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arofili · 4 years

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Worldbuilding Exchange Letter 2021

Hello lovely creator, thanks for creating for me in the Worldbuilding Exchange! I’m very excited and grateful for whatever you create for me <3

This letter will restate my DNWs, list my likes, give you a brief rundown of my canon preferences, and then dive into specific prompts for each of my requests.

I’ll warn you upfront that I tend to ramble, so feel free to skip prompts that don’t interest you and/or use ctrl+F to search for whatever it is you want to write for.

My requests are divided by fandom, and in the case of the Silm + Middle-earth Legendarium, by topic too, so hopefully that will be helpful for you! Also, my TAZ request is waaay down at the bottom, so if that’s what you’re here for, just go to the bottom of the page.

Housekeeping:

DNWs:

Non-con

Unrequested dub-con

Abusive/Neglectful parenting (especially wrt Fëanor)

Sibling incest, parent-child incest (cousin pairings are fine)

Unhappy/Unhopeful endings (unless otherwise specified)

Jealousy/Possessiveness

Cheating

Character or ship bashing

Hanahaki/any scenario where unrequited love is physically damaging

Soulmates, especially soulmate AUs (soul bonds are OK, if there is choice involved)

Porn without plot (Porn with plot is fine!)

Food involved in sex

Unrequested Modern AU

Non-trans mpreg

If you’re writing a slash ship where the characters are/were married to/involved with someone outside the ship, please don’t have the character(s) hate their spouse or not have been actually in love with them (the one exception is Finrod; I’m fine with him and Amarië not having been actually in love, but please don’t do this for anyone else, especially not Fëanor)

Hobbit/LOTR-specific DNWs:

The concept of a dwarven “One”

Any Fíli pairing

Alfrid

Legolas or Gimli paired with anyone other than each other

no smut for these fandoms, please

Silm-specific DNWs:

Evil/irredeemable/incel Maeglin

Elwing bashing

Fëanorian bashing

Over the top Fëanorian apologism (they did bad stuff; it was at least partially their fault. you don’t have to address that, necessarily, but don’t rewrite the story to claim they were blameless)

Fingon with a wife

Fingon or Maedhros ships that don’t take Russingon into account (polyamory, an open relationship, Mae with someone after Finno dies or vice versa for an AU, them with other people while they’re separated on the Ice/in Angband - all of these scenarios are fine, but in the end I need them to be with each other first and foremost)

Dark!Maedhros

Elvish re-embodiment after death being an actual, literal rebirth that requires the characters to have a second childhood; I much prefer them being granted a new hröa in their prime (feel free to explore what “in their prime” means, though, especially wrt scarred and disabled elves)

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Likes:

(these might not all apply to worldbuilding, but they might give you a place to start from!)

Gen fic

Found family

Family dynamics

Loving families, even when things get complicated

Friendship, intense/important platonic relationships

Relationships that defy categorization

Queerplatonic relationships

Polyamory

Queer headcanons (especially aromantic-spectrum headcanons)

Trans/nonbinary headcanons (genderbending is also fine, but I prefer trans/nb hcs)

Angst with a happy ending

Gray morality

Explorations of magic

Most tropes

Fanon and fandom tropes

Deconstruction/Inversion of fanon and fandom tropes

Interspecies relationships

Peredhil

Secret relationships

Secret relationships coming to light

Secret kids (especially secret peredhil!)

Giving ships OC kids

OCs interacting with canon characters

Confessions of love

First times

Hurt/comfort

Redemption, forgiveness, mercy

Ironic foreshadowing

Canon divergence AUs/X Lives AUs

Politics and scheming

Resolving conflicting canonical details

Historical/Narrative bias affecting what is and isn’t “canon” (to an extent; changing motivations, consequences, etc is great, but please don’t ignore canon entirely)

Elrond & Elros having complicated relationships with both their bio and adoptive parents

Names fitting the time period (Quenya names in Valinor, please; if this is difficult for you, that’s okay, no pressure, but I do strongly prefer it)

Names having a lot of thought put behind them (does the character go back to their original Quenya name upon rebirth? or do they keep their Sindarin name? or come up with something else entirely? do they hate their new Sindarin name and resent having to use it, or do they embrace it? As long as you put some thought into it, I’m sure I’ll like whatever you decide!)

Author’s notes where you explain your thought process, if you want; I love hearing how the story took shape!

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Preferences re: Canon:

LaCE compliance is always completely optional (except if you’re choosing a prompt that is specifically about LaCE, lol). If you do want to include it, that’s great, but if you just want the characters to fuck without having that be an issue, go for it. I love explorations of LaCE that take into account the exceptions, boundaries, definitions, etc; I also love takes that emphasize that they are Laws and Customs, not biological imperatives.

I’m not picky about my Amrod deaths. He can die at either Losgar or Sirion (or, hell, some other time/place if you make it interesting enough!), whatever works best for the story. I do like Lightly Toasted Amrod, aka he almost burns to death at Losgar but survives/gets rescued at the last minute.

Gil-galad theories are all very fun. Please don’t make him the son of Fingon and a wife; if he’s Fingon’s son, I want Maedhros to be involved at least a little bit (adoption or trans mpreg are both fine in this scenario). Otherwise, I don’t have a particular preference, though if it’s not really relevant I usually default to the son of Orodreth (who is in turn the son of Angrod). Also, I’ve requested “Origins of Gil-galad”; there’s more information on him in that section.

Honestly, when it comes to theories and headcanons, my rule of thumb is “convince me”! I’m down for whatever, for the most part, as long as you can justify it :)

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For all of these, “suggested characters” pulls from the list of characters I requested with that signup, but if you’ve got an idea involving other characters then go for it! And in the end, all characters are just suggestions, this exchange is more about the worldbuilding :)

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The Hobbit (Book)

Adventuring Hobbits Before Bilbo: Who were they? Did they ever come back, or was Bilbo assumed dead because of precedent? Were they all Tooks, or did some other hobbits tag along on adventures, too? Suggested Character(s): Belladonna Took

Dragon Magic & Dragon-hunting: Talk to me about dragons! I’m interested in dragons & dwarves, especially in relation to the first time dwarves were driven from Erebor and into the North and the War of the Dwarves and Dragons. What kinds of dragons set their sights on the mountain? How old was Smaug when all that was happening; did he learn anything from the failures of his kin? Who were the dragon-hunting dwarves who fought in that war? Suggested Character(s): Smaug, Original Dwarf Character

Dwarven Craft and Magic: Enchanted weapons, enchanted armor, runes and spells...all so interesting! Borrowing from the movies a bit, did Kíli’s runestone from Dís have any magic power? What’s the deal with the Arkenstone’s thrall? How do elf and dwarf magics intersect when it comes to objects like Bilbo’s mithril coat? Suggested Character(s): Dís, Frerin, Thorin, Original Dwarf Character (perhaps a craftsdwarf?)

Dwarves and Gender: We need more dwarf women! And I’d love any takes on nonbinary dwarves and/or dwarf-specific genders. Were there female dwarves in the Company that Bilbo mistook for male dwarves? Are dwarven women really only a third of the population? If dwarf men and women are very similar in appearance, how do they differentiate between them, or do they differentiate at all? If you included something about dwarvish braiding styles indicating gender, class, marital status, I would be delighted. Suggested Character(s): Dís, Frerin, Thorin, Original Dwarf Character; in this case I’d prefer a focus on canon characters, but OCs interacting with them would be marvelous, especially people like Dís’ spouse.

The Black Arrow: Bard’s little pep talk to his arrow has always intrigued me. I’d love to see your take on the origins of the Black Arrow. Does it really come from Erebor, and if so, who made it? How did Bard and his forefathers come to acquire it? (I like the movie version that ties it into Girion’s attempt to kill Smaug, so feel free to incorporate that if you feel like it.) Is the arrow enchanted? (Perhaps that could be tied to the Dwarven Craft and Magic tag!) Suggested Character(s): Bard, Original Character from Dale, Original Dwarf Character

The Stone Giants & Were-worms: I don’t have many thoughts on these guys except “neat! tell me more!” I’m fascinated by the creatures Tolkien only gives us a passing mention of; if you feel like it, maybe you could combine these tags with some of the creatures in the LOTR tagset (crebain, cold drakes, Watcher in the Water, Mearas, Kine of Araw, etc...I didn’t sign up with all those tags, but it would be neat to hear about them anyway!)

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The Lord of the Rings (Books)

Cold-drakes and Fire-drakes & Crebain & The Watcher in the Water: Like with the Stone Giants and the Were-worms, I just think they’re neat and I’d love to hear your take on their origins and how they affect the history of Middle-earth. Feel free to combine this with other creature-related requests. Suggested Character(s): Scatha

Ghosts and Hauntings: Barrow-wights? Nazgûl victims? Just your crotchety old hobbit neighbor who still holds a grudge about losing the biggest pumpkin contest despite having been dead for 20 years? There’s a lot of potential for stories here; maybe you could combine a ghost story with some other prompt to add a murder mystery or haunting plot to a relationship you’re exploring!

Dwarf-Elf Relations: I don’t believe All Dwarves and All Elves hated each other! We have famous elf-dwarf friendships across the ages, and really it was just the Sindar vs. the Broadbeams/Firebeards that had the feud. Still, Legolas (a Sinda) and Gimli (raised among Broadbeams and Firebeards in the Blue Mountains) are caught up in that, so their friendship is quite remarkable! I’d love interrogations of how that feud continued across centuries and discussions of what really went down in Menegroth, perhaps with one of the Durins having an elf friend at some point in the past that sheds light on how Legolas and Gimli can get along. (I am here for any and all Gimli and Legolas combinations; I love them as friends, I love them as boyfriends or husbands, I love them as queerplatonic partners, I love them as anything in between! Do whatever you’d like with them!) Suggested Character(s): Gimli, Legolas, Original Elf Character, Any of Durins 1-7

Elvish and Mannish settlements in post-Ring War Ithilien: How do Legolas and Faramir get along, both living in Ithilien after the war? What do Legolas’ people think about being neighbors with a bunch of Men? Faramir and Imrahil were Aragorn’s chief commanders after the war, and Legolas expressed admiration for Imrahil; I imagine Imrahil visited his nephew in Ithilien, so what are the interactions of those three like? I’d love to see an exploration of Silvan elves and their culture here, with Legolas leaning into his Silvan heritage and maybe some Silvan OCs who have spent their whole lives in Mirkwood up until now and have never met Men before now! Suggested Character(s): Faramir, Legolas, Imrahil, Original Elf Character

Relations between the Dúnedain and Rivendell: Talk to me about the Grey Company, or Elladan and Elrohir fighting alongside their distant kin, or Rangers taking breaks in Imladris, how the Rangers think of Aragorn who was raised among elves, etc. I’d love an outsider POV here, such as an OC observing the oddities of a canon character. Suggested Character(s): Original Elf Character, Original Ranger of the North

The Glittering Caves of Aglarond: More Gimli and Legolas stuff - but with a focus on Gimli this time :) Gimli as a lord in his own right, Gimli who takes elves on tours of his dwarf-kingdom and weirds out his people (is it just Legolas, or does he take any Silvan elves with him, or like...his elvish in-laws??), Gimli as a craftsman... Or, alternatively, you could explore the caves before Gimli gets to work on them, what the Rohirrim thought of them and how they were created - by natural processes, or by magic, or a mixture of both? Did Aulë make them for the dwarves to find, perhaps? Suggested Character(s): Gimli, Legolas

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The Hobbit (Movies)

Dragonsickness/Goldsickness: The parallel to mental illness in the movies was really interesting. I’d love to see lingering effects of the goldsickness on Thorin after the Battle (Everyone Lives AU, probably), or an AU where Fíli or Kíli inherit the throne of Erebor and are afflicted by it as well. Or, sticking to canon, how did Fíli and Kíli and the rest of the Company deal with Thorin falling into madness? Were the other dwarves affected by the thrall of the gold? Bard and Thranduil were observers of Thorin’s madness; what did they think of him? Did Thranduil remember Thrór under dragonsickness? Or, since movie!Thranduil is a far cry from book!Thranduil when it comes to going to war over jewels, was he affected by the dragonsickness even from a distance? Was Bard? Suggested Character(s): Thorin, Fíli, Kíli, Bard the Bowman, Thranduil

Dwarves who "choose craft"/Aromantic-Spectrum and Asexual-Spectrum Dwarves: This is pulling more from the books than the movies, but I didn’t have enough nomination slots to include any book nominations, so it went here, lol. Anyway: as I’m sure you can tell from my tumblr url, I headcanon Fíli as aromantic, and I love seeing that in fanworks! It’s really wonderful that Tolkien mentioned that many dwarves choose their craft over marriage, and I’d love to see an exploration of that aspect of dwarvish culture, and how Fíli fits into it. It seems to be fairly common/accepted, but are there different cultural pressures around marriage for the crown prince? How does Fíli figure out he’s aromantic? If aro and ace dwarves are expected to be choosing a craft over romance and sex, what’s Fíli’s craft? Or does he not have one, and people judge him for that? The “choose craft” language I use is very much inspired by this post and the Neo-Khuzdul word “bijebtorva” :) Suggested Character(s): Fíli, Original Character(s)

Governance and Politics in Mirkwood: How did Thranduil and Oropher come to power in the Greenwood? I hate the “lowly Silvan elf” line from the movie; can you somehow justify that with worldbuilding, or show how it’s not accurate? Is Legolas half-Silvan like is implied in the LOTR books? Who are Thranduil’s advisors? Is Tauriel really the only one who dislikes and defies Thranduil’s isolationist policies? Is Mirkwood very patriarchal, and is Tauriel’s appointment to Captain of the Guard something she faced opposition or competition for? Are the Sindar elite colonizers, or did they integrate into Silvan society? How does the average Silvan elf feel about their king, or do they not even think about him? Suggested Character(s): Thranduil, Tauriel, Original Character(s)

