#In an ethereal androgynous elf way | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

scientificdeliriummadness · 7 years

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My partners and I are doing our own DnD campaign. Two of us will be playing two characters each while the other DMs. We’ve already played one session and got to know our characters a little better. Meet Snaggletooth, the Half-orc barbarian pirate who takes things way too literally, Pleiades the sarcastic brooding high elf, Saxon the human soldier WHO CAN SMELL WITCHES, and Legretta, the sexy gnome cleric who loves a good innuendo. Here are the backstories. (Long)

(by Belinda, DM) Welcome to Evermore. Our adventure begins in the country of Opas, possibly one of the largest landmasses on Evermore as well as the most diverse. It is ruled by a King and Queen who make their home in the capital, Everrock, in the northeastern corner of the continent. It is a bustling metropolis, well established as the trading capital of the world as ships come and go regularly from the city ports. The kingdom has known peace for many decades following the Great Revolt where the underground-dwelling grey dwarves and dark elves both fought for the domination of the surface world and its many races. After a sound defeat, both races fled into seclusion as their numbers were greatly reduced, and the surface was once again at peace. Evermore breathed a collective sigh of relief after so many years of turmoil. Militaries relaxed, dropping their numbers in favor of expanding trade and commerce. It is from this city that a great call to arms has been issued. The monarchy seeks only the bravest fighters and adventurers to step within their castle walls and answer the call they have set forth. Strange happenings have been reported from within the kingdom, and a great reward is offered to those who would join beneath the banner of Opas and fight to vanquish any darkness which threatens their peaceful existence. by Connie (Pleiades and Legretta)(I’M NOT A WRITER PLEASE DON’T JUDGE ME) The elf's copper blood filled her cheeks as she watched the gnome modeling her crummy, handmade accessory in the reflection of the water. Luckily, as often and easily as it happens, her embarrassment is masked beneath the faint burn permanently imprinted over her otherwise saturated azure skin. Despite spending so much time as a child outdoors in a typically bright, yet cool climate, her skin suffered no other naturally occurring blemishes other than the soft gradient of light to dark along the regularly exposed portions of her body. It still maintained the same pristine quality you would find from the icy terrain of her hometown, Geminight. Until relatively recently, she tended to dabble in a variety of activities her society had to offer. This was in a futile attempt to live up to all the possibile legacies of her seven preceeding sisters could have achieved had they survived a full gestation period in their mother's womb. No one but herself had expected this of her, but encouraged her to partake in something nonetheless. It seemed to give her some pupose and fulfillment. Although she was not particularly good at anything she picked up, she gained a fondness for it all and it helped her feel a closeness to the sisters she had never met. At the very least, she embodied the spirit of their assemblage and when she came of age, chose to engrain this into her identity with her choice in name: Pleiades. Traditionally, her society embraces the permanence of self-idenity with something a little more literal: a self-inked tattoo. Unfortunately, like with many of her interests, Pleiades lacked the finesse to create something other than a few dots around her left eye that had semblace of what was now her most symbolic constellation.Pleiades watched the gnome put the necklace she had given her around over her little head."There's a little bit of craftsman in everyone....manI love homemade things! They have so much character and love and there's always, like, some kind of special meaning behind it. Even if it's subconscious! I feel so special you let me have it even though you've only known me for literally, like two seconds!" The gnome gleefully giggled while stroking the pieces of the pendant now hanging from her neck.Pleiades appreciated the compliment, but uncharacterstically, she hadn't put too much thought into this particular task. Boredom had overtaken her and she swiped a long spiral shell off the beach and in its opening, stuck a thick rounded piece of weathered glass she found lying near the tavern that opened, in her opinion, way too early in the morning. The gnome had curiously approached her just as she was finishing wrapping the pieces together with some abandoned strip of twine. She was so enthralled by the little trinket that Peiades told her that it was hers if she liked it. Perhaps the gnome wasn't too far off; the blue tint of the glass did remind her of home..A pang of sadness stung her heart as it passed with the fleeting thought. She missed home, or what was left of it. Geminight had experienced a major ecological shift. It was no longer an icy haven, glistening in the sun that hung in theclear blue sky. The temperatures began creeping upward, weather fronts came more frequently and more varied. Vines, weeds, and other foliage broke free from the snow, the gems, and the ice; slowly domineering the region. While the changes weren't detrimental to the survival of the city or its people, the new environment felt entirely unsettling. On top of being unexpected and undesired, it felt dark and sentient. Pleiades did not want to stand by and watch her chilhood be tainted with this feeling. She decided to hold on to the nostalgia and venture out to new things. She had exhausted the petty hobbies her society had offered her and wanted toexperience something grander; a single legacy worthy of her and her sisters. When some vague propaganda from the Everrock government started to appear on bulletins near her, she decided it was time to leave. Her parents willingly stayed behind.The gnome watched Pleiades' expressions as they passed over her face one by one. She noticed a lot negativity and she supposes that's what attracted her to