#I'm not maintagging. i just have opinions.

[biocrafthero]

All i wanna add to the convo I saw on dash is that Omori and ISAT may seem very similar on the surface, but are fundamentally very different games. They may seem like they tackle similar themes, but they really don't—I don't quite have the words to articulate the exact details I'm trying to get at right now unfortunately.

One game is about being stuck in the past, while the other is about being stuck in the present, and those very basic narratives make them go in two very different directions. While both games can easily be compared to each other, they're both strong and weak in their own ways. I wouldn't say one is more "juvenile" than the other imo, they just go about things in very unique ways compared to each other.

One is about childhood and the other is about adulthood; to leave things behind and to accept change are themes present in both, but in very different ways. One is a scabbed over wound you keep picking at and the other is a wound that never heals, okay? Being stuck by choice and being stuck despite your choices. "I want to leave this all behind" vs "I want to stay like this forever," alright? Does that make sense? Are we clear?? Good. That's all <3

[justworthlessreblogs]

society if kirakira acknowledged noir's backstory as being kinda lame instead of trying to make you feel bad for him

[welcometogrouchland]

Wait crying again bc I was rewatching The Intruder today (episode 4 of season 1) and I realized that like. The glyphs represent a few things in the narrative but one thing that's consistent is they're always there when Luz doesn't feel like she's good enough on her own. They appear to her as comfort in moments of self depreciation or self doubt, or she coincidentally learns them in episodes where she faces her fear of rejection or makes a mistake (at least this is true in terms of the first four base glyphs she discovers). It's the titans way of saying "you may have to do things differently, but you can do anything they can do" to Luz bc he cares about her

AND THEN. IN WATCHING AND DREAMING. WHEN THE TITAN PASSES ON AND THE GLYPHS DON'T WORK ANYMORE. IT'S BECAUSE NOW LUZ FINALLY FEELS LIKE SHE'S GOOD ENOUGH, ALL ON HER OWN. SHE'S LEARNED THAT SHE HAS INTRINSIC WORTH AS A PERSON AND SHE DOESN'T NEED TO MAKE UP FOR WHO SHE IS. SHE MIGHT DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY BUT SHE CAN DO EVERYTHING ANOTHER WITCH CAN DO- THIS TIME WITH HER OWN, MORE PERSONAL ACCESSIBILITY TOOL (HER PALISMEN) INSTEAD OF THE ONE THE TITAN GAVE HER. MAN!!!!!

[adhdo5]

K so the reason we sniched was our friend found it straight up in call,told us and got heated in the moment and are now embarassed together with the author over sending that ask. The persons already feeling bad about being impulsive and adding fire to our friends embarassment

OK this is fair tbh and honestly like . I've been there

I am sorry we did this publicly that was Not fair of us. We discussed this and like I think we srsly got 2 comfortable considering our blogger collective as #irrelevant – which like we are, to be clear, but we r still like . In Public nd it was rude of us 2 be doing shit like this to Some Guy's work like it was the latest DJK article. I do think I will go dig up some stuff from middle school from myself or smth to shred bc like Fair's Fair

But yeah I . Am genuinely sorry I can definitely see why that would be upsetting to come across. I should in fact probably take my part of it down which I will do like . Tomorrow (later today) bc I did just fully wake up at 4 but yeag . It was our bad 2 thoughtlessly clown on your comrade's writing, in public no less, and I Am sorry, and will not b doing it again

[conarcoin]

So Elon bought Twitter. I'm honestly not gonna push away Twitter newcomers, but if you're in the MCYT fandom you need to understand that the social etiquette and expectations and culture here are very different than over on Twitter. So as someone who's been an active part of mcytblr for two years now, I'd like to offer some thoughts and advice!

One: Shipping. MCYT communities on Tumblr have always tended to lean more tolerant towards shipping of roleplay characters due to the idea that this is a space for fans primarily. The creators who visit or actively use Tumblr like Eret and Martyn understand that this is a fan space primarily, and don't bother us for the content we make, and we don't bother them with it.

The number one worst thing you could do is share shipping content with creators who have not asked for it. This is a huge social faux pas here. Secondly, on the other end — writing callout posts for shippers here isn't gonna fly. Even for RPF shippers and people who may ship boundary-breaking pairings, our default is usually to not engage with these people rather than publicly call them out. It makes the space a healthier place for everyone and makes it much less likely that CCs may come across content they are uncomfortable with. It's also considered a social faux pas to ask CCs their opinions and boundaries on shipping, since that's bringing it up when they didn't ask!

Speaking of shipping, people typically don't mind you maintagging ship content so long as you also tag it as shipping so people can filter it. For Hermitcraft the tag is hermitshipping, Life Series has trafficshipping, and the lesser known DSMP tag is dsmpshipping.

Two: Reblogging. This is something a lot of newer users tend to struggle with. There is no algorithm on Tumblr, at least not one that works, so content creators rely on you reblogging their work in order for it to spread. If you see a fic or piece of art you enjoy, please reblog it! I often reblog art for MCYT fandoms I'm not even personally in.

Three: Tagging (again). There are a wide variety of tags you can use for your content! The most common tags you'll want to use are "mcyt" and "mcytblr", and any relevant series, pairing/group or character/CC names. However, please don't use the tag "minecraft"! Minecraft has an entirely separate fanbase on Tumblr that we co-exist with and have some overlap with, but don't necessarily appreciate seeing MCYT content in their tags. Any tag with "minecraft" in it is also a no-no, such as "minecraft youtubers" or "minecraft championships". Please use shorthands!