Poetry and prophecy: Bard uncovers that tapestry that turns a song from the book into a somewhat ominous prophecy; there’s a lot of discussion of fate and signs from the thrush at the door to the last light of Durin’s Day; Thranduil has seen enough in his thousands of years to have had time to brush up against a prophecy or two. What do these three believe about fate and prophecy? Are any of them prophets in their own right? How does poetry/music lend power to prophecy? (Bonus points if you tie it back into the Ainulindalë...) Suggested Character(s): Bard the Bowman, Thorin, Thranduil

Poisons and antidotes: I love Kíli/Tauriel and the scene where she heals his wound...but the worldbuilding around morgul poison and athelas is a little murky. It’s a decent parallel to Frodo’s condition in the LOTR movies, but it’s confusing lore-wise. Can you make sense of it? If Tauriel is a warrior, where did she learn healing? (In my own headcanons, her foster family are healers, which is how she learned those skills even though she’s primarily a warrior - but feel free to take it in whatever direction you’d like!) Suggested Character(s): Tauriel, Kíli, Original Character(s)

Rebuilding Erebor & Relations between Dwarves + Elves + Men: (I’d prefer an Everyone Lives AU for this situation.) How do Thorin and his Company put Erebor back together again? What are the renovation projects like? How long does it take Dís and the rest of the Longbeards to arrive in Erebor and help out? How long does Dáin stay to help his cousin? I would love to see some politics both internally within the Longbeard dwarves and externally as they relate to Mirkwood and Dale. Smaug’s corpse is just lying in the Long Lake...how do the dwarves feel about their old enemy’s body so close by? Do some Men want to re-establish Lake-town, and demand help from the dwarves who flushed the dragon out of the mountain? Do the dwarves want to harvest Smaug’s corpse for resources? (He’s probably got gold and jewels stuck in his scales, and dragon-skin/scales is probably a good raw material for crafting things.) What’s the process of Bard becoming King of Dale? Does he face any opposition? I love the idea of Hilda Bianca challenging him for leadership, or maybe insisting on some kind of democracy/representation in Dale! And if she doesn’t get her way, maybe it’s her leading some people back to Esgaroth and founding a democracy there that would make the old Master roll in his watery grave... How do Bard and Thranduil and Thorin reconcile after the battle? Does Thorin pay up like he said he would? Does Tauriel hang around, or does she go somewhere else? Are any elves inspired by her, or is she a total outcast? If you choose to explore the Kíli/Tauriel relationship, how does that affect politics between Erebor and Mirkwood? Suggested Character(s): Thorin, Fíli, Kíli, Bard the Bowman, Hilda Bianca, Thranduil, Tauriel, Original Character(s)

Tauriel's fate after the Battle of the Five Armies: This is for exploring what happened to Tauriel in canon. Does she wander the world and explore new places? How long does she mourn Kíli? What does she do with the runestone? Does she return to Mirkwood, and if so, how does she manage to get back into Thranduil’s good graces? There are a million different ways to take this, I’d love to see your take on her! Suggested Character(s): Tauriel, Thranduil, Original Character(s)

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The Silmarillion: Magic & Spirits

Houseless Elves: Why did they refuse the call of Mandos? Do Avari even go to Mandos? Can Melkor and Sauron ensnare these spirits for their necromantic purposes? If the call of Mandos is refused once, does that bar them from listening in the future? What kinds of ghosts are haunting Middle-earth in the First Age? What kinds of ghosts haunt Aman? Suggested Character(s): Original Character(s), Melkor

Magic as a connection to the Music/the Song: Magic isn’t always the best-explained in Tolkien’s universe, but what we do know is the incredible power of the Music. How do the Maiar and Valar, who are not technically beings of Arda, interact with the world? How do elves and men (and dwarves! and orcs!) tap into the Song and manipulate it to their benefit (or detriment)? I have the headcanon that Elemmírë, the elf who sung the Aldudénië, is a priestess of Varda; what was the power of that mourning song, and how was it received by her patron Vala? Suggested Character(s): Elemmírë, Varda, Melian, Melkor, Original Character(s)

Nature Spirits: These holes in Tolkien’s worldbuilding are fascinating to me. What role do nature spirits play? How many are there? I’m thinking particularly of river spirits, like the River-woman and Goldberry, but there are probably also mountain spirits and water spirits and-and-and... Are they Maiar? Lesser beings? What do the Maiar we know of think about them? Gandalf seems the kind to listen to them and learn their stories, but perhaps Melian sees them more as servants in protecting her realm... Suggested Character(s): Melian, Original Character(s)

The Shadow-shapes in the hills above Cuiviénen: What were these shapes? Melkor’s prototypical monsters, Maiar who didn’t know how to interact with the Children, something else entirely? What did the original elves believe about them? Did they fear them, did they try to appease them, did they try to confront them? I headcanon that Elemmírë is an Unbegotten elf, so perhaps she lost friends to the Shadows, or thought she did. If the Shadows did take elves, was it out of malice or curiosity or a desire to protect them from whatever Melkor was planning? Suggested Character(s): Melkor, Elemmírë, Original Character(s)

The Void: Melkor spends a whole lot of time here. Does he have any company? Something or someone he makes to pass the time with? Do the Valar (like Manwë or Námo or Varda or Nienna) visit him there? What is the nature of the Void, is it pure emptiness or chaotic magic or a nightmare machine? Is Melkor being punished or is he being contained? And where are the boundaries of the Void? Varda rules the heavens; does her realm bleed into Melkor’s prison? Suggested Character(s): Melkor, Varda, Original Character(s)

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The Silmarillion: Elven Relationships

Note: This request deals with relationships, and while I’m open to pretty much anything, please keep in mind my DNWs. Exploring these topics using canon relationships is a safe bet; I adore Maedhros/Fingon so having a look at them through this lens would be amazing; I have Aredhel as a character request here, and I see her as aromantic (“to none was her heart’s love given”) so while showing her in a relationship is fine, I’d love it if you could take her lack of romantic feelings into account; if you have a question about another ship, you can check to see what I’ve written and/or send me anon message! Additionally, a lot of these talk about soul bonds, which I’m very interested in, but one of my DNWs is soulmates. To me the concepts are very different things; it’s the destiny and inevitability and universal assumption of romance that really squick me out about soulmates. Soul bonds, on the other hand, have an aspect of choice to them that I really dig. So, please don’t make characters Fated For One Another, but please do explore what joining souls is like!

Laws & Customs of the Eldar: Boy do I have a lot of feelings about LaCE—and I’m always intrigued by other people’s feelings, too! I’d love to see an exploration of how these laws and customs came to be, which parts of the rules around marriage and children and re-embodiment are social constructs and which are innate to the fëa and hröa, and/or relationships that defy the norms. If your take on the laws is hetero/cisnormative, how does that affect queer elves? If your take is free of bigotry, what are the flexibilities around queerness, including asexuality and aromanticism? Laws and customs and rules always have loopholes and exceptions, so what do elves who don’t fit into the expected relationship mold do about these norms? Suggested Character(s): Aredhel, Maedhros, Fingon, Elrond, Any Unbegotten Elf Character(s)

Arranged Marriages among the Eldar: Russingon arranged marriage AU?? Orrrr....Maedhros or Fingon are politically engaged to someone else, and they have to deal with the ramifications of that? (Please don’t have them actually go through with the marriage if you go that route; I’m not interested in a story with Fingon having a wife, even if she’s a beard.) If elves (usually) only love once, and by declaration of the Valar can only marry once (Finwë being the somewhat disastrous exception), how is an arranged marriage justified within the cultural emphasis on these bonds? Are they more like arranged romances, people pushing their children together in hopes that they’ll fall in love? Or is it a stricter rule about “you do what’s best for this family”? (Note: Bad/cruel parenting is one of my major DNWs, so if you’re going that route, please don’t make the parent uncaring or malicious. Stubborn and narrow-minded is fine, as is the genuine belief that this is what’s best for the child, but ideally they’ll learn from their mistakes or perhaps everything will be interrupted and derailed by Canon Events. This is especially important wrt to Fëanor.) Suggested Character(s): Maedhros, Fingon

Creation/Discovery of soul bonds: How do soul bonds work on a metaphysical level? Can they be broken? Do they have to be nurtured and maintained? What’s long-distance communication like? Heck, what’s short-distance communication like, is it like talking in your mind or sharing your feelings or more abstract than that? Can elves form soul bonds with mortals? And most importantly—how did elves figure out they could soul bond with one another?? I can imagine that would be quite a shock when they’re discovering sex and then suddenly they’re inside each other’s minds! Suggested Character(s): Any Unbegotten Elf Character(s)

Non-romantic/sexual soul bonds: I’m good with practically any relationship here. Explore sibling bonds, twin bonds, parent-child bonds, queerplatonic bonds, found family bonds, adoption bonds, the bond between a Vala and their Maia...any kind of soul bond that is familial or platonic or chosen without regard to romance! (Feel free to take a canon romantic relationship and turn it queerplatonic, I live for that shit!) How are these bonds formed outside of sex? What are the rituals and ceremonies around forming them? Is it a public or private thing? Are non-romantic soul bonds taken seriously, or are they seen as less important than marriage bonds? Since elven parents literally give part of their soul in the creation of the child, is that parent-child bond innate? Suggested Character(s): Aredhel, Any Unbegotten Elf Character(s)

Elven adoption: I nominated this with Kidnap Dads in mind (if you go that route I love fluff for them as well as more nuanced/complicated takes on the situation, but whatever you do don’t make M&M cruel, and please include Maedhros as a parental figure alongside Maglor)...but hey, it could work for Fingon (and Maedhros) adopting Gil-galad! What are traditions around elven adoption? Are there soul bonds created between the adoptive parents and children? Was adoption even a thing in Aman, or is it only practiced in Middle-earth? Did elves adopt mortals and vice versa? Is adoption extended to found family other than a parent-child situation? How is adoption viewed by elvish society, especially if inheritance/succession is a concern? Suggested Character(s): Maedhros, Fingon, Elros Tar-Minyatur, Elrond

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The Silmarillion: Noldorin Politics

Original Fëanorian follower(s) who turned on their lords at Sirion: Okay, this is a character tag, but I’m absolutely obsessed with this line: “For the sons of Fëanor that yet lived came down suddenly upon the exiles of Gondolin and the remnant of Doriath, and destroyed them. In that battle some of their people stood aside, and some few rebelled and were slain upon the other part aiding Elwing against their own lords (for such was the sorrow and confusion in the hearts of the Eldar in those days).” Who were these people who followed the Fëanorians into exile, into a Kinslaying, through the burning of the ships, through 30 years of Maglor as a king-regent incapable of treating with the Nolofinwëans, through the scattering of their lords and the harsh conditions of the North, through the Bragollach and the Nírnaeth and a “wild and woodland life” and the Second Kinslaying (where some of them went as far as to abandon children in the winter woods to die because they thought it was what their lord/s would want), through isolation and hatred from every other elven group, through the plan to attack a refugee camp—through ALL OF THAT, and THEN they turn on their lords at Sirion??? Why betray your lords NOW? And the people who DID keep following them after that (after kidnapping children!!!), what were they thinking?? — I firmly believe that Maedhros has many escapees from Angband in his service who are ride or die for him and whose morality was somewhat warped by Angband, but what about Maglor’s followers? Caranthir’s? Ambarussa’s? Even Celegorm and Curufin’s?? There’s just SO MUCH potential for story here, I’m dying to read about them!

Noldorin lines of succession: Was It Sexist Or Was It Not: The Eternal Question aka Why Didn’t Idril Become High Queen After Turgon? Also, what does “eldest of the house of Finwë, and not the least wise” even MEAN, Maedhros?? How did Gil-galad come to power? I find it hard to believe he became king immediately after Gondolin fell; was it a wartime power grab? A battlefield promotion? How did the kingship get established in the first place? Why was Finwë chosen to go with Oromë to Aman? Was Maglor ever really king, or did he only rule as a regent for the missing Maedhros? Suggested Character(s): Finwë, Gil-galad, Maglor

Origins of Gil-galad: I am always so interested in takes on Gil-galad’s parentage. My favorites are Russingon baby Gil (through trans mpreg or adoption, both are good) and secret peredhel Gil (probably an Aegnor/Andreth baby adopted by Orodreth), but I also love Finduilas Is Gil-galad and honestly, any situation is fascinating here—just convince me! A possible way to explore this is through Outsider POV; some noble or historian trying to figure out just what the heck is up with Gil-galad. His parentage being confusing in-canon is so fun!! Suggested Character(s): Gil-galad, Original Nobility of the Noldor

Maglor's Kingship between Maedhros' capture and rescue: Was Maglor ever really king? Did he give up on Maedhros early on, or did he cling to the hope that he still lived? Did his brothers turn to him for support, or did they connive to take responsibility from him? The rift between the Noldor wasn’t healed until Maedhros’ rescue; did Maglor try to cooperate with Fingolfin, or did he keep his people isolated? Was he relieved when Maedhros came back and took responsibility, or was he resentful to lose his power? How does this situation (and Maglor not going to rescue Maedhros) affect M&M’s relationship later on? Suggested Character(s): Maglor, Original Fëanorian follower(s)..., Curufin, Caranthir

Dwarf-Elf relations in the First Age & Dwarf-kingdoms: Dwarf-friends!!! Yes!!! I love elves and dwarves being buds (or partners if you’d like to go that route!) <3 IIRC, Curufin learned Khuzdul, and I’m sure Celebrimbor did too; Caranthir was supposedly rude to the dwarves, but what if that’s just his (and their!) love language? How did relations between the Sindar and the dwarves sour over time? Maedhros was friends with Azaghâl; how did that relationship begin? How did Finrod’s contract with the dwarves blossom into a real friendship? Eöl was also buddies with the dwarves; did he ever bump into Curufin or Caranthir while at a trade festival or something? And the dwarf kingdoms of the First Age are fascinating on their own, too; what was the political structure like? Did the dwarves bring items from the other side of the mountains into Beleriand? How did the petty-dwarves get exiled? What happened to Nogrod and Belegost in the War of Wrath, and were they ever re-established after the sinking of Beleriand? Suggested Character(s): Curufin, Caranthir

