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raul-volp2 · 1 year

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City Noire is my main personal project, and a very messy one, I have teh tabletop rpg that Im going to make a text with a big analysis of what the ttrpg is, how it's progressing, its issues, a big depressing look of it. But now talking about my other CIty Noire project, a digital turn based tactical strategy/rpg with stealth elements.

This is the passion project that it's probably never going to see the light of day, simply because I am trying to make while learning to work with game engine and programming, Im a game designer and artist but have 0 programming skill, so it's been painfully difficult work with it. My hope is to use a visual script to help to lessen some of the coding (please Playmaker Visual Script for Unity have a promotion these days, my birthday is in August, give me this gift).

But lacking of skills aside, what City Noire Digital (im thinking calling it City Noire Tactics or City Noire Rogue Crew) is. In it you control a faction of rebels trying to take down the IMperial Tyrant in the City Noire, liberating districts, defeating the factions aligned with the Tyrant that control the districs, help other Rebel Factions that oppose the Tyrant and make Side Quests for unique characters around the City.

The gameplay loop is divided into the City Map and Tactical Map. The City Map is where players manage their faction, choosing upgrades for their crew, researching new techs, upgrading and recruiting new crew and choosing the next missions. The missions would be divided into City Missions, whre players fight in a district controlled by an enemy faction lowering it's influence on it, defend liberated districts from enemy factions, helping an npc with a side quests , missions to help and advance relationship with other Rebel factions and Fight Main Story missions when it's possible. There would also have events where the player make choices that can help or hinder their development.

The missions will be turn based and the player crew (between 3 to 5 characters) start in stealth mode and need to infiltrate the enemy base to complete the objective, objectives can be sabotage an armory, steal valuable object, eliminate a important target, free an ally and other kind of missions. Missions will not have a time limit, but they will have a clock that will increase the challenge as long player istay in the missions, adding more enemies, security systens, upgrade enemy equipments.

The idea is for players to have frredom to approach missions the way they see fit, the game will have a focus on stealth approach but allow an aggressive style, and can upgrade their characters with the approach they want.

The player crew will be divided into different classes with unique skill tree and equipment, like The Shade uses a sword and hand crossbow as it's main weapons, and The Eye can dual weild pistol or use 2 hand guns like rifles and shotguns. They get upgrade by spending Runes, a resource players gain from completing missions and robbing on the mission map. So if the player want to have a better upgraded team of crew they need to take more risk approach on the map.

While the game will have a small sandbox approach on the City Map, with players choosing which mission they want to take, they will always have the main objective that is defeat the Tyrant, and that mission will require a more linear approach.

This game I view as a mix of 2 of my favorite genres, Turn Based tTactical Strtegy and Immersive Sim, and I know this is a tall order for one person to make, those are verydifficulty genres to work by themselves, and mix those 2 is a nightmare, not counting that I am learning to work on UNity at the same time, so I am setting myself for failure here, but I think that there are ideas that is worth trying and fail, at least I would have tried.

#pixelart #pixel art #pixel #gameart #pixelartist #rpg #strategy game #turn based strategy #gamedev #game dev #game design #gamedesign #game development

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furryprovocateur · 1 year

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a day later and i can finally post the update

extremely shitty chapter for ranks because there's basically no way you're hitting both experience and tactics. that said, the obvious choice to prioritize is tactics. i've said it before and i'll say it again: tactics is universally convertible as far as ranks go; you can burn turns to build up funds or experience, but the reverse isn't possible. so, i'm very happy i was able to hit par on this one. and i'm really surprised i got as much experience as i did, because i was expecting it to be somewhere between 500-700 experience at most.

marcus was basically necessary to field if i was gonna hit tactics for this chapter. you need to rescue hector and jump him far ahead in the map if you're gonna hit 7 turns, and florina can't do it because of the archer + ballista. hell, even without them, it'd still be risky to throw florina into a swarm of enemies. so i ended up rescuing hector with marcus on turn 3 and bolted marcus towards bauker. he's thankfully durable enough to handle getting all the attention from enemies without dying. i also lucked out a bit because where like two or three different enemies could've been aggressive after being hit by marcus, they instead chose to retreat and use vulneraries, essentially removing them from the path of resistance.

lyn's people were in a really precarious position because of the two aggressive PKs, but i managed to work out kent to kill one and lyn/will doubling up on another. sain is a fucking wrecking ball and was able to take out the dangerous mercenary and myrmidon near lyn's group. the downside is that sain is like a better marcus while still having the marcus flaw of being an experience hog. probably not gonna field him until around pirate ship or the dread isle.

i mentioned her earlier, but florina is insanely useful thanks to lyn mode bonuses. TAS strats be damned, florina having like 12 strength at level 9 is fucking silly. she's also surprisingly durable compared to average due to having the angelic robe boost. i'm gonna be using the living SHIT out of her.

trying to baby kent in the mean time since he's relatively behind. still better than lowen (who's probably going to be warming the bench very very soon). i'm not sure what i want to do about erk either; i wanted to use erk to boost the experience rank, but HHM deployment slots are tight and i'm not sure it's worth my time to try and worry about experience this early. i'll meditate on it.

level ups were good or average so i'm happy. guy's coming out very nicely, lyn's not as durable as i'm used to (i always give her the angelic robe casually) but she's still a sniper rifle of a unit thanks to her strength + mani katti. eliwood got hp strength and skill, which isn't an outstanding level up, but at this point, it's better than what i've gotten so i'm happy. i've felt fairly lucky that eliwood is the only "bad" unit i've had, everyone has gotten good level ups for the most part. if anything, the only real stifling thing is deployment slots. i think i'll have to put experience on the back-burner and hope that if i need to boost it, i can use people like nino and farina to save it (yes i'm planning on recruiting farina 🤪)

#long #long post #i should start tagging these with fire emblem for my own blog's convenience #fire emblem

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newstfionline · 9 months

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Sunday, December 17, 2023

No room at the inn? (AP) It could be a cold, grim New Year for thousands of migrant families living in New York City’s emergency shelter system. With winter setting in, they are being told they need to clear out, with no guarantee they’ll be given a bed elsewhere. Homeless migrants and their children were limited to 60 days in city housing under an order issued in October by Mayor Eric Adams, a move the Democrat says is necessary to relieve a shelter system overwhelmed by asylum-seekers crossing the southern U.S. border. That clock is now ticking down for people like Karina Obando, a 38-year-old mother from Ecuador who has been given until Jan. 5 to get out of the former hotel where she has been staying with her two young children. Where she will end up next is unclear. After that date, she can reapply for admission to the shelter system. A placement might not happen right away. Her family could wind up getting sent to one of the city’s huge tent shelters far from where her 11-year-old son goes to school.

