#I'm thinking about changing the format for match-up's soon

[xxsycamore]

𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐊𝐓𝐎𝐁𝐄𝐑 𝐃𝐈𝐀𝐋𝐎𝐆𝐔𝐄 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐊 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐓 𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 ━ ≪ VISIONS OF TEMPTATION 2024 ≫

Welcome to the fifth annual installment of Visions of Temptation, a multifandom kinktober prompt list/creation challenge! ►Under the cut you will find both lists written down in blank format. You’ll also find a short explanation of some of the lesser-known kinks.

███ GUIDELINES

► minors DNI!

► The two lists are absolutely free to use across all fandoms, with a main focus on otome games. If you’re a writer, artist, visual graphic creator, etc., you can use these lists to create your kinktober works.

►You can share this with your followers and open requests using these lists.

► In the kink list, you can choose a kink to work with for each day of October, while in the other list, you have 31 dialogue prompts. It’s up to you whether you choose to follow one of the lists or both, and to combine them or not. You don't have to follow just one list either - mix and match them if you'd like!

► Make sure to put content warnings where needed.

► Unlike most of my challenges, this one won't have a masterlist featuring the works created for it, meaning that it won't have a deadline either - feel free to complete it at your own pace.

► About credit: Make sure to mention the challenge itself and its creator. I’d be happy to see your works, so please tag me when using my list here on tumblr! Posting to other sites is fine, as long as you credit me :)  

►In order for us to find each other's works and appreciate them, please make sure to use the tag " #visions of temptation 2024 " !

►Don't hesitate to reach out if you have a question! My askbox is always open!

►Remember to have fun and not stress over this really long challenge! ❤

targeted fandoms: Ikeseries (Ikemen Villains; Ikemen Prince; Ikemen Vampire; Ikemen Sengoku + other cybird games); Love and Deepspace; Tears of Themis; Obey me!; Mr. Love: Queen's Choice; Count of Darkness; Voltage games; Mystic Messenger; Lovebrush Chronicles; Light and Night + all other mobile/console otome you can think of. Remember, this is just the focus of the challenge - you can write for any fandom at all!

Depending on how much free time i've got on my hands, I'll also be checking out your works and reblogging them on my main blog, @kissmetwicekissmedeadly - under the tag "#vot '24 reblogs" :)

If you're wondering if I'm taking requests for my challenge, make sure to check my blog beforehand. At the moment of posting this, requests are closed - but that might change in the future.

███ PROMPTS

► both lists in blank format + handy explanation of some of the kinks under the cut.

Happy creating, everyone and may you have a great October! ❤

KINK LIST:

 Porn Actors AU  |  Anonymous Sex/One-night Stand

 Gloryholes  |  Handjobs/Fingering

 Phone sex  | Guided Touching 

 Orgasm Control  |  Bondage/Shibari

 Make up Sex  |  Mirror Sex

 Feather Play  |  Coming Untouched

 Sensory Deprivation  |  Sex Toys/Object Insertion

 Workplace Sex  |  Sex in a Vehicle 

 Choking/Breath play  | Dacryphilia

 Accidental Stimulation  |  Body Part Worship 

 Wet Dreams  |  Sexual Fantasy

 First Times  |  Role Reversal

 Fetish Clothing & Accessories |  Striptease

 Bathroom sex  |   Outdoor/Public sex

 Discipline & Punishment  |  Degradation/Praise Kink 

 Nipple Orgasms  |  Lactation/Pregnant sex 

 Blade/Gun Play  |  Spanking/Impact play 

 Intoxication/Hypnosis/Aphrodisiacs  |   Dry Humping

 Watersports  |  Begging 

 Food Play  |  Come Play

 Anal Sex/Pegging |  Size Difference

 Omegaverse/Breeding  |  Petplay 

 Massages  |  Temperature Play 

 Facesitting  |  Deepthroating

 Voyeurism/Exhibitionism  |  Getting Caught 

 Spitroasting  |  Double Penetration 

 Casual Sex/FWB  |  Switching Partners 

 Biting/Marking  |  Jealousy/Possessiveness 

 Sex Games/Dares  |  Trying New Positions     

 Cockwarming/Somnophilia  | Foreplay/Aftercare focus

Non-human characters/traits |  Sexual Roleplay 

DIALOGUE LIST:

 "I have no plans of stopping anytime soon."

"You have to say it. Use your words."

"See this? It's going to go inside you."

"Hush now. I'm only trying to help you."

"Let's see how long you can last."

"You know what happens when you do that."

"Maybe I should be punished?"

"Look at you, you're taking it so well."

 "We can go, or we can stay here and fuck."

"And here I thought you were an innocent one."

"Go on, put it in yourself."

"Where do you want me to cum?"

"Don't tease now. Be nice."

"I want to watch you come just from this."

"Beg me to be gentle."

"You thought you could get away with seducing me?"

"One more orgasm and I'll untie you."

"You look good like that. Thoroughly loved."

"I thought this is what you wanted?"

"I love that you're only making this erotic face for me."

"Poor thing, you're barely standing on your legs."

"Here, bite into this. Since you can't stay quiet."

"That's it, you're doing such a good job."

"I can't stand a second more of not being inside you."

"Did the risk turn you on so much?"

"Oh, you'll regret letting me know that you like this."

"Come here. I'll make it all better."

"You're breathtaking. It makes me desire you so much."

"Seems like we can't keep our hands to ourselves."

"You feel so good. I don't ever want to stop."

"I've got much more in store for you."

some prompts explained...

Gloryholes - A person inserting their sexual organ through a hole in the wall with the intention to be pleasured from the other side.

Anonymous sex - Here's an idea: masquerade balls.

Orgasm Control - Can include Edging, Forced Orgasms, Orgasm denial.

Make up sex - Sex after an argument.

Mirror sex - Sex in front of a mirror.

Sensory Deprivation - Blocking stimuli from one or more of the senses. Example - Blindfolds.

Dacryphilia - Being turned on by your partner crying during sex.

Sexual Fantasy - Sharing/being made to share about a sexual fantasy, masturbating to a sexual fantasy, or helping your partner live out a sexual fantasy.

Role reversal - Swapping the giving and receiving role during intercourse.

Voyeurism - secretly watching someone participate in sexual activities or do something private and intimate like taking off their clothes.

Watersports - Everything involving pee. Holding it in, Golden showers, etc.

Come play - Anything to do with a partner's cum, for example Come marking.

Spitroasting - A three-way sex act in which a person is penetrated orally and anally/vaginally at the same time.

Omegaverse - A kink-trope-universe build around a hierarchy of biological roles: alphas>betas>omegas.

Somnophilia - Intercourse while a sexual partner is asleep.

FWB - Friends with benefits.

Switching partners - Two or more couples having intercourse at the same time, swapping/switching their partners.

Impact play - Slapping a sexual partner, could be across the face or on their rear.

Sexual roleplay - doctor/patient play, boss/employee play, all kinds of play pretend.

Hope these could be of help! Remember, you can always come ask if something's unclear. Once again, happy creating! ❤

[catboybiologist]

Transition journal and documentation: Jan and Feb of 2024

Measurements for January are up, and February will be soon to follow! Tagging @whalesharkcat and @trans4hire here. If you want to be tagged when I post these, let me know! The advice for injections is in the journal below.

Some quick notes to clarify things:

I'm consolidating qualitative observations into my journal. Oftentimes these haven't been easy to cleanly classify into different categories of observation, so I'm not really gonna bother.

As I'm sure you've realized, the timing of these observations isn't consistent. I have a private document with exact date stamps for everything, and these are mostly right at the end of the month. But my levels checks don't match up to this cleanly, so I group them with the closest set of other measurements. Sometimes I don't have one that cleanly fits.

I can't trust myself to measure height anymore, to be blunt. I want to ask the doctor every time but chicken out about it easily.

But anyways.

And now, as a journal, a brief summary of my thoughts on the past two months:

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

*deep breathing*

fuuuuuuuucccckkkkkkkkkk

Okay. So. I'm not gonna list off everything that's happened since the year started. So many independent things started happening, one after the other, that I had to start formatting it as a bulleted list to tell people I know irl what's been going on. Each one has been a crisis on its own- massive emotional events, health problems, health problems in people close to me, transphobic drama with former "friends", academic&research problems, and a resulting mental health spiral. And all of this leading up to my qualifying exams at the end of February, for which I barely scraped by and passed.

But. With all of this. There's silver linings.

The biggest one is that the start of this year has been a stress test of my overall emotional state since starting HRT. I'm not gonna lie- if all of this had happened a year ago, I don't think I would be here now. I either would have completely snapped and done something I regret, or... yeah. But as it stands? I cried. A lot. I isolated a bit. I had mood swings and anxiety and anger and excitement and relief and highs and lows beyond my wildest dreams. It was intense. It was not pretty. But it was cathartic, and healthy. Before this, I would've processed all of this as a generic, stressful, anxiety-ridden malaise, that would've weighed down on me until a breaking point. As it stands, however, I made it. Not in a neat way, not even really in an emotionally stable way, but I made it. And there is no fucking way that would be true pre-HRT. I think I can genuinely say at this point that estrogen has been life saving for me.

In the middle of all this, I switched to injections, right at the start of February. A mistake? Maybe, but I'm too fed up with delaying my progress because "the time isn't right", so I stubbornly refused to delay that change any further. It's a goal I worked out with my provider ahead of time and I stuck to it. So how's that been?

It's been an incredible and WILD experience. I'm on estradiol valerate. For those that don't know, estradiol is conjugated with another compound, which is then cleaved over time in your body to release it. For injections, that results in a peak irculating levels about 1-3 days afer injections. Some people feel it more than others- and holy shit, do I feel it. This has given rise to "the Sundays", because on Sundays, I'm going fucking nuts. My senses are heightened, and I start craving and reacting to physical touch in intense ways. It's not always sexual- while arousal comes easier to me the closer I am to peak, mostly I just become a cuddleslut. It is WILD. I'm also more emotional and cry more easily. Some cis female friends I have confirmed that it mirrors the feelings they get at a certain point in their monthly cycle, so essentially the fluctuating levels are giving me the sensory and emotional effects of a period every week.

The flip side of this is that I feel like shit on Thursdays, like I missed a sublingual dose when I was on that. After the first two weeks, I started taking 2mg sublingual on Wednesday night and Thursday mornings to avoid this, which helped a lot. My provider specifically said this was a good idea, so if you're dealing with that yourself, consider trying it out. I might move to a 5-day injection interval instead, but we'll see.

I've only had one problem with injections so far, which I'm dealing with right now- on my fifth self injection ever, I had unsteady hands and hesitation before stabbing myself, causing a not-great needle stick. Currently, I have a nasty looking injection bruise. Not painful, and healing pretty well, but not fantastic to look at. Self injecting has been intimidating and scary, moreso than I thought it would be. But the actual physical pain is much, MUCH less than I thought it would be, its just that the lizard brain refuses to stab yourself.