Guilds and Noble Houses of Tirion: Give me a Tirion political drama! Finwë trying to appease his lords and craftseldar? Indis integrating into Noldorin society and making connections with the noble houses? Arranged marriage situation between Nolofinwë and Anairë? The younger princes running amok and causing chaos in their elders’ carefully-laid plans and delicately balanced alliances? Suggested Character(s): Finwë, Indis, Original Nobility of the Noldor, Curufin, Caranthir, Maglor

Roles and Responsibilities in the Noldorin Royal Family: There were oodles of princes in Valinor. What did they all do? How did they get the followers who came with them to Middle-earth? Were they free to pursue their own crafts, or did they have responsibilities to the common people? How did this change in Middle-earth when suddenly everyone was in danger and had more pressing needs? What is it like being a re-embodied royal in a society that’s adapted to life without you? Suggested Character(s): Finwë, Indis, Maglor, Curufin, Caranthir, Gil-galad

Fashion as Political Statement: This is an excuse to request Color Coding Politics. Fëanorian red! Nolofinwëan blue! Findis wearing Aggressively Neutral White! Lalwen in orange? Arafinwë in yellow? Finwë in an amazing technicolor dream-coat...or more likely just red, showing his bias once more? Art of this would be absolutely fantastic. I have lots of headcanons about color politics; feel free to ask me about them if you choose this option. Suggested Character(s): Curufin, Caranthir, Gil-galad, Finwë

~~~

The Silmarillion: Trauma & Religion

War of Wrath: For a war that took so long and had such wide-reaching repercussions, we really don’t have very many details about this. It’s free real estate, basically! I have my favorite characters (Maedhros, Maglor, Elrond, Elros, Gil-galad...) that you could use to explore this time period, but literally anyone who’s alive at this point is fair game. And OCs! What do the Noldor and Vanyar (and Telerin sailors) feel about the War and interacting with the war-weary exiles and Sindar and Men of late-stage Beleriand? What kind of culture shock/culture clash is there? Were re-embodied exiles permitted to return to Middle-earth, or were they barred from going to war again? Suggested Character(s): Original Noldorin Character, Original Vanyarin Character

Trauma after the War of Wrath for elves and humans & Exiles adjusting to life in the Undying Lands post War of Wrath & Dealing with psychological trauma in Valinor: Trauma was commonplace in Beleriand, but not so much in Valinor. What’s it like for exiles who sail West to be in a society that doesn’t know how to support them? Are the Valar having to learn how to deal with the trauma of living elves super quickly, or are they reticent to change? How do the exiles interact with their re-embodied kin? What do the Vanyar and other Amanyar think of these elves who have been so deeply hurt? What kinds of treatises on psychology are penned by scholars with little to no previous experience? What is therapy like in Valinor? Do the exiles get together for support groups since no one else understands them? Or did the trauma of the Darkening and the First Kinslaying wake up the Amanyar and get their act together before then; are the exiles surprised by the structures already in place to support them? And what about Avari who have been dying steadily all this time from accidents and incidents in Middle-earth? If they’ve been re-embodied, how do they engage with the Eldar who have similar traumas? Suggested Character(s): Estë, Finrod, Maeglin, Original Noldorin Character, Original Vanyarin Character, Rúmil, Any Avarin Elf Character(s)

Worship of the Valar and Religion & Avarin religious culture: Do the Vanyar really worship the Valar, or do they seem them as hyper-powerful neighbors? What are priests and priestesses like in a world where the gods walk among you? How does each kindred of the elves interact with the Valar? Are Maiar viewed as equal worshippers/servants or as deities in their own right? Do the Avari even know about or acknowledge the Valar? Do they worship the stars, or simply Eru? Suggested Character(s): Pengolodh, Rúmil, Any Avarin Elf Character(s)

~~~

Middle-earth Legendarium: Magic & Spirits

Afterlives: This is pretty vague, but I think it’s referring to the various kinds of afterlife. What are the Halls of Mandos like? What happens to spirits who don’t go to Mandos? Do Men pass through Mandos on the way to Beyond? What happens to Men? Are they reincarnated in the more traditional understanding of the word, do they go to some other realm similar to Arda, are they just endlessly partying it up with Eru? Do dwarves really go to the Halls, or is that just a superstition? And of course, what about orcs? Suggested Character(s): Námo

Fate of orc souls after death: Yeah, really, what about orcs? If the orcs were originally elves twisted into Morgoth’s servants, are their spirits still elven? Are they reborn as they once were, elven despite their life as an orc? What about orcs who are many generations removed from their elvish ancestors? Do they have fëar? Can orcs be rehabilitated? I refuse to accept that all orcs are inherently evil; but what does everyone believe in-universe? Suggested Character(s): Námo, Original Orc Character(s)

Foresight and Prophecy and Doom: I’m honestly not sure if this fanon or canon, but Finarfin and his line having foresight through Indis is a wonderful concept and I’d love an exploration of that. How accurate is foresight? Can fate be circumvented? Are prophecies like the Doom of the Noldor self-fulfilling, or are they warnings about possible futures, or are they curses upon people? If you have a high Doom upon you, does that end with your death, or does it follow you to Mandos and beyond? Suggested Character(s): Námo, Finarfin

Songs and Words of Power: Rap battles with Sauron! ...joking aside, song as magic is just fascinating to me. How does this connect to the Ainulindalë and the Song of the World? The elves named themselves Quendi, the Speakers; how do they view the power of words and their ability to change the world around them? Can music be used as a force of destruction or a weapon (battle bard Maglor)? Can it be used to manipulate someone’s mind (Sauron)? Suggested Character(s): Maglor, Sauron

Stars and Starlight: “All light is sacred to the Eldar...but wood-elves love best the light of the stars.” Okay, sorry for being a Hobbit movie apologist on main, but I do love Tauriel! How do elves view starlight? Is it holy, or are the stars more like their friends and guides? Did the Avari choose to remain in Middle-earth partially because of their love for the stars, which were drowned out by the light of the Trees? How does Eärendil feel about being a star; does he feel blasphemous or holy? What legends and superstitions are there among Avari and Men and others who don’t know the origins of Gil-Estel about the new star in the sky? Suggested Character(s): Morwë, Eärendil

The Unseen Realm: This is the in-between world where Frodo goes when he wears the ring, the world that the Nazgûl in their half-life inhabit. Are Ainur able to slip into this realm at will? Did Gandalf walk invisible in Gondolin? How does Sauron manipulate this realm to his purposes? Is this where elves go if they fade? (I don’t usually like Maglor fading, but it could be an interesting way to explore this...) Suggested Character(s): Námo, Sauron, Nazgûl, Maglor

Magical Artefacts & Magical Communications: Palantíri! Galadriel’s mirror! Ósanwë! All sorts of cool ways to talk with magic. Do the Rings of Power enable long-distance ósanwë? Did the Silmarils contain pieces of Fëanor’s soul? What other marvelous magical creations were there that didn’t make it into the Legendarium we know? Suggested Character(s): Sauron, Maglor, Eärendil

~~~

Middle-earth Legendarium: Politics & Lore

Feudalism between Eldar and Edain: We have Edain entering into the service of Noldorin lords (Bëor and Finrod, Hador and Fingolfin, Amlach and Maedhros) and land being given to Men by elves (or not, in Haleth’s case)...how far did this feudal relationship extend? Were the Edain mostly autonomous or were they very much bound to their elven lords? Were there common elves who paid tribute to Edain lords? Can any relationship between elves and Men truly be equal if this is the way they originated? Fealty kink? Suggested Character(s): Curufin, Original Elf Character

Fourth Age Tirion: What’s Tirion like with a bunch of dead people walking around living again, and a bunch of weird legends now imposing in daily life? What’s the first meeting of Rúmil and Pengolodh like—who geeks out over whom? Are the Fëanorians back yet? Is the average elf even really aware of all the nonsense that happened in Middle-earth, or are they extremely unimpressed with King So-and-So of a square of land that’s now underwater trying to cut them in line at the coffee shop? Suggested Character(s): Original Elf Character, Pengolodh, Rúmil of Tirion, Celebrimbor, Elrond, Galadriel

Relationship between Noldor and Dwarves: See “Dwarf-Elf relations in the First Age & Dwarf-kingdoms” in my Silm request for a starting point...but also, was Elrond’s Last Homely House open to dwarves? How did Galadriel come to respect the dwarves, especially after her Sindar kin grew to hate them? Suggested Character(s): Curufin, Celebrimbor, Elrond, Galadriel

Timekeeping between the Death of the Two Trees and the Rise of the Sun and Moon: Tolkien’s math drives me ABSOLUTELY INSANE. His timelines are contradictory, I get headaches just thinking about the length of elf pregnancy, what does aging mean for an immortal species, WHY ARE TREE YEARS LIKE THAT and WHAT IS A YÉN? Please try and make sense of this for me, I beg of thee. I’m especially interested in the time period between the Death of the Trees and the Rise of the Sun and Moon. Did the Noldor wander the Helcaraxë for 3 years or 30? How long was Maitimo in Angband? Did the Sindar even realize something was different? How did people start calculating Sun years? When was the calendar of the First Age adopted? Who did all this math? Is there an in-universe explanation for these contradictions? Do people fight over math? Do the Ainur experience time the same way the Children do? Did some Noldo genius come up with a timekeeping system that worked with the Moon, only for the Sun to come along and muck it up? Suggested Character(s): Pengolodh, Rúmil of Tirion, Original Elf Character, Fëanor - really any scholarly character, tbh!

Treatment of Angband's Escaped Thralls: Which kinds of escapees choose to go to Himring with Maedhros the Tall, and which choose to go to Gondolin and the House of the Hammer of Wrath? Was Rôg an escapee too? Can Maedhros really tell who’s been turned by the Enemy? Does Thingol have the right of it in turning away thralls from Doriath? (If he even does that, I’m now researching this and I’m not sure it’s actually canon...) What was it like for Maedhros and Gwindor to readjust to elven society? Did Elrond grow up surrounded by Fëanorian followers who escaped Angband, and is that where he learned healing? Suggested Character(s): Original Elf Character, Elrond

In-universe authorial bias in historical texts: All of the Legendarium is a history, which means there’s bound to be unreliable narrators. Was Maeglin really as evil as the story says? What gets left out of the narrative? What gets lost in translation? Who lives, who dies, who tells your story? Suggested Character(s): Pengolodh, Rúmil of Tirion

Trade in Middle-earth: What was trade like in First Age Beleriand? What about Second Age trade between Númenor and the mainland? Was Ost-in-Edhil a trade hub? After Sauron returned and traveling became dangerous, what intrepid traders braved the wilds for the sake of goods and money? How was currency developed around the world? Suggested Character(s): Curufin, Celebrimbor, Elrond, Galadriel

Orcs Surviving the Wars: Again, I don’t believe that all orcs are irredeemably, inherently evil. Were they persecuted and stamped out after the Ring War, or did some escape and adapt to a life without a harsh overlord? What’s orc agriculture like? Would Elrond take a chance on rehabilitating an orc in Rivendell? What if orcs were more complicated all along, and it’s the histories that simplified them to cardboard-cutout villains? Suggested Character(s): Original Elf Character, Pengolodh, Celebrimbor, Elrond, Galadriel

~~~

The Adventure Zone: Balance

My only non-Tolkien request, oops. Don’t think I’m not as interested in this request, though; I’m the only one who nominated for it, so I picked my very favorite concepts and I’d love to see what you do with them!

Angus McDonald’s Grandfather: This guy’s name was lost to time, and he loves silverware, and he has a grandson, and that’s pretty much all we know about him. Was he involved in the Relic Wars somehow? Did his name get eaten by the Voidfish? I imagine he’s a rather eccentric fellow; how much of that did he pass on to Angus? Is he even real, or was Angus lying to Tres Horny Boys about his destination?

Any Wonderland Adventurer(s): I’d love to see what happens to the other people who go to Wonderland before our boys. Do they all die? How many get what they want and get out? Do any of them have weaker moral compasses than THB and agree to advertise for Edward and Lydia? What if Edward or Lydia fell in love with an adventurer and trapped them there? What kinds of things do people sacrifice to the Wheel? We know about the Escape Game and the Healing Game; what about the Recovery Game? How long has Wonderland been around? How has it evolved over time? What was it like before Edward and Lydia got ahold of the Animus Bell? How did they get ahold of it? (Personally I think Barry just gave it to them...but did he have to go through the trials first?)