U.S. Military Returns to the Jungle, Training for a Very Different Threat (NYT) One by one, the American soldiers slid down a muddy hillside to a river deep in the Hawaiian jungle. With guns on top of rucksacks, they kicked their way across, wobbling in the current, trying to stay quiet. It was a sluggish advance stinking of sweat and silt—reminiscent of Vietnam, and similar to what they might face in a potential fight with China almost anywhere in the Pacific. Military strategists like to say the jungle is neutral, helping neither friend nor foe, but for most of the 79 students last month at the U.S. Army’s only jungle school, “the J” was just plain new. It was nothing like home or deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, which explained why they were there: To deter China and work effectively with partners in the region, American ground forces need more jungle expertise. The Marine Corps has been assigning a significant portion of its force to the muggy, rainy terrain of Okinawa, Japan, and training with partners near the Equator.

‘People Snatchers’: Ukraine’s Recruiters Use Harsh Tactics to Fill Ranks (NYT) With Ukraine’s military facing mounting deaths and a stalemate on the battlefield, army recruiters have become increasingly aggressive in their efforts to replenish the ranks, in some cases pulling men off the streets and whisking them to recruiting centers using intimidation and even physical force. Recruiters have confiscated passports, taken people from their jobs and, in at least one case, tried to send a mentally disabled person to military training, according to lawyers, activists and Ukrainian men who have been subject to coercive tactics. Videos of soldiers shoving people into cars and holding men against their will in recruiting centers are surfacing with increasing frequency on social media and in local news reports. The harsh tactics are being aimed not just at draft dodgers but at men who would ordinarily be exempt from service—a sign of the steep challenges Ukraine’s military faces maintaining troop levels in a war with high casualties, and against a much larger enemy.

Shell shortages force us to limit firing, Ukrainian troops tell BBC (BBC) A crackling sound on the radio sends instructions to artillerymen waiting inside a US-made M-109 Paladin howitzer. “We have a new target.” Immediately, the entire crew springs into action. The engine roars. One of the gunners pushes a projectile into the barrel. The gun is loaded. “Fire!” he shouts, and pulls the cord. A deafening explosion shakes the armoured machine. They fire just one round, and then wait for the next command. But after a prolonged silence, the same crackling voice on the radio gives them an order: “Stand down and cover the gun.” Ukraine’s gunners have to use ammunition rounds sparingly, as there is a shortage of artillery shells. Their gun, like most artillery systems provided by the West, fires 155-mm projectiles that are also supplied by foreign partners. The problem is, Ukraine’s troops need more rounds than their allies can currently give them.

“Clash Of Civilizations” Fervor Grips Turkey (Diken/Turkey) The ceasefire for the hostage exchanges was brief. Israel is back to carrying out massacres in Gaza with utter disregard for the women, children and elderly they may kill. Since the war began, there is no doubt that Israel committed a series of offenses that would logically be within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. There are people that have made a point of evaluating the current events in the Middle East as an extension of the so-called “clash of civilizations.” Here in Turkey, the massacres committed by Israel in Gaza, and the support granted from Western countries, seems to have augmented a belief that the historic “clash between East and West” is accelerating. Most of those who support the Palestinian people and condemn Israel also see the West as the accomplice to an Israeli genocide in Gaza. Moving outside the traditional Israel-Palestine question, the current war in Gaza has turned into a conflict between the cross and the crescent, a conflict between Islam and the West.

Private Gun Ownership in Israel Spikes After Hamas Attacks (NYT) In Israel, a nation of 9 million people, roughly 150,000 held private gun licenses in 2021, a figure that had dropped by about 20 percent over the previous decade, according to the National Security Ministry. The overwhelming majority of such licenses are for handguns. But in the aftermath of Oct. 7, Israelis have submitted at least 256,000 applications for gun licenses, including many who had never before considered owning a weapon. Israel’s current far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has long pushed for an expansion of gun ownership, and in mid-October, lawmakers signed off on eased gun ownership regulations promulgated by his office. Young adults with assault rifles slung over their shoulders are a common sight in Israel, where hundreds of thousands are soldiers on active duty or reservists with weapons stashed at home. But despite decades of insecurity, private gun ownership never approached the levels seen in the United States, where surveys show about one-third of adults own firearms. “Israel won’t become the United States,” said one former security official. “But we will pay a big price, as a society, for this proliferation of private weaponry: more gunfire accidents, more suicides, more kids playing with guns, more daily conflicts escalating to drawn guns.”

Detained without charge (BBC) Since the Hamas attacks on 7 October, Israel has been detaining Palestinians at its highest rate in years. Known as “administrative detention”, the longstanding security policy allows the Israeli state to imprison people indefinitely without charge, and without presenting any evidence against them. “What really gets to you is the uncertainty,” 17-year-old Yazen Alhasnat said, sitting in his living room. “Will you finish your six months and leave? Or will you be extended for a year, for two years?” The detainees can mount an appeal, all the way up to Israel’s Supreme Court, but with no access to the evidence against them, they have nothing to base it on. Israel’s use of the policy in the West Bank had “crossed all lines—red, green, every colour”, Yazen’s mother Sadiah said. “We are living under a parallel system of justice.” Israel says its use of the policy is compliant with international law.

Gaza families beg for bread, eat donkey meat as aid deliveries falter (Reuters) People in Gaza described begging for bread, paying 50 times more than usual for a single can of beans and slaughtering a donkey to feed a family as food aid trucks were unable to reach most parts of the bombarded Palestinian territory. “Aid? What aid? We hear about it and we don’t see it,” said Abdel-Aziz Mohammad, 55, displaced from Gaza City and sheltering with his family and three others, about 30 people in total, at the house of friends who live further south. “I used to have a big house, two fridges full of food, electricity and mineral water. After two months of this war, I am begging for some loaves of bread,” he said by telephone. “It is a war of starvation. They (Israel) forced us out of our homes, they destroyed our homes and businesses and drove us to the south where we can either die under their bombs or die of hunger.” The head of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said on Thursday hungry people were stopping its aid trucks to take food and eat it straight away.