Pleiades in the first place. Gnomes were known tricksters, but she herself liked to focus on the lighthearted nature of her heritage and tends to get tunnel vision when she sees someone in distress. When she noticed the elf sitting alone listlessly on a crate of bait, she recited her motto of "When things look grim, find your grin!" and pranced up to her with a mission for fishin! For compliments. To give the elf." Y'know, I'm glad I saw you making this. It's so unique and I really appreciate that about things. I originally come over to you thinking of a mililon compliments to give you based on just your looks but I had no idea what to say since I'm sure you get complimented all the time...Just look at you! but yeah, you're pretty unique looking too now that I've had a good look..But I dunno, I just appreciate me a good trinket, y'know how us gnomes are."Pleides would probably not be considered epitome of the elvish ethereality that made them so intimidating. In fact, for an elf, she appeared quite neutral and approachable. Double takes were not uncommon when passersby took note her androgynous physique. The sun bleached blonde streaks in her dark blue hair gave it a green appearance if looked at in the right light and angle. And men and women alike also thought that her soft almond eyes suggested more than just the politeness of eye contact. And although her hands struggled with its intricacies, her hair always fell into place perfectly after she finished braiding it."I just appreciate you taking the time to go out of your way to say something nice to me. What's your name?The gnome grinned somewhat amused. She extended her furry hand and said proudly proclaimed "Ranandal Legretta Aaa Thawa Teffata Wata Gah! "There was a pause. "But you can call me Leggy! That's what the humans do anyway, but I grudgingly embrace it. The name “Leggy” works when I..." Legretta stopped for a moment and looked over Pleiades shoulder distractedly. Without a beat, she purposefully walked toward a tall, well built half-orc that just exited the tavern across the sidewalk. "EEeeeeeeyyyy! DAMN boooooooi. You're lookin FOOOOINE. I bet that grog gotchu all loosened up. You know what Leggy could do with a body that limber?" She asked as she flung one of her furry copper legs from her patchwork cloak and around his shin."Auuuughgh" The half-orc responded burping through his words, " nah, goway lil one, Yer so lil y'can't even reach. nainterested" He stumbled away until he reached the corner of the alleyway."Well, fine. I’m having more fun over here anyway" she scoffed over the muffled sounds of distant vomiting. Pleiades didn't even acknowledge the bizarre exchange she just witnessed and carried on "Well, I think the name Leggy might be reserved for someone a little more, um, promiscuous than I. So I'll just practice your nicknames and in the meantime, just stick with Legretta. My name is Pleiades Luaer. I couldn't help but notice, Legretta. You have a unique trait as well..." She said as she eyed Legretta's limbs. "They're really well....tamed" She struggled with the compliment. Legretta's eyes lit up as she stuck out a limb at a time, admiring her own handiwork. "Yeah! Y'know! boy gnomes have big thick beards that they can do whatever with! I even saw an old-ass gnome with a beard so long, he was able to shape it into a flying snake dragon! It's not fair! It' was so cool and I can't! Gnomes don't tend to keep their hair well kept and I wanna stick to the traditions of my heritage! I can't grow a beard..only some wispy tendrils... So I found a loophole.."Legretta had bright platinum blonde body hair contrasting her warm copper skin. It was quite thick and she had trimmed hairs on the legs into little hearts and the hairs on the arms into little diamond shapes. Pleiades grinned bittersweetly, "You remind me of my father. Elves can't grow beards either and he's always resented that fact. So he spent much of his life growing out his hair so long that he could be able to tie it under his chin into a ponytail. He was also quite a open about his sexuality with my mom and they’re always going out of their way to put me in the spotlight, so you also remind me of that. They really were quite embarrassing at times, but I suppose it's different coming from you." She lightly blushed and glanced at the poster that had beckoned her here. Legretta cocked her head to view the poster a bit more easily. "Ahh! Yeah! There's been some spooooky things have been happening here lately." she said as she tucked her face behind her wiggling fingers. "I've been kinda grumpy about the call to arms 'cause I think the strangities have kept this places more fun an interesting, but if you're going, I wanna go! I think it'd be fun. Maybe if we find out what it is, we can be part of it...It'll be fun to prank the traveling merchants, right?...I mean, I guess we can stop it, too. But now that I'm really thinking about it, the mystery is killing me. Can I come?!" Pleiades nodded. "YASSS. Be right back. I live under those sand dunes over there. Lemme go tell my mom." Legretta ran off for only a few minutes and returned with a small basket of sandwiches and her cloak's pockets overflowing with trinkets. She offered Pleiades some food, which she promptly accepted. The gnome walked a couple of feet ahead, looked back and up at Pleiades and said. "Castle's that way. Let's party." by Marty (Saxon and Snaggletooth) Saxon Bloodwulf- Human Fighter From the city of Nightmoor, in the kingdom of Ravenholde comes Saxon Bloodwulf. Once a member of the 13th Legion -the battalion that served as the King of Ravenholde's personal guard, this Captain had it all in his life, until the 13th Legion once arrested a witch who plotted to kill the King. The witch was sentenced to life imprisonment in the dungeons of Nightmoor, where she cried to the city that she swore revenge on Captain Bloodwulf as she was locked away. A fortnight later, Saxon Bloodwulf was seen creeping into the King's castle, and attempted to take the King's life. The King managed to avoid the attempted deathblow that came in the form of a knife and raised the alarm. Saxon was seen by the King's guard on duty that night fleeing the castle and retreating into Nightmoor forest.