Four: Opinions on MCYT drama tend to be very different here than they are on Twitter. For instance, you should assume by default that most bloggers here either like or are completely neutral towards "problematic CCs" like Schlatt. But also, we tend to be very against spreading anything originating from leakers, and we also tend to not be fond of making posts "holding CCs accountable" for things they did years ago. Generally, mcytblr prefers to be a more drama-free community, and if you do engage in discourse, many would appreciate you tagging it as such!

Five: CCs do not need you to babysit them.

Generally speaking you will see a lot of jokes and memes on mcytblr that wouldn't fly on Twitter, and it is generally looked down upon to try to speak on behalf of CCs personal boundaries — they are grown adults, and you are a stranger! Calling out or harassing people for "breaking boundaries" is mostly just going to get you looked at strangely, especially if you don't have a source for your claims. Most of us will stop doing something if asked, but we don't need stans to tell us to! CCs can speak for themselves when uncomfortable.

Six: Most mcytblr blogs don't want CC notices. There are quite a few CCs who are active here, but the community is chill with them as they don't tend to talk about us elsewhere and allow us to do our own thing. We do not, however, like encouraging CCs to join Tumblr or to follow us or reblog our posts — many people here actually prefer being out of sight of CCs and many of us consider it rude to seek out attention from CCs outside of sending the occasional ask.

Please treat CCs kindly and don't gawk at them like you just saw a celebrity on the street — the ones who are active here are just Tumblr users like the rest of you! Seeing Eret reblog fanart or respond to an ask isn't something to point out.

While we joke about Twitter users joining, we don't actually have anything against you guys, it's just that we've built a very different community here and ask that you respect it and the etiquette we've come to establish! Thank you, and I hope you enjoy your stay on mcytblr ^_^

[hermitcraftx]

I agree with your post about hermit fans in regard to things being very popular. I’ve seen more people being angry and annoyed about scarian in the last six months than people celebrating it. Not tagging shipping is shit but it’s better than harassing people. I don’t know what was put in the water but something changed drastically and I’m glad I’m not the only one who’s seen it.

IT'S FUCKING INSANE! This fandom used to be so positive and welcoming and overall way more pleasant than some... other MCYT fandoms, but now??? I can't log on without seeing untagged negative interpretations in the main tags, can't express an opinion without getting anons calling me heterosexual sympathizers and hoping that I die, everyone has turned their back on everything that used to make this fandom really... fun? Like, I don't tag ON MY BLOG, but usually I don't maintag my shipping posts, and if I do, I tag the ship name so people can filter it.... I don't maintag duo names. What the fuck happened to make everyone so- miserable. Anons are probably going to be permanently off for me, too many people comfortable with their opinions and not comfortable with mine and desperately needing to tell me that.

And like- look. I get not liking interpretations. Personally I'm not a fan of the Double Life cheating arc because of how abusive and out of character people made Grian be, and I had to avoid ao3 for a bit because of that and filter the fucking tags. Same thing with found family dynamics. Just because you don't like something doesn't make it "overrated and popular" and just because you don't like something doesn't make it immoral or unethical either!!! People have to make everything a moral standpoint nowadays and it's really exhausting-

But that's a tirade. All over all the confessions blogs there's "scarian is overrated" despite Grian having nearly 10mil subscribers and most of them being on YouTube and considering all the hermits friends or family truthing them. Yes, there is more shipping than before- that's because Hermitcraft season 8 made it very obvious that the people on the SMP and the people IRL are very different, and it's no longer considered RPF. None of the real hermits died via moon explosion, ZombieCleo often says she's doing "lore", they make different skins, even GRIAN acknowledges that he's acting and playing a part with the permit office. Despite all that, there's STILL wars on shipping and people insisting that we're shipping real people, I fought this war on the DSMP side of things and it's SO TIRING.

DND podcast listeners, do you ship the people playing the characters? NO!!!!! Unless you do, in which case, have fun with that. I don't really care about RPF and I filtered the tags for it a long time ago, so maybe they do do that.

Every other day I see "Third life is overrated" "Last life is overrated" (LAST LIFE IS OFTEN THE LEAST FAVORITE SEASON I SEE PEOPLE SAY!), "the life series is overrated" "the cactus ring is fucking stupid" "they left the desert but we didn't" "no, THIS interpretation of scarian is bad and wrong" and like... guys. Guys. Fandom is supposed to be fun. It is not supposed to be a full time job. It is not supposed to be moral or ethical and you shouldn't feel the need to police shit. Jesus Christ, every other month there's a new fad that tumblr users flock to and once it's over everyone goes "EWWW THAT WAS LAME AND OVERRATED AND I NEVER LIKED IT ANYWAY" like.... I promise you cannibalism as an allegory for love is not mainstream you are just on Tumblr.

Like Good God. If it's so bad here go to Twitter. I'm sick of all the complaining and misery and hatred and I miss when things were fun- people are so scared of being cliche that they don't want to write things that they enjoy. Where are the coffee shop aus???? Where are the fun silly things??? Where are the 100k grimdark fics with worldbuilding??? Wheres the 500k fics that aren't even about the same characters anymore but that we love just the same??? Where are the forums and people talking to each other in comments and meeting each other that way??? Where are the roleplay servers?????? What are you all doing??????