Shipping firms are suspending routes in the Red Sea (Washington Post) This month at least six commercial ships traveling through the Red Sea have been subjected to drone and missile attacks as they approached the narrow Bab el-Mandeb Strait. The attacks have come from Houthi rebels, who since 2014 have controlled a large portion of western Yemen, including the capital, Sanaa, and coastal areas along the Red Sea. The attacks endanger ships traveling through this vital corridor with cargo and energy shipments from the Suez Canal through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and out to the Indian Ocean. The Houthis have claimed that these attacks are aimed at ending the Israeli air and ground offensive targeting the Gaza Strip and Hamas. The Red Sea is defined by two narrow waterways: to the north, the Suez Canal, an Egyptian waterway; and to the south, the Bab al-Mandab Strait. The strait is only 20 miles wide and is bordered by Djibouti and Eritrea to the west and Yemen to the east. Nearly 10 percent of all oil traded at sea passes through it, and an estimated $1 trillion in goods moves through the strait annually. The Strait of Hormuz, which is the entryway to the Persian Gulf and is bordered by Iran and Oman, is roughly 30 miles wide, for comparison.

A heavy building wouldn’t budge—so workers bought 700 bars of soap (Washington Post) As Sheldon Rushton prepared to move a 440,000-pound building earlier this month, he realized he was missing a crucial piece of equipment: soap. Rushton’s construction company had been tasked with moving a nearly 200-year-old Canadian building a few feet to make space for a new apartment complex. But the building wouldn’t budge until it became slippery with soap, Rushton said. To help complete the project, Rushton’s wife, Leanne, went to 15 stores to buy every bar she could find of Ivory soap, the brand Rushton said is the softest. It took four days and more than $970, but by last week, Rushton’s crew had 700 bars of soap to unpackage and place under the building. After the soap made the steel beams and the bottom of the building slippery last week, construction workers moved the structure in Halifax, the capital of Nova Scotia. Rushton said he has moved buildings with soap dozens of times. Small buildings only need between 20 and 40 bars of soap, he said, but the building in Halifax was the heaviest he has moved in his five decades working in construction. After the crew put away their equipment, Rushton said, “And we all smelled good when we left there.”

#headlines #news

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violetsystems · 2 years

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#personal

I didn't journal yesterday because it's been particular tense with my neighbors. For the record, the girl who confronted me as I was waiting for a package doesn't appear on our mailbox. She's a guest of the property. A running theme of problems I've had with people on this property intimidating me. I had been waiting for a package from target. I had an open police report for a package that was stolen behind the gate to our apartment where they live on our property. I have a picture of it from Fedex. There's a front gate and a gangway gate that leads to the back. I had been reloading the tracking on my phone. I was worried about things being stolen. A group of about six male adolescents strolled pass acting suspicious. One of them wore a blatant statement shirt that said "In my defense, I was left unsupervised." I looked it up and it referred to a reddit thread about guns. My FOID card was also stolen from that mailbox. I had to contact the state police to get it resent. I didn't take any pictures at that point. They walked to the end of the block then loitered for a minute, laughing and looking back in my direction. The neighbor's girlfriend came strolling around that corner behind them out of nowhere almost rehearsed and they started to rotate back, laughing to themselves. She paced herself to arrive just as they walked past a second time. By the time, they passed the front gate the girl stepped on the property behind the gate and started to berate me. Her boyfriend stepped out over the threshold but said nothing aping a forced look of disbelief. "Why are you taking pictures of these children? You can't take pictures of minors." It felt hurtful, accusatory and set up. I started to explain myself and she got more aggressive driving home the guilt of taking a photo of a minor which she didn't even see happen. See stood on our property bending over the locked gate where I sat behind. The children started to join in trying to start a fight. This is the tactic of the proud boys. Start street fights where they think they can get away with it. I guess this time by manipulating children. There's definitely records of educators recruiting children into gangs in my city. When the child started to get aggressive and threatening I left them all and went inside. I had submitted a tip about the neighbor in the gangway to the FBI over a year ago. I got on the computer and submitted another one about the incident. I found the open police report for the stolen item in my junk mail and resubmitted it. It had been denied because they stated the address wasn't valid. They approved it two minutes later after sending it. It's always at the mailbox. In this case, my mail in ballot was waiting for me at the time though I didn't want to leave the property to check the mailbox. I felt targeted and threatened. Ironically, over a year ago was the same exact thing.

That summer I went to check the mail and my COBRA renewal was in the mailbox last July. It was a year exactly since I had been let go from my job. That very same neighbor was having his bike fixed on the next property over by someone from my old job. It felt forced, serendipitous and planned. I've been entrapped before. Around the world. And for an entire year, no one from my old place of employment would talk to me or empathize with what happened. This felt cultish and manipulative. And over a year and a half later, yesterday felt worse. It felt like intimidation. And the intimidation has a pattern. Earlier in the summer, the couple that accused me of taking photos of minors watched me help two minors carry a piece of furniture from in front of our house down the street. They seem to be at the right place at the right time to observe and look authoritatively at whatever I do. But the key here is that minors are always involved. Like they coach them to interact and perform weird interventions that take advantage of my civic nature. I've been living here at the same address for almost eleven years. I am the only person who has. One of the neighbors I was having problems with moved out but eerily enough seems to still live on the property next door. As a man. They were transgender when they lived here. In fact, I still have suspicions they still stay in the apartment over here and receive mail here. Like they have two identities and switch back and forth between this property and the next. To make matters worse, I've delivered mail from the Chicago Police Department addressed to them. So it makes you wonder if all of this is just one long setup that goes nowhere. The landlord doesn't want to talk about it. The neighborhood follows me around and bullies me like a bunch of nazi gestapo. They're all tied together and they've stolen federal mai from me more than ten times. The police do nothing. The FBI does nothing. The problem keeps getting worse. And I get the feeling it's like people trying to intimidate me to move from a situation that is in my best interests. I'm the only name in this building that was filled out on the census that still lives here. My apartment is part of a strange zoning experiment. And I feel like it's given this entire neighborhood the right to conspire with the police to fuck with me with no rights or due process. They just act like a gang. Like terrorists who have studied and analyzed everything about me in a sort of fair game scientology sort of way to destroy my life. And nobody does anything except waits for me to give up.