The following week, Saxon was found in a village some 50 miles away and was arrested by the very 13th Legion that he was in command of. He claimed his innocence, swearing he had simply taken a holiday the day before he was seen attempting to murder the king, but mysteriously, no record was kept of his absence. Saxon was brought back to Nightmoor, where he was sentenced to death. He spent a single night in the dungeons, the night before his execution, where the witch hinted that she had something to do with Saxon's situation. Shacked and imprisoned in another cell, Saxon was unable to do anything other than vow revenge on the witch and others like her.

The following day, Saxon was to be hung in the city square. By chance, a few moments before he was to be hung, a gang of bandits stormed the city square. In the confusion, Saxon managed to free himself from his rope bonds and he fled Nightmoor, making all speed for the coast. It was at a harbour town that he met a group of pirates who were spending the night in the town, and agreed to take Saxon aboard their ship for a fee of 50 gold coins that Saxon had managed to retrieve from his old house before fleeing Nightmoor. This is how he met...

Snaggletooth- Half Orc Barbarian. Snaggletooth, a 32 year old Half Orc had been part of a crew of pirates known as the Jolly Robbers. This gang of pirates made the ship known as the Fearsome Scabbard their home. They sailed from port to port, taking what they could and giving nothing in return. The Jolly Robbers were actually number one on the navy's most wanted list, but the Jolly Robbers were able to escape the navy's clutches each time it seemed that they were able to be arrested for their crimes. One night, they met a member of the royal army, Saxon Bloodwulf. While suspicious of Saxon, they agreed to take him to the neighbouring continent in return for 50 gold pieces.

They set sail the next day, with Saxon aboard. It was during their voyage on this day that they encountered a freak storm. The storm, which hadn't been foreseen, due to the clear skies that day, tore the Fearsome Scabbard to pieces. Most of the crew died during the storm, but only Saxon Bloodwulf and Snaggletooth survived, thanks in no small part to Saxon's actions. The pair survived on a piece of the Fearsome Scabbard, and they drifted for days, until finding themselves washing up on the shore of the land they find themselves on now.

Snaggletooth, while a pirate, is grateful to Saxon for saving his life during that terrible day of the storm, and for now has decided to accompany Saxon, who has tasked himself with the burden of somehow clearing his name and has become a self appointed Witchfinder General as he is determined to ensure no person be victim to a witch or witchcraft ever again.