If you're thinking of switching to injections, here's a bit of my advice:

keep as many oral/sublingual pills on hand as you can anyways. These will be helpful if you feel your injections aren't carrying you emotionally for the entire interval, or if you don't have an environment where you can inject regularly

If you have a provider, they should provide a nurse tutorial and consultation for you to inject properly. If they don't, try to insist on one. They'll give better advice than I can.

think less, do more. Ideally, the actual moment of the stab should be painless. Be quick and steady about it. The fluid entering feels like pressure and slight burning, but nothing more than that.

vary your injection sites. A doctor or nurse should explain this to you, but this reduces risk of doing what I did and bruising yourself.

be extremely sterile about things. All of the wiping down and sterile technique you'll hear? Don't fuck around with it. Infection is no joke, and absolutely can happen.

Purchase spare needles and syringes from a pharmacist or online. Several reasons for this- one, if you make a mistake and a needle is no longer sterile, you don't want to hesitate about throwing it away. And two... well, let's make a second point about this.

If you want to stock up on estradiol for the future (if you're worried about future access to HRT), this can be easier with injections- but you have to be careful, and you'll need extra needles (for the love of fuck, do not reuse needles). Vials will always have excess medication, because it allows standard volumes to fill and distribute, and it also ensures that needle draws will always be able to be fully submerged. Do NOT try to run your vial out. You WILL run into sterility and contamination issues. That said, vial expiration dates are typically measured from time of first puncture. This will vary, but for me, I was told that the vials are good for 4 weeks after the first puncture. This is overcautious, but not egregiously so. My recommendation would be to use each vial for 1-2 extra punctures, and open the next vial a bit later. Still get prescription refills as frequently as you can. That way, you can stock up on unpucntured vials in case anything happens to your supply. THIS SAID- if you notice ANYTHING wrong with the vial- if the seal isn't containing the fluid properly, if bits of the seal are falling into the medication, if you can see a noticable hole in the seal, DO NOT USE THAT VIAL. Look me in the fucking eye. Do. Fucking. NOT. get sepsis. Do not fuck around with this. The flexibility to be cautious about your vials is a great reason to stock up on a bit extra in the first place.

To anyone in the US, if you're comfortable with doing this to stock up, I would highly, HIGHLY recommend starting this now. Slowly start using your vials for 1-2 punctures extra, stock up unbroken vials. Just in case something bad happens after the elections.

Typically, your medication will come with two sizes of needles- a draw needle (puncture the seal and draw medication into the syringe) and an injection needle. You might want to consider going *slightly* smaller on one or both of those needles. Estradiol is dissolved in a viscous oil as medication, and can be difficult to draw and dispense as a result. But, if you're patient, a smaller gauge might help. For the draw needle, it can help do less damage to the seal and preserve it a bit longer. For the injection needle, if you have a bit more sensitive skin, it might be comforting. Don't deviate too much, though, ESPECIALLY without a medical professional involved.

Remember that I'm not a medical professional, please consult one whenever possible.

I'm still on spiro for now, and I'm continuing it until my next levels check comes back clean. I don't want to erase months of progress getting my levels up by dropping it too early.

Measurement-wise, there hasn't been much change. But I'm starting to realize that the measurements aren't really telling the full story. My breasts look so much larger and, for lack of a better word, breast-like than they did even a couple months ago, but that hasn't been coming through in the measurements very well. I think what's happening is that my fat around my sides is shrinking at the same time my breasts are growing. This is reflected a bit in terms of underbust and waist measurements, but it still seems more dramatic than those are letting on.

Face wise, I think I'm really seeing some changes now. It's hard to put into words, but I'm starting to look more and more androgynous or femme by default, especially if I shave. I'm estatic, honestly, and I hope the trend continues. My chin and nose continue to be problems, but as the structure of the face around them changes, that's becoming less and less true.

I've been getting laser, but so far it's done pretty much nothing. There's lag time, and some of my health issues meant that I had to delay a session and get both sessions at a much lower power than I would've like. I was really hoping to have visible hair removal by June or so, but it looks like that's not happening. That kinda stings, and is a huge blow to my ability to pass by the one-year mark, which has been my target.

I think my boymoding has been holding, for the most part, although its been harder. Even with my sports bras, small bumps are visible under a t shirt, and the face changes won't be unnoticable forever. I've def been more loudly bisexual, and I think most people just write it off as me being fruity. Cis people can also be pretty oblivious, especially when changes are gradual. That being said, I've been coming out slowly to people, giving my usual speech of "I'm still presenting as a man for now, but just so you know this is what's going on", which removes a lot of the pressure and anxiety from boymoding. Still, I haven't told everyone (notably, labmates and family), and my timeline of social transition between June and August seems to be holding steady.

So uh, yeah. If you're curious about anything specifically, I'm an open book, although I may move it to DMs if it gets too personal. Hope that my progress updates are helpful to at least someone!

[dreamy29]

George Weasley as your boyfriend <3

Hi<3 I hope you like the headcannons and I can already hint that there will be more parts of this format (I'm so sorry, but English is not my mother tongue, I hope you can still read and understand everything)

Pairing: George Weasley x Reader

Warnings: none, just fluff

Preview: Headcannons, how Georgie would be as a boyfriend he is such a good choice

I would say he would be a bit suspicious of you in the first week

but not so obvious

he would be just as loving and funny as after that week

but he always has an ulterior motive, it's actually much more of a fear

he thinks that maybe you don't really love him after all, but are just with him because you want to get to Fred

all his life he's always had to be content with being just one of the Wesley twins and that Fred was always the better known and more popular twin

it's a small detail, but everyone always says "Fred and George"

he first became aware of you when he heard you talking to your friends about him and his twin brother and you said "George and Fred"

but you keep convincing him that you love him and love him for being George Fabian Weasley and not for being able to bring you closer to his twin brother

after this is clarified and he really believes you he is so loving

likes to play pranks on you with his brother, but only gentle pranks that end in an apologetic kiss on the cheek

Pda wherever you are, but only certain pda after all, he is of course much more intimate in private

sweet pecks on the cheek, playing with your hands and putting an arm around you

sorry, but he just can't hold back

you're his comfort person

even the slightest touch triggers the feeling in him

the feeling of never being second choice again, and that voice… that voice that whispers to him that he is loved, appreciated and needed

and whenever, whenever he looks into her eyes… Then he sees this light… this light that warms him when he is almost freezing to death, this light that illuminates his path in the darkest moments, he loves this light and would like to be with this light forever, with your light. With you…

Napdates, where you simply go to a random place for half an hour and sleep there together

Bonus points if the place is comfortable, such as a bed or a sofa, but also works with a school desk

once when he asked you about it after a long back and forth, you said enthusiastically: "Yes of course, Georgie! "

It was wonderful

you slept on a sofa in the Gryffindor common room, snuggled up together, warm and overjoyed

of course Fred had to make fun of it again, in a respectful way of course

he would give anything to cuddle with you

sometimes you learn together

actually only you study and George looks at you dreamily when you are particularly absorbed in a book

has an ego boost when you're at a Quidditch match and you're carrying a flag that says "Georgie!" on it

he always looks into the crowd just to see you in one of his Wesley jumpers, in a fiery red with a G and your flag on it

he's never felt so supported

Cuddling him after an exhausting match

comforting him after a lost match

visit him in the hospital wing, hold his hand when he's injured and kiss his forehead

always end up hiding under the bed when Madame Pompfrey comes round and still be there all the time to watch over him even when he's asleep

Attention!: The characters and the gif do not belong to me. The credits go to the original owners. If you want something to be changed or removed, just write me and I will try to fulfil your request as soon as possible.

Byyee~

[elleloquently]

lmk if this is dumb or if you arent taking requests rn but i just dyed my hair (myself) for the millionth time and i was thinking... college!ellie... helping reader dye their hair.... you get what im saying?/!?:))-&2):$2)/

LOVE INVISIBLE STRING BTW

-🪩

| a/n : what color did you do?!? sorry this took a bit to get done, i did a headcanon type format bc i felt that would work best so i hope that's okay!! <3 thank you for requesting!!

college!ellie helps dye your hair :

maybe deciding to dye your hair in the middle of the night wasn't the best idea, but after debating the idea for weeks, you finally felt inspired enough to do so and decided to jump on your sudden burst of motivation, finally taking the plunge.

it was the same back and forth for weeks. you were going to leave your hair alone, until you happened upon a gorgeous color you absolutely had to have. soon enough you had purchased the dye and the color was in your hands, but you had changed your mind. you did this often, examining the package in your hands, admiring the color and swearing you would finally dye it in the morning, but the only event that came with a new day was a change of heart.

finally, feeling fed up with homework but not tired enough to call it a night, you turned the package containing the dye over in your hands. you contemplated it, thoughtfully, before mumbling out loud.

"i think i'm gonna do it now, ells."

ellie, who was laying on her stomach with her feet in the air, wordlessly peeked at you from over the top of her astronomy textbook.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

-you wouldn't agree on whose idea it actually was. ellie would side that you begged, pleaded, even bribed her to help out with your hair project. you would disagree, claiming that ellie pushed to help with promises of 'it'll be fun!'

-regardless, you ended up in the bathroom, suddenly feeling uncertain as yourself and ellie stared at each other in the mirror. you had a towel wrapped around your shoulders, a lazy attempt at covering the old tee shirt you were wearing. you dug it out of your closet purposefully for this, not caring if any hair dye stained the worn cotton fabric.

-you were feeling excited, eager even, especially since ellie was going to help. that feeling was quickly replaced with doubt at the way ellie mischievously laughed while snapping plastic gloves onto her hands, flexing her fingers under the clinging material. you giggled nervously nonetheless, forcing ellie to read through the instructions once and then a second time to make sure she had really read them.

-the event would prompt a lot of laughter, and definitely a lot of light-hearted bickering. you would insist that ellie pays attention to what she's doing, it's your head for god sake, and she would argue that you need to stay still and let her focus.

-"ellieeeuugghhh"

-despite the banter or the moments of brief silence, it was practically an excuse to simply enjoy ellie's touch. she was gentle, even when she was being ridiculous on purpose, and the way she would examine each strand of hair, squinting and furrowing her eyebrows to make sure the color was evenly distributed, was adorable.

-it was simply because it was you, and ellie wanted to be careful with you and also wanted you to be proud that she had helped and even did a good job.

-you would let your eyes close momentarily, sighing in contentment when ellie spoke, quietly announcing her approval by saying, "this is going to look so good."

-it was nearly so peaceful, so perfect, until you had to remind ellie to make sure she was putting enough dye on the top and not just on the ends, and until she started grumbling about how the gloves were making her feel clumsy.

-"just be careful please ellie, i have class tomorrow," you laughed, imagining how terrible it would be to walk around with stains on your skin, matching the new color of your hair.

-only you didn't have to imagine.

-a few reminders here and there, (some gentle, some not) and ellie's responses of 'i know, don't worry,' came to a halt in an instant.

-it was a small moment, a teeny tiny slip up. you had gotten caught up with talking, and poor ellie really tried to work around your wiggles while you had been talking, and she even attempted to scold you about moving around so much, which you should've taken seriously.

-ellie needed a better view of the top of your hair, and you kept looking up at her while you were speaking. to hold you still, out of habit, ellie placed a gentle hand across your face, fingers spread over your chin and cheeks.

-upon the touch you immediately both froze. your mouth snapped shut and ellie's dropped open, registering what she had done. she slowly pulled the sticky glove away from your face, afraid to reveal what was underneath and you squeezed your eyes shut.