And when all is said and done nothing changes. Things get more violent. Dead animals thrown in my path and in front of my window. The same property where I see multiple people walk back and forth between our building and theirs. It's fucked up. It feels like they are trying to build an argument that my security cameras are a nuisance or worse. And in some ways, it seems like they have nothing to back their shit up. Especially with a paper trail with the police and the federal authorities. I've had shit traps set up on the property. I've had people who live on the property follow me around the city as if they've been surveilling me. And I've had no legal counsel, help, or acknowledgment that I exist. It all feels like a secret punishment from a bunch of people who are above the law enough to manipulate children to fight me. And the city just sits here and waits for it to boil over. I don't know what to do. I don't think a lawyer will do any good. In the meanwhile, I'm completely invisible and dead in the water in the job market. I'm ridiculed and libeled behind my back. They act like I've been exiled by some secret FISA court they hold the warrants for. And yet, it's all engineered and fails. They never have the balls to be normal. To confront the truth. And have no problem ganging up on me like I'm a gang member to be pushed out of a community that is literally racketeering property to save their own pensions in the fire fighter and police organizations they brag about being a part of in front of me with obvious t-shirts and bullying tactics. These people are fucking criminals. And I can't really write 3000 words every week to explain without a lawyer anymore to take action. So I don't know what to do anymore. I don't have a real life. I don't go anywhere. My friends have alienated me for super star dj careers with Scientologist drug addicts. I have a crossdressing aggro male who lives on both properties with two different identities. I am being made to doubt my sanity while the federal government watches. And I've had my federal mail tampered with so many times, that I feel these people have so many lawyers behind them they can berate and attack me into submission. I don't know how else to explain it anymore. I need someone to make these people explain themselves. And I"m afraid it's the whole United States now. A country I no longer belong in. But I'm going to die trapped in just the same because nobody wants to admit I have human rights or the right to work and incur income. At least I still get to vote when eight people aren't ganging up on me who have used an entire year and a half to study me like a guinee pig. These fuckers are nothing but nazis just like Kanye. Let them answer for it in public since they're not very good at hiding it any more.. Maybe they'll finally incriminate themselves. Maybe this blog will help that happen faster. <3 Tim

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aspecpplarebeautiful · 3 years

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What is the aro/ace exclusionist movement? What do they believe and who are they? You mentioned that terfs often use it as a stepping stone to get people to believe transphobic rhetoric, can you elaborate on that? I’ve never seen anything about this, so I’d like to be more informed about it.

What is the aro/ace exclusionist movement?

The ace/aro exclusionist movement was something that began sometime around 2015, a wave of people claiming to be part of the discourse suddenly started overtaking ace/aro spaces and tags, especially here on Tumblr. The discourse being whether or not aces and aro (though usually aces as they often forgot aros existed) should be in lgbtqia+ spaces.

Most of their arguments weren't new, a lot of what they were saying are things I've been seeing around for years. What was new was the name 'discourse' and I think also calling themselves 'exclusionist' and just the force of it. What used to be a very rare isolated comment was suddenly flooding ace/aro spaces.

What do they believe and who are they?

Instead of giving a breakdown I'm going to post the LGBTA Wiki page on this which shares a lot of their arguments and tactics they used. But basically they seemed to believe aces/aros weren't valid identities or if they were they weren't LGBTQIA+ identities.

They seemed to be a mix of people. From radfems, especially TERFS (but also a lot of SWERF rhetoric seemed to make its way into their posts), and a lot of young people who didn't know much about the community and its history seemed to be the largest groups.

You mentioned that terfs often use it as a stepping stone to get people to believe transphobic rhetoric, can you elaborate on that?

Yeah, so two parts to this. Number one is that ace/aro exclusionist rhetoric and TERF rhetoric is extremely similar to the point some arguments are almost 1 for 1.

Some examples I've seen personally:

'I just don't want cishets in lgbt spaces' vs 'i just don't want men in women's spaces'. Cishet is a common dogwhistle for ace/aro people the same way 'men' is a common dog whistle for transwomen.

'There is no A, it's just LGBT' vs 'It's 'It's LGB not LGBT.' Just like TERFs want to drop the T, and will even pretend there was never a T, or it's just a fringe movement adding it on, despite it being there for years. Ace/aro exclusionists act like the full acronym is LGBT and it's always been that way when it a. hasn't been that for years, and b. wasn't always those four letters.

'Allo is a slur' vs 'cis is a slur.' Sometimes they don't say it's a slur but will say it's disrespectful to their identity to be referred to that way.

'The LGBT community is a community about attraction and gender identity, not about if you like sex or not' vs 'The LGB community is about attraction, not about gender'.

And we have documented posts of TERFS using the ace/aro exclusionist movement to try and recruit people by pointing out how similar the rhetoric is: Here's one that was going around for a while.

But the very basics of if they can get you believing these things about one group of people, it takes very little work to convince people the same logic can apply to trans people. I'm also not sure if we know the real origins of the movement, but TERFs have definitely been a part of it since the beginning. And while a lot of ace/aro exclusionists claim to be anti-TERF, it's very rare to find a TERF who isn't also an ace/aro exclusionist.

The ace/aro exclusionist movement has definitely died down a lot here on Tumblr, they were very aggressive for a long time. The wider LGBTQ+ community has also in general caught up to them and gotten better and countering their tactics, but it was basically everywhere in 2015 and 2016. And I remember things like being on ace/aro themed discord servers and they'd join and troll, or they'd harass ace/aro blogs (including this one, though I have a block and don't interact policy). It was definitely a really difficult time for the community. They are still around, there's some tags you can find them in sometimes, though I think they're more active on sites like Twitter and TikTok where they can get away with it more. The best way to avoid them is definitely hang out in more moderated spaces.

So hopefully that gives you a bit of a rundown and covers most of the basics. If you have more questions though or want anything elaborated on, let me know.

All the best, Anon!

#the so called discourse cw #radfem cw #transphobia cw

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arcane-ish · 3 years

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My boy Ekko, leader of tomorrow plot bunnies

Story concepts that I wish people would use in fic that I don't think will ever happen because it's too plotty but I'm going to do it anyway, because dammit my boy Ekko is a true leader!

Ekko is the middle ground between Vander and Silco

AU where both Vander and Silco are around either as competing leaders in Zaun or still working together, but still disagreeing over the best methods.

In the end, it is Ekko who convinces them that it isn't just between violence and inaction, but that they have to find a healthy middle ground where they still proactively push for change but with "medium-level" tactics. And he makes it clear to them that the piece they've been missing is more aggressively and proactively building up the community and creating infrastructure (from schools to water purification plants) and defending said infrastructure if Piltover or the chem barons come for it.

He's also their future son in law

A Noxian Invasion

I would LOVE for someone to write a really in-depth fanfic where Noxus tries to invade Piltover. They would definitely contact people in Zaun and offer them independence within the Noxian empire and revenge on Piltover if they help Noxus take over Piltover.

And Ekko (or whatever other leaders are left in Piltover) would have to decide, do they fight for Noxus? For Piltover? Do they try to stay out of it? What if some people within Zaun (ie some chem barons) to ally with Noxus, do they fight their own then?