Differences within species between the Two-Sunned World and Faerun: I love the fanon that Two-Sun elves are juuust a little different from Faerun elves...like Taako’s echolocation, for example. But what if this applies to the other species like gnomes and dwarves and even humans? How are the Seven Birds just a liiiitle off from everyone else around them? Also, Cat Elves. This is an excuse for Two-Sun Cat Elves. GIVE TAAKO A TAIL. (I mean, or not, do what you want, but I’d love to see that, lol.) Suggested Character(s): Any Member(s) of the IPRE, Original Character(s)

Reclaimers before Tres Horny Boys: Who were the other Reclaimers? Who did Lucretia trust to carry out this dangerous mission? How did they all each, inevitably fail? What if Magic Brian was a Reclaimer gone wrong? What was the last straw for Lucretia, the last failure that made her scheme to get her boys back? And the other Reclaimers weren’t officially disbanded right away; how did they feel about the new guys in town, and losing their jobs to these doofuses? Suggested Character(s): Lucretia, Original Character(s)

The Relic Wars: There were wars about the Relics!!! Wars!! That everyone forgot!! Wars where people that THB knew died!! And then we never get into this in canon! It drives me nuts! I would love to see an exploration of this chaotic time period, what the IPRE did to mitigate the damage, which relics were obvious and terrifying and which were secret and terrifying, etc... I’ve written a bit about Relic War-era Hurloane, but what were the other NPCs doing? (Or Hurley and Sloane too, I’d love to see your take on them too!) When Lucretia wiped everyone’s memories, what was lost? (I suspect Angus’ Grandfather got caught up in that...) How did those missing memories lead people to the Bureau of Balance? Suggested Character(s): Lucretia, Any Member(s) of the IPRE, Angus McDonald’s Grandfather

The Robot World's crystal post-Story and Song: The IPRE promised to return the Robot World’s crystal if they ever managed to defeat the Hunger...and we know they can plane hop from the casino liveshow...so, did they ever return the crystal? How did that go down? How does the Robot World rebuild itself? And if we’re going into it being the (K)nights Arc’s setting, are there other characters than Troth that we might recognize? Suggested Character(s): Magnus Burnsides, Lucretia, Any Member(s) of the IPRE