People are scared of being judged. They want to do what everyone else is doing. They don't want to be cringe or cliche and every day I see a "cringe culture is dead" post and then someone making fun of another part of fandom, an antithesis to their previous statement. They don't want to be late to things, either. Who cares if Last Life was a couple years ago? Draw the fanart anyway!

I'm scared. Maybe I'm just old, but every post I see I notice that I get maybe a 10th in reblogs of what I do in likes, and I don't even post my art or fics to this site. Every post is like that. More and more people only like posts and they die, unseen, by everyone. More and more people misuse archive of our own's functions, treating it like it has some algorithm, when it doesn't, and it never has and hopefully never will. I see fic reuploads to "gain traction" (not how it works) and people reaching out to find RP partners (breaking TOS) and all sorts of other shit on both sites and it fucking horrifies me. I'm not even that old- I'm eighteen, and I can already tell how fandom has changed for the worst for everyone. Fandom used to be a community. Not consumption.

It's just... sad. Old fandom had PLENTY of fucking problems, and we have problems here too, but at least the positives outweighed the negatives. It's so... mean here, now. Even the happy things are mean-spirited. People treat it as if certain people have invaded this fandom space, spreading horrible opinions and ruining it for everyone, but the truth is is that shipping is always going to be a thing. It's a foundation of fandom- fandom started with housewives in the 1950s writing Star Trek fanfiction. You can never get rid of shipping. You can just interact with what you want to interact with and leave others to mind their own business.

[tubbytarchia]

You don't have to publish this ask but I just need to vent to someone who might understand, cause like, I'm over here like "I don't like fh or scott sorry, I promise though I won't talk about it or maintag just letting you know so you don't waste time since I know there's overlap between us, also I have a lot of interesting ideas about them still but I won't talk or write about them because I know that would make some of you upset and more than anything else I want everyone here to have a fun time and ship and let ship <3" and these unproblematic only fh fans will turn around and be like "oh so you're homophobic? You're the most annoying person on the planet? You're just trying to start a ship war? You're the problem with fandom" like BITCH?! Never met people so determined to make their actually quite comparatively good and healthy fandom toxic

This is where it stops being funny and actually genuinely really upsets me, is that very few people dare to talk about "toxic" Flower Husbands, let alone maintag it (and they should be able to! Because it's not fucking hate? Its valid discussion and expression of opinion that doesn't attack anyone). A few people have been more vocal about it recently and I've seen more people besides you come forth NOW, because you didn't want to upset anyone or get shittalked etc in the past for holding a different opinion to the overwhelming majority. I know people who've joked "am I just insane? Am I just stupid for seeing something here that everybody else is vehemently against?". There's evidently people who have just shut up because otherwise they'll get burned at stake, or they stay in their own little circles

And then a few too many FH posts that dare even imply any negative qualities about FH from a character standpoint get a little bit seen, and suddenly FH tag is full of 10 people defending their ship's honor because how dare you!! The way these people are so fucking volatile about fuck-all upsets me so much. Like, haha, we've been proven right I guess! You DO get burned at stake. These people probably aren't even bothering to read any such FH interpretations if they even SEE any, and don't just see 5 other posts claiming "oh my god can people just shut up about toxic FH and write characters breaking up for NORMAL reasons" (genuinely baffling concern that I've seen like at least 3 times btw??) that just leads them to believe that this is a wide-spread "problem" that needs neutralizing? They take even the thought of such posts as personal attacks that prohibit them from shipping FH for some reason? Like dude I fucking dig FH? Just for not always the same reasons as the majority but I guess I've sinned and shouldn't be allowed to speak lol. And these people don't HAVE to read interpretations they don't like, goddamn, look past?? Block if it hurts you that much?? As you said, the Tumblr traffic fandom is largely really kind and healthy so I can't fathom where the hell these guys come from. And then they proclaim the people who have largely shut up or kept to themselves "the problem", and that's the exact response that has been feared lmao

sorry. Long answer but fuck. I'm so sorry anon. The Flower Husbands scene is truly miserable if you dare think of them as anything other than cuddly and cute and teasing at most. Your interpretation is invalid because. ? homophobia I guess lmao

[lakesbian]

i have to confess that while """amycourse""" doesn't bother me i'm inexplicably like 2x more annoyed (so still not very annoyed) by how every time someone posts anything mildly political about amy the next time i backscroll the wormblr tags there's at least 2 or 3 posts in them that are just solely about how op saw people having opinions about amy and doesn't want to read those opinions or post opinions about amy themselves. like sometimes i think to myself "i hope i'm not spamming the parahumans tags by putting this mildly low effort couple of paragraphs in them" and then i remember that people consistently make and maintag posts solely to say they're not going to post about a character. what are we even doing here. my tag counter said there was going to be [insert number here] new posts to read about worm and like 3 of them are literally just the op stating they're not going to post about something related to worm. you've lied to me egregiously. that is not a post about worm.

[druidposting]

Not to get sociopolitical in the cr maintag, but I think a lot of people arent understanding something VERY critical to the "gods good or bad" argument, so I'm gonna try and lay out these points as best I can.

(This ended up being very long, but if you enjoy analyzing CR through a sociological lens, it's all under the cut.)