If they try to decide their home against Noxus, how is their relationship with Piltover, does it bond them together fighting side by side, is Piltover still snooty about their abilities? Is Piltover trying to use Zaunites as cheap cannon fodder? Do Zaunites employ more brutal or more guerilla tactics?

Silco and Ekko have a serious political debate

I would love a fanfic where Ekko, masked, as Firelight leader comes to meet with Silco. He for example demands that Silco stop the Shimmer trade and Silco is very "don't try to talk about things you don't understand, we need the Shimmer trade to be economically independent" versus Ekko's "it's hurting people right now". And Silco might beat back with Ekko is wasting his time by trying to fight Silco when he should be fighting Piltover. And Ekko could hit back by accusing Silco of having spent the last years sitting on his ass and getting rich and not advancing the revolution.

Silco tries to rope in Ekko... for a while

Now I personally think that in canon Silco didn't consider worth his time or a useful idiot at the most. (or you know, a traitor because he fights Silco rather than fighting against Piltover)

But I would love a hypothetical fanfic where Silco decides he is going to indulge Ekko a little bit and see where Ekko's loyalties lie. I think from a character point of view Silco isn't really interested anymore in allies that aren't just straight up taking orders from him/neatly slot themselves in underneath him. But let's say for whatever reason he thinks it might be convenient to toy with Ekko for a bit.

He asks Ekko what he can offer Ekko in exchange for Ekko working for him or at least ramp down the attacks a bit or do a specific job for him (maybe they have a chem baron rival or somebody like Urgot or Camille who both of them dislike and want to get rid of, or they both have people in Stillwater they want to be broken out and yes it would be awesome if Silco sent Jinx, partially as a provocation with how many Firelights she has killed, but they have to work together to get whatever thing they want to get done done). Let's say Ekko dares Silco to build a school or a community center and in turn Silco does that but tries to get Ekko tied up in the day to day details of running that thing. (in my mind at this point Ekko is all doing his while still being masked, but whatever works for the story)

Ekko founds the Zaunite Justice League

In recent League lore Ekko recruits a Zaunite girl from I think one of the higher/mid levels from Zaun with electric powers named Zeri. I would love for him to recruit more League characters, I guess the young ones like Ezreal or even Seraphine would make the most sense. Or Viktor could be their tech guy. And yes of course he would also try to recruit Jinx or at least have her as a loose ally which would cause problems with other team members.

Maybe Caitlyn and Vi would somewhat skeptically watch this development.

Maybe a Noxian plot or a Void plot (ie there are some cultists try to let in the Void and they are spread out all over the city)? Or just general anti Chembaron stuff?

(alternatively, this could also lend itself to a comedy story where they do nothing but hang around in their clubhouse and squabble over what they should do next)

#arcane #arcane plotbunnies #ekko #silco #vander #jinx #timebomb

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zuko-always-lies · 3 years

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Was Zuko “Correct” to Object to General Bujing’s Plan?

So this is going to be a weird post, because war is entirely awful, so awful that we perhaps can’t or shouldn’t attach rules of morality to it. And clearly getting large numbers of Fire Nation troops killed off in imperialistic war of aggression is something awful, and at a certain level Zuko is absolutely right to object to what was going on.

Yet looking at what was going on through the lens of military ethics might give us a better understanding of why Zuko’s actions were looked upon so poorly.

“The Storm”:

General: The Earth Kingdom defenses are concentrated here. (Cut to a view from the throne, where the Fire Lord is watching the generals discuss the situation, the cut back to the speaker.) General: A dangerous battalion of their strongest earthbenders and fiercest warriors, so I am recommending the 41st division. Old General: But the 41st is entirely new recruits. How do you expect them to defeat a powerful Earth Kingdom battalion? General (coldly): I don't. They'll be used as a distraction while we mount an attack from the rear. What better to use as bait then fresh meat? Zuko (jumping up): You can't sacrifice an entire division like that! Those soldiers love and defend our nation! How can you betray them? (Cut to a view down the map as the generals look back to Zuko, clearly disapproving of Zuko's outburst. The scene fades to the present where Iroh continue his story to the crewmen.) Iroh: Zuko was right, you see, but it was not his place to speak out, and there were... dire consequences.

Bujing speaks in a very disrespectful and inconsiderate manner. Yet his plan is to deliberately sacrifice some troops as a distraction in order to gain a military advantage(presumably by avoiding the sacrifice of vital assets a straight frontal assault would entail). That is well within the norm of warfare. Even at the most basic level, the first wave of an attack can be expected to, under most circumstances, take extremely heavy casualties, yet the sacrifice of lives in order to gain an advantage is considered justified.

“Men, I am not ordering you to attack. I am ordering you to die. In the time that it takes us to die, other forces and commanders can come and take our place.”-Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

And if we want to be completely honest, “fixing” an enemy force through attacking it from the front while simultaneously flanking it to attack from the rear is just normal military tactics.

So what Bujing is proposing is well within not only toxic and awful military norms of the Fire Nation, but also within military norms in general(which sets aside whether his plan is specifically the best way of handling the tactical situation). Iroh claims that Zuko was right, but Iroh is generally biased in favor of Zuko, and he has unusual opinions on how worthwhile the war is at this point anyways.

So what is my point? Zuko’s objection was to something which is considered entirely acceptable within military norms. Thus, when he objected, he looked not only like unruly and disrespectful child usurping the Fire Lord’s prerogatives, he also looked like an unruly and disrespectful child who hadn’t done his homework and who had no knowledge or understanding of military affairs doing the same. He looked like he was arrogantly proclaiming his authority over military affairs despite having no knowledge of the issues involved. And that helps us understand why Zuko’s faux pas elucidated such an extreme reaction, why Zuko was called upon to defend his honor.

And, it should be clear from this post why I find the fandom’s focus on the 41st division and how horrible it was that it specifically was sacrificed to be weird.

However, I also wish that the sentiments Zuko expressed here were developed more and formed a major part of his redemption arc, but they don’t. 16 year old Zuko never expresses the compassion for ordinary Fire Nation soldiers and citizens that 13 year old Zuko did.

#Zuko #Ozai #Iroh #general bujing #Zuko's redemption arc deserved better writing #Zuko's Redemption Arc #Issues with Zuko's Redemption arc

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shihalyfie · 3 years

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Shiramine Nokia, and her role in Cyber Sleuth’s narrative

This one’s on request! Cyber Sleuth is quite the interesting game and a rather landmark entry in the franchise, mainly for being a love letter to the franchise and its long history itself, and for being the franchise’s very first work exclusively aimed at adults, meaning that it can explore different topics that wouldn’t normally be Sunday morning timeslot material, while also being a little more willing to assume that the people playing this are familiar with a lot of older parts of the franchise (not that it’s advisable to have complete lockout, but the game benefits greatly by not needing to assume lockout by default).