-"please tell me it's not bad please tell me it's not bad plea... ellie? why aren't you saying anything? is it bad? oh my god ellie is it-"

-okay, it wasn't that bad, but you definitely had some stains on your face.

-ellie thought you might react poorly but you howled with laughter, even surprised by your own reaction.

-ellie got a little bit grumpy though and ripped the gloves off of her hands and dumped them into the trash, insisting she could work more accurately without them. honestly she just felt bad but kept cracking a smile about it anyway.

-"ellie," you frowned, "i don't think that's good for your skin," you said in protest.

-ellie raised an eyebrow at you, practically referencing her mistake that was stained onto your face. "i'll be fine," she muttered. "it could be worse."

-hair color anew and mess cleaned, you admired your new hair in the mirror while ellie grinned proudly over your shoulder. you thanked her endlessly for helping, and she insisted it wasn't a big deal but honestly felt proud that you even trusted her in the first place to have her help out.

-you had the evidence to show for your evening together, the splotched stains around your face matched the dye stains covering ellie's fingers, which you both could not stop laughing about the next day.

[abubblingcandle]

If you ever wanted to share some of those feelings about prem teams and poor roster management, I would love to hear about it! I'm still very much in learning mode and love to know people's thoughts :D

Oh all the time!! I'm going to put this under the cut because this is going to be a long one gang! (This is also going to target Man City a bit, and Nottingham Forest, and Chelsea a bit as they are the current examples I could think of so ... sorry guys)

Introduction - Premier League Squad Rules

So in general the Premier League squad rules are that you can name a 25 man squad to play in the Premier League that season. Only 17 of those players can be not "home-grown" and under 21s are not included in this list.

A "home-grown" player is a player who, irrespective of nationality or age, has been registered with any club affiliated to The Football Association or the Football Association of Wales for a period, continuous or not, of three entire seasons, or 36 months, before his 21st birthday.

So these rulings massively encourage teams to sign very talented Under-21s to their academies (ideally under 18s) so that they can play them if needed and keep them so they class as home-grown when they get older.

Point 1 - Homegrown Players

Therefore, what a lot of rich title challenging prem teams do is they find reliable, would be fine in the team but not exceptional, cheap homegrown players to fill those slots and make use of that 'extra' space. For example Man City have a third choice keeper Scott Carson who (credit to him) has the most lush job imaginable. He plays like 10 minutes a year or maybe a few matches in lesser trophies but because he is a homegrown player they might as well have him on the squad list instead of an international third choice keeper who would take up one of the valuable spots. So if you have no intention of playing a player except for in dire, there is truly no one else situations then get a homegrown player from a smaller team for cheap.

But! What this does mean is it can really hamper the careers of these homegrown players because the club has no intention of playing them (often the managers don't even really like them or play a formation that suits them), they are just there because you might as well. An example of this is Kalvin Phillips at Man City. Now by now a lot of people on here know how much of a fan of Kalvin I am (he is a wonderful human being, excellent defensive mid and all round sweet guy), but even that aside he does not play more than 15 minutes in a match for Man City because there is no space for him. He is used to rest players when matches are already won and that's it really. The only position he could fill is filled by Rodri and if Rodri can't play then Pep changes the whole formation. SO he is only there for dire emergencies. But he is an England player, he is national standard and despite all the medals, the lack of squad rotation is harming his career in a massive way.

So the home-grown player rule is great to improve development of English players but it encourages teams to sign players they don't really want or need because there are spots to fill.

Point 2 - If you want him then I'll have him

(This is particularly the case with under-21s)

With clubs being bought by oil money now, this leads to a "throw money at the situation approach" which means that as soon as a player is highly rated then lots of clubs jump at the chance to buy that player whether that is actually a player they need or fits in their scheme. If this player is under 21 then it's better because they don't fit into the 25 man squad. For example this summer transfer window Chelsea signed 12 players. Three of them were defensive midfielders ... a position that AT MOST you play 2 of at once. And they already had three! This panic of "oh no, this team want this player so he must be better than what I've already got" leads again to teams getting players that don't improve the team and/or are surplus to requirements. But you can't throw your multimillion dollar signing who you have very publicly signed to the wayside! So they have to play no matter what because so much effort and money has gone into their signing. You can't bench someone who cost £100m for an academy player or you will be torn to shreds even if it might be better for a team to rest their star or if god forbid he ain't performing, it is so difficult for the manager for the manager to make changes.

Point 3 - Win at all costs!

So, being part of a Premier League side means congested fixtures. You might have European competition, you might have FA Cup, you might have World Club Cup, you might have League Cup. So this means playing a lot of football! You might think "Candle, contrary to your argument here this sounds like a great opportunity to rotate in players so that people don't get tired or injured?" WRONG! Particularly in mid table clubs, cups are their best chance to win trophies. If you want to win trophies you play your starters to not risk an upset. But then you need to play your starters in the league because league performance is the most important thing for Euro qualification or to avoid relegation. Big clubs also don't want the shame of being victim to a giant killing so may play starters against lower league sides to avoid that. If you are worried about your league position and lose to Arsenal in the cup, fine. If you are worried about your league position and lose to Forest Green Rovers in the cup, you are a disgrace and an embarrassment to the sport. Therefore encourages lack of rotation because you are more likely to win if your best players are out there.

Point 4 - Attention Span of a Goldfish

The fans are to blame for this ... sorry fans. If you rotate in a player, and that player has a bad game or is lacking match fitness then managers get torn to shreds in the media, by the fans and the board of their club. So that player gets benched again, even if it was a blip or against a superior side. If a player is playing well and is benched for rest and then the team loses then managers get torn to shreds in the media, by the fans and the board of their club. The culture doesn't encourage looking after the players and maybe accepting that there might be some iffy performances for a player to get settled into the side or slightly less impressive performances from fringe players. For example Darwin "Captain Chaos" Nunez for Liverpool. When he first came to Liverpool he was god awful, couldn't even hit the stands when he shot, got the nickname Captain Chaos because no one knew what he was doing. He kept being benched, because he wasn't doing what the club wanted but all that did was knock his confidence and mean that it was a lot harder to rotate strikers.

Point 5 - Favourite Children

Simple point, most managers have players that they just ... like and others that they don't. Managers are human. You are more likely to pick a player that you like to start than one that might irritate you or you didn't really want on your team EVEN IF it is to the benefit of your favourite child to rest them.

TLDR - Premier League clubs (particularly those at the top of the table) are awful at reducing burnout and injury in their players through rotation. This is partially through team design, external pressures, stupid signings, cost of players, and favouritism. It is bizarre that the teams that have the best depth in squads are the most reluctant to use it

[eschergirls]

Hi everybody!  

It's a new month, so it's time to celebrate how awesome squirrels are and also to do a site update and to thank our wonderful Patreon subscribers (and adjacent squirrels)!

For a site update, the big news is me and our website designer (Socketwench) are going to revamp the main website (eschergirls.com) and change the overall look, probably so the web version has a grid of post previews rather than just listing the posts in a row because the current setup leaves a lot of empty space since it only previews one line of text.  Mobile users shouldn't see much change except we'll be removing or changing the scrolling menu bar so it doesn't block most of the post on small screens.  We'll also be adding a popular tag cloud so people can more easily browse the blog if they want to casually.

If anybody has any other suggestions to improve the main site's usability and readability, please let me know!!!  I'm very interested in feedback.  I'm also working on the glossary and index, so people should be able to search the tags by category of character, series, genre, etc... and the glossary should explain what some of the terms like "boobsocks" (clothing that encases each breast separately like socks), "boob flounder" (both breasts on one side of the body), etc... mean.

Also, as usual, I've been working through the archives and fixing up all the old posts to match the current way I'm formatting my posts and to fix posts that were broken during the Tumblr export.  I also add alt-text to every post I restore so people who use screenreaders can access them.  This month, I fixed this post involving Marvel's Magik on an old trading card, the two posts with Boundless Comics' Ember (1, 2), and these old PLAY Magazine "Girls of Gaming" pages (1, 2, 3). I also fixed up this submission about how video game magazines used to advertise contests where you could go on a date with Lara Croft and stuff, and I edited the post to include an update with a link to an interview with one of the models who portrayed Lara for those ads, for those interested! 

I'm still working my way through the Tumblr inbox backlog, so if you submitted a post a long time ago, you might see it pop up soon.  Unfortunately, the way Tumblr does its inbox means the older it is the longer it'll take me to reach it. :\  I apologize sincerely for how long it takes me to get through the inbox sometimes.

I'm also still appealing the many incorrectly flagged posts on Tumblr, and the arbitrary algorithmic flagging, sudden rule changes, and other issues, are why I'm trying to fix up the main site to try to get it as usable for everybody as possible so Tumblr isn't the only way to view the blog, or the only place where it's archived.

I know it's repetitive, but it's also why I really appreciate everybody who supports us on Patreon and Ko-Fi.  It gives me much needed help to pay for server costs, upgrades, domain hosting, and just keep the site going in general. :)  I really appreciate that people think what we do is worth supporting <3

So I want to thank everybody who supported Escher Girls on Patreon in March!

Thank you so so much to:

Anne Adler Cat Mara CheerfulOptimistic  Chris McKenzie Em Bardon First Time Trek Greg Sepelak Ian Cameron Ken Trosaurus Kevin Carson Kim Wincen Kristoffer Illern  Holmén Leak  Manuel Dalton Mary Kuhner Max Schwarz Michael Mazur Miriam Pody Morgan McEvoy randomisedmongoose Rebecca Breu Ringoko  Ryan Gerber Sam Mikes Sean Sea SpecialRandomCast  Thomas 

And a special thanks again to PJ Evans for donating on Ko-Fi last month! :)

Also a huge thank you to everybody for reading, submitting, and generally commenting and engaging with Escher Girls!  It makes running the site so worth it. :)

For those who want to follow us without using Tumblr, we have an RSS feed. (For newbies, RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and is basically a feed you can read using an RSS reader. Simply copy and paste https://eschergirls.com/rss.xml into an RSS reader and it will keep you up to date on Escher Girls!)

Thanks so much to everybody, and see you next month!

Ami

If you have any issues with the site or suggestions to improve it, please do not hesitate to contact me and let me know!

If you wish to support Escher Girls, you can subscribe to our Patreon at: https://www.patreon.com/ami_angelwings or donate through Ko-Fi at: https://ko-fi.com/amiangelwings.

[visionkept]

SERIOUS TALK. I'm heavily considering moving this account to a new one. This one is getting really cluttered between the awful tumblr changes not remembering my tags, not being able to find headcanons, old asks & threads accumulating, in general is a mess. Not only that but things as general graphics and aesthetics feel very outdated. Being pretty honest, Tomoya was supposed to be a "TEMPORARY BLOG" while I took a break from my previous main muse. That's why I didn't even bother to make pretty fancy tags, pages or really elaborated graphics. I didn't expect to get attached to them, surprised myself with the bonds they have created too ! Plus, I think I have grasped by now the direction of this muse, builded up a story I still have to talk about and AUs set that I sure do love exploring. So as soon as this semester is over, I'll start preparing a new blog to move this one and have a fresh start. Here comes a to do list for myself on what I should prepare before moving this account though. Will be done in the shadows as I continue using this one for the time being.