Worlds that survived the Hunger: In the worlds where the IPRE found the Light of Creation before the Hunger arrived, what was it like for the people there who had to endure the Hunger’s attack? What was the scope of the destruction? How did they rebuild afterward? Does uniting against a common enemy bring the people of the world together and create more Tesseralia-like societies? How many people knew about the IPRE, and what did they think about them? When they hear the Story and Song, what’s the reaction? If they didn’t know about the IPRE what myths do they create to explain the Hunger? Suggested Character(s): Lucretia, Original Character(s)

~~~

Alright, that’s the end of my prompts/requests! Thanks for reading this far, and whatever you end up writing for me I am super excited to read it!! And if you have questions or ideas or something, my askbox is open and I have anon messages on, I’d love to talk! Thank you again for creating for me, you are the best! <3

#tmi anna #worldbuilding exchange #exchange letter

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oh-great-authoress · 4 years

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Tag Game!!!!!

Thank you, @the-coruscanti-blogger, for tagging me!

Okay, here we go!!

Name: Nadia of oh-great-authoress!

Gender: Female.

Star Sign: Like @the-coruscanti-blogger said, this is technically against my religion, but I do know that I am a Virgo.

Height: Over 5 feet, I can’t remember the exact number.

Sexuality: Straight.

Favorite Book: Uhh, difficult question. How about top three?

“The Lord of the Rings” by J. R. R. Tolkien (In my opinion it counts as one book. Yes, I know I’m technically cheating.)

“Washington's Spies: The Story of America's First Spy Ring” by Alexander Rose (They even made a tv series based on the events in this book called Turn: Washington’s Spies!) [Yes, I am a history nerd. :)]

“Niamh and the Hermit” by Emily C. A. Snyder (This book is a hidden treasure. It’s an adventure/epic quest/love story that is just… *chef’s kiss* perfection. It’s along the lines of LotR, so if you like that, you’ll probably love this.)

Current Time: Uhh, unholily late, or unholily early, depending on your outlook.

Average Amount of Sleep: Outside of quarantine, it varies from 8+ to 0, depending on the day.

Dogs or Cats: Both. Both is good.

# of Blankets You Sleep With: One thick one in colder weather, and two thin ones in warmer weather. I know it’s weird I use more when it’s warm, but it works for me.

Dream Job: World Domination. Hahaha, I’m joking. Or am I?…

Favorite Animal: Foxes. Look at the YouTube channel SaveAFox. You’ll thank me later. Go.

Blog Established: January of 2020!

# of Followers: As of when I post this, 31!

Reason for URL: I hang around music nerds, and I am a bit… okay, I’m a music nerd. It’s a sort of oblique reference to a Gilbert and Sullivan song called “Minerva! Oh, Hear Me!” It’s a warping of one of the lyrics, which says, “Oh, goddess wise” I couldn’t remember the actual lyric, (I forgot google existed) and in my memory, I changed it to “Oh, great goddess”, which sounded right. Again, I forgot google existed. And I have a dramatic streak a mile wide. (Or a couple of miles wide, depends on who you ask) In addition, I like to write, a lot, (I also hate it a lot sometimes) so that turned into @oh-great-authoress!

Something I’m Grateful For: My faith, my amazing and wonderful parents, my grandparents, my and my family’s health and life, my friends irl and on tumblr, sunrises, music, my interests and fandoms, tumblr, and all the amazing people I’ve met here.

Followers I’m Tagging: @megsann13, @batmantaking-hobbits2gallifrey, @ruinofsilver, @fromsolowithlove, @rainmakesyouwhole, @demichrising, @cptdorkery, @lynntheninja, @loveandmusic67, @magic-and-the-macabre, and @lenacs!

Questions I’m Adding (Feel free to ignore my added questions)

Favorite Pairings

Favorite Season

Favorite Color(s)

Favorite Actresses and Actors

My Answers to My Own Questions

Question 1.

Favorite Pairings

Reylo — Ben Solo/Rey — Star Wars (I don’t need to say any more about this.)

Gingerflower — Armitage Hux/Rose Tico — Star Wars (Okay, guys, guys, guys, hear me out, okay? Please don’t come @ me. I got sucked into this via Reylo Modern AU fanfics, and I went down a rabbit hole. From there, I read some canon-divergent fic, and it got me thinking. I mean TRoS didn’t even obliquely mention Finn/Rose, so, I thought, why the kriff not. Why shouldn’t Rose “Save What We Love” Tico get a romance/definitively happy ending via fanfic. We already had one Enemies-to Lovers pairing in the Sequel Trilogy, what’s one more? And when you add in Hux’s “I’m the Spy!”? This kinda writes itself. Resistance Spy-Master Rose Tico? Why not. Plus, that deleted scene from TLJ did kind of open this whole thing up.)

Farawyn — Faramir/Eowyn — LotR (If you haven’t read the books or watched the Extended Editions of the films, Faramir and Eowyn end up together, which is why they’re standing next to each other in the Theatrical Edition of RotK, at the end. In the books, they have practically an entire chapter dedicated to them and their romance. And boy, does Faramir have game.)

Fitzwilliam Darcy/Elizabeth Bennet — Pride & Prejudice (I also don’t need to say any more about this.)

Col. Brandon/Marianne Dashwood — Sense & Sensibility (Watch the 1995 adaptation and tell me this is not pairing gold.)

Mary/Matthew — Downton Abbey (Yes, the Season 3 finale broke my heart, thank you.)

Dramione — Draco Malfoy/Hermione Granger — Harry Potter (Again, please don’t come @ me, this pairing is basically Reylo in a Harry Potter AU.)

Bathena — Bobby Nash/Athena Grant — 911 (Yes, I do watch this. I actually didn’t see this coming. My Mom saw it coming before I did. But once it happened, I was like, oh yeah, this is my jam.)

Ventrobi — Obi-Wan Kenobi/Asajj Ventress — Star Wars (Okay, yes, I am a sucker for Enemies-to Lovers, okay? And this is Enemies-to-Lovers gold, alright?

Christopher Pike/Number One (Una) — Star Trek (Got into this ship via fanfic, but Discovery/Short Treks well and truly cemented this for me.)

Question 2.

Favorite Season

Fall. Without question. The weather becomes temperate, and in early fall you still get the pretty flowers of summer, but with cooler weather, and in full-out-fall, you get to wear pretty sweaters and boots and scarves, and you get the trees changing color.

Question 3.

Favorite Color(s)

Pink

Teal

Green

Blue

Purple

Question 4.

Favorite Actresses and Actors

Adam Driver (Guys. Come on.)

Daisy Ridley (Guys. Come on.)

Domnhall Gleeson (I liked him even before he was General Hux, guys, he was great in a movie called “About Time” and “Goodbye Christopher Robin”.)

Kelly Marie Tran (She was amazing as Rose, I still feel bad she didn’t get more screen time, especially after what happened to her after TLJ.)

Ewan McGregor (Um, he’s Obi-Flipping-Wan Kenobi.)

Letitia Wright (She was great as Shuri in “Black Panther”.)

Danai Gurira (She was Awesome as General Okoye in “Black Panther. Note the capital A.)

Colin Firth (P&P ‘95 and The King’s Speech. That’s all I have to say.)

Alan Rickman (S&S ‘95 + Harry Potter + Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. Amazing performances. I mean, truly amazing. Nuanced, and just plain hilarious in the case of Robin Hood. His performance as Col. Brandon just pulls at the heartstrings with every single expression in his eyes, and no matter how you feel about Severus Snape, you cannot deny that Alan, God rest his soul, played him brilliantly.)

Hayden Christensen (He was The Chosen One.)

Bruce Greenwood (His portrayal of Captain Pike in Star Trek: 2009 was the reason I wrote and actually finished a fic.)

Anson Mount (His portrayal of Captain Pike in Star Trek: Discovery was the reason I wrote and actually finished more fic.)

And that’s it! I hope I have not ticked off anyone. If I have, I apologize for the ticking off, but not my opinions. I hope you can respect them, or at least ignore them.

Stay Well, People!

#hope i still have followers after this #bracing myself #asks #tag game

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inactivesimblrr · 6 years

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get to know me tag!

tagged by @literalite (thank u lamer clone!) n im not tagging anyone bc.............. every1 i think i know has already been tagged so thats calm, there r 125 questions below!

1. WHAT IS YOUR FULL NAME? Pat[REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED]

2. WHAT IS YOUR NICKNAME? pat

3. BIRTHDAY? 23rd of nov!!!!! <3 (2001)

4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE BOOK SERIES? hmhmhnnnn,,,,, lotr, the hobbit, harry potter, anything from the grishaverse,,, idk man i like books a lot,,, the raven cycle,,, hnmgmg,,

5. DO YOU BELIEVE IN ALIENS OR GHOSTS? aliens 100% i believe in them! ghosts? i mean... i half kind of do half dont but my kind of ghost aint the same as the usual idea of a ghost yanno? mine r nicer <3

6. WHO IS YOUR FAVORITE AUTHOR? leigh bardugo, tolkien, i would say j.k rowling but shes trash! her books r good tho ://

7. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE RADIO STATION? ??? idk so im gon pretend this means podcast and in that case im listening to the black tapes rn!

8. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE FLAVOR OF ANYTHING? matcha or strawberry!!!!!!

9. WHAT WORD WOULD YOU USE OFTEN TO DESCRIBE SOMETHING GREAT OR WONDERFUL? thats swag (i began using it ironically but now i cant stop)

10. WHAT IS YOUR CURRENT FAVORITE SONG? uhhh eve or the wonderful world by mark joshua! orrr shiloh by little chief!!

11. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE WORD? grinned

12. WHAT WAS THE LAST SONG YOU LISTENED TO? walking back to georgia by jim croce

13. WHAT TV SHOW WOULD YOU RECOMMEND FOR EVERYBODY TO WATCH? honestly.... drop dead diva... im sorry.... but tbh i dont watch tv all that often!! ACTUALLUY HECK i would def recommend merlin the bbc tv series and ofc sherlock the tv series but keep in mind both those recs will rip out your heart MULTIPLE times,

14. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE MOVIE TO WATCH WHEN YOU’RE FEELING DOWN? .......... im down all the time lolol but tbh all the harry potter films + the 1st fantastic beasts movie, all the lotr films and all the hobbit films AND sherlock both the rdj and jude law films and then the bbc sherlock christmas special the abominable bride

15. DO YOU PLAY VIDEO GAMES? yah! my all time favourite game is tes oblivion!! it has been my fav since i was 6!

16. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST FEAR? my life not working out the way i want to!! i want my life to be happy and long and spent with the people i love and not having 2 worry abt money or health!!!

17. WHAT IS YOUR BEST QUALITY, IN YOUR OPINION? i think maybe my ability to find everything funny??

18. WHAT IS YOUR WORST QUALITY, IN YOUR OPINION? my temper is beyond vicious honestly like im not kidding my temper is.... disgusting

19. DO YOU LIKE CATS OR DOGS BETTER? birds

20. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SEASON? winter

21. ARE YOU IN A RELATIONSHIP? nah!

22. WHAT IS SOMETHING YOU MISS FROM YOUR CHILDHOOD? im still a kid im only 17!!! and uh,, i miss the innocence!! i miss being oblivious!!

23. WHO IS YOUR BEST FRIEND? i dont have one!

24. WHAT IS YOUR EYE COLOR? brownn w/ a bit of green!

25. WHAT IS YOUR HAIR COLOR? dark brown!

26. WHO IS SOMEONE YOU LOVE? my parents and my family!

27. WHO IS SOMEONE YOU TRUST? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

28. WHO IS SOMEONE YOU THINK ABOUT OFTEN? jude law, sebastian stan, emma stone

29. ARE YOU CURRENTLY EXCITED ABOUT/FOR SOMETHING? back to school shopping!! also i get to eat fried chicken and cheesecake tonight because even tho my birthday was yesterday im celebrating it today!!!!

30. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST OBSESSION? stationery??? video games?? FOOD??

31. WHAT WAS YOUR FAVORITE TV SHOW AS A CHILD? jane and the dragon!

32. WHO OF THE OPPOSITE GENDER CAN YOU TELL ANYTHING TO, IF ANYONE? i dont know what a male is sorry

33. ARE YOU SUPERSTITIOUS? a baby bit only

34. DO YOU HAVE ANY UNUSUAL PHOBIAS? n’aw i dont think so!

35. DO YOU PREFER TO BE IN FRONT OF THE CAMERA OR BEHIND IT? i mean... if i weren’t as ugly as i am id love to be in front of a camera doing fun acting stuff or whatnot! but bc i am ugly im usually behind the camera + i do film at school!

36. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE HOBBY? lettering/calligraphy!

37. WHAT WAS THE LAST BOOK YOU READ? what if its us by becky abertalli + adam silvera (its so cute but the ending was.... not satisfactory...)

38. WHAT WAS THE LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? fantastic beasts the crimes of grindelwald!!!

39. WHAT MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS DO YOU PLAY, IF ANY? used 2 play piano, accordion, and violin! but i dont do tht anymore!

40. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ANIMAL? bird!!

41. WHAT ARE YOUR TOP 5 FAVORITE TUMBLR BLOGS THAT YOU FOLLOW? too many 2 pick from !!! im srry!

42. WHAT SUPERPOWER DO YOU WISH YOU HAD? gdgs all of them!!!!! maybe the power to warp reality bc i could do anything then?? a reality where im married to jude law or emma stone? done, a reality where i have all the powers in the world? done

43. WHEN AND WHERE DO YOU FEEL MOST AT PEACE? a cliff somewhere where its cold and the water is vicious underneath!

44. WHAT MAKES YOU SMILE? babies, animals, happy couples, pregnant people, old people, a lot of things really!

45. WHAT SPORTS DO YOU PLAY, IF ANY? i used 2 do karate but now i dont do sports!

46. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE DRINK? idfsng idk! strawberry milkshake maybe?? matcha boba??? milk!!

47. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU WROTE A HAND-WRITTEN LETTER OR NOTE TO SOMEBODY? last week!!! i love handwriting!

48. ARE YOU AFRAID OF HEIGHTS? nah!

49. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST PET PEEVE? ppl who r rude for no reason and also ppl at school who just pick on other ppl for no reason looking at you rahni teagan and the other f*ckheads!!! hope u die literally i know thats a horrible thing to say but you all deserve it

50. HAVE YOU EVER BEEN TO A CONCERT? i went to two twenty one pilot concerts!! the first one was in the forum in melbourne and then the other one was a few years or one year later and it was in a sold out stadium!! both were in the mosh! and then idk if this counts as a concert but i went to and did the meet and greet for dan and phil’s first tour! i dont like them anymore tho ! ://

51. ARE YOU VEGAN/VEGETARIAN? no way in HELL!!!!

52. WHEN YOU WERE LITTLE, WHAT DID YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GREW UP? a lot of things!!! famous actress, spy, war general, prime minister, pro wrestler, explorer, cartographer, filmmaker, architect, interior designer, dragon, PIRATE

53. WHAT FICTIONAL WORLD WOULD YOU LIKE TO LIVE IN? i know this is a bad idea but honestly the harry potter universe PROVIDED i had magic!! bc like,,, yah

54. WHAT IS SOMETHING YOU WORRY ABOUT? a lot of things! my future mainly lol :(

55. ARE YOU SCARED OF THE DARK? no but i gotta say sometimes in the middle of the night when i wake up and the undefined shape my clothes sitting on my desk chair looks like That i get a bit worried yanno it looks like a demon im not gonna lie

56. DO YOU LIKE TO SING? ya but i dont htink im any good at it!

57. HAVE YOU EVER SKIPPED SCHOOL? only due to sickness, funerals, or holidays!

58. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE PLACE ON THE PLANET? my house! OR the cliffs of moher :o)

59. WHERE WOULD YOU LIKE TO LIVE? in some old old old european castle in the middle of nowhere on a mountain and next to the sea

60. DO YOU HAVE ANY PETS? nuu :( but i do feed a lot of birds that come to my house and ive named them and love them even if the lorikeets dont love me back which is fine!!!! :(

61. ARE YOU MORE OF AN EARLY BIRD OR A NIGHT OWL? early bird i guess

62. DO YOU LIKE SUNRISES OR SUNSETS BETTER? sunsets??

63. DO YOU KNOW HOW TO DRIVE? yes! but i dont have my full lisence only my learner’s permit!!

64. DO YOU PREFER EARBUDS OR HEADPHONES? headphones (noise cancelling!!)

65. HAVE YOU EVER HAD BRACES? yup!! they were green!!

66. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE GENRE OF MUSIC? soft rock, indie folk, indie-everything mainly except for indie-rock,,, country music dont hate my i love country music as long as its certain country music!! aint having none of this keith urban rubbish in my house!! we only listen 2 the james taylor brand of country music in this house!!! so i guess country folk. folk music in general is my jam!!! i love ballads as well and ofc blues!! theres so many more jbdsgjbas but i cant possibly list all of it!!!

67. WHO IS YOUR HERO? the idea of me living out the future i want if that makes sense!

68. DO YOU READ COMIC BOOKS? yah!!

69. WHAT MAKES YOU THE MOST ANGRY? a lot of things honestly!!!! 2 many to list im really passionate!

70. DO YOU PREFER TO READ ON AN ELECTRONIC DEVICE OR WITH A REAL BOOK? real book but i read more on electronic devices bc its easy and i dont have to worry about lights !!

71. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SUBJECT IN SCHOOL? idk!!!!!!!! maybe history!

72. DO YOU HAVE ANY SIBLINGS? nup!! im an only child thanK GOD

73. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU BOUGHT? movie tickets to crimes against grindelwald last night!!

74. HOW TALL ARE YOU? i think im like 176cm??

75. CAN YOU COOK? only if i have a recipe! but i can make really good drinks (non alcoholic ofc!!)

76. WHAT ARE THREE THINGS THAT YOU LOVE? rainy weather, good literature, my family

77. WHAT ARE THREE THINGS THAT YOU HATE? hubris, wrath, pococurantism

78. DO YOU HAVE MORE FEMALE FRIENDS OR MORE MALE FRIENDS? female

79. WHAT IS YOUR SEXUAL ORIENTATION? ?????????? who knows

80. WHERE DO YOU CURRENTLY LIVE? australia!!

81. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TEXTED? my group chat

82. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? my birthday yesterday lol

83. WHO IS YOUR FAVORITE YOUTUBER? dont want youtube tht much anymore tbh

84. DO YOU LIKE TO TAKE SELFIES? nah

85. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE APP? procreate

86. WHAT IS YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH YOUR PARENT(S) LIKE? incredibly close with both parents but fight with my dad like cats n dogs

87. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE FOREIGN ACCENT? irish or strong strong american or posh english also scottish

88. WHAT IS A PLACE THAT YOU’VE NEVER BEEN TO, BUT YOU WANT TO VISIT? israel, republic of ireland, and so many more places like nksgskbgs i cant list them also all the nordic countries

89. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE NUMBER? 3

90. CAN YOU JUGGLE? no

91. ARE YOU RELIGIOUS? nah

92. DO YOU FIND OUTER SPACE OF THE DEEP OCEAN TO BE MORE INTERESTING? both!!!!!!

93. DO YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF TO BE A DAREDEVIL? daring in terms of i like to do things that could potentially kill me for the adrenaline rush but not daring in terms of introducing myself to other ppl lol

94. ARE YOU ALLERGIC TO ANYTHING? nah thank GOD

95. CAN YOU CURL YOUR TONGUE? oui

96. CAN YOU WIGGLE YOUR EARS? non

97. HOW OFTEN DO YOU ADMIT THAT YOU WERE WRONG ABOUT SOMETHING? ill happily admit i’m wrong provided the other person wasnt a douchebag about it but even then ill admit im wrong! aint no shame in recognising ur wrong ma dude

98. DO YOU PREFER THE FOREST OR THE BEACH? dont like the beach but i love the sea?? so forest i guess bc i dont like sand

99. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE PIECE OF ADVICE THAT ANYONE HAS EVER GIVEN YOU? "two things stand like stone, kindness in another’s trouble, courage in your own” - adam lindsay gordon

100. ARE YOU A GOOD LIAR? an excellent one, but i dislike lying and value honesty so!!

101. WHAT IS YOUR HOGWARTS HOUSE? ssssss slytherin!

102. DO YOU TALK TO YOURSELF? ya

103. ARE YOU AN INTROVERT OR AN EXTROVERT? cop out answer here but it depends on the situation

104. DO YOU KEEP A JOURNAL/DIARY? yes

105. DO YOU BELIEVE IN SECOND CHANCES? depends

106. IF YOU FOUND A WALLET FULL OF MONEY ON THE GROUND, WHAT WOULD YOU DO? try and find the owner and track em down but if i cant ill hand it in to the place where it was lost

107. DO YOU BELIEVE THAT PEOPLE ARE CAPABLE OF CHANGE? yes

108. ARE YOU TICKLISH? yes

109. HAVE YOU EVER BEEN ON A PLANE? yes

110. DO YOU HAVE ANY PIERCINGS? ears but theyre closed up!!

111. WHAT FICTIONAL CHARACTER DO YOU WISH WAS REAL? thorin oakenshield

112. DO YOU HAVE ANY TATTOOS? nah

113. WHAT IS THE BEST DECISION THAT YOU’VE MADE IN YOUR LIFE SO FAR? ? idk man

114. DO YOU BELIEVE IN KARMA? no, too many bad people are living good lives right now

115. DO YOU WEAR GLASSES OR CONTACTS? nope! perfect vision here my dude!

116. DO YOU WANT CHILDREN? in the future i want 1 child only

117. WHO IS THE SMARTEST PERSON YOU KNOW? my little cousin

118. WHAT IS YOUR MOST EMBARRASSING MEMORY? a Lot

119. HAVE YOU EVER PULLED AN ALL-NIGHTER? a few times only, but i value sleep

120. WHAT COLOR ARE MOST OF YOU CLOTHES? black and green

121. DO YOU LIKE ADVENTURES? hell ya !

122. HAVE YOU EVER BEEN ON TV? audience member for the xfactor!

123. HOW OLD ARE YOU? 17

124. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE QUOTE? “so comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their endings.” -tolkien OR “always seek the giant.”

125. DO YOU PREFER SWEET OR SAVORY FOODS? savoury

#nonsims #non-sims #non sims #saviorhide #saviourhide #tag #tagged

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bibliophileiz · 6 years

Text

The Three Fandoms Asks

I keep seeing this around tumblr, and it looks fun.

3 fandoms (I chose three important ones from my childhood)

1. Harry Potter - The Original Fandom. I mean, not the original original obviously, but probably the original for my generation. It was a huge part of my childhood and the story itself formed a lot of my opinions about how to tell good stories. I also have fond memories associated with this series -- Harry Potter was the first reason I ever had for Googling anything. “Harry Potter Book 5 news” and “Harry Potter Book 6 rumors” became frequent searches of mine. (The rumors took me to a lot of chat rooms where I read up on the wildest theories. It was a blast.) And then there were the midnight visits to Barnes and Noble and, in one memorable case, Walmart the nights of the book releases. Harry Potter was my childhood.

2. Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit - Like Harry Potter, these books (and movies) taught me a lot about storytelling. Tolkien’s works have become more complex to me as I’ve gotten older, and I’ve found there are plots and characters I like more now than I did as a kid (as opposed to Harry Potter, which my opinions about have mostly stayed the same). I also love Tolkien’s writing and world building. I’m one of the few people I know who enjoys reading all the poetry, and I read “The Council of Elrond” chapter three or four times before I got tired of it on Fellowship rereads. Lord of the Rings is a fantastic example of a really good book being adapted into really good movies. Both the book and the movies are each their own thing while also complementing each other. Just -- Lord of the Rings, man. I love it.

3. Charmed - Not as good, quality-wise, as the other two I’ll admit, but damn do I love this show. Before Charmed, I kind of watched whatever my family or friends watched -- my brother was a TV hog, and while I liked his cartoons ok, I didn’t like them nearly as much as I did Charmed when I discovered it. I got my dad watching it and it kind of became our thing. The Charmed Ones were kind of role models in a way. I can remember thinking, This is what being in my 20s will be like. Not the magic, but dating and clothes and deciding whether to go corporate or pursue your dream job or go back to school. People accuse the Charmed Ones of being boy crazy, but what I remember most about them is their work ethic. I thought, Prue prioritizes work, and I want to be like Prue. I love this show.

First character I loved:

1. Professor McGonagall is, has been and will always be my favorite character in anything ever. I also remember being small and redheaded and really liking Ginny Weasley before many other people did.

2. Arwen was the first, but that was only because she appears in the movies before Eowyn.

3. Prue. Although I like all four sisters.

The character I never expected to love so much:

1. Sirius Black is obviously introduced as this terrifying villain, so when I started reading Prisoner of Azkaban, I didn’t expect him to become one of my favorites. To be honest, my fan girl love of him has waned since I was a teenager, but I still appreciate him.

2. Sam Gamgee. Another of my favorite characters in all of literature, though I had to mature a bit before I felt that way. But Sam is so small and overlooked, yet he’s so loyal, brave, determined, sassy and just all around good. He’s a gardener, which is a profession Tolkien holds in high esteem. Also in the books he doesn’t have that awkward break-up with Frodo that he does in the movie, plus he’s less whiny. (To be clear, I’m criticizing the movie’s writing, not Sean Astin’s performance. He did great especially considering the material he had to work with, and he feels the same way about the character I do. Also, his book about making the movies, There and Back Again, is the first nonfiction book I ever read for fun.)

3. Cole Turner. I came into the show in Season 4 right as his baby was turning Phoebe evil, so I was like, “Ah, ruler of Hell, not good.” My dad and I had to start the show over and watch Season 3 to realize he’s one of Charmed’s most complex characters.

The character I relate to the most:

1. Probably Ginny, especially as a kid. We’re physically similar, but there’s also the temper and the fact that people always end up being surprised she’s as tough as she is. She and I also had to both grow out of self-esteem issues, though hers were more severe since they came from Chamber of Secrets-related trauma.

2. Pippin. He’s not sure if he’s actually qualified to be on that adventure, but hell if he’s being left behind. Also he’s small, like Ginny and me.

3. Prue. Sort of opposite of the Ginny stuff, she’s got the older sister syndrome of being responsible, in charge, bossy and often feeling like the only person who can get a job done right.(I don’t like having help with dishes or laundry, nor do I like assigning other reporters crime stories at work, as a couple of examples.) I am pretty protective of my younger brother and my mom always quoted It’s a Wonderful Life with the “you were born older” line when talking about me. Also like Prue, I tend to over-focus on work and not enough on my social life.

The character I’d slap:

1. Percy. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a fabulously complex and underrated character, but I would still slap him silly.

2. Denethor. I used language I’d never used before in the theater when he sent Faramir off to fight in Return of the King and I started laughing a few minutes later when Gandalf knocked him out with his staff.

3. Ugh. Leo. (Also Sam.)

Three favorite characters in order of preference:

1. McGonagall, Harry, Ginny. (That last one was insanely difficult as I also considered Snape, Lupin, Regulus and Luna.)

2. Sam, Eowyn then Aragorn (movies) and Bilbo (books).

3. Prue, Piper, Phoebe (Sorry Paige.)

Character I liked at first but don’t anymore:

1. I mean, I’m not going to say I don’t like Hermione, because I definitely do, but the movies wore me out by over-glamming her to the detriment of Ron Ginny other characters.

2. I like all the characters except Denethor, who I never liked. Ditto Grima Wormtongue.

3. Believe it or not, I liked Leo when I was a kid. (*shakes head at how naive 13-year-old Iz was*)

Character I did not like at first but do now:

1. Narcissa and Snape. This is not to say their views or the pro-Death Eater actions are ok, but they were both smart, they surprised me (always a plus) and they helped defeat Voldemort.

2. Didn’t like Boromir or Faramir at first, but now I love them.

3. Paige.

Three OTPs:

1. Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione, Lily/James

2. Arwen/Aragorn (in a doomed, tragic way. Seriously, read the Appendices.) Eowyn/Faramir and Linsdey Ellis got me liking Eowyn/Merry

3. Piper/Mark Chau (I will never be over it!), Paige/Henry, Phoebe/pretty much anyone, including but not limited to: Cole, baby Misha Collins (Eric Bragg) and Aviva from Season 1 (#Phoebeisbisexual).*

* I really just think that everyone Phoebe interacted with before Season 3 should have come back as a love interest after she and Cole divorced. Aviva would have been old enough for that by then, and we could have gotten great sub plots of Eric Bragg’s little conspiracy theory brain trying to figure out which secret organization the sisters work for before Phoebe tells him they’re witches. (Then he and Henry could meet for beers after work and talk about how goddamn weird their lives are.) Any of that would have been better than the post-Cole love interests Phoebe got. (One of them was named Leslie?? And he took her job?? Fuck Brad Kern, honestly.)

I’m going to break the rules by not tagging people, but whoever wants to play should go for it.

#harry potter #lord of the rings #charmed #professor minerva fucking mcgonagall #sam gamgee #prue halliwell #Ginny Weasley #anti-Leo Wyatt #also anti-Denethor in case he has any fans

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fullvoidmoon · 7 years

Text

Come Back

Pairing/s: Fili x human!reader

Setting/Timeline: A year after BoTFA, Durins live!AU

Warning(s)/Genre(s): Angst, with a little comedy

Word Count: 1,132

The Hobbit, the Durins, Bilbo Baggins, Any of the Company, Azog, Bolg, Mahal/Aulë, and the Valar © J.R.R. Tolkien Context © me

Requested by @deepestfirefun

A/N: I’m so sorry that this fanfic turned out to be too long than I thought when I was drafting this, so I will have to divide this into two parts.

The Hobbit tag list: @sdavid09, @igotanaddixon, @fizzy-custard, @life-is-righteous, @kittenwritesstuff, @fromthedeskoftheraven, @deepestfirefun

Masterlist: HERE

Part 2 - Here to Stay

“Those eyes...”

The Crown Prince of Erebor would never imagine seeing those eyes again. The same eyes that brought immense joy and perilous pain to his heart and soul; the eyes that vividly remind him of the love that was found, the love that was lost in that fateful but cursed battle.

And the love that will forever break his very being, but will continue to mend it back for him to keep on living.

“.... amrâlimê?”

But something tells the blonde prince that that same love was never truly lost upon seeing the wolf they’ve been looking for and hunting down.

-----

“First, you suggested hunting it down-”

“Uncle is going to have a fit,” Kili cackles, trying hard not to be obvious.

Fili, while having a hard time making a straight face, couldn’t help but give out a sigh, “thank you for stating the obvious.”

“-now you are telling me that we should keep it?!” Thorin bellows as he looks at his older nephew, clearly in a state of disbelief in the situation.

One of the things Fili doesn’t want is for him to make mistakes, especially now that he is truly the Crown Prince. But never would he expect that the wolf they’ve been hunting down for days is actually a pure softy, without admitting it to anyone but himself that the wolf reminds him of his (Y/N).

‘It’s like she was resurrected to live her life again after the day I lost her.’ Fili thinks as he remembers how the she-wolf nuzzled up against him the other day, ‘just like how (Y/N) would give me warmth when she was still with me.’

Thus his current predicament to persuade Thorin to keep the wolf and let it live in Erebor.

"She can certainly be a sort of additional protection to us and to the kingdom,” Fili exclaims, apparently becoming desperate for Thorin to allow him to keep the wolf, “she proved herself she can protect us when we were suddenly surrounded by orcs on the way back.”

“It is true Your Majesty. I was there with Kili when we arrived with reinforcements as the orcs swarmed in,” adds Balin as he tries not to laugh at his younger brother, who is currently being treated like a puppy bed by the said wolf, “and we would’ve never expected for the she-wolf to be such a sweetheart.”

“Sweetheart or not, if this wolf lassie goin’ to live here let it stay in the lad’s chamber,” Dwalin looks at Fili, his accent becoming thicker as the wolf continues to lay comfortably on him, “I don’t want to be her official bed!”

“Why does the she-wolf reminds me of (Y/N)?” Bofur suddenly asks, who seems to just pass by the library and hears all the commotion, “I clearly remember the lassie likes to lie down on Dwalin just for fun.”

The resemblance clearly doesn’t escape Thorin as he watches the said wolf, bigger than any wolf they’ve ever seen and clearly not an ordinary one, lying on top of his best friend and captain of the guard.

And with contentment and good humor in him for seeing Dwalin in an uncomfortable state, surely a rare occurrence to behold and to keep as a reference in case the titanium wall of a dwarf needs some bribing in the future, Thorin decides for the she-wolf to be accepted in the halls of Erebor and be the kingdom’s “guard dog”.

-----

“You have to go, now!”

She shouldn’t have come here.

“No (Y/N), I will stay with you.”

She shouldn’t have been here.

“This is a trap, Fili. Bolg and the rest of the Gundabad Orcs are coming here from further north,” (Y/N) said as she tried to pull both Kili and I away from where we stood, “you will be surrounded before it’s too late.”

“Then you have to come with us,” Kili interjected, clearly alarmed and worried with the news, “we have to warn uncle and Dwalin about it!”

(Y/N) could only shake her head as she tried her might to pull us away and hid us from the enemies’ views. “Bilbo and I took different ways when we arrived here. He’s currently with Thorin and Dwalin by now to warn them.”

She is obviously terrified, never could she have expected for something like this to happen. But as I tried to force her to calm down and go with us she suddenly pushed my brother and I towards a path that lead to where uncle, Dwalin, and Bilbo were.

Suddenly there were orcs coming from almost all directions.

“I’ll distract them, you two just go ahead,” (Y/N) exclaimed, her twin swords at the ready, “I’ll catch up with you.”

And that was the last time I saw the courage and determination in her visage, one of many reasons why I fell in love with her.

For the next moment I saw her is in the hands of the Defiler, the blade in replacement of its lost arm pierced in her chest.

“May the Line of Durin perish,” Azog said in his black tongue, sneering down on us, “and may it start by the death of this woman.”

-----

A good night’s sleep is now a foreign word to Fili ever since that cursed day, as guilt and self-pity took hold of his heart as days pass by, reminding him that his beloved died for him.

And he couldn’t do anything to save her.

“I love you, my lion prince,” (Y/N) said as the blade drove through her, “and I will always love you.”

And dreaming of her in the Defiler’s hands, a dream that always haunts him every night, makes his grief even worse. Even the comfort that the she-wolf gives him since having its first night in Erebor does not help him in anyway.

“(Y/N), my princess, please...” Fili whispered, grief slowly becomes too strong for him to take, “...please come back to me.”

A dream that only makes him wish harder to Mahal, to any Valar that might take pity on his plight, for his One to come back in his arms once again.

Then he hears it, a voice that he never had the chance to hear after that day but is surely never forgotten; the voice that he wishes to hear every day and every night, the voice that never fails to have butterflies in his stomach and makes his knees weak.

“Fili...”

The voice that causes chills run down his spine whenever it calls his name.

And Fili couldn’t help but turn his azure gaze to the she-wolf that lies on the foot of his bed, its (e/c) that reminds him of his fallen One becoming more apparent as if it is the one calling out to him.

“...my lion prince.”

#the hobbit #the hobbit x reader #fili #fili x reader #durins live!au #FVMfanfics #FVM fics #FVM fili fanfics

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nobodysuspectsthebutterfly · 7 years

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@ainedubh asked:

Regarding your tags on the Lady Stark interiority / Tolkien thing, I feel like if Tolkien was ASKED about Bard or Thranduil's wives he would absolutely want to talk about them. "Oh, these are their names, and they mean this, and this is their entire ancestral line, and they met like this and their courtship went like this and..." Like, he wanted every detail fleshed out, and would never blow off a fan asking for them, even if he had to make it up then and there.

Hey, @ainedubh! @joannalannister’s a little overwhelmed with asks at the moment, and as your question was in reference to the tags she wrote in reply to my post and tags about Tolkien and female representation, she forwarded it on to me, hope you don’t mind! Note, she also deleted that post (because she reblogged another one with a further reply), so I can’t recall exactly what they said, but IIRC in reply to my tags:

#jrr tolkien #may have an awful proportion of female characters but every single one of them has interiority #that grrm is a tolkien fan makes me facepalm every time i read that interview

she wrote something wondering about Bard’s dead wife and Thranduil’s dead wife, both of whom are non-existent (except for Thranduil’s being used as a manpain plot device in the Hobbit movies), and are something she’s groused about before in reference to the Dead Ladies Club.

Now, I pretty much agree with you regarding Tolkien probably responding with lots of details if anyone asked. (I haven’t read most of his letters, but they’re quite educational and entertaining.) But the thing is, well, the problem of the missing wives is really a movie problem, not a book problem? That is to say, it’s a function of Peter Jackson’s adaptation, rather than a problem innate in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit (except for certain elements I’ll get to in a moment).

See, in The Hobbit (the book), Bard isn’t a father, and neither is the Elvenking. (Who isn’t named Thranduil in the book; he’s not given a name or history at all.) Oh, we learn in LOTR that they are fathers, sure, because Brand son of Bain son of Bard is said to be ruling Dale, and Legolas son of Thranduil is a messenger to Elrond (and of course becomes a major character in the trilogy). But in The Hobbit, these men are barely sketched out. They have no known family, no known children, no known wives... and that’s pretty typical of almost all the non-central characters of the book. They exist to play roles, they have a certain amount of characterization and interiority, there are sometimes brief references to ancient history, but other than that they’re barely people, they’re just kind of there.