#Dnd #dnd 5e #dnd 5e character #gnome #gnome cleric #half orc #half-orc #half-orc barbarian #elf #high elf #elf ranger #human fighter

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latestnews2018-blog · 6 years

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Florence Welch puts herself out there in ‘High as Hope’

New Post has been published on https://latestnews2018.com/florence-welch-puts-herself-out-there-in-high-as-hope/

Florence Welch puts herself out there in ‘High as Hope’

The 31-year-old singer says she’s made herself more vulnerable and is ready to showcase her self-acceptance in her latest album with her band

Florence Welch, of Florence and the Machine, in Manhattan, May 11, 2018. Even for an artist who makes anthems out of the confessional, the upcoming album “High as Hope” represents a new openness, and a new confidence. “It was a very physical record,” she said, “very tactile. Really, the thrill of making a sound has never left me.” (Kathy Lo/The New York Times)

The day that Florence Welch got “Always Lonely” tattooed in blocky print on her left arm, she was not lonely at all. She had spent a blissful day traipsing around New York with a close friend, visiting bookstores, savouring ice creams and coffee, feeling enamoured and alive with the city’s possibilities. She wrote a poem about it, “New York Poem (for Polly),” which contained a line that became the title of the fourth Florence and the Machine album, High as Hope:

Heady with pagan worship

of water towers

fire escapes, ever reaching

high as hope.

And yet there she was, in an East Village tattoo shop, getting that sad phrase inked on her body while her friend (Polly) looked on. Welch, the effervescent leader and songwriter of the British rock band Florence and the Machine, has made a speciality of wringing joy from despair, so she did not think twice about exposing her loneliness.

“I thought that I would just cement it,” she said, “because maybe if I just had it on there, I could own it somehow, make it a part of myself, or embrace that part that I find difficult.”

Welch, 31, is lately very ready to showcase her self-acceptance. Her New York poem is collected in Useless Magic, a book of her lyrics, poetry and drawings that’s out July 10. High as Hope, due June 29, is full of secrets she never thought she would share, let alone sing and dance about in front of fans. Even for an artist who makes anthems out of the confessional — a painful breakup fuelled How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, the group’s last album — High as Hope represents a new openness, and a new confidence, for Welch.

“I made myself more vulnerable and made a step away from the metaphoric,” she said in a recent interview at the Bowery Hotel. “It created a creative bravery. I was like, it’s OK to put yourself out there.”

It was a path she had been on since 2015, with the No. 1 How Big, but even then “I still felt I had something to prove,” she said. “This one, I had a lot of joy in making it.”

“Florence has definitely gone through a transformation,” said her bandmate Isabella Summers, with whom Welch began playing music in her teens in South London, where she grew up. Summers, who plays keys in the group, went on to help produce and write some of Welch’s early work, including the 2009 breakout Dog Days Are Over.

“The first time I really found my sound was working with another woman, working with Isa,” Welch said. “As a young artist, you can struggle to find your voice, and it takes a while to say, ‘No, I want it to be like this.’” Now, she added: “I’m very OK with being in charge. Because I know that I know what I’m doing.”

For this album, Welch took a producing credit for the first time. She spent six months just making demos, mostly on her own. One of the most challenging songs was Hunger, the second single. Its opening line — “At 17, I started to starve myself” — is a reference to an eating disorder that Welch struggled with as a teenager. “I never thought I would talk about it,” she said. “I didn’t really talk about it with my mum until really recently. So to put it in a song — it’s like, what am I doing?”

She worried that people would be angry with her for discussing it, and tried to convince herself to take the line out — the rest of the lyrics deal more obliquely with emptiness. But the song was not as powerful without it. She thought about tossing the whole track off the album, but, she said, “It’s at the heart of it.” Her revelation stayed, and it helped her own understanding. “It definitely was a release for me,” she said. “The songs sometimes have more clarity in them than I do about my life.”

(Welch declined to go into greater detail about her eating disorder, for fear that others would model themselves after her. “When I was in it, I was always, like, hunting for information,” she said. “I want to be responsible.”)

‘A kindred spirit’

Working with producer Emile Haynie (Lana Del Rey’s Born to Die), High as Hope centres, as always, on Welch’s muscular, emotional voice, which can go from ecstatic to mournful in one lilt. The tracks build from piano and earnest percussion toward sometimes lavish instrumentation; the saxophonist Kamasi Washington did arrangements for French horn, tuba, flute and bass clarinet.

Washington, who also plays on the album, signed on quickly — he had ideas the moment he heard the demos. “The thing for me was trying to add without taking away what she had already put in there,” he said. He called Welch a kindred spirit, comparing her to another of his collaborators, Kendrick Lamar, in the purity of her love for music and her freedom to follow where the tune goes in the studio. “It was really cool, every time we’d finish recording, we’d go in the room and she’d have all new vocal parts that she’d created while we were recording the horn parts,” he said.