Look for a new URL ! If possible one that matches the spring aesthetic I want to give off. If not, one about fate / destiny or lighting / thunderstorms will do.

Make a new rules page and be more precise in the unfollowing / following section as well as some things I want to prevent while plotting and shipping with others.

Use a new formatting that uses purples and reds ! C'mon Berry, use to your advantage the new formatting options.

Make that mains / bonds page. But make it extra special by adding drawn chibis of Tomo's bonds: Chihiro, Tem, Satoru, Kaeya ( aka. I gotta start doodling them ).

GRAPHICS with a new aesthetic ! Mobile header, dash icon, not doing a theme this time tho, a header for asks and threads even. But especially a new icon border cause I hate the current one so much.

Draw. yourself. new. Tomo. chibis. berry.

Remake Tomo's dish.

New tags, with quotes this time.

BERRY, DROP THE TOMO LORE ALREADY. Glad it's all in your silly little brain but damn girl, get it together cause that new blog gotta have an ABOUT PAGE with Tomo's CHARACTER STORIES.

Also gotta work in an AU PAGE explaining the most important points about the following AUS ( besides those I have in that page already ) : modern, knight, star rail ( the two versions ), archon, stardew valley, spiderverse.

Yes, as you see I got A LOT to do but I'll take my time. Will be striking the things i manage to do in the shadows these weeks. Meanwhile this blog is still running like always ( aka. spotty activity but somehow here ❤ ).

NOTE: plot important asks as well as threads will be continued and answered in the new blog in case I don't answer those by the time the new account is ready.

[nuttyrabbit]

I’d like to hear what you have to say about IDW.

Alright, let's do this then! I'm not gonna make a big mega review, because frankly I don't think I need to, but I'm just gonna run down some things I like and don't like about the comic just to get it out there, and I'm gonna do it in a "Like-Dislike-Like-Dislike" format just to make things interesting.

With that being said, let's rock and roll

LIKE- The Art

For whatever problems IDW may have, one the most consistently good things about the comic has been its art. Whether it be Archie vets like ABT, Yardley, and Skelly or newcomers like Mauro, Thomas, and Foundraine, IDW has looked consistently fantastic! Some of the action scenes in this comic are some of the best action scenes I've ever seen in any Sonic media (especially anything drawn by ABT. Y'all accuse me of having Ian as my husbando, but the closest thing would be ABT because that man physically CANNOT FUCKING MISS)

Many of the covers especially are some of the best Sonic has ever seen, PERIOD

This cover in particular is something I'd love to have framed

IDW is just a consistently gorgeous comic, even moreso than Archie at its peak with a few exceptions. Also helps that IDW has multiple good inkers and colorists to help the lines pop out, which was an issue I had with Archie

DISLIKE- The Setting

The thing is, I don't inherently dislike the setting of IDW. Setting it past Forces was a good move and setting it in something similar to the games was also a really good call. While I greatly prefer the mix and match setting of the reboot, there is a charm to a more simple, gamelike setting

The problem is that the setting, at least to me, is too simple. At any point it feels like there's maybe 4 locations on the planet: Resistance Base, Eggman Base, Sunset City, and Forest. There are a couple other named locations like White Park, Angel Island and Spiral Hill and that one camping site, but for the most part it feels like the comic ping pongs between these fairly generic locations. As a result, the comic world feels shockingly small in terms of scope and wonder, which is something weird to say about Sonic of all things, a game franchise which has done wonders in taking the hedgehog to various weird, wacky, and cool locales.

It also doesn't help that unlike the games or other comics or even stuff like the OVA and Prime, a lot of the locations don't really have a tangible history or interesting visual motifs, so they just kinda fall flat

I'm not expecting the comic to go full Archie reboot and have a MASSIVE world full of named locations established with DEEPEST LORE from day 1, since that was an extraordinary situation that kinda hurt the comic long term, but having a bit more variety would help the comic loads.

As is, most of the comic's settings just kinda blur together for me to the point where something like Eggperial City just seems like another Eggman base to me. Unfortunately, given what Ian's said about developing the setting (I.e he won't for asinine reasons), I doubt this'll change any time soon, which is a crying shame

LIKE- MOST of the New Characters

While I'm known as an Archie diehard, I'll fully admit that I do like quite a bit of the IDW newcomers. Tangle, Whisper, Starline, Surge, and Kit are characters I've all found to be enjoyable or compelling to some degree. Other characters like Clutch, Rough, and Tumble are also quite enjoyable, though severely underutilized.

IDW has done a pretty solid job (FOR THE MOST PART) of introducing and establishing new characters that add something interesting to the comic at large, and I'm glad to see that some of them have begun making the leap to the games

DISLIKE- Belle

Yeah, I'm not gonna sugarcoat it, I think Belle sucks hard. The concept is fine, but the problem is that A: you know where this shit is going the moment she shows up and B: it takes fucking FOREVER to get there.

Like by the time Belle has her big confrontation with Eggman in issue 50, I'm just rolling my eyes because we knew this was coming and it's just kind of a lame part in an otherwise really cool issue.

Also she just feels like a lesser version of at least 3-4 different characters, including IDW Mecha Sonic. Scrapnik Island is just Belle's arc but actually interesting

Yeah, I just don't think Belle works and is probably the only major dud of the new roster, but man she is a BAD dud. Like the kind that drags down every arc she's in.

Like- Some of the Canon Portrayals

When it comes to portrayals of the canon cast, IDW is a fairly mixed bag, and I think a fair deal of them are abjectly weaker than both game and Archie portrayals (Team Dark being THE most egregious example of this, but Eggman also kinda falls into this)

With that being said, I still do like some of the canon cast in IDW.

Sonic: For all the flak Sonic gets and despite how annoying some of his long-winded speeches can get, I do for the most part like his portrayal. I think having him wrestle with morality, while a bit tedious at times, is interesting, and he still has quite a few moments that make me go "That's my Sonic!" Still inferior to post-SGW Sonic and ESPECIALLY Adventure-era Sonic (who is my eternal GOAT)

Amy: Despite people accusing Amy of being a Sally clone (an accusation which I always find hilarious because it's thrown at ANY female character in a leadership position), she also gets a few pretty solid moments throughout the comic (mainly before and after the Zombot arc). Not as good as Archie Amy but still aight

Silver and Blaze: It's nice to see Silver and Blaze have consistent characterizations and for the latter to not job horrifically. They have good chemistry with each other and the rest of the cast and are a pretty welcome presence, especially since they show up more than once every 600 issues.

The Chaotix: I also like the Chaotix and think they get a lot of really strong moments. Probably one of the few abjectly great parts of the Zombot arc was how they were done

Zavok: Turns out the moment you take Zavok away from the D6 and put him with real characters he actually becomes mildly interesting

The Others: Characters like Cream, Tails, Vanilla, Orbot/Cubot, etc aren't amazing but they're perfectly fine so I'll put them in the good side.

But yeah, I think a few characters get pretty decent characterization with some really strong moments here and there. Though the issue is that none of these portrayals are really the peak of these characters. The most I can say for some of them is that they're good, but there's rarely a moment from most of these examples where I'd point to them and go "This is the perfect way to write this character

DISLIKE- Other Canon Portrayals

Here's what you were probably here for, so let me do this bulletpoint style

Eggman- Isn't as menacing as Archie nor as goofy as his best showings in the games. He has some pretty great moments here and there, with him mulching Starline being a highlight, but he's kinda disappointing overall, especially compared to what's been done before

Knuckles: It's cool they remembered his duty to the Master Emerald and got rid of that dumbass "military leader shit" (which they still kept in Frontiers for some weird fuckin reason. Dunno why they're pushing that). Shame that means he basically sits in the background for most of the comic because there's no Sonic Universe equivalent (which I'll get to). His characterization is okay but MAN compared to all the cool stuff he got to do in the reboot it's very disappointing

Omega- He's still funny, but god it just ain't the same. This is a case where I think the Archie version was just flat out better. He, Amy, and Shadow are the biggest cases of "Archie just did you better"

Shadow: Do I even need to explain this? It's discount Vegeta/Sasuke/Vergil. He's an arrogant prick without anything that made him interesting. Comparing him to Archie is comical since the latter clears so hard it isn't even funny. But fuck, I'd even take Prime Shadow or hell, Boom Shadow over IDW, because at least the former has a reason to be pissy and the latter is at least funny. IDW Shadow is just miserable every fucking time he shows up and I can't tell if it's because the restrictions are that bad or it's because he's just not fun to write, but it sucks. I love Shadow, he's a great character, but every time he shows up I groan. It seems like Sega's gonna be a bit more lax with him, so hopefully that changes things but yeesh

The Deadly Six: It's a shame that Ian couldn't make the Deadly Six outside of Zavok worth a shit, especially since he decided to show them into two separate fucking arcs. I'm not gonna pin my dislike of their portrayal entirely on the comic because I just don't like them, but I am gonna give it shit for using them twice, once in an arc where they didn't belong

The Babylon Rogues: I'm not a fan of the Babylon Rogues, but even I can tell that outside of Jet's sacrifice in the Zombot arc, they've been done exceedingly dirty. That one annual story with Jet and Whisper may be one of the worst stories in IDW Sonic that shit was BAD

Metal Sonic: He's portrayed okay in these comics but my issue is more the shit around him. Sonic trying to redeem him and getting rebuked the first time was interesting stuff. The 2nd time made sense. Beyond that it's gotten obnoxious

LIKE: The Minis

While I dearly miss Sonic Universe and think the comic could use an equivalent (more on that next section), I think the minis we get each year are pretty damn good!

Tangle and Whisper, Bad Guys, Imposter Syndrome, and Scrapnik Island have ranged from good (T&W) to some of the best stuff IDW has put out ever (Scrapnik Island). They're paced well, drawn well, and have really cool shit happen in them. Scrapnik Island in particular was really, really cool and I found Barnes' pacing and character work to be even better than Ian and Evan in places and think he should get a shot at writing some mainline stories.

Also the specials have been pretty good, with the 30th Anniversary Special being extremely pleasant

DISLIKE: Plotting (Or lackthereof)

Now we're getting into some of the nitty gritty.

The big issues with IDW's plots are threefold, so I'll tackle each one individually

Pacing. Evan and Barnes are generally fine with this, but my god Ian Flynn still doesn't know how to pace a story that's more than a couple issues. The Zombot Arc is the absolute worst fucking caes of this (You could cram that entire story into 6 issues and it'd be significantly more effective), but stuff like Eggperial City and even Surge's storyline are also examples of this. So many of the things he plots just drag on and on and repeat themselves ad nauseam in terms of plot beats and even what the characters talk about.

It's an issue that's more readily apparent when reading on a monthly basis as opposed to on a trade basis (where the pacing is less noticeably bad because it's written FOR trades like many modern comics are, much to their detriment), but it's still really bad nevertheless. The only times it hasn't been with Ian are during the minis where, surprise surprise, having to do your story in 4 issues means you gotta actually tighten things up and cut filler.