One of the ways Cyber Sleuth exhibits its “franchise love letter” status is by starting off the game all the way back at the franchise’s roots, before Digimon Adventure changed the game and everyone’s perception of Digimon and Digimon partnership, when the V-Pet lore was intertwined with Digimon as elements of hard sci-fi. As the game proceeds, the atmosphere slowly starts to resemble the more fantasy-like version of the franchise established by Digimon Adventure and its follower entries -- and that change is represented in none other than Nokia herself.

Before we begin: As anyone who follows my meta work has probably noticed, I generally prefer to have my analyses use tons of references and screenshots so that it’s easy to follow and the evidence is concrete, but Cyber Sleuth is a game, and it’s much harder to get those things without replaying the entire game, so I hope this won’t be too hard to follow despite being mostly text.

Nokia’s background and personality

If we want to apply the producer’s statements on Twitter, Nokia is 17 years old at the time of Cyber Sleuth, and has a backstory of having originally been a shy, bullied child who broke out of her shell thanks to the influence of her cousin (who, of all people, happens to be none other than Date Makiko). The flashback we get with Nokia in chapter 18, however, portrays her as just a fairly cheerful, go-getter child, but (although we only get to see her hair) she’s not quite as “flashy” or in-your-face as the description entails.

A possible hypothesis for rationalizing this all together comes from a what we learn about the process of memory wiping in Cyber Sleuth chapter 14: even if memories are extracted from the person, there’s some kind of residual memory left behind (the producer’s above statement also states that the same thing had even happened to Suedou). In Hacker’s Memory chapter 16, Arata confesses to Ryuji that the first Under Zero incident and Jude's loss to the Knightmon had re-triggered his trauma from having lost Yuugo years prior -- “not the memory, but the feeling.” So in other words, there was some feeling of loss that came after the loss of Yuugo that impacted those involved -- and it’s very possible that this deeply impacted and traumatized Nokia as well.

Assuming we’re still following this line of thought (since, again, this background point wasn’t actually in the game proper), Nokia eventually decided to break out of her shell thanks to Makiko’s influence, and become eccentric and assertive, and thus, the game begins.

While we’re here, I also want to point out that Nokia is also voiced by Han Megumi, possibly the Digimon franchise’s most notorious “promoted fangirl” who freaked out after getting to meet her childhood characters’ voice actors while cast as Airu in the Xros Wars crossover and ended up casted in a handful of major Digimon roles thereafter as a result. Which is not to say that her voice performance wasn’t also absolutely perfect for the bright and aggressive Nokia, but, you know...considering the below analysis, food for thought.

Nokia as a representative of “the conventional franchise”

Cyber Sleuth opens on a world where Digimon are largely seen as hacker programs, and even the hackers themselves only see them as non-sentient programs; there are ones like Chitose who treat them with empathy, but his attitude seems to be kindness towards them in a way not entirely unlike a family would treat a Roomba. Although he doesn’t admit to it at first, Arata himself also comes from this “world” of hackers, and we later learn that Yuuko herself is as well (via her “Yuugo” persona), meaning that, other than the playable protagonist, Nokia is the only “outside-context” person -- a completely ordinary civilian who’s gotten dragged into all of this.

Much like, say, the protagonists of Digimon Adventure.

With this background behind her, once she’s thrown into the world of hackers, she immediately has a “fateful encounter” with Agumon and Gabumon, instantly recognizable as two of the franchise’s most prominent Digimon (and complete with their Adventure voice actors, too). And I do especially bring up Adventure specifically, because while Nokia’s position in the game does end up taking in certain elements that roughly came around that era and possibly slightly predated it (mostly Digimon World and V-Tamer), Agumon and Gabumon weren’t particular mascots of the franchise until Adventure basically blew everything to pieces.

Right off the bat, Nokia does not have a single shred of doubt that Agumon and Gabumon are living beings and should be treated as such (again, much like the protagonists of Digimon Adventure; even Taichi in his “is this a game?” mode never doubted this). And they open up their meeting with this conversation:

Agumon: Umm, who are you? Nokia: It... It can talk?! It's so... so... so adoooooorable! M-M-M-M-My name's Nokia. What're your names? Agumon: Me? My name is Agumon! Gabumon: I... I'm Gabumon. Nokia: Agumon and Gabumon? Hee hee! What weird names! Gabumon: Hey, they're not weird! Agumon: You're the one with the weird name! Nokia: As if! My name's not weird! Hee hee!

And on top of that, Agumon refers to Nokia as having a “familiar” scent. Remember this for later.

Nokia’s second encounter with Agumon and Gabumon in Cyber Sleuth chapter 3 involves her properly partnering herself with Agumon and Gabumon, and learning about the existence of the “Digital World”. Note that, for all intents and purposes, EDEN had been treated like the functional equivalent of the Digital World in this narrative up until this point -- cyberspace with hackers, coming from the network, it’s basically a “digital world” from top to bottom, and yet here Agumon and Gabumon are introducing the concept of a more fantasy-esque incarnation of a digital world. (And, in fact, despite EDEN being right there, many long-time Digimon fans playing this game often complained about how little you get to see the “Digital World” in this game, because of how associated that term is with something more fantasy-like.) So, again: here we have Nokia, who’s forming a partnership with Agumon and Gabumon as equals instead of recruiting them as hacker tools (even the protagonist wasn’t immune to this method), and being indirectly responsible for introducing the more fantasy-like concept of the Digital World that the modern franchise is currently associated with.

Nokia embarks on the conventional shounen anime character arc of starting off cowardly, but eventually learning to have her own inner strength, with her Digimon evolving in accordance to her emotions. And, eventually, in Cyber Sleuth chapter 8, she decides to form her own hacker team, called the “Rebels”. She ostensibly bases it off the old creed of Jude, having heard that they were a team that never caused trouble for others, but we later learn via Arata turning out to have been its former leader, and the even later portrayal in Hacker’s Memory of its spiritual successor Hudie, that this is an extremely rose-colored image of them -- Jude (and Hudie) was not a well-intentioned team by any means, but rather a sort of mercenary group meant to enforce the “freedom” of EDEN, often taking on shady jobs and “punishing” entities they considered to be causing chaos. But in this case, Nokia forms her team under the idea of legitimately fighting for justice and good will -- again, much like a Digimon Adventure protagonist.