To start, you have to understand that the Exandrian gods are immortal beings with immense power and influence compared to the mortals of the material plane. Yes, obviously gods have died/sustained wounds in the past, but comparing the power required to do any of those things to a god is like comparing the wattage of the Sun to that of a lightbulb. Its just incomparable.

In spite of this, however, I keep seeing posts about how its fucked up to kill someone just because they didn't give you what you wanted. For starters, the gods aren't just "someone" - as I said before, they're unfathomably powerful and immortal beings, and while they no longer have the ability to walk the earth and shape it to their whims, they absolutely have the ability to influence the ideas and ethics of the mortals that do walk the earth in very material ways (see the Angle of Irons cult, Tevan Klask the champion of Asmodeus we just met, and Pelor vs the Valley Coalition for examples). To put it in maybe more understandable terms, you can make a decent allegory between the gods and real-world political pundits, in the sense that while a president cant literally shape the world how they want, they have an overwhelmingly disproportionate ability to influence and shape how the people they rule over think and feel, and what should and shouldn't be morally permissible in their society. In a vacuum, the fundamental role of politicians in current neoliberal societies is to try and ensure their ideas and ethics are the dominant ones, so that the people they rule over can do the shaping of the world for them. This is why I find it much more permissible, and often necessary, even, to pass judgement over and rise up against (and wish death upon (in minecraft)) political pundits whos morals don't align with mine - their ideas have material influence on society, in ways that normal individuals don't, and I happen to agree with Marx when he said "the ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas".

So all that said, I totally see why some Exandrian mortals would be very very upset with some of the gods for various reasons! And I fully support their desires and rights to protest and fight back against any proponents and arbiters of bad ideas and prescriptions.

HOWEVER. This does NOT mean I am pro destroying the Exandrian pantheon. I think that based on everything we know so far (especially with the new info from the latest episode), that would be a net bad for Exandrian mortals.

To understand why I feel this way even in spite of my above arguments, I think it will be helpful to outline what I think are the worst of the likely outcomes if Predathos is released;

A power vacuum opens with the gods eradicated, and Ludinus (or some other dictator, but likely Ludinus as I think this is his actual goal) promptly fills the position of god emperor of Exandria, With no external forces to restrict their actions, and free reign over how they choose to rule the people. The consequences of this are even less freedom for Exandrian mortals than they had under the oversight of the gods, which is in my opinion, very bad.

The swaths of demon armies who have been chomping at the bit for literal millennia to find any minute perceived weakness in the divinely appointed (whether by Prime or Betrayer god) defenders of the Material Plane from the Abyssal armies, are finally able to overcome these defenses and wage devastating war and eradicate all life on Exandria. This is something we're already starting to see happen in the Grey Valley in the current arc, and I have to say, this also seems like it would be really bad for mortals.

Predathos doesn't stop after eating the gods, and in the end, devours all of Exandria. That would probably also be pretty bad.

Even if none of those things ended up happening, the overwhelming threat level of any of those outcomes, and the fair likelihood of any of them happening, far outweighs the potential benefits Ludinus proposes. I'll liken it again to real-world politics in the US, because I think some useful parallels can be made here; Think of the Exandrian gods as the Democrats, and Predathos as the Republicans. No one likes the Democrats. They're cowardly, their polices are luke-warm at best and detrimental to human happiness at worst, they continue to bolster capitalism even though their constituents hate it, all of their politicians are way too old, and god damn do they ever come off as condescending. But compared to the Republicans? They are the bastion of freedom. The Democrats are far from perfect. The Exandrian gods are far from perfect. But when your other option for who gets to govern you and your society is a fascist, you must do anything to preserve the freedoms you currently have, even if they're limited. Under the Exandrian Gods, the limited freedoms mortals have are infinitely more favorable to the zero freedom they would have under a dictatorship or as a dead person. With the Exandrian Gods, individuals have the chance to rise up against oppressions they face from their disciples, and to make more and more gains over time that solidify and bolster their freedoms. This is just objectively not an option under any of the above scenarios if Predathos is unleashed. If you're facing down the existential threat of fascism in a neoliberal establishment, you do not toss the current establishment aside in favor of a better one - you buy time by bolstering the current establishment, and when the threat is lower, then you can look at revolutionary action and work towards better forms of governance again. I believe that similarly, Exandrians will have the best opportunity for the greatest freedom in the future if they're able to stave off Predathos and Ludinus.

Now with all this context, I can talk about something that Ludinus either fails to understand - or deliberately doesn't care about and misconstrues for the sake of enacting his end goal - that is key to this debate, that being the difference between positive and negative freedoms.

Very briefly, negative freedoms are characterized as freedom from external constraints on any actions they may wish to take. For example, freedom of speech allows an individual the freedom to speak whatever they wish without the imposition of government. Positive freedoms are characterized by the freedom to do something, the ability to enact your future goals and desires. Positive and negative freedoms are often at odds with each other. A good real-world example of this would be murder. I think everyone would agree with saying murder being a punishable crime is a good thing - but is it not an imposition on an individual's freedom to legislate against them acting on their free will, if murder was what they wanted to do? Technically, its a removal of their negative freedom to act without constraint, but outlawing murder is itself a positive freedom, as it allows people the ability to live without fear of death (and obviously grants positive freedom to the hypothetical victim in that they now have the freedom to live instead of having died to the murderer).