Elrond, for example, hosts the dwarves and finds the moon-letters on the map; but he has no children (Elladan and Elrohir and Arwen), he has no wife (Celebrian, who went to Valinor for solace), he has no parents (Earendil and Elwing), he has no in-laws (Galadriel and Celeborn) -- he just is, merely Elrond master of Rivendell, “noble and fair and wise”, who “comes into many tales”, but only has a small part in Bilbo’s. And that’s because, (a) The Hobbit is a children’s book, with a first-person narrator telling the story, far less complex and developed than the later Lord of the Rings, and (b) The Hobbit was written fairly early on in Tolkien’s works, before he’d even created most of Middle Earth and its characters. (And the information Tolkien had developed already, he wisely left out of The Hobbit for simplicity’s sake, except for the occasional tantalizing reference to the legendarium here and there.)

So it was with Bard and the Elvenking in the book. Bard is a “grim-voiced” descendant of the last king of Dale, he doesn’t think the dwarves’ adventure will bring gold to Laketown, he can understand the speech of thrushes, he has a lucky black arrow that he uses to slay Smaug, he helps lead the people of Laketown after its destruction and during the Battle of Five Armies, and becomes king of the rebuilt Dale at the end. That’s it. The king of the elves of northern Mirkwood hosts feasts in the forest, gets ticked off when the dwarves keep flailing into them (because they’re lost and starving) and disturb the giant spiders, gets further annoyed when the captured dwarves won’t explain what their mission is, has another feast during which Bilbo helps the dwarves escape, helps the people of Laketown after its destruction, loves jewels and has an old grudge against dwarves (not the dwarves of Erebor, probably related to the Elf-Dwarf enmity of the First Age), leads the Elves in the Battle of Five Armies, etc. But both these men are just simple characters, with no connection to any other characters other than being a member of a race and their leadership, they have no families, barely any background.

However, because Peter Jackson’s adaptation of the Hobbit became three movies, putting a 300-page kids’ book on the same epic level of the 1200-page LOTR, the simplicity of those characters was no longer enough. Legolas becomes a major character in the story, as does Thranduil, and their relationship is prominent. Thranduil gains a deeply personal motivation for his enmity with Thorin’s people and his desire for the Arkenstone (he contracted a necklace from Thorin’s grandfather for his wife, and was cheated out of it), a reason to keep Legolas out of the fighting (his wife was kidnapped by orcs and tortured to death), an angsty thing about love, and much more. Thus the fact that his wife isn’t even named makes her very much a Dead Mother trope and Dead Ladies Club member (LOTR edition). Bard’s example is much less egregious -- however, he too was far more developed with a much greater heroic role, and given three children who also play roles in the story (the daughters are wholly inventions of the movies, as is the son’s personality and actions), and a prominently nonexistent dead unnamed wife.

So to be quite honest, these Dead Ladies of the Hobbit movies are Peter Jackson’s fault, not Tolkien’s. (Or Guillermo del Toro, or whoever wrote those parts of the scripts, but I’m going to assume PJ.) Yes, it is Tolkien’s fault that by LOTR Legolas is introduced and we know that he’s the son of Thranduil son of Oropher but his mother isn’t mentioned at all -- but hell, if PJ could invent Tauriel, could invent so much about movie-Thranduil (elk riding! dragonfire burns on his face that he hides by magic!), the fact that he made Thranduil’s wife a huge part of his backstory but didn’t bother giving her a name... that’s all on him, sorry. As for Bard’s son Bain, he’s only mentioned in LOTR because humans aren’t as long-lived as dwarves and hobbits and therefore the king of Dale by that point had to be Bard’s grandson, and Brand barely exists but to be in Gimli’s reports that the Black Riders had asked him questions, and to fall in battle in the northern front of the War of the Ring. (Alongside Dain; and that story is only briefly mentioned in the ROTK appendix.) That is to say, yes Tolkien didn’t create Bard’s wife either, but lbr he barely created her son. The fact that in the Hobbit movies Bard’s a widower with 3 kids with no mention of his wife’s personality or name or what happened to her is, again, all on Peter Jackson.

Now, I’m not excusing Tolkien for his severe lack of female characters, especially in the Hobbit. (I think Tauriel’s a great addition to the movies, and only wish they’d gone further with more.) But to reiterate, when Tolkien does have female characters, they all get stories, or close to it in the case of very minor background characters. In the Hobbit consider the “remarkable” Belladonna Took, Bilbo’s mother (who should have been developed in the movies more since they were adding so much already I’m just saying). In LOTR, besides Gilraen, even dead mothers such as Finduilas, Theodwyn, and Morwen get personality sketches. And the Silm goes much much further with women, there’s a huge variety there, minor and major.

Aaaanyway, yes. I do think that if asked, Tolkien would have given tons of details about Legolas’s mother, her history and lineage. (And whether she was still living at the time of the Hobbit and LOTR -- I very much doubt that whole captured by orcs thing would have been part of it, as that’s pretty much a copy of poor Celebrian’s story.) Maybe not so much detail in the case of Bard’s wife (I’d imagine she was also a descendant of the men of Dale), but probably a name at least. But I really don’t think that Tolkien would have ever done the GRRM sort of answer of “Lady Stark. She died.”, or a “I don’t know, probably dead by that time” (re Sandor’s mother’s whereabouts at his burning).

Ah, if only Tolkien had done that 1960s rewrite of The Hobbit (to bring it more in line with the style of LOTR) and not abandoned it...

#ainedubh #joannalannister #jrr tolkien #the hobbit #lotr #bard #thranduil #legolas #thranduil's wife #bard's wife #elrond #peter jackson #the dead ladies club #joannalannister's asks #i always end up going on about elrond when i talk about lotr but i can't help it he's always been a favorite #also this is less of a reply to the questioner than it is to jl whoops

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tkwrtnewsfeed · 7 years

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Newsfeed #86 August 13, 2017 (13 Úrimë)

ICYMI: Fantastic Credits and Where to Give Them.

I worked in Hollywood for 4 /12 years and one of my good friends is an intellectual property lawyer I’ve known since then--well over 16 years--with a client list that includes none other than Maurice (Kevin Kline) in the live-action film “Beauty and the Beast” starring Emma Watson.

(My attorney could sue anyone spreading salacious rumors about me and my work should he choose to do so, but I’m not a jerk. But he does know about it; he’s good at what he does--he’s successfully sued Google).

Translation: I’m at least 3-7 degrees of knowing how to give credit to artists. Otherwise, my attorney/friend would have me shot at sunrise. Would you like to learn how to do it without being a pain about it and spreading unscrupulous rumors? Let me explain Copyright © from a legal perspective from 30 years of working with copyrighted materials with an actual attorney that specializes in artistic intellectual properties with 40 years of experience that includes everything from visual art, music, film, books and has won a major copyright infringement case against Google (among other high profile cases) for major A-List celebrities.

1) Whatever you do is copyrighted from the moment you put it on paper by law. You don’t have to bitch about anyone stealing it perpetually. HOWEVER, you can’t complain about someone posting it anywhere in public (Pinterest, mostly) if YOU post it anywhere in public. If you share it, even asking people not to, it is already public and can go anywhere. What people CAN’T do is SAY it’s theirs. If they explicitly say “I did this” and they didn’t, you have a case. Otherwise, it is NOT copyright infringement if someone posts it anywhere.

It would be nice if EVERYONE would give credit--I try to do it if I do or link back to the original place I find something and that is time consuming if the work is not located where it came from (dead-link) or it was digitally stolen--something my attorney told me about a couple years ago. I see it all the time. But, if you make it public, it is assumed to be public. It is NOT ASSUMED to not to be copyrighted. Put that cute copyright sign on it and let it go. You should have the original as collateral, I would think. That’s the only way no one can claim it and you can properly bitch about it w/o an official U.S. Copyright.

2) I PUT “Images: ©2012, 2013, 2014. Warner Brothers Pictures. The Hobbit: The Unexpected Journey, The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, The Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies. All Rights Reserved.” on pretty much every post for The Kingdom of the Woodland Realm Trilogy because the photos I use BELONG to Warner Brothers/New Line Cinema/Wingnut Productions. Altered by someone online doesn’t change this UNLESS the person altering got permission from WB/NLC/Wingnut to alter it. Otherwise, it is their property and they can sue anyone that alters their work and put their name on it if they so choose. I post this disclaimer to keep from GETTING sued--even though I don’t alter the photo in anyway. Gifs are the same way and currently seen as pirated these days and are subject to suit as with screen caps.

The reason no one gets sued over screen caps and gifs is because no one is making $$ off of them. You only get credit for edit not the work of the camera guy that was paid to shoot a film and the studio that owns his camera work. Unlike Marvel that has begun digital copyrights on some photos (you post something on Facebook, it automatically gives credit). The minute someone charges for any altered screen caps, gifs or photos and calls it their own work, that is the legal definition of copyright infringement.

Without proper credit, you are open to lawsuit by the studios, photographers. I go out of my way to avoid altered anything because then I could get sued even if I didn’t alter it--even if I am not making money from it. Which brings me to the next point:

3) IF I was making $$ and using someone’s art, then I could get sued. That means I’m not paying the original person their due (licensing fees) for use of their work. THAT includes my original story that uses and will use a great number of canonical characters from Tolkien. If I want to turn The Kingdom of the Woodland Realm Trilogy into a book, I have to do it the right way--which is get permission from the Tolkien Estate (I’ve had the paperwork since 2016 when it was shown to me by a member of the Mythopoeic Society--they are close to the Estate). They can allow me to publish after negotiations of paying for use of the characters or force me to put “not affiliated with the Tolkien Estate” and/or change names if they so choose.

Example of a Tolkien allowed to go to press with “non-affiliated” tag of Tolkien. It’s clean, so the Estate probably doesn’t mind so much. Not all of these “non-affiliated” books are bad or not liked by the Estate. The label is not exclusively a non-endorsement--there might be something unknown about as to why it’s there.

Example of a book with the coveted “Tolkien Trademark” and approved by the Estate--spoke with one of the authors; pretty cool.

You want this, you better have your %^$* together. Yes, they give them out, but they are particular--do it right: legal and above board.

I’m not making any revenue off of TKWR Trilogy but if I were, I wouldn’t be using film photos. I would HIRE an artist to tag along over to the final phase of getting this book turned into something sold on Amazon or in Barnes & Noble. Then, the artist of choice would get paid for their work properly. They could use the work from this book anywhere they wanted and it would be protected forever--example of this would be Ted Nasmith.

Due to all the rumors about people say I’m doing because they have nothing better to do with their time (regardless of the obvious), I decided not to share any Tolkien Fan Art, use and Tolkien Fan Art or consider any Tolkien Fan Art unsolicited by anyone on Tumblr, Pinterest, DeviantArt or anywhere else that isn’t done by anyone not represented by an agent or a lawyer. If I so choose, artists will have to go through my lawyer--not me. After today, there will be no artists’ works mentioned or shared by me anywhere again until I’m done with the entire trilogy--unless idiots stop spreading lies and rumors (they won’t so don’t hold your breath).

I discovered a lot of fan art pertaining to my book and I could say something, but I’m not a jerk and I’m not complaining. I’m also not making any $$ of the book. It is assumed to be public but not assumed not to be copyrighted--which it actually is (ask my attorney).

I will do something should I decide to take any number of offers to publish after a lot of legalities I will go through. For now, I’ll just watch to make sure no one’s claiming my work--my words--as their own (and some have which is why I sent the book to witnesses so I have a case and proof should I do something later on). The book will change in the final form as I edit; it already has with additions and changes in Book II: The Saga of Thranduil and Book I: The Epic of Eryn Galen and Book III: The Last Tale of Legolas Lasgalen.

I love artists here, but a few ruined it for everyone. I’ve had artists wanting to illustrate Book II: The Saga of Thranduil, but now that’s been narrowed to only one that doesn’t accuse me of salacious and reputation-altering deeds I’ve never done. Having a friend that’s a respected and experienced intellectual properties attorney with connections in the U.S. and Europe that has worked within the industry successfully for 30+ years with a stellar reputation protecting my works--all of them including screenplays, poetry, stage plays--makes it possible for me to help protect an artist of my choosing (and he’s already done wonders for clothing designer friend of mine in Florida that designed things for my film project HERETIC: THE LEGEND OF AKHENATEN*). He loves protecting properties and takes referrals. I’m not helping anyone spreading rumors.

Thank you, Captain Obvious. That was obvious.

I told someone once that I would, but they thought it better to insult me rather than allowing me to connect them to a publisher I knew that could have looked at their work without the long query process. You make connections in the business and it’s good to keep them and I do.

I live by the motto: “The ass you kick today may be the ass you kiss tomorrow” so I try to be nice and respectful to everyone--even I have to draw a line.

[By the way, there will be a LOT of versions coming for The Kingdom of the Woodland Realm Trilogy. This one is the Annotated Version--complete with all the notes and references and explanations of the use of Tolkien to create the entire trilogy. Let’s just say it took 4 hours to do the first bibliography and I just added more books. This one (which will be done for both the original version and extended version) will take years.]

But if you don’t want to be seen as an artist, it’s a safe bet you won’t think pinning = stealing. Pinterest is nothing more than a bulletin board for what people like--it’s not supposed to deal in copyright protection like YouTube or Instagram where you are actually legally protected by copyright law. If they were, a lot of stuff they still allow would be subject to lawsuit against them--not the pinners. They blame pinners to keep themselves from being liable for allowing copyrighted properties. I’ve already deleted my Art page of potential artists for The Kingdom of he Woodland Realm Trilogy. I’ve gotten blocked on Pinterest by people here on Pinterest over pins I re-pinned years ago over what they don’t know--probably out of spite. I don’t mind and don’t care. My job is to finish my work to the best of my ability and move on to the next.

Writing has been my life since the age of two. Only an act of GOD is going to keep me from doing what I love. I write because I love it. If it’s liked, I’m happy. If its not, that isn’t a deterrent for me to stop. Like any artist, I want to protect my work--but I’m going to do it the right way and I’m going to give credit due when credit is due if I eventually use an artist for The Kingdom of the Woodland Realm Trilogy. Full Stop--end of sentence. There is nothing left to say. I have to do it right because I have a too many people in the business watching me and if I’m not doing what is right, they aren’t going to want to work with me and that lessens the work I put in to write this and it will not be able to help a fellow artist along the way. My attorney acts as a free attorney for artists that can’t afford to hire expensive attorneys for protection because he believes in protecting the rights of artists and we often work together on helping artist connect with attorneys that work for free for all artists (Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts).

I know, that won’t keep some people from being jerks--I just wanted to put it out there.

*HERETIC: THE LEGEND OF AKHENATEN by Jaynaé Miller (me) is copyrighted by the U.S. Copyright Office. Any unauthorized use is strictly prohibited without prior consent for the next 100 years. In other words, I could sue a major studio if they don’t buy it from me. This is a wholly LEGAL and Recognized (and stamped) copyright. It doesn’t make the original copyright less potent, it just makes your work recognized by law and gives you further protection for your works. This includes photography, visual art, books, film, plays, videos, logos. Being a copyrighted work, it is also subject to the Berne Agreement (World Copyright Organization) guidelines for international use. With this, it wouldn’t matter where you work is posted, if someone said it was theirs, it’s a lawsuit waiting to happen. Once you put a stamp on it, by law, it is already protected by the government as it is being sent via the federal government--and it is protected from loss of materials sent as well (USPS is good and finding it, too; get a tracking number and it is found faster).

I know all this stuff because I work with copyrighted and trademarked things since I wrote my first opera and lyrics for which my music teacher taught me about this in fifth grade. I’ve written adaptations with permission of the original writers. The More You Know depends on how much you care to know.--J.

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ciathyzareposts · 5 years

Text

Journey: Won! (with Summary and Rating)

The winning screen you’ve been desperately anticipating for 8 years.

Journey

United States

Infocom (developer and publisher)

Released in 1989 for DOS, Amiga, Apple II, and Macintosh

Date Started: 20 March 2011

Date Finished: 21 May 2019

Total Hours: 23 (including 9 in 2011) Difficulty: Hard (4/5) Final Rating: (to come later) Ranking at time of posting: (to come later)

Yeah, this one requires some explanation.

I was sitting around the other night trying to decide what game to play with the couple hours I had available. I had made some progress with Kingdom of Syree but wasn’t loving it (it’s another Ultima clone), and I was holding out hope I could dispense with it in a single entry. The self-imposed deadline for my next entry was looming and it didn’t look like I’d be able to win that fast. At the same time, I wasn’t keen to start on a complicated game like Darklands. So I did a quick scan of all the games I’d skipped and abandoned over the years to see if I could find a quick win. House of Usher (1980) looked promising, then The Amulet (1983), but both ended up as “NP” (and on my “Missing and Mysterious” list) when I couldn’t get them to emulate.