Again, Evan and Barnes don't seem to have this issue, so a lot of this is on Ian. I like the dude's writing but holy fuck he is still SO bad about this

2. Repetition. I talked about this in a sense in the pacing section by talking about how repetitive Ian's plotting and dialogue can get because of the poor pacing, but I wanna talk about it in a different sense. A lot of IDW's plots are uh, very repetitive, especially as of late. It boils down to "Eggman is doing a thing, go look into it/stop it" a LOT. I know Eggman's the main villain and all but I swear the schtick of "We gotta go check out the Eggman base and fight badniks" has gotten very, very old. Even the Surge and Kit arc ended in "Go to the Eggman base" Arcs like Chao Races and Camping are welcome breaks because they involve the characters doing other shit.

It also ties into my complaints about the setting being small because it often feels like characters just have nothing better to do than go raid Eggman bases and fight Badniks. I know it's an action comic and all but maybe actually utilize some of your smaller villains? Maybe make some new ones? Or maybe even invent some weird new locations for your characters to check out and switch things up? Just an idea.

I keep bringing up that this comic needs a Sonic Universe equivalent and I really believe this because it'd not only give characters like Knuckles, Shadow, and the Chaotix more time to shine, but it'd also give some fantastic diversity in terms of plots. Like while Sonic is fighting Eggman for the billionth time, maybe the Chaotix are doing actual detective work or Knuckles is exploring some ancient ruins and finds a weird new thing he's gotta deal with or an ancient secret he's gotta unlock.

Post reboot Archie benefitted greatly from this since while the main comic was mostly Sonic and co doing shit with Unleashed, Universe was exploring and expanding the world and giving the side characters way cooler shit to bounce off of, making the setting not only feel larger, but also making it feel more varied.

3. Long Term Plans (Or lackthereof)

This one ties a lot into my complaints about setting, but it's strange seeing a Sonic comic do so little in terms of setting up mysteries or future plot threads (that aren't solved IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE CURRENT ARC ENDS), and it also results in a comic that feels more constrained. It gives so little to really talk or speculate about. Maybe it's more a fandom thing for me but I enjoy it when media drops cool background stuff for the viewer to speculate about and make the world like a puzzle the viewer has to piece together. It adds so much to a story and narrative when a viewer can pick up on little plot threads and watch them come together over time.

LIKE Action

This one's simple. IDW has a lot of really well drawn, really interestingly written action bits. Any time there's an action scene, no matter how mundane or banal, it's always gonna look fantastic

Like DAMN. And that's not even an ABT action scene.

DISLIKE: Too Self-Contained

Okay this is a weird complaint but I really don't like that the comic can't explicitly draw on locations and plot elements from not just the games but other side stuff. I get why, but it's also lame because one of the coolest parts of reboot Archie was seeing what insane stuff the comic would pull from and reinvent.

Also it's absolute bullshit they can't bring back the Hooligans and Battle Bird Armada. Like come the fuck on, those are good villains

RAPIDFIRE TIME

Okay so I've been typing this up for way longer than I anticipated so I'm just gonna rapidfire a bunch of other shit I like and dislike

Like: Neo Metal Sonic being the first villains rules and that arc is really fun

Dislike: The Zombot Arc. It's got cool ideas but it goes on for fucking ever and devolves into misery porn pretty hard. Also I don't care if the Zeti were always planned, them being there sucks **IAN**

Like: The fact that Ian isn't the only person writing. I've been saying since Archie that a revolving team of writers would be cool and lo and behold, we've gotten that. Very cool stuff

Dislike: No Off-panels. It's a crime we don't have those because they're funny

Like: The cool outfits the cast wear in Chao Races. I love alt outfits

Dislike: "No alt outfits outside of very special exceptions". See above

Like: IDW actually puts out trades on time.

Dislike: Wispons are overused as FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK. I get randos having them and Whisper specializing in them but I don't think Lanolin needed to have one. It's creative yeah but just give her sound powers

FINAL THOUGHTS

Okay so clearer I had a lot to say about IDW Sonic, and I was deliberately being as general as possible to try and write this up fairly quickly. It's a comic that I find to be decently enjoyable, but also very noticeable flawed and ultimately kinda lacking in some key aspects. I like the comic well enough but it's never clicked with me in the same way other Sonic media like Archie did. I'm hopin in the future that some of these issues I've listed are remedied and that the comic continues to find success.

But yeah, this was fun, albeit exhausting, to write up. So to close this out, I'm gonna give it a numerical ranking

As of now, March 21, 2023, I give IDW Sonic a 6/10 (For context I'd give the reboot a 7.5 overall and the pre-reboot a 6 as well)

[sburbian-sage]

In a few of your recent posts, you've mentioned that you might be out of sync with the replayernet, and honestly, I think you might be.

I know Time is pretty fucked/nonexistant out in the furthest ring, but I got my current session's Seer of Time to look over your posts, and he's estimating with his powers that you started posting around like, seven or so years ago from our perspective? How long has it felt to you?

Regardless, the game seems to have version-drifted really far from where it once was. A ton of your old posts match up with older guides I've read, but not newer ones, and are totally inaccurate to any version of the game that I've ever personally played.

I went back through a bunch of your old stuff, and here's some updates on how they usually work now:

Dream players have that purple and beige color scheme for real now, not "transparent" as you once said (never even heard of that one before).

Void players are (much more likely to be) able to get fraymotifs now, and don't always fuck up text as badly. (varies a lot between different sessions)

"Modded" sessions seem to be much less common, and whatever the "Andern Association" you mentioned in a few posts was, it seems either dissolved, or else is now so secretive that I can't find any info on it anywhere. Meanwhile, ordinary version-drift has seemingly sped up.

Many classpects in general seem to have changed a bit over time, and many have become much rarer, but it's too much to get into all at once.

There's tons of other more recent developments but I gotta go sorry ohgodwhat in my house again fuck ill get back to you soon maybe

I don't believe I ever wrote about an Andern Associations. The one post on my blog that mentions it has a frankly funked-up formatting, I think because it was submitted by someone else (instead of sent via ask) and I failed to delineate how much was my input and how much theirs. But I don't believe I wrote any of that, so it doesn't really constitute evidence that I've undergone version drift. In fact, all accounts of modded game sessions were reports from other people, so it's really not applicable to me at all.

Granted, a lot of goofy stuff does come my way, and I might be a bit too credulous, perhaps in the interest of entertaining hypotheticals because my advice is generally good in principle, even if the specifics are shaky (like that earlier post about those weird titles, the titles might not exist, but my advice for figuring out how they work is sound no matter what). And there could also be lapses in judgement. I'm subsistence farming in the The Furthest Ring, intellectual fugue states are a common worry for me, and I might have accidentally validated the existence of things that, in hindsight, have no way of being real (I officially denounce those Double Aspect or Double Class posts, I don't know why I believed and wrote up hypothetical summaries of bugged titles when the consensus is that Title attribution is never bugged, only the Titles themselves).

But speaking of unreliable askers, the fact that you haven't ever heard of "Dream's color scheme is transparent" is suspect. Not only does purple and beige as a color scheme conflict heavily with their frankly iconic transparent glass constructs, but "Dream player ascends to godhood and wakes up buck-ass naked on Skaia" is a community meme that frankly comes up way too often in discussions of the Dream Aspect.

But that's not the only thing that bugs me. You brought up Version Drift Theory, which is not A Theory The Same Way Gravity Is A Theory, but is instead a highly speculative model of, essentially, the evolution of Genesis Frogs in an attempt to explain not only bugs and glitches, but why some people's sessions are radically different from one another. It's not an authoritative truth, it's an analytical model of sorts that some people find use for, so why are you trying to convince me that Version Drift is real and I've undergone it? Especially when my concern was never that my game version is out of synch, it was that my connection to the ringservers were out of synch. I had a gap in my knowledge concerning Cherubs, because I'm often busy performing upkeep on myself and the ship, and I worried that either my computer, my connection, or maybe my browsing habits were caught lacking, and now someone in my askbox is trying to convince me that I've undergone such severe time dilation in my Ring Journey that all of my writing is now obsolete and worthless and that SBURB is now an unrecognizably different game.

I choose to believe this ask is psychological warfare on the part of a bad faith or not very reliable actor. Not only do your session reports sound wildly out of whack, but you're trying to convince me that I'm the out of touch one? This is Spriteless Behavior, I'm living in your walls, I'm summoning demons and sending them to your dwelling spire, they're going to beat you to death with hammers, I'm going to equip hammerkind so I can do the same, also I'm a mental health risk (Ring Journey) and physically disabled (glasses) and this is a level of gaslighting that probably falls under ableism, etc. etc. I am always right and may the Ohgodwhat destroy your computer such that you never imply otherwise again.

[hermesserpent-stuff]

https://youtu.be/SSCJphSvNoI

Devil doesn't bargin

Building on the tombstone idea. Weird formatting cause I'm on mobile lol.

Tw: injury blood

Tombstone sits at his desk, quietly working. Rain taps on his window, calming. His favorite sort of weather as it warps the light coming into his office, creating artistic shadows across the floor. He often received commentary from ill-meaning social elites that his office is rather plain. He preferred it this way. Peaceful organization that becomes an evolving beauty with the changing weather. It also happened to look quite nice in the dawn and cast in the lights of the setting sun. But rain highlights its best features, with elongated shadows and a gentle drumbeat that serves to drown out much of the city below.

His mind is narrowed in on one of the legitimate branches of his company, the side that dabbled in chemicals, and the side that he kept the closest eye on due to his own history. That is interrupted by a terrible crash as his reinforced window cracks and shatters. His eyes widen slightly at the sight of Shocker rolling across the floor, dragging glass and blood along with him. The Enforcer seems to be wrapped protectively around something, a something that dislodges from the cowboy's arms slightly and whacks the wall with a loud crack, leaving a dent. Is that?

After a beat of shock, Tombstone rises and steps closer to the second figure. It is. It is Spider-man, who is badly beaten with most of his mask damaged and torn away. Tombstone recognizes the face beneath the bare threads that remain. Peter Parker.

The child that had begged him for protection from Norman Osborn. Peter looks awful, bruises dark and blossoming across almost every inch of skin. Blood smeared everywhere. Montana had to have known. It would explain quite a bit about his behavior around Peter, like how he could love the kid so much and so clearly and not work to stop Peter from getting hurt. Though Tombstone finds that he does not wholly agree with the conclusion that Montana appears to have arrived at. Another moment passes in speculation and revelation and then Tombstone realizes that he should get the child help. He lifts up both as it would be rather difficult to detangle them here and goes up a story to his personal apartment. He locks the door behind himself and deposits the two in the bathroom.

After a little struggle, for the child's grip is very impressive, he manages to separate the two and start cleaning. Some of the cuts he finds are very deep and will need stitches. He quickly gets started on that after cleaning the kid up and is almost as quickly brought to a halt by Montana latching on to his arm and pulling. He pushes the cowboy away but this does not deter Montana from yanking on him Tombstone is forced to pin the cowboy to the wall with one hand and a look of irritation that Montana matches despite his eyes being slightly dazed.

"You can't use stitches."

"These cuts are very deep. I don't think you’re in any state-"

"Use stitches and you'll have to yank them out pretty soon. I've been helpin' the kid for a good while. More misery than the amount of help they provide."