With Ludinus, the freedom he talks about, freedom from the meddling and imposition of the gods on the free will of mortals, is a negative freedom. But if the potential consequences of releasing Predathos could be as dire as the complete destruction of all mortals on Exandria, or the subjugation of all mortals to the dictatorship of whoever fills the resulting power vacuum, then I feel pretty safe in saying that Exandrians deserve the positive freedom to continue living without the fear of certain death or subjugation under a post-Predathos world, even if there's the possibility that the current gods continue to meddle with ideas as they have. A dead Exandrian can't rise up and resist the will of the gods and their disciples, after all.

[utilitycaster]

Oof, the first half of the episode is a little rough ngl. I like the second half with Aabria a lot more. The first group does get better as the episodes go on if that helps at all.

Also, to add a bit more context to Kollok: the creators - Hyper RPG - are filmmaking nerds and are mostly known on Twitch for their various virtual productions.

So Kollok has a lot of those post production visual effects and sound effects, which is them using their strengths to create a show, similar to CR and voice acting and D20 and improv comedy.

Obviously that's not gonna be everyone's cup of tea and it can get a little too much I admit, but it's not that bad of a show.

Hi anon,

I am...not sure if you read this in the necessary context (this provides some, and this some more, and if I'm being totally honest based on this I don't feel like you read my entire weird rant, which to be fair, it is long and weird but covers quite a lot of issues I have) but I am coming in with the premise of "I think heavy post production of actual play is a poor choice." It don't care that it's their strength; I think that if that's your strength you would do better to apply it to scripted works or to improvised non-actual play shows.

I will freely admit that I went in expecting it not to be my cup of tea for that reason, and with an added grudge of "being hyped up and cited as brilliant by Polygon's AP/TTRPG team, with whom I almost always disagree," but did genuinely want to give it a shot in as good faith as I could muster, instead of solely talking shit about. I hoped the acting, premise, and GM-ing might shine through even though the effects were unlikely to win me over and indeed were likely to annoy me.

That was not the case. I found the GM-ing (Driving?) style profoundly grating and pretentious (and I have a very high tolerance for pretension), the premise nothing to write home about, and honestly I don't know jack about sound mixing but I do know I have perfectly good hearing and had to crank my laptop speakers up to higher than I have to for CR or D20 for the prologue to the prologue only to subsequently hear some of the most irritating static sounds at top volume for the prologue, so I'm not even impressed by the production.

And to be clear: that's all fine. I think people are drawn to different aspects in actual play, and there's room for all sorts of shows. I might even finish this episode simply because if I were recommending something to someone else, and they quit an hour into a 3.5 hour episode, I'd feel a little miffed. But I really don't expect it to ever be my thing, and I watched it mostly because it felt uninformed to be criticizing heavy production in actual play without watching a notably deliberately heavily produced actual play show.

I do want to wrap up, and this isn't specifically directed at you but: when it comes to my opinions on a work, I'm not going to say I'm never going to be swayed by an anon ask because who knows, it could happen, but it's very unlikely. If I dislike something, I don't really care if other people like it - I'd never send anons or get on their posts or maintag something like the post I just made (and which I made nonrebloggable specifically to prevent it from spreading into fan spaces) but I hope that people who like something can show me the same respect and permit my dislike. If you're a fan I will not be offended nor resentful if you unfollow or block me or whatever you need to do, but I can pretty confidently say that new cast members or improved acting will not change the fact that this is extremely not for me.

[ourlordapollo]

Uh oh girl my Kristoph Gavin musings are calcifying into unshakable headcanons

Have we already talked about his pathological need for validation. Can we. Can we talk about it again.

Obviously this is all speculation and knowing the writers, the Gavins probably have some fucked up supernatural backstory and dead parents, but the writers aren't here right now. *locks the doors*

Anyway, for the sake of minimizing stupid ppl yelling at me (assuming I'm brave enough to maintag this instead of letting it rot in obscurity, unrebloggable), please mentally insert "IN MY OPINION" before every statement I make

This is a classic case of choosing a conclusion and retrofitting evidence to support said conclusion but. I'm allowed to do that. I'm not turning this into Professor Fandom for a special grade in "FAN 485: Feverishly Justifying Your Own Bullshit."

Anyway.

Let's recontextualize Kristoph's actions using the following framework:

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

1. Phoenix

A lot of people (alright, haters. A lot of haters. You made me talk like Donald Trump. Are you happy now). *ahem*

A lot of haters like to paint this move as stupid like it's some kind of "gotcha".

"What move?"

The dual move of voting in Phoenix's favor and choosing to befriend him.

Here's the thing.

Of course it's fucking stupid. We're not looking at the pinnacle of criminal masterminds here

Why did he do that? The psychosexual need to force Phoenix to submit? (Actually wait keep talking I want to hear this—) Paranoia? By this point in the timeline, he's already shown a willingness to commit murder, so why not just kill Phoenix?

Because (say it with me now):

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

He's not some wannabe criminal mastermind.

