories. Especially since the current one I'm playing is for hoard of the dragon queen, on the swords coast and while we have a group that avoids the fantasy racism tropes as much as possible, there are still stumbling blocks. My new character is too new and I could write some interesting stuff there but I don't know what the DM is going to use or how much I should know compared to how much I should let him decide on certain backstory elements.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA for asking my friends to pay me for DMing?

Maybe a weird situation but hear me out. I (22F) really really love DND. I listen to shows like NAADNDP and CR and D20. I’ve played in a lot of online oneshots and tried finding a local group to play with but haven’t been very successful because between classes and work I’m always too busy.

A couple days ago in a discord movie night with my friends (all early 20s) we watched the DND movie, and my friends were super into it and kept asking me stuff like “Is this from the game? Can you really do that in the game? Was that a good dice roll?”, just being really into it. Later one of them asked if I would maybe DM for them. I was SUPER excited as I’ve always wanted my friends to play DND with me but never pushed cause they didn’t seem too interested. I said yes without a moment’s hesitation and started planning. But in the middle of planning I realized how much I really needed to buy. I’ve never actually done DND in person. At the very least I need a dice set, plenty of paper, something to use for maps, something to use as a screen- even if I forgo minis and the books and the modules and all that expensive stuff. Not to mention I would need to take time off work, because right now I’m going to classes 5 days a week and working 6 days a week and that 7th day is for staying at home in bed recovering only.

So I was wondering: would it be considered a dick move if I were to ask my friends to give me a bit of cash in return for DMing? Obviously not enough to replace the lost income from work, but maybe like $20 each (from 5 people)? Or maybe ask them to help buy some of the materials I need? I’m afraid to ask and scare them off the idea of playing, because I wanna play soooo bad, but also I am very much broke and might be putting myself in a bind if I try to do this all by myself.

What are these acronyms?

[thevalleyisjolly]

There’s a weird recurring take in D20 fan circles that Zac doesn’t play “complex” characters and that people are just waiting for the day when he “finally” plays an asshole, which kind of baffles me.  Quite apart from the idea that only morally grey characters are complex or compelling, are you sure we’re watching the same show?

In Fantasy High, we have Gorgug, an adopted biracial teenager whose journey includes realizing his self-worth, coming to terms with his rage (literally), seeking out and navigating new relationships with others (his birth parents, the Bad Kids, Zelda), and discovering what he’s capable of. 

From The Unsleeping City we have Ricky, a second-generation Japanese-American, who has a very personal struggle across two seasons between doing the dutiful/sacrificial thing for other people’s benefit and expressing his own needs, wants, thoughts, and feelings; it’s a very particular exploration of immigrant generations and the relationship between the sacrificial model of your ancestors and the culture you grew up surrounded by which emphasizes the self.

There’s A Crown of Candy and Lapin, whose snark and one-liners are honestly less interesting than the way he engaged with and sought to understand religion and faith; the different yet similar ways in which both the Sugar Plum Fairy and the Church exerted control over their followers, and the search for spiritual meaning beyond these figures/institutions.

Then there’s Cumulous, whose every character aspect navigates a space of tension - the ultimate war guy who made himself hardened (literally) and pragmatic to get the job done but who also remains soft and caring and empathetic at the same time; wielding the power of death without glorifying or giving into it; the cousin who both is a member of the family and yet who remains at somewhat of a distance from the centre; a literal warrior-philosopher who is single-minded in battle and quietly thoughtful about the mysteries of life and death outside of it.

As for actual assholes, we have Norman Takamori in A Starstruck Odyssey, a bitter man who is the living embodiment of both the Superior Orders excuse as well as scapegoating.  On a side note, the amount of absolute vitriol and double standards which people threw at Norman during ASO for being an unapologetic asshole -and he had less than two full episodes of screen time- kind of underscores the calls for Zac to play a “real” asshole.  Zac can and will play whatever type of character he wants, but is fandom really ready for him to play an asshole if that asshole doesn’t have a secret heart of gold?

From the same season, we have Valdrinor/Skip, who starts as the “prince running from his destiny” archetype with a dash of brain slug possession, has a humorous yet oddly profound exploration of what humanity is and what it means to be human, and springboards from there into “wait, who am I really and actually, why are we doing things (brain slug possession) this way when there are other ways to engage with the universe.” 

Most recently in Neverafter, we have Pib, who apart from the fascinating meta element of being a literal character archetype, constantly straddles the line between self-absorbed self-interest and putting himself on the line to help others; his repeated demonstration of both at various points throughout the season is a subtle yet intriguing manifestation of free will and choice-making in a story all about lacking free will and agency.

So, I mean, lack of complexity where?  Does a character need to be an asshole in order to be deep or compelling?  And because I’ve heard this specific rebuttal quite a few times now, does a character need to vocalize their innermost thoughts loudly and frequently in order to prove their complexity?  If a character is “less vocal” compared to other characters, does that mean they lack interiority? 

Also, other people have brought this up before, but I am once again asking that people remember the difference between fictional characters and real life people.  Zac playing one (1) himbo on the show does not make him a himbo in real life, nor does it make him incapable of creating or playing complex characters (especially as said himbo is himself an extremely complex character), nor does it make him a lesser player than other cast members.  You don’t have to find all or any of his characters interesting or complex, but can we stop conflating character with player?