Tombstone narrows his eyes at Montana who seems to be fighting against passing out.

"This is how it's going to go. You're going to tell me exactly what to do about Peter's injuries and what I want to know."

He presses Montanan a little more harshly into the wall, drawing a broken cough from the cowboy. It is not an idle threat and Montana seems to spot that quickly, eyes sharpening for a moment. Good.

"Fine. Window huh? That explains the glass."

The last bit is muttered and seems to have been a thought that slipped out into words rather than something meaningful. Tombstone drops Montana and the cowboy has to use the wall to support himself, swaying a little. Montana then crouches next to Peter, and after slipping off his gauntlets and mask, starts running his own check over the kid with gentle hands. He mutters a few soft words and then a few cut-off curses.

"Broken bone. I hate broken bones. Upper arm. Hold him, or he might just send me sailing through the wall."

Montana maneuvers Peter into Tombstone's arms, face calm seriousness. Tombstone is a bit surprised to find his arms filled with a child, but recalls for himself the strength that Spider-Man seemed to possess. It is hard to remember that in the face of Peter's tiny frame. Montana grabs a towel and gently eases Peter's mouth open. And then promptly swears.

"Montana?"

Tombstone's firm tone barely slows the cowboy down.

"Broken fang. Shoot. Looks like the venom's flowing free. Right. One problem at a time.”

He presses the towel up and then focuses on setting the arm. Peter opens his eyes and lets out a muffled scream. Tombstone holds firm as the cowboy keeps working. The arm is soon wrapped and then the cowboy rises, dampens a cloth, squeezes out the water, and then gently takes the towel out of Peter’s mouth.

“Mont…”

Peter whines and Montana shushes and coos.

“I’m here. Gimme a sec Peter. Open your mouth for me.”

Peter slowly does and whines as Montana holds the cloth to his teeth. Montana holds it in place and glances around.

“What kind of pain meds do you keep here? Any?”

“Advil. Upper cabinet.”

“Alright. Hold this please. Be careful to not let him bite you. Not sure if his anti-venom survived that crash.”

Montana waits for Tombstone to take over holding the cloth and then rises to look for the Advil. For all the calm the man appears to be trying to exude, Tombstone can see the faint tremor in his hands and the terror hidden in the depths of his rusty eyes. Peter makes a noise of complaint and a soft sob. It is heartbreaking in a way that Tombstone is not sure he can describe. Montana gently touches Peter’s face to get the kid's attention once he has the medicine.

“Hey, Peter, think you can manage some Advil?”

Montana’s voice is low, sweet, and careful. The child makes a tiny noise of affirmation and holds out a trembling hand. Montana puts five in the kid's hand and gently aids the child in getting the hand to his mouth. Tombstone moves the cloth away from the tooth and puts it back after Peter swallows.

“That many?”

“It’ll make enough of a dent for him to sleep. If I'm particularly lucky.”

Peter then starts struggling and pushing.

“Whoah, whoah. Easy there.”

Montana gently touches Peter and Peter shoves his way out of Tombstone’s arms onto Montana, burying his face in the crook of his neck.

“Oh, Peter.”

Montana half collapses under the light weight of the child and closes his eyes. Peter clings tight to the cowboy. And Tombstone finds himself feeling the emptiness of his arms. Peter hides his face and Montana curls around him protectively.

"Montana. Report."

Tombstone keeps his voice low but it seems to fill the room. Montana stiffens a little and Peter whines and grips his shirt tighter. The cowboy runs a soothing hand down the kids back and starts his report.

"I was fighting with the Six like normal. Ock had some new brilliant plan he done told nobody about. But that’s normal.” Montana then coughs and his entire face pinches in pain, but the man presses through. “We got where we were supposed to be, and Spidey showed up fairly soon into our street wreakin’. Course he tossed around some quibs and annoyed the heck out of Ock and Rhino. ‘S were the real trouble started. Ock set off some sort of device ment to shut down any tech Spidey uses. Course he didnt take into consideration my gear and my gauntlets exploded with the next blast and me and Peter went flying. Through a window apparently.”

The report is fairly short and concise, much like all of Montana���s reports. That was part of the reason he had hired the man. But now Tombstone is forced to reexamine everything.

“And youve been botching your missions with Spider-man on purpose?”

Montana gets a look of irritation, even as the man winces through another round of coughs.

“That’s a discredit to Peter.”

The man’s eyes are growing more unfocused. Tombstone narrows his eyes, wanting to ask more questions, but knowing that Montana passing out from bloodloss would mean also not getting his answers.

“You need to bandage yourself up.”

Montana’s hands clench around Peter for a moment and then he loosens his hold. He gently pulls at the kid’s hands. Peter whines.

“Peter, I need to handle my injuries.”

There is a faint whisper that Tombstone cannot hear. Montana winces slightly as Peter holds tighter.

“I know. Love you too kiddo.”

Montana says, pressing his cheek against Peter’s head. Peter slowly relaxes his grip and slips off to the side of Montana. The kid stays close to Montana’s side, looking at Tombstone with big eyes that are wide with fear and confusion. Tombstone feels his gut twist at the lack of trust clearly on display there. Why does he care so much about this child’s opinion? He should not. And yet he wants it. He wants Peter to look at him with trust like he had before. He wants the clear adoration that Peter has in his eyes when he looks at Montana. He wants to be the person Peter turns to in times of need.

Tombstone notes that the chipped tooth is leaking some sort of yellow liquid. Montana had mentioned venom. Tombstone offers out the cloth he had held to the boy’s face before. Peter stares at it for a moment, and then glances at Montana who is sorting out his own wounds. Peter slowly reaches out and takes the cloth and presses it to his mouth with hands that are clearly struggling to stay up. Tombstone invades the kid’s space and takes over holding the cloth. Peter looks like he might struggle for a moment and then his hands slowly slide to his sides. There is still a lot of fear in the child's eyes. But the light in them is dimming.

Both Tombstone and Peter startle when Montana thuds against the ground. Peter has a look of uncontrolled panic and immediately is pressing his head to Montana's chest. He must find a heartbeat because his entire body slacks. Brown eyes look up and into Tombstone's own, a plea resting in their depths.

"I… Help him, please. I can't… I can't lose anyone else."

Tears bubble up in the child's eyes as he begs. Tombstone nods, finding himself unable to deny the plea for help.

[heavnlytears]

Hi! I purchased the always connected full bundle. How exactly do I edit with it?

Hello ! First of all: thank you for purchasing my psd, I hope you enjoy using it as much as I enjoyed making it !

I also hope that it's ok that I'm posting your ask for everyone to see, I was going to answer it privately but I thought this could be a great way of posting a mini tutorial in case someone else has the same question ( let me know if you want me to delete this and i will ).

Below the read more, you can find an in-depth explanation on how to edit the "always connected" full bundle !

This is what the screen looks like as soon as you open the psd on photoshop:

On the screen, you can see a note and the rules. The original layers are divided in the group layer, the main graphic group layer and the pop-ups group layer.

The first thing you should do, is to toggle off the visibility of the first group layer. You'll be left with what I call the main graphic ( images below ).

The main graphic has a lot of parts and possible iterations, so let me know if you want a more in-depth tutorial on how to edit them. But as you can see, I have some "optional" group layers, which means they can be used to substitute each other. That way, you can have the reminders aspect of the graphic, the notes aspects of the graphic or another photo, see below for the other two options:

After you figured out which of the two options you want, you can start editing each individual group layer. All of them are formatted so you can just clip the photo to their respected shape and it'll work. ( to clip, the photo needs to be in a layer directly above the shape you want to clip them to and you can either use ctrl + alt + g on windows or right click the layer of the photo you want to add and select "create clipping mask" )

Now, onto the pop-ups. This is what you see as soon as you click the pop-ups group layer:

I made it so all of the elements in the main graphic had a customizable pop-up. That means you'll have to remember to edit the "widget notifications" to match the original graphic, but I think it looks cute when it's done. I also formatted all of them to work with clipping masks, so all you have to do is to go through the ones you want to use and clip the photos to the correct shapes.

I, once again, can go through a more in-depth tutorial about all of those group layers if you want, just let me know !

All of the colors and fonts are also fully customizable, so here's how to edit them to the palette you want/fits you the best:

First of all, I like to enable "properties". To do that, all you have to do is to open the windows menu and select properties. The tab below will open and you can choose where you want to leave it ( i like to add it to the collapsible menu next to the fixed one on the right of the screen )

As you can see, "properties" allows me to see the sizes of the shapes, their colors and so many other aspects of the shape selected. To change their color, all i do is select the shape I want, open "properties" and scroll down to "appearance". Most of the shapes only have "fill" enabled, so I click on the current color and choose a new one.

Let me know if you have any more questions and I'll be happy to help !

[starset21]

Chapter 7: Changing Perspectives

Standard Disclaimer: I only own my original characters, I've done some research but there will likely be Navy/military inaccuracies, and I do not consent to the posting, translating, or publishing of my work to any 3rd party site, the only place it may be found is on tumblr and Wattpad under @.itswildflower

Looking for the other chapters? U.S.S. Christmas Masterlist 

A/N: This story is heavily inspired by the hallmark movie of the same title and is very self-indulgent. I'm also trying a different format than I'm used to using so it may change in later chapters.

Summary: Kate finally tracks down Jonah and Dorothy

“Good Morning,” Jake greeted his father.

“Morning son. So... Kate told me that you had a great day in New York,” Ron started.

“Yeah, it was nice. We ended up at the train show.”

“The same one I took you to as a kid?”

Jake nodded.

“Oh!”

“Yeah. Brought back a lot of memories of Christmas. And memories of the divorce. You know, we never really talked about you leaving, pops. One day you just moved away and it was… The code of silence after that,” Jake confessed.

“I regret that. Somehow it just seemed easier to act like nothing happened,” Ron shook his head.

“I-I just... I didn't understand, especially at Christmas. I just wanted my dad,” Jake told him.

“I failed you. I failed your mom. But I want you to know how much I missed you. When you got older, why do you think I wanted you to be a pilot so bad?” he asked.

“To follow in your footsteps?” Jake guessed.

“To… To be close to you. You are the most important thing to me in my entire life, more important than any career,” Ron confessed.

“Your career is everything to you,” Jake pointed out incredulously.

“And I'm proud of my service and what I've accomplished. But nothing… Nothing holds a candle to my only son,” Ron finished.

“Thanks, pops.” 

“How's my Christmas story coming?” Kate’s editor in chief asked as soon as she got into the office.

“I'm still working on it, but I'm honestly not sure if it's gonna be done in time,” Kate told him.

“Well, I'm counting on this. You have till end of day, then I'm gonna have to go with something else,” he told her sternly.

Kate left his office with a frown and went to her desk, sitting down and putting her head in her hands. “I can't believe this. I finally have a heartwarming story worth telling, and I don't even know how to tell it. I… I don't know what else to do,” she lamented.

“Go get hot chocolate with me?” Abigail, her best friend asked.

“With marshmallows? Lots of marshmallows?” Kate asked sadly.

“As many as you want,” Abigail confirmed.

“Okay. Lets go,” she told her, standing up.

“So you can't find any record on Jonah William?” Abby asks as they get on the elevator.