My eyes then fell on Journey, an adventure game that I blogged about in 2011. By the time I was a few hours into it, I realized it wasn’t even really an RPG (and MobyGames has since removed that designation). But I’d numbered and rated it anyway, so its loss was counting against my statistics. I began to wonder what the problem was. How hard is it to win a freaking adventure game? Why would I have abandoned it? Was I too proud to get a hint? How long could it possibly take to turn this loss around? That last question was particularly important because, as often happens, at this point I had spent longer trying to find a “quick win” than it would have taken me to just play a regular game.

Infocom called this a “role-play chronicle.” What does that even mean?

I read my first and second entries from 2011 and began to remember the title, as well as the core problem: you have to reach the endgame with a sufficient number of reagents still in your possession, or you can’t cast the final spells necessary to win. Since there are a fixed number of reagents to find during the game and plenty of opportunities to use them, you can put yourself in a “walking dead” situation as early as the first 5 minutes and not know until you reach the end, two or three hours later. I was apparently so disgusted with that prospect that I refused to re-start and took the loss. I was more willing to do that in 2011 than I am now.

So I restarted Journey with a willingness to play it through a couple of times if necessary, and it wasn’t long before my “quick win” had taken over not just my few allotted hours but rather the entire afternoon, evening, and night until about 03:00. During this time, I restarted not once or twice but about 30 times, filled pages with notes about cause and effect, broke down and consulted two walkthroughs and still couldn’t win because the walkthroughs were wrong, and finally–14 hours after I started–ended up with the set of actions necessary to get a party from the beginning to the end. And make no mistake–there really is only one.

In case you forgot, Journey is the game that canonically establishes that orcs and grues are the same thing.

By the end, I had a much clearer picture of the game than I did in 2011, and I reached an obvious conclusion that I’m surprised I missed back then: this is the worst adventure game ever made.

Journey hides this fact with nice graphics and typical Infocom-quality prose, but the game’s approach is all wrong–fundamentally an insult to anyone who cut his teeth on both text adventures like Zork and graphical adventures like King’s Quest. Every option it suggests is a complete sham, every hint of an RPG influence a complete farce. And its story isn’t even that original–so much is lifted from Tolkien that he ought to have a co-author credit.

I feel like I’ve seen this somewhere before . . .

Journey (whose subtitle of The Quest Begins exists only on the box, not the game screens) tells the story of a ragtag band of village peasants who set off on a quest to determine why their crops have failed and their water has gone foul. A better-equipped, better-qualified band, led by the village blacksmith, Garlimon, left the same village the previous year and was never heard from again. This new effort is headed by the village carpenter, Bergon, and includes a wizard named Praxix, a physician named Esher, and a young apprentice food merchant named Tag. The game is mostly told from Tag’s perspective, and the game lets you rename him in its one nod to RPG-like “character creation.”

The party later finds Garlimon insane and living as a hermit.

The title differs from previous Infocom outings in that you do not type any of the commands. Instead, you select them with the arrow keys from an interface that distinguishes between high-level party commands (most of which move you to a new place or situation) and micro-level individual commands, aspected to the skills and abilities of each character. Thus, the party leader, Bergon, can almost always “Ask for Advice.” Praxix has a perpetual “Cast” option, and Tag has most of the inventory options. I find the interface inoffensive, but not as revolutionary as the developers were clearly intending.

Some of the options in dealing with a party of orcs.

The party’s initial quest is simply to find their way to a powerful wizard named Astrix who lives on Sunrise Mountain. Once they arrive, Astrix explains that the land is being threatened by the return of the Dread Lord, and he gives the party a quest to find seven magical stones. They must first find four (Nymph, Wizard, Dwarf, and Elf), which will lead them two others, which will lead to the final one, called the Anvil. Astrix believes that the stones are the key to defeating the Dread Lord. In their quest to find them, the party has to negotiate with dwarves, befriend elves, defeat bands of orcs, and explore ancient tombs. In these adventures, they make use of the special skills of several NPCs that swap in and out of the party.

Astrix gives the party its final quest.

If they recover the first six stones, Astrix tells them to seek the Anvil on the Misty Isle. The party must travel to the port city of Zan, dodge agents of the Dread Lord, and convince a captain to take them to the Misty Isle. Praxix has to cast some spells to help the ship navigate. Eventually, the ship crashes on the island and the Dread Lord attacks. Praxix is knocked unconscious, and Tag must figure out how to mix the right reagents to call a lightning bolt and smite the Dread Lord.

Tag saves the party in the final combat.

Just about every episode has some Tolkien source, though mercifully not in the same order as The Hobbit or Lord of the Rings. There’s a dwarven mine that recalls Moria and an escape that not only feels but also looks like the bridge at Khazad-dûm. Another moment recalls the discovery of Balin’s tomb. A ranger named Minar joins the party early on in an Aragornesque episode. There are echoes of Gandalf in Astrix and of Bilbo in the initially-hapless but ultimately-competent Tag. There’s an episode that mirrors the Fellowship hiding from evil crows, and a tense episode in a tavern at the end that recalls the hobbits in the inn at Bree (the solution even involves turning one of them invisible). There’s a Tom Bombadil-like figure named Umber whose nature remains a mystery until the end. The Dread Lord is, of course, an exact analogue of Sauron, and the stones are the game’s equivalent of rings.

Crebain from Dunland!

Tag, just like Frodo, freaks out when he sees some suspicious characters in the Prancing Pony. If they stay at the inn tonight, the party will be killed.

The whole thing is reasonably well-written and would make a serviceable young adult novel, but as a game, it’s nothing but endless frustration. Here is a small list of its sins:

1. It is completely linear. The one saving grace of difficult adventure games is that they are rarely linear. Usually, you can move back and forth between locations and solve puzzles in a variety of orders, taking the time to figure out what must be done in each place. Journey subverts this tradition entirely. You have to choose the right options the first time you arrive in a new location or you cannot return. For instance, there’s one castle where you have the option to go to a left room or a right room. If you go to the right room, you see a chest full of jewels. If you’re not exactly sure what to do there and leave the room, you can never enter it again. This happens repeatedly throughout the game.

The second screen invites you to enter a tavern or “Proceed” down the street. In any other adventure game you’ve ever played, if you proceed down the street, you can later turn around and go back to the tavern. Not here. Hit “Proceed,” and you’re out of town and on your way. It’s pretty easy to hit some of these options accidentally, by the way; one too many ENTERs while scrolling through text will accidentally activate the default option on the next screen. An “undo” option could have helped a lot.

2. A “Back” option doesn’t really take you “back.” Most screens have a “back” option, and sometimes this returns you to a previous screen so you can choose a different direction. But much of the time, it serves as simply another way to go, usually one-way.

A simple choice to go left or right has enormous consequences for the rest of the game.

3. You’re almost always walking dead. As I previously mentioned, if you don’t reach the end of the game with the right number of spell reagents, you can’t win. It is very easy to miss some of the reagents that you might otherwise pick up along the way, and also very easy to accidentally burn too many reagents casting spells. One of the options that burns too many reagents, by the way, is asking the wizard to “Tell the Legends” of magic. Usually, the “Tell Legends” option produces some useful lore about the game world, but if you ask him about magic, he does a little magic demonstration as part of his tale, which wastes necessary reagents.

The reagents are the most egregious example, but there are plenty of others. Fail to purchase a map early in the game–a map that the shopkeeper himself encourages you not to purchase–and you can’t find your way to Astrix. Fail to ask a dwarf companion about some elf legends at the right time, and you don’t have the right words to speak to an elf woman and thus miss your chance to get the Elf Stone. Fail to do a number of things just right in an early encounter with a nymph and you miss the Nymph Stone. Fail to accept a suspicious character into the party early in the game, and you miss later encounters because you don’t have his scouting skill.

The shopkeeper tells you that a required inventory item won’t help you.

Not only does the game give you no warning when something like this happens, but lots of other things happen that seem like they might be mistakes. In particular, party members disappear, get lost, get wounded, and even die on occasion, and you feel like you need to reload–only to discover, 20 turns later, that you can find or heal them in a different location.

4. Some of the walking dead criteria make no sense. Except in a single place where the dwarf Hurth has to “die” (or seem to die) only to be found alive again later, no character can die in a successful game, even if that character is no longer needed. This particularly bit me towards the end, in the city of Zan. If you don’t do the exact sequence of events correctly in several locations, the Dread Lord’s thugs are able to find your party and kill Hurth before the rest of the party members can escape. Even though Hurth’s skills are no longer needed for the rest of the game, his death prevents you from winning.

5. Not only do you get no notifications of walking dead situations, a lot of text is wasted in such situations. It feels like fully half of the game’s text would never be seen by a party destined to win because such text only appears when the party is already walking dead. There are entire areas of the game that, if you enter and experience any of the adventures to be had there, you’ve already gone the wrong way and cannot win.

A lot of text and programming–not to mention the graphics–went into a battle you’re not even supposed to fight. You’re meant to take a different path.

6. A lot of the options are completely nonsensical. Basically, on every screen, at every option, and at every encounter, you have to try every potential option and note the result–keeping in mind that its implications might not be fully realized for several scenes–and then try to assemble the “best” list of options in the right order. Some of the “successful” options you’d never hit upon by logic alone. Most involve the use of spells. For instance, Praxix encounters a stump on the ground in his explorations. If he casts “Tremor,” the stump splits and reveals a passage into the Earth. It’s both nonsensical to assume (without any other evidence) that such a passage would be revealed, and that “Tremor” would be the spell to reveal it. Later, you have to use the “Wind” spell in a random cave to reveal a hidden rune. Other encounters force you to discern at the outset whether you can cast a regular spell or need the extra “oomph” that comes from mixing the regular spell with grey powder, only the game has given you no gauge to determine the normal strength of spells.

7. The game randomizes some variables. Even if you can make an exhaustive list of the “right” options in the “right” orders, you’ll still lose the game because each new session randomizes some of the variables. The most obvious is early in the game, when you’re trying to navigate the paths to get to Asterix’s tower. There are six choices of left or right, or 64 possible total paths, and you don’t know if you’ve chosen right or wrong until you arrive. Each new game generates a different combination of correct paths. Now, technically you can bypass this navigation by casting a “Glow” spell on the map you hopefully purchased in the first town, but after a few sessions of this game, you’re so paranoid about conserving reagents that you’re more likely to sigh and start working your way through all 64 possible combinations.

The name of the boat captain you need to ask for at the end of the game is also randomized.

One of the things that the game randomizes is the color of the reagents that correspond with the different “essences”: wind, fire, water, earth, and so forth. At the end of the game, Tag has to figure out what reagents to mix, and only a throw-away line in an earlier scene about brushing some color of powder from his hands keeps him from, again, having to reload multiple times and work through dozens of possibilities.

Failing to note the “fine orange residue” early in the game makes it nearly impossible to cast the final spell.

The one nod the game makes to its own difficulty is by letting you view Tag’s “musings” once you’ve lost the game. This screen lets you go one-by-one through all the things you did wrong, but only those things that led to your particular demise, and even then it’s maddeningly vague with advice like “conserve reagents,” not “you used reagents when you didn’t have to in this specific place.”

Tag muses on the many things the party did wrong.

Given all I’ve described, I have to highlight this particular paragraph from the game manual:

Your Journey will provide you with many hours of enjoyment and many hundreds of difficult decisions. But unlike other games you may have played, there are virtually no dead ends. Any action you take will advance the story toward one of its many endings. But there is only one ending that is the best.

I’ve never read such a blatant lie in a game manual before. There are no “alternate” endings–every single ending except the victory screen above has the main character reflecting on the literal destruction of the world. And the only way it can say that “there are virtually no dead ends” is because the damned game lets you keep on playing as long as possible even when you’re in an unwinnable situation. That’s not a virtue!

“Not a dead end.”

These various failings are why it took me ultimately 23 hours to win a game that only lasts about 1 hour if you hit all the right options. And that’s with using walkthroughs to help in some areas. With Journey, what you basically have is a cruel Choose Your Own Adventure book that you have to read 25 times, each time getting maybe an extra paragraph. It’s barely a “computer” game, and of course certainly not an RPG. It has no character development, hardly any inventory, and the combats are all scripted.

The most frustrating part is, I’m the only one who sees how bad this is! In the June 1989 Computer Gaming World, Roe Adams–Roe &@&$*# Adams!–practically wets himself, calling it “the best effort to date of any game designer struggling to find a new way for the game to interface with the player,” although he does caution about the use of reagents and mentions some of the more illogical puzzles. He seems to have been seduced by the interface–which is innovative but not all that great–and the plenitude of the graphics. European Amiga magazines gave it in the 80s and 90s.

Only more modern reviewers have failed to be lured in by its promises. In 1998, All Game Guide rated it a 40, called it “shallow,” rejected its RPG credentials, and said that “it fails to take advantage of what a reactive computer can do that a non-reactive book cannot.”

When I got done typing all of this and started searching for other modern takes on the game, I was delighted to see that Jimmy Maher (“The Digital Antiquarian”) had covered it in 2016. As I read his piece, he at first scared the bejesus out of me by calling his initial reactions “a unique and very pleasant experience.” But his opinion evolves as he plays, and eventually we get to the good stuff:

[T]here inevitably comes a point when you realize that everything Infocom has been saying about their game and everything the game has been implying about itself is a lie. Far from being the more easy-going sort of text adventure that it’s purported to be, Journey is a minefield of the very dead ends it decries, a cruel betrayal of everything it supposedly stands for. It turns out that there is exactly one correct path through the dozens of significant choices you make in playing the game to completion. Make one wrong choice and it’s all over. Worse–far worse–more often than not you are given no clue about the irrecoverable blunder you’ve just made. You might play on for hours before being brought up short.

When I rated it in 2011, I gave it a 23 without even bothering to explain the GIMLET. I don’t know what I was thinking with some of the ratings. I gave it 2 points for “character creation and development” when it deserves 0 and 4 points for “magic and combat” when it deserves maybe 2 (some of the uses of magic to solve puzzles are at least well-described). A revision brings the score down to 17. It does best in the “game world” (3) despite being derivative, and in the graphics, which are credited to Donald Langosy. I agree with Adams that they’re well-composed, and the game didn’t skimp on them: practically every scene has a different set.

Evocative graphics are one of the game’s few positives.

The most surprising thing about Journey is that it was written by Infocom-founder Marc Blank, author of the original Zork series as well as the Enchanter series and several other Infocom titles. It certainly has his quality of prose, but it’s hard to believe that he didn’t understand why the basic approach was so much worse than the open-world games for which he was famous. Maher’s account of the game’s development suggests that the developers were in love with the interface: “an experiment to find out whether you could play an interactive story without having to type.” There’s nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t explain why the interface had to so relentlessly drive the player forward, to punish him so severely for minor mistakes, and to waste so much of his time in unwinnable scenarios. Fortunately, it didn’t begin a trend. I like to think that Blank himself was dissatisfied with the result, which is why we saw no more games in the “Golden Age Trilogy,” as the secondary title screen has it.

I like to think that the next two would have been Destination and Return.

So there it is. In an attempt to get a “quick win,” I managed to waste a lot of time and get myself highly frustrated on a non-RPG, for no benefit except to increase my “win” percentage by 0.31%. This does not bode well for an eventual return visit to, say, Wizardry IV, but we’ll see.

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/journey-won-with-summary-and-rating/

#retro games #dos games #retro #crpg #adventure #amiga #oldcomputers #8bit #16bit #blog #repost

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