He wants to be Phoenix's savior. He wants to be the only thing Phoenix has. He needs to be the sole recipient of Phoenix's gratitude and admiration. Because he's better than Phoenix, dammit! Of course he's better than Phoenix. Law is a meritocracy, he's got money, he's got white loafers for fuck's sake, he wins trials by working really goddamn hard because being a lawyer is hard for everyone, you don't just stumble ass-backwards into the courtroom and win every case by stuttering and sweating and stalling so OBVIOUSLY KRISTOPH GAVIN IS BETTER THAN PHOENIX WRIGHT! SAY IT! SAY IT! Look! Look at them together! Look who's still a lawyer and who's an evidence-forging fraud! Look how nice Kristoph looks next to this sad burnout! Look! LOOK AT HOW MUCH BETTER HE IS!

Do you see what I'm getting at here.

Obviously on some level he knows and fears that Phoenix really is better than him, and that matters, so he he really really needs Phoenix's validation

And lbr, he probably does have a deep psychosexual obsession with the idea of forcing Phoenix to submit to him

2. Forging evidence

I'm not gonna speculate on Kristoph's lawyering skills here. Really, I'm not. However I'd be cautious about making the argument that he forged evidence solely because he thought Zak was guilty and he reeeaally wanted to win. We saw that it was an extremely tricky case and that Zak's innocence would have been very difficult to prove. It's entirely possible Kristoph believed in Zak's innocence but didn't think he'd be able to prove it without cheating.

That being said, I don't think it matters.

It matters that the case was complicated, but it doesn't matter whether Zak was innocent or guilty or a secret third thing, because Kristoph would have cheated regardless becaaauuuuse

Say it with meeee...

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

He was up against a fucking rockstar. A famous, hotshot, cocky, little upstart rockstar. A young prodigy. A fucking teenager. It didn't matter one bit that they just so happened to be related. Or did it.

Of course he needed to win.

(If you want to get really headcanony with it, which I do, I think the Gavin parents definitely raised their kids with an extreme superiority complex, setting them apart from their peers by straight-up telling them "you are better than they are. You are not like them."

Klavier goes on to prove them right by becoming internationally famous and beloved and Kristoph. Well, Kristoph is, uh. Well, he's a pretty good lawyer. Got his own little office and everything. And then Klavier comes into his domain as a cocky lil teenager with a HUGE, high-profile case and here is Kristoph's chance to demonstrate to the world what he already knows: that he's special too. That he's special. Dammit. Why can't anyone else see that.)

And then Zak takes that away from him. And gives it to Phoenix.

Unforgivable.

3. Apollo & Vongole

Sorry for putting Apollo in the same category as a literal dog but. That's kind of point here.

I've seen ppl theorizing that, although Kristoph seems like a stereotypical cat person, he got a dog (specifically a golden retriever) out of a sense of paranoia bc!! That's normal! Normal people have dogs!!! Wealthy people have purebred golden retrievers!!! I am so normal and wealthy, look at my very average typical status symbol dog!

I humbly disagree. Even the Wiki seems to point to paranoia as Kristoph's chief, driving factor, but I.

Well.

I humbly disagree. Let's not circle back around to this; I'm not trying to discount anyone else's headcanons.

Anyway.

Why a dog and not a cat?

Because cats have a reputation for independence, for coming and going as they please, for not needing you. "Dog," meanwhile, persists as a synonym for "loyal." To call someone a dog implies ultimate trust, ultimate submission, to someone higher than them. To their master.

Now.

Why hire Apollo, specifically, an orphan with few friends or connections and a fuckload of trauma?

Why mentor Apollo? Why adopt a dog? (Why befriend Phoenix?)

The answer is the same:

He needs people to depend on him. He needs others to view him as a kind, benevolent benefactor. He needs their praise, their admiration. He needs people to tell him he's special and he needs other people to see those people telling him he's special and also believe he's special and then he needs additional people to talk to those people and hear about how special he is, he needs the whole wide fucking world to say that KRISTOPH GAVIN IS SPECIAL!!!!

(Although. Maybe he just likes dogs. Not everything has to have a shady ulterior motive. People don't fit neatly into your preconceived categories of "good" and "bad." Maybe he's a murderer who loves dogs and genuinely thinks of Vongole as his best friend. Maybe he saw promise in Apollo and genuinely likes the guy. Did you ever think about that.

Or maybe. It's both. Two things can be true simultaneously and people, both fictional and real, contain multitudes and contradictions we could never hope to understand.)

4. Murdering a guy with a wine bottle, Psyche Locks

I'm gonna be so so real with you, I don't think even Kristoph knows why he did that. I think he blacked out. I think he was a lil drunk ("grape juice" my ass), I think paranoia and fury, the fear and resentment of 7 long, long years, collided like atoms in his brain and fucking exploded I think the bottle was cool in his hand I think his arm hurt I think he felt the impact all the way up his elbow I think the cards were red I think the cards were blue I think he saw Phoenix Wright's face dripping blood I think he blinked I think he heard Vera Misham calling him "angel" I think he watched himself do it from behind his own back

Do you understand.

To even begin unpacking why he did that, he'd have to address that nagging fear that maybe he's not special, that maybe he's just some guy, that Phoenix Wright is special and Gramarye was right in choosing him over Kristoph that Gramarye was justified in taking away Kristoph's shot at admiration and acclaim and Kristoph killed him out of revenge because he couldn't handle the truth that he's not special he's not special he's not special. Phoenix Wright is special and Klavier Gavin is special and now even Apollo Justice is turning out to be special and Kristoph Gavin is an okay-ish lawyer who sucks at poker and talks way too fucking much. That he committed so many monstrous acts and ruined his own life out of the perverse desire to be loved by others because he doesn't. love. himself.