In case the metaphor weren’t clear enough, Nokia decides that the members of her group will not be called “hackers”, but “Tamers” -- the same lingo used by the franchise to refer to a human who partners alongside a Digimon to help them get stronger -- and that she wants to promote the idea of humans and Digimon working in tandem (complete with emotional bonding exercises). For this, everyone looks at her weird, and yet her methodology, initially naive as it seems, keeps working, because Nokia’s natural charisma starts bringing people from different places together and making quite the formidable team. Everyone is perplexed by this, but perhaps it’s only natural, because Nokia has just independently invented the modern concept of Digimon partnership in a world where it did not exist. And this is eventually solidified by the Under Zero invasion in Cyber Sleuth chapter 10, in which Omegamon is finally formed (from sheer guts on her part).

Omegamon is yet another symbol of the modern franchise, but it’s important to remember that he hasn’t always been so; even his appearance in V-Tamer was as more of a tactical piece than any kind of game-breaker, but the impact of Our War Game! has led him to constantly make a resurgence in major franchise roles (maybe a little too much these days). However, on top of Nokia basically embodying the modern franchise itself by doing this, Nokia and Arata’s positions are an obvious reference to Our War Game! in particular, being Omegamon and Diablomon Tamers -- but they’re not seen directly fighting each other. In fact, Arata’s partner only ever reaches Diablomon when he’s at the highest point of his morality, so the reference is more ideological; Nokia represents the more idealistic and heroic side of Digimon, whereas Arata represents the more dirty-playing and cynical hard sci-fi side of it (remember that Diablomon himself was rather detached from the fantasy conflict of Adventure, being a mysterious entity that sprouted out of nowhere on the Internet and wreaked havoc). Moreover, Nokia’s usage of Omegamon embodies a theme that’s central to both Our War Game! and Cyber Sleuth itself as a whole -- while most people associate Omegamon with Taichi and Yamato these days, the original method of formation back in Our War Game! came from “bringing people from different places together”. Nokia managed to bring together a formidable army in a place where everyone else in the hacker world was trying to promote a dog-eat-dog philosophy, and the sense of cooperation is arguably making her stronger than anyone else.

(I should also point out that Nokia’s name is, obviously, a reference to the Finnish telephone communications company, and this has a lot of relevance to the game’s theme of connection, along with her phone Digivice...and, also, the method used to bring everyone’s powers together in Our War Game!’s spiritual successor, Diablomon Strikes Back. Feels a bit too on-the-nose here.)

In the second half of the game, when the world starts falling apart due to the Digital World portal opening, Nokia becomes one of most important people holding everything together as Arata goes off the deep end and Yuuko starts fixating on her own personal problems and revenge -- because she’s the one most in tune with treating Digimon as the living beings they are, she’s most active in advocating for them and helping them bond with humans, and and she’s the one making the chaos be a little less chaotic. The second half is basically the more fantasy-esque version of Digimon leaking into the sci-fi, with the sidequests progressively resembling your average Digimon anime monster-of-the-week episode, and holding that all together is Nokia, who becomes a vital figure in maintaining that fellowship by being in tune with the modern franchise’s philosophy.

Through all of this, Nokia ends up taking a role rather similar to a Digimon protagonist, which is highlighted very strongly in Cyber Sleuth chapter 18 when she ends up literally becoming the player character while the main protagonist is out of commission. During that time, Yuuko and Nokia learn the truth of what happened during the EDEN incident eight years prior -- and we also learn that the five children involved had an extremely conventional “first meeting in the Digital World” experience that could have been pulled right out of the first episode of a Digimon anime, with them having a lovely adventure meeting new creatures. And at the center of that “first contact” was none other than Nokia, Agumon, and Gabumon themselves:

Agumon: Um... who are you? Nokia: Ahem! I am Nokia! And just who are you? Agumon: Me? My name is Agumon! Gabumon: I... I'm Gabumon. Nokia: Agumon and Gabumon? Hee hee! What weird names! Gabumon: Hey, they're not weird! Agumon: You're the one with the weird name! Nokia: As if! My name's not weird! Hee hee!

Nokia, Agumon, and Gabumon’s meeting at the beginning of the game had been an (accidental) reenactment of their first meeting in the Digital World eight years prior -- and, in the flashback, Nokia invites them to go on an “adventure” with them. So in other words, Nokia getting involved in the hacker conflict at the beginning of the game was, unknown to all of them, her attempting to restore that beauty and idealism of the Digimon Adventure-esque philosophy and fun in a world where the Eaters had torn it away and EDEN had turned into a haven of cynicism and hacker battle royale.

In the end, the game’s conflict is only resolved by bringing everyone together; Arata has to be retrieved from the deep end, and Yuuko has to settle her deep-seated personal grievances. Everyone makes a promise to return together, in the sense of making things right and repairing the connections between them that had been cut in that incident. The final battle (momentarily) causes the playable protagonist to literally fall apart, and the one reaching out to them and sending her message to them at the end of the game is none other than Nokia herself -- again, in the absence of the game’s protagonist, Nokia is the one with the closest role, because in the face of the new world going forward, she was the one who contributed most to restoring its idealism.

Ultimately, all of this is especially because Cyber Sleuth works under one of the most terrifying imaginable premises for a fan of a kids’ franchise: “we made an entry for this, but for adults.” Many of us can testify that this kind of premise can go very well, or very badly -- the latter especially in the case of things that decide “taking the opportunity to do things that you can’t do on a Sunday morning kids’ timeslot” means “going out of your way to put edgy violence and sexy things and cynicism just because you can”, or, in other words, looking down condescendingly on its kids’ franchise roots with malice and deciding that something for adults means “more suffering” and not “issues that require more life experience to understand”. The reason the game ended up getting as much acclaim among longtime Digimon fans as it did was that despite being the franchise’s first venture into this territory, it did end up setting itself up as something that took that opportunity to do something new and unique that would have never made it into any of the prior entries (holy hell the doll quest) and yet never gave up on the idealism and themes of connection that make up the franchise at its core, and paid respect to everything that had contributed to all of that while it was at it.

And at the center of that is Shiramine Nokia, who is effectively the spirit of Digimon Adventure, condensed into a single character.

#digimon #digimon story cyber sleuth #shiramine nokia #nokia shiramine #shihameta

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shepherds-of-haven · 3 years

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Lena, who would be drift compatible in a pacific rim AU?