“Oh, no, I found plenty, but none that match the age and profile of our pilot, its so frustrating. It's like he's a ghost or something,” Kate groaned.

“I can't believe it's this hard to find someone,” Abby commiserated.

“I know. It's a mystery,” Kate sighed.

“Sounds like you've had quite the adventure on that ship. By the way, whatever happened to Mr. Military man?”

Kate’s face heated. “We, um… We almost kissed,” she confessed.

“What?!” Abby nearly yelled.

“Abby! Shhhh. But it's not going anywhere,” she told her.

“Wait. A romance grounded before taking flight? Do you like him?” Abby pressed.

“Yes. But it's not that simple, Abby,” Kate told her.

“Just imagine the wedding! All those handsome groomsmen in uniform? With their swords? Your bridesmaids in peach? That is my color palette, by the way,” Abby smirked. 

“A wedding announcement!” Kate’s eyes snapped to Abby’s.

“I'm convincing, but…” Abby trailed off.

“No, no, maybe there's a wedding announcement for Jonah and Dorothy,” Kate started as the elevator door opened. “I don't know why I haven't thought about this before. You're on to something…” Kate trailed off as she spotted a familiar head of blonde hair. “Jake?”

Jake nodded to the woman at the reception desk and turned. “Can we talk?” he asked. 

“I hope it's okay I came to see you,” he said after they came to a stop in a park.

“Yeah, of course. Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, everything's good. Oh, I... I brought this for you. You know, just in case you find him,” he told her, pulling out the ornament that said ‘To Dorothy.’

“I... I can't believe you came all this way just to give me this,” Kate told him.

Jake’s adams apple bobbed before he spoke again. “You know, I… Really didn't want to say goodbye to you yesterday. When you left, it felt… It felt wrong. You know? Like I was losing something. I've fallen for you, Kayleigh Wells. And before you say anything, I know how you feel about what I do. The military life. But… I was just hopin' maybe I could take you out on a date. We can see where things go,” he explained. 

“Jake. What if one date turns into two, and then two dates turns into three, and… Look, if… If this goes somewhere, it's not gonna end well. So is it even worth taking that risk?”

“Remember when you asked me if I was ever scared when I'm flying, and I told you that I'm not scared of anything?”

Kate nodded.

“Well, the truth is… I'm scared of falling in love. But I'm willing to take that chance,” Jake told her.

“Jake... i-I'm so sorry. I can't…” she looked away from him.

“So is that it? Kayleigh, what if our whole lives have led up to this point? What if you and I found each other just like Jonah and Dorothy did?” Jake asks.

“I have to go back to work,” Kate told him, water beginning to line her eyes.

“Kate… I'm not gonna hurt you,” Jake says quietly.

Kate shakes her head. “You don't know that,” she told him before walking away yet again.

“He seems sweet,” Abby attempts to start the conversation when Kate returned.

“Yeah, he is, but romance grounded, remember?”

Abby frowned at her.

“Look. That's them. They were married on Christmas day in 1974. But their last name isn't William, it's Williams. They must have gotten it wrong on his file before the fire,” Kate told her, pointing her computer screen towards her friend. 

“Fire? Whatever. You're a genius. Keep going.”

“Last known address… Veterans home in Norfolk.” Kate picked up her phone and made a quick call.

“What did they say?” Abby asked when she hung up.

“They moved out a couple of years ago and they can't give me any information unless I'm family,” Kate sighed.

“So close! Wait. Look at that. The call sign painted on his plane. What does it say? "Picas... so"?” Abby pointed to a photo Kate had found.

“Picasso. That's funny,” Kate mused.

“What?” Abby asked.

“There's a diner I've been going to since I was a little girl, Picasso's diner. Do you think there could be a connection?” she asked her friend.

“It would be a Christmas miracle if there is. Go get 'em, Kate.” 

Kate quickly made her way to the old diner. “Hi, Sharon,” she greeted as she stepped inside the establishment.

“Kate! Your brother joining?” she asked.

“No, no, I'm not here to eat. No, I actually have a question about a story that I'm working on,” Kate told her.

“Is it about that bank president?” Sharon asked.

“No, not him. It's about a man named Jonah Williams, he was a pilot for the Navy, he married a woman named Dorothy?”

“Yes, Joe, he owned the diner. He sold it about 25 years ago. I worked for him as a teenager,” Sharon told her.

“Any idea where he is now?”

“No, but I do believe that he has a daughter in Virginia beach. Lily is her name,” Sharon told her.

“Sharon, you are amazing, I'll see you on Christmas day!” Kate exclaimed before heading back to the office.

Kate couldn't help the smile that was growing on her face as she heard the words spoken on the other end of the phone.

“Okay! Thanks! Okay, that sounds great. I'll see you tomorrow,” Kate hung up and threw her hands up in the air out of excitement. Abby sent her a questioning look.

“I did it! I found Jonah and Dorothy. They live with their daughter now, I'm heading to go see them tomorrow,” Kate told her.

“That's great!” Abby exclaimed. 

The next morning Kate knocked on the hardwood door of the Williams residence.

“Kate?” the daughter Lily asked.

“Yeah! Hi! Merry Christmas,” Kate greeted.

“Merry Christmas. They're on the back porch, come on in.”

“Okay, thank you.” Kate stepped through the front door and followed Lily through the house.

“Come on in. Mom, dad, this is Kate from the Norfolk register,” Lily introduced.

“Hi! Lily told us about this story you're working on,” Dorothy smiled.

“Yeah. Yes, it's just, oh, your life, it's so exciting. Do you mind if I record this?” Kate asked, taking a seat across from them.

“By all means. But I don't know what all the fuss is about,” Jonah laughed.

“Well, from what I could tell, Mr. and Mrs. Williams, you just have such an incredible story. Now, tell me… What happened after the tiger cruise, how did you win over Dorothy?” Kate asked.

“Well, her brother told me where the dance studio was, so after we docked, I drove seven hours to find her in New York City,” he started.

“He made it in the Nick of time. Practically had to duel the doctor I was seeing. I wasn't sure about that guy. But there was something about Joe. So I ended my relationship, and after a few dates, I knew. He was the one,” Dorothy chimed in.

“We got engaged shortly after, and we were gonna wait to get married until after I got out of the service. But then I got called back to Vietnam,” Joe sighed.

“I told him I would wait as long as it took. I just didn't realize how long it would be,” Dorothy added.

At Kate’s questioning look Jonah picked up the story.

“My plane got shot down in Vietnam and, well, the next seven years I was a pow,” he told her.

“I had kept hope alive. But then when the war ended, two officers walked up the driveway, and I thought for sure Joe had died. Instead they said he was alive! I fell on the ground crying. It was the greatest moment of my life,” Dorothy told her.

“What gave you the strength to not give up on him?” Kate asked.

“I prayed every night that he'd come home. He had to. He's my one true love, after all,” Dorothy told her.

“Okay, and, let's see. How did you end up at the diner?” Kate asked Joe.

“Well, I was an artist. That's why the guys gave me the call sign "Picasso." They were always teasing me because whenever I wasn't flying, I was sketching. But I couldn't make any money in art, so I opened the diner. But it's amazing that you figured this all out,” he told her.

“Oh. Well, uh… It was tricky with your last name having two spellings,” Kate chuckled. 

“Oh, yeah. The Navy messed that up. They left off the "s," and I just left it as "William." I finally got it corrected to Williams when I came home from Vietnam,” Jonah informed her.

“And do you two have any more children?” she asked.

“We have two older sons in the marines corps, five grandchildren. And they're coming to visit today!” Dorothy exclaimed.

“How were you okay with just uprooting your life like that for Jonah, for the Navy?” Kate asked.

“Easiest decision of my life,” Dorothy said immediately. “It didn't matter. Joe was my home. Wherever we went, all I needed was him. And I had the kids and my dance career, which always kept me very busy.”

“You know, the U.S.S Polaris is named after the north star. It's the way sailors have been finding their way home for centuries. And in this case, it led me to Dorothy,” Jonah told her and Kate nodded.

“Actually, I have something for you,” Kate told them, pulling a tin that she had placed the ornament in out of her bag and opening the lid. “I think this belongs to you,” she offered it to them.

“Oh! I don't believe it! Joe, look! It's the star you made for me,” Dorothy smiles, looking at him.

“Where did you find this?” he asked as Dorothy carefully pulled the ornament out of the tin.

“A pilot I know, he found it in an old box on the ship,” Kate told them.

“It's a symbol of our everlasting love. Thank you. Did this pilot help you track us down?” Dorothy asked.

Kate nodded.

“Well, please... thank him. For us,” Jonah smiled almost knowingly.

“Oh, I will. He's… He's a wonderful man,” Kate tells them. 

[belphegorbillickin]

Hi! As someone who played your quotev match-up quiz (and had a lot of fun with it), I’m kind of curious if your opinion on it has changed any now. I could tell from your posts that you value accuracy to canon when dealing with fan content about characters, so I was curious to see if the new character information released since 2022 has affected how you view it.

Sorry if this came off as rude or repetitive in any way. 😅

Dw it's not rude at all! I love to ramble on and on about my projects and characterization anyway, and I'll really glad you enjoyed it! It also fuels my ego a little to hear that you can tell lol.

I'm curious to know who was your top 3 and how accurate you thought it was, was it surprising in any way? If you don't mind ofc, I just love being nosy about what people think of my stuff lol.

I'm inviting you to ramble along with me!

To be honest, that quiz was always meant to be more on the wish fulfillment side for the readers, because that kind of quiz is usually taken by younger, more sensitive people as a whole and it's hard to do more nuanced takes in that format.

I also can't really have my usual interests be more obvious like I can on tumblr and AO3.

It was kind of my way of trying to do what older fans had done for me back in the Quizilla days. (RIP Quizilla, gone but never forgotten.) I actually preferred the edgy, in-character variants even back then, but the TWST fandom on tumblr is very...

Let's just say I'm very hesitant to interact with most TWST fans first, unless they post similar things, and that I've gotten anon hate just for posting that quiz while being a yandere/OBM!/adult (as in age) writer.

That being said, the point allocation was intended to be fairly accurate without any cheat answers, and I didn't wanna sugar coat the results too much.

Some characters are easier to "game" than others, and some have broader or more niche tastes, but if you're not careful you could get Sebek or Vil instead of Riddle for example.

Also, Idia and Jade are pickier than Rook and Floyd and the points try to take into account what the player would want as well.

I've adjusted the point spread a lot since then at different times.

A tiny bit due to new characterizations, but mostly because the point spread system is annoying to work with and because I realized not everyone will read the questions and answers the same way.

You also can't do negatives, which would've helped the quiz be a lot more accurate, but what can you do?

I actually really regret accidentally contributing to the whole "crybaby" Azul and thought about it re-doing his result soon after posting.

I've actually been thinking about it again recently, but I kinda don't want to take away what people are used to either.

I had initially thought that was a joke/affectionate bullying, but I found out not too long after that a lot of people seem to genuinely think that Azul cries over everything, despite canon saying that he's changed.

It seems like poor Azul has been hit with a double dose of woobification and ukeification by the fandom, and I'm not a fan. He's a pos (affectionate) like the rest of them, and I'd like him less if he wasn't.