(I call these "load-bearing neuroses" because if you knock one pillar down, the whole structure goes down with it.)

5. Vera Misham

So I think Kristoph is good with kids because he was, for the most part, old enough to be a Small Person when Klavier was born and because I don't think he gets off on exercising that brutal, domineering kind of power over the powerless. I don't think outward cruelty appeals to him.

Why?

Well...

Kristoph Gavin is a sad little boy in a man's suit, desperate for the validation of everyone around him to the point that he would do anything to get it.

Fear and deference are not validation. People talk badly about you and think badly about you when you're a bully. He charmed Vera instead of threatening her because he needed her to like him. He needed Drew to like him. Good god, he needs everyone to like him so much. Talk about him when he's not in the room and tell him what you said. Write him a letter of recommendation and let him read the contents. Sing his praises at your local bar, then send him a recording.

6. "Keep the riff-raff out!"

Ohhh, buddyyyy :( You said the quiet part out loud

Because law is a meritocracy. Because Kristoph Gavin is kind of a big deal. People know him. He's very important. He has many leather-bound books and his apartment smells of rich mahogany.

Only special people are able to become lawyers. And Kristoph is such a special, special boy. He's so special that he got Phoenix disbarred. He's so special that he helped Klavier attain acclaim as a prosecutor. He's so so so special.

But when a group of select people are special, it means that there's another group. The un-special group. The group that Kristoph is so afraid that he's a part of.

By admitting that they exist, that he believes that other people are beneath him, he's asserting his belief in his own inherent superiority one final, desperate time. He's clinging to it so hard his fingertips are cracking the marble. He's starting to bleed. It's starting to hurt.

Before Phoenix, Klavier, and Apollo fucking spin-kick the pillars propping up his self-identity, toppling them and sending the foundation of Kristoph Gavin collapsing into jagged pieces on the floor of his psyche.

—

Personal note but everyone seems to be in agreement that Kristoph's Psyche Locks fuckin. shattered into little bitty pieces during that scene. Don't you think that hurt? Don't you think that hurt like fucking hell? When you break [REDACTED]'s Black Psyche locks in DD, they cry out in pain several times and imply that their head hurts. And that was Phoenix doing it right that time! So I say again:

Don't you think that hurt?

[decepti-thots]

I was in the tumblr tf fandom for a hot second a few years ago and i just wanted to ask, is it still really aggressive here? because back then there was a lot of shipping drama, there were a few callout posts going around (can't really remember about what) and just...a lot of bad stuff. I personally had someone tell me to kill myself because I liked one of the villains. guess I'm just wondering if, in your opinion, things have chilled out? Cuz I'd like to get back into it but I'm a little hesitant;;;

I'm going to try and give the fullest answer I can in the best faith to this! For context, this blog is a couple years old now, I have enough followers that I get a lot of active engagement on my posts etc, I am very active in TF fandom here, Twitter, and IRL, and while I did not used to be active I have been lurking in TF fandom as long as I have been on Tumblr.

There is absolutely still some toxicity; all fandoms have their bad faith actors, their drama hounds, their shipping Diskhorsers TM. I have gotten hate mail, I know folks who have issue with weird anon haters who are persistent, whatever. But no, it is not as bad as it has been in the past, IMO, not at ALL, and it is 100% possible to have an active, sociable and nice time in this fandom so long as you curate your engagement, with basically no drama at all. Many of the worst folks burned out and left when the fandom got less active and their shitstirring paid lesser and lesser dividends, IME.

People sometimes ask how I maintain such a vocal presence without falling into the still-there drama, and I have some advice that I promise you will mitigate like, 99% of the possible issues you could encounter:

Block whenever you feel like blocking. If you get a bad vibe, if you just don't personally like someone and don't wanna see them, if you see them throwing what looks like a temper tantrum you don't want in on, just block 'em. Remember: blocking is nothing personal towards the person you are blocking. It is not insulting and doesn't need to be 'earned'. Block every single person you think not blocking might even just theoretically cause stress or drama. (I am blocked by several people for reasons no more serious than 'I hate your OTP', and I commend every one of them for doing it and having a better time on this site!)

Delete any and all anon hate. Block anyone and everyone who sends you hate. No exceptions. No witty comebacks. No takedowns. Nothing. You see it and the actual literal second you do, you block and delete. None of it is worth one second of your time. Deprived of the oxygen, they will leave. And you won't be tempted to re-read it and stress out.

In that same vein, if it causes issues, just turn anon off! Turn it off. Personally I keep it on because I simply do not care about the odd troll, but if you care even slightly? Fuck 'em, turn it off, anon is a privilege your followers need to earn by acting in good faith.

Find people you like and follow them, ignore blatant shitstirring in the maintags (again: block people!) and try to curate content and follows and mutuals based on what you do like and not what you don't. Curate positive engagement; do not rely on the general fandom slurry, find what you like and hang out in your own corner of things that bring you joy. If the maintag stresses you out: don't check it. Check the blogs of folks you know are cool instead. Stuff like that.