Hmmm, good question! I don’t think I’ve ever done a Pacific Rim AU post, so let me give it a try (all Shepherds work in the Jaeger program):

Blade: a powerful but vengeful and brooding Jaeger pilot who’s known for being one of the few pilots to solo-fly a Jaeger for several missions. Has refused to take on a co-pilot since his older brother (his first co-pilot) was killed beside him in battle. Known for using lightning/plasma attacks, making him popular with the public--however, he refuses to appear in any public-facing PR campaigns, preferring only to fight and kill kaiju. 1st Jaeger: Coyote Lightning

Trouble: a reckless and headstrong hotshot pilot known for having a death wish and zero fear of kaiju. He was born into a family of Jaeger pilots and is eager to make his name distinct from his father’s, who is a veteran war hero of the First Contact Wars. His Jaeger is specially equipped with more explosive weapons than most. He was voted to have the best smile among the Jaeger pilots for three years in a row. 1st Jaeger: Atlas Striker

Tallys: a solemn and no-nonsense pilot known for her refusal to employ flash and cool maneuvers in battle, and for her refusal to join the celebrity culture surrounding Jaeger pilots. Few know this, but her family was killed by kaiju during the First Contact Wars and she joined the program out of revenge. She is motivated solely by bloodthirst for kaiju, and her Jaeger employs long-range attacks, making her an effective defensive pilot. 1st Jaeger: Echo Hydra

Shery: like Mako Mori, she is the daughter of the current director of the Jaeger program and therefore relegated to secretarial and administrative duties only. In the academy, she became known for her abilities to drift with almost any partner; however, she freezes in combat situations until she is paired during an emergency crisis with Riel, whose ruthless determination forces her into action.

Riel: a scientist and financier of the Jaeger program, he uses his vast wealth and expertise to work to develop better and more efficient technology (and weapons) for the Jaegers. He knows every Jaeger’s components from top to bottom and would be an extremely efficient and tactical pilot, but is adamantly a non-combatant until the kaiju attack the outpost he’s staying in, necessitating his becoming a sudden pilot alongside Shery as a last resort.

Chase: a former thief/criminal who had his prison sentence commuted in exchange for becoming a Jaeger pilot. He was initially forced to fly solo because other pilots didn’t trust him and thought he would either run during battle or would refuse to put himself in danger to save innocents. However, he is one of the most popular “Jaeger Idols” in the public eye, earning fans everywhere with his sense of flash, fashion, and flair. He pilots as if he has a death wish, and his Jaeger has two blades installed into its forearms. 1st Jaeger: Lucky Corsair

Red: initially a scientist and academic who wanted to study kaiju behavior and the Breach from which they came, he was eventually recruited to the Jaeger pilot program due to his excellent combat abilities and due to the wishes of his friends, Pan and Neon, who became their own drift-partners. He is working with Riel to develop technology to allow Jaegers to either become invisible or to teleport very short distances. The prototype of this technology has led to the development of his signature move in battle, the Flashstep. 1st Jaeger: Garnet Dawn

Ayla: a headstrong pilot initially known for deviating from orders, she was also known for developing friction with her partners, leading to a never-ending roulette of pilots who would join up with her and then quit shortly afterwards. She is famous for a technique in which she spins her Jaeger at such velocities that she creates devastating whirlwind attacks. It’s rumored that she was trained in a secret Jaeger facility in a foreign country and later defected, leading to supposed assassination attempts by rival government agents. She always carries a bo staff with her in the Jaeger outpost, even in the canteen. 1st Jaeger: Cyclone Banshee

Halek: one of the first-ever Jaeger pilots, he initially flew and fought with his twin, Naolin, as his co-pilot. However, their many fights took a toll on Naolin’s body, leading to him retiring from the program. However, Halek continues to fly (even to the detriment of his own body) in order to avoid returning to civilian life, where an arranged marriage to a wealthy socialite awaits him. Thus, he is desperate to take on any partner, leading to... well, you’ll see down below. 1st Jaeger: Willow Titan

Briony: one of the most resilient and powerful Jaeger pilots to exist, she is known for fighting so effectively that she can push her body past the limits of most other Jaeger pilots. Her signature move is a superpowered punch that can send a kaiju flying more than a mile away. She performs body slams, punches, kicks, and whirling chain sword attacks with her Jaeger. However, she can have trouble controlling her own strength and momentum, a flaw little-known to the public until the strength of her will accidentally overrode her co-pilot and wreaked massive damage on a city she was protecting. As a result, she has become hesitant and fearful of her own piloting, as well as afraid to fly with others. 1st Jaeger: Valiant Orion

Lavinet: a surprise Jaeger pilot and former model, she is the heiress to a massive construction empire: her father is in charge of building the Pacific Wall, a last-ditch effort by humanity to protect the coastlines from the invading kaiju. Although she could live in peace in one of the few safe zones left on Earth, she has decided to throw her hat in the ring and become a Jaeger pilot, attracting media attention and fan adoration everywhere. Due to her father’s fortune and massive donations, her Jaeger is one of the fastest and sleekest to exist. To the horror of her superiors, she ordered her warmachine to be painted in pink and lavender. 1st Jaeger: Wildcat Renegade

Croelle: a Jaeger pilot who professes to only be in it for the money. Despite his selfish attitude and mysterious background, he is one of the most skilled and powerful pilots in the program, allowing him to stay on despite his loud insistence that kaiju will ultimately destroy the world. Few can manage to pilot with him for more than a few weeks due to his utter lack of respect for others. However, he proves his valor while running am (ultimately unsuccessful) mission to destroy the Breach, earning him a medal and a promotion to being the liaison between pilots and the people who run the Jaeger program. 1st Jaeger: Crimson Rogue

MC: idk who they would fly with, but my headcanon is that they would be a new pilot of mysterious origins who turns out to be able to communicate with and/or control the kaiju. Turns out they were developed in a secret genetic lab to be the first-ever human-kaiju DNA hybrid!!! And they have mutant superpowers as a result!!!

Drift Partners:

Blade-Briony: It turns out Blade’s total sense of control and dominating precision is a good match for Briony’s chaotic and uncontrolled power; her bubbly and almost indomitable determination also thaws his aggressive solitude and stoicism. Their Jaeger is named Coyote Sakura and its signature attack is charging a chain sword with plasma lightning and launching an all-out flurry of superpowered moves!

Tallys-Lavinet: Despite an extremely rocky beginning, these two mature and tactical pilots form a well-coordinated team focusing on long-range defense and rescue, with Lavinet handling close-quarters combat and Tallys handling ranged attacks. Despite their extremely different backgrounds, their measured ways of thinking and steely determination give them a lot of common ground. Their Jaeger is named Lattice Electra and its signature attack is throwing a huge Jaeger lance that is strapped to its back, spearing two kaiju at once!

Trouble-Chase: Trouble is the only