Tbh, I actually think he's one of the most morally bankrupt in the entire cast, along with the Tweels and Leona. Like, he's dealing in literal, violence enforced slavery whereas Jamil is trying to escape it for example.

(I also hate what the Eng localization has done to poor Jamil, but that's another rant.)

Also, Rook has said a lot of questionable things to Vil and I'm unsure as to what the intentions were. Like, is Rook negging Vil when he points out millimeters of weight gain? Is it supposed to be a normal, "positive" thing because Japan loves to glorify EDs?

It makes the VDC thing look really bad too, not the actual vote itself, but all of his other actions imo.

I'm leaning towards Rook being manipulative tbh, because he has a pattern of it, already really disrespects non-humans, and is very socially savvy and close to Vil. (This isn't bashing btw, I still love Rook as a character.)

Otherwise, not much has changed other than me getting more comfortable with the characters and fandom I suppose?

I'm guessing you're caught up as an Idia fan? Good choice btw, and if you are the one that sent the Idia ask dw, I'll try my best to fulfil it too.

Tbh, I'm actually really disappointed that his parents are actually really cutesy. And, speaking as vaguely as possible, I honestly don't like the new fae lore in Ch 7 either.

I feel like Yana has suddenly decided to start downplaying the more serious, heavy tones and I'm not quite sure why? Maybe to ease players into a slightly more romantic slice of life continuation after the main story ends?

Idk maybe it was always planned, but I feel like it makes Idia seem a bit more like a generic whiny teenager. I still love him, but I choose to ignore that part of canon and give him more distant parents who are still struggling with grief and their work.

But feel free to disagree, I don't mind at all. It's just nice to have someone to talk about TWST with too!

[feathvrings]

“When everyone knows you’re a monster, you needn’t waste time doing every monstrous thing.”

selective and semi-private indie portrayal of KAZ rietveld BREKKER, JESPER FAHEY, naoise burns NESHA VLADSTIK, and WYLAN van eck HENDRIKS, as understood by sen.

rules below cut for mobile users.

general:

all muns must be 18+, as i am. i do not allow anon asks, so please be aware of this. this is my first venture into indie/1x1 rp, so please go easy on me—i’m accustomed to group rp, and still don’t know all the terminology. i will use the block button, whenever i feel it necessary. be nice and respectful. it’s a basic thing. i’m here to write, not argue—so let’s keep the ooc drama to a minimum. i don’t interact with call-out posts/purity culture/passive-aggressiveness/etc. don’t godmod/metagame, please. my name is sen! i'm 18+ and use they/them pronouns.

writing:

i write semi-literate to literate multi-para responses. i use a mix of beta and legacy editors, mostly because i’m new to tumblr and can’t figure out what the hell is going on with that, but i don’t seem to have the option to switch whenever i want. i will cut posts whenever possible—please be patient with me. i’m very active and have a tendency to reply frequently. please don’t feel rushed by me, i’m very patient—this is just a heads-up. just a warning, i talk in the tags. a fair bit.

plotting:

please don’t reach out through dms to plot with me unless we’re mutuals. if we are moots, feel free to contact me at any time to start up a thread, fangirl about the source material or our threads/characters, or just chat about anything at all. ask memes are a great way to start up interactions—always feel free to throw an ask my way, even if we’re not moots. memes and open starters are open to everyone, and i’m willing to write those threads for as long as they go.

formatting:

i do use small text, just to keep my dash easier for me personally to read. if you’d prefer i not use it for various reasons, just reach out and let me know! i generally use gif icons and/or small/medium gifs, but you don’t have to. i do not expect you to match my formatting. please don’t expect me to match yours.

content:

dark themes and triggers will absolutely be present on this blog due to the nature of the source material. i will do my best to tag things as needed, using the format “trigger cw.” things that will 100% be tagged are as follows:

death.

gore.

nsfw content (not that there should really be any of it on this blog).

this list will be added to as necessary.

following:

i will not follow/interact with blogs that:

write only/primarily smut/nsfw content.

contain omegaverse or a/b/o content.

roleplay as real people.

use a deceased person as a fc.

if you write untagged smut/nsfw, i may block you. if i follow you, i have read all of your rules/information and am interested in writing with you. if i don’t, i’m not. if you initiate a follow, 9 times out of 10 i will check it as soon as i see it and read your page. if i don’t follow back, i’m not interested—it’s nothing personal, and it could be for any number of reasons, so don’t feel bad. please don’t spam follow me to get me to accept it—my answer likely won’t change. if i initiate a follow, you are (of course) under no obligation to accept it. if you don’t intend on reciprocating however, please block-then-unblock (i think that’s a softblock?) me to remove the follow. i will take the hint, i promise. if i soft or hard block you, it’s nothing personal. i keep my dash very strictly curated.

nopes:

i do not write nsfw/smut. i do not accept anons. i reserve the right to not interact with anyone or engage in any interaction that makes me uncomfortable—period, end of discussion.

asks:

any meme/starter can be answered at any time. (if it’s one of those “send an emoji” ones you may need to remind me which post it’s coming from.) you’re always welcome to turn an ask response into a thread. please don’t use me as a source for memes—reblog them from the op. they’re the one that created it, they should get the credit.

for mutuals:

if you’re going to drop a thread, please let me know. i don’t mind, just tell me ahead of time so i’m not eternally on hold. always feel free to reach out to me. my dms are open: if there’s a reply that you’d like me to make some changes to, any plotting things you want to clear up, a cool musing you saw that fits our characters, or you just plain want to chat—hit me up.

[andmaybegayer]

Last Monday of the Week 2023-03-06

Gamers only play competitive first person shooters when they're extremely distressed

Listening: It was BandCamp Friday this week, so new music! Already posted my album list here so I won't dump it again

For a single song, here's Machine by Dangerfields

Watching: this bizzare 3D anime a media archival guy on YouTube has. I watched it on my phone in stereoscopic crosseyevision which worked surprisingly well but I did have to take a few breaks. The original format used the interlaced lines of SDTV to display left and right, synchronized by active-shutter glasses.

It's about some journalists following up on a terrorist plot or something, there's a lot going on, one of them is a. Robot? Maybe? It's a bit hard to keep on top of the subtitles because they are not in 3D so they appear twice below the image when you're cross-eyed, I think I still have like 10 minutes to go. Fun exercise. It was uploaded in a 3D format so you can just watch it normally or use a VR headset to view it. I lost my Google cardboard thing, so.

Reading: Re-read 17776 and 20020, it's been a moment. 20020 is incredible, 17776 was already good but it had to spend so long setting the scene that it couldn't do as much storytelling. Unbidden my comparison to this came as "Avatar S2 Vs S3"

Man I hope 20021 gets out soon. Great how it can get you so deeply invested in this multi-millennium fake football game. The introduction of the Illinois Chess bit to show that everyone has gone equally crazy about their interests over the past 18000 years is a nice touch.

Playing: Knocking out a couple matches of Valorant swiftplay most nights after the power comes back. The first to 5 is so much faster than first to 13, makes it possible for someone like me to actually enjoy the game when I don't have friends to banter with so I can level up at an acceptable speed. Trying to get Neon because nyoom.

Between everyone having power outages at different times it's nearly impossible to arrange proper matches with my friends, which sucks. I recently found out that they changed how aim rollback works to basically exclude my entire region from rollback netcode so I guess I have to start leading my shots.

Making: Quilt continues apace, now with actual quilting and not just patchwork. This is most of what I'm doing between finishing work and like, seven in the evening these days.

My cousin bought a very fast new car a few days ago and I spent the afternoon photographing it on a rooftop parking lot the other day. Haven't had a chance to go through and do full processing but here's a couple sample images.

Tools and Equipment: Had to spend an hour scouring the house looking for my parents passports so here's a pitch for getting a waterproof bag and keeping all your important personal documents in it and putting that in your bug out pack and putting that in the same place all the time. This avoids many issues.

[krejong]

Better late than never, right? : What's "hard headed woman" about? Fingers crossed for more Leo/Karin content🤞🏻

Thanks for your ask! 🌞

(Also literally do not worry, I would answer these even if you sent them a month after I posted the tag aha. Plus you have ~special~ circumstances re: internet access so again literally do not worry about being late).

So this is Leo/Karin content! It's the third installment of the RP! series actually. This time from Leo's POV (see how I'm switching POVs, how intricate, right??) The story is that Leo is a doctor, and Karin's fallen from her bike (the plots on these are never very complicated, also because I'm trying to fit them into a >2.5k word format.)

Anyway, here's an excerpt for you :))

"“I’ll just have you change into a hospital gown, so your clothing doesn’t contaminate the MRI machine environment.”

Ms Gorniak made to slide off the examination table, moving her legs over the long side of it. Leo came closer, and it was a good thing she did: as soon as Ms Gorniak’s feet hit the ground, she almost went to her knees, her arm grasping out for support. Leo caught her. Her skin was warm and soft under her hands. 

“Oops, careful there,” Leo said breezily, “I think you’ll find that hypotension and concussion symptoms do not combine particularly well.”

Ms Gorniak huffed something that could have been a laugh. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” Leo said. She had Ms Gorniak sit back down on the examination table sideways, then scurried to her cupboard to grab her a hospital gown. “I’m afraid the nursing staff is a bit overstretched at the moment, but we’ll make do, won’t we? Here, let me help you get this on.”

She waited for Ms Gorniak to unzip her hoodie and shrug it off. Then she came closer, and sank down to a crouch to untie her shoes, so she wouldn’t have to bend forward. She set the sneakers down next to the exam table, then peeled off her socks. 

Ms Gorniak’s t-shirt was the next thing to go; she bunched the fabric in her hands before lifting it up over her head. It briefly caught in her long hair, but Leo brushed it away, willfully trying to ignore the fluttering in her stomach, as her brain came up with a few other scenarios in which she could be doing that.

“Have these been checked?” she asked with a frown. They sure didn’t look like it, and she didn’t remember the chart mentioning anything about any lesions. “No,” Ms Gorniak said, confirming her expectations. She avoided her eyes; Leo deduced she’d chosen not to inform the nursing staff about it.

Great. A Silent Sufferer.

Leo began palping the contusions that had blossomed over her ribs, carefully checking for any fissures; over the right side of her sternum, the eighth and ninth pair of vertebrochondral ribs. Ms Gorniak hissed when Leo brushed a pear-coloured spot. “Sorry,” Leo mumbled, continuing her ministrations with a single-minded focus. She opened the button of Ms Gorniak’s jeans, unzipped them, and worked them around Ms Gorniak’s buttocks and down her legs. 

Ms Gorniak was now sitting on her exam table in nothing but a heather grey bra and matching tanga briefs, and however much Leo was willing herself to remain totally professional, she couldn’t help the slight flush she could feel burning on her cheeks. 

“Should I take this off as well?” Ms Gorniak asked, looking down at her underwear and sounding rather indifferent to the answer. 

“No, you’re alright,” Leo said. It wasn’t necessary for the procedure, and equally as important, she might spontaneously combust if she was expected to completely denude her. She didn’t know what it was about this woman in particular that had her this flustered. Leo prided herself on being a competent and thorough physician, and she wasn’t looking to break that habit. However much she might want to touch Ms Gorniak all over."