She starts with the lyrics, filling graph-paper journals at home, some of which are replicated in her book, complete with whimsical doodles. “I could fall in love with a plastic bag, if it paid me some attention,” goes one, with a sketch of a heart-adorned bag. The album has its share of songs about wanting, and love, though not always romantic love — Patricia is about Patti Smith, whom Welch calls her North Star. Though Welch herself is bad with directions (she gets lost even in the grid of Manhattan, she said), her music has an urbane sense of geography, skittering from scenes in a rainy Los Angeles to a bleak Chicago and a nostalgic London. And it also gets wry. The song Big God is about “obviously, an unfillable hole in the soul,” Welch said, “but mainly about someone not replying to my text.”

In a two-hour conversation, she laughed often, and robustly. In the hotel lounge, she spilled her secrets in a voice loud enough to demonstrate she did not care who else heard; she has the surprisingly rare ability, as an artist, to translate how her emotions and music intersect. “You know, having an overactive mind and overthinking stuff, and being anxious — ever since I was a kid, if I had a song that I could follow, everything would become very calm,” she said. “It was like this cocoon that I could go into.”

She was sitting on a dusty-gold velvet couch, beneath a Renaissance-looking tapestry, that, in her own vintage tapestry coat and ruffled ivory blouse, she might have slid right out of. She wore necklaces and rings on six fingers, many adorned with horseshoes, and tucked her wild, softly glowing hair over her right shoulder. Her natural colour is more mousy reddish-brown than her signature flaming tresses, she said. In concert, her energy is brash and soaring, and she moves as if the music is catapulting her — a fierceness that seems at odds, but should not be, with her romantic vibe.

Almost as soon as she came on the scene, Welch became a fashion industry darling, but her ethereal look was nearly happenstance, said Tom Beard, a director and photographer who began shooting the musician when they were students at Camberwell College of Arts in South London in the mid-2000s, and continued to create her album covers. The first photos he took of her, at a festival, she wore a pink dress and elf ears; Summers, her bandmate, remembered this period as being full of glitter. Only after Beard and Welch checked out an exhibit of Pre-Raphaelite art at the Tate museum did she transition to her much-copied flowy-boho-goddess aesthetic, he said.

For the tour after How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, Welch experimented with a more androgynous (for her) style, all angular suits. It was, she said, a reaction to her heartbreak: “I was almost angry at the more vulnerable, feminine sides of myself, because they seemed weak.” But it felt like a pose.

Now, she said, as she’s collapsing the boundaries between her on- and offstage life, she wants to wear more real-world clothes — even sleepwear. “On this record, I was embracing the femininity, embracing the things I really liked, embracing that you can still be powerful and strong and scary in a pink nightie,” she said.

Beard, her friend since her earliest days as an artist, said she is now being more truthful than he’s ever seen. “It’s the confidence of 12 years,” he said. “What she’s putting out there is the Flo that I know and I’ve always known.”

Listening to her record in the studio, he said that he welled up. “When you’re not holding anything back, no one can hurt you anymore, can they?” he said. “Whatever was hurting her, I can just hear it in her voice, how collected she is now. She’s comfortable with the person that she is.”

Her fall tour for High as Hope is her biggest yet, with headlining stops at arenas like the Hollywood Bowl and Barclays Center in Brooklyn. At a preview show at the Brooklyn Academy of Music last month, the stage heaved with flowers and moss and baby’s breath hung overhead, like clouds. Beforehand, she had joked that the tour “could be called, like, ‘On Nightgowns and Spiritual Confusion’ because that’s what it is, I’m in a nightgown being confused about things in a loud way.”

But when she walked onstage, de-accessorised and barefoot, in a shell-pink lingerie gown and lace-edged bed jacket, there were no doubts. She stalked the floor with the fervour of a preacher, raising her arms in exaltation and executing balletic spins. In the end, she made her way into the crowd, for a communion. “Tell someone you don’t know that you love them,” she instructed. “Make it awkward.”

In real life and in performance, Welch is looking for connection. “I quite like the idea of putting really big, unanswerable spiritual questions in pop songs,” she said earlier. “We can be together in this moment, and celebrate the not-knowing, and perhaps feel closer to each other. We can jump up and down. If you just dance about it, you will feel better.”

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