Fandom should be fun. Fandom should be finding people you like and sharing good times with them, not stressing about avoiding folks you hate, or who hate you. Tumblr lets you moderate how you engage, when, and where more than almost any current social media site; now you can even turn off reblogs and oh my GOD is that a lifesaver function btw. If you want, you can make your blog unsearchable! It means you will need to be more proactive in making friends. But TF fandom is pretty tight knit these days, and folks want to talk a lot of the time. You'll still be able to engage with cool people.

There's way less aggro losers around these days, but more to the point, you can absolutely avoid the ones that still insist on being annoying and starve them out without much effort, tbh.

[cyberbeez]

I won't be maintagging this because this seems to be an extremely unpopular opinion rn but this man has more desk space than I do and has given me idea on how to use what little space i have in a more ergonomic fashion. It doesn't even look that horrendous! Maybe I'm just not getting the que right again and peeps are just memeing, though. I'm famously bad at getting social ques

[jennyfromthebes]

I'm going to my first mountain goats show in a few days and I'm taking my brother along because I didn't want to go alone. He knows nothing about the band and only really knows no children and this year by name. Should I tell him anything in advance or should I just ask him afterwards if he liked it?

oh how exciting!!! hella jealous of all of y'all getting to go to concerts this week, they're gonna be so much fun, I hope you have a blast <3

i don't know how much experience you or your brother have with concerts in general but really all you need to know is basic courtesy stuff, be respectful of everyone else in the crowd around you, etc. different fans have different opinions about whether taking pics/videos is okay but I think as long as you're being unobtrusive and not disturbing anyone's experience you're fine. if you're wanting more specific advice for your first show, there's a lot of good comments on this recent post from the tmg subreddit, and first concert advice is a pretty common topic on there if you feel like searching for anything in particular.

it might be worth mentioning to your brother a) the way a tmg show is structured, with the solo set in the middle and the encore after, and b) that john talks a lot between songs sometimes, tmg shows tend to be a lot more chatty than other concerts usually are. but both of those definitely aren't necessary, they're just the things I usually think of when people are unfamiliar with the band! I took a couple friends who didn't know tMG at all to a show last month and didn't tell them anything at all beforehand and they still had a lot of fun.

final note: I've seen a couple of other people in the maintag (here and here) say that they're going to the UK shows! I don't know how you feel about meeting people from the internet but I can vouch for them being cool, and it's always fun to go "hey you're that person from the internet!" in the crowd before a show lol.

this has turned into a very characteristic ramble but I hope it was helpful! enjoy your first tmg show!!!

[little-laurance]

You have a point. There are types many confession blogs. That's why I planned to do nothing with my headcanon blog at first, I only changed my mind at someone's reblog asking for it. But now some else came in and it's a lot. It's probably becoming too many.

Sorry, do you think I should delete mine?

I won't do it yet. I don't want the asks that I got to fade away. But it is a lot of anon confession accounts. I just thought that maybe if it where headcanons I could be unique enough.

Ughh I don't know what do I do

Maybe I should post all the asks at once and hope the account will die out quickly. So I won't have to delete the confessions from existence.

I'm not trying to tell you what to do with your blog! I'm actually really sorry for stressing you out abt it.

A headcanon confession blog is cool! I'm in other fandoms that have these! I think it is generally a good idea, but we're such a small fandom my fear with the headcanon blogs is that they will overtake tags and ppl will be less inclined to post their own headcanons and such? The main regular confession blog (@/aphverse-confessions) only posts twice a day, but if every one of these accounts did that abt half of the maintags would probably be from confession accounts rather than individuals

I suppose I am less disgruntled with the creation of these blogs and more with the overuse of them? I think having one headcanon and/or one regular confessions account would be fine, especially if posts were limited to a certain (small) number a day. But people seem so much more interested in adding to these blogs' queues rather than posting themselves?

@/aphverse-confessions is on break I'm fairly sure, but their account is still posting from a backed up queue. Maybe they have updated the queue since going on break, but if they haven't, they've been gone a few weeks? And there are THAT many posts in queue! Imagine if ppl just posted those instead! We'd have more individuals in maintags! Rn it's mostly two bigger blogs and few small ones. If ppl stopped using these confession accounts for SO many posts we'd have better fandom engagement.

So I don't think you should delete your blog or anything! I'm not trying to be a party pooper, but I think we should really be trying to post our own opinions as much as possible, rather than hiding behind anons for benign posts

[voidsiblings]

4, 9, 22~

4. what was the last straw that made you finally block that annoying person?

uh. well. most of my blocks are for feed curation reasons, but there are a couple people I have blocked for constant, maintagged kink content and for being really weird on discord. I'll let you figure out who that might be. Can't tell you what the last straw really was, except for the one guy who (unsolicited) tried to hit me up in DMs after I said "hi" to him in a public server. Eugh.

9. worst part of canon

I'm taking this to mean "something in canon that I'm personally annoyed by" but I've already invoked Zote in a previous answer, so... I'd say the fact that there's so much cut content that I'm not convinced needed to be cut. I know this is a popular opinion, but I'm with all y'all on this. Stuff like Lurien's dialogue, PV's dreamnail thoughts, I think there was stuff about Monomon and PK... some of those are actually integral to the type of story they were trying to tell, and I feel like removing them has made people misinterpret things because they don't know any better. True, digging up the cut content does feel like a treasure hunt, but is it worth it when you also have to deal with the curse of knowledge while staring at people who just don't get it like you do? /lh

22 answered here!

choose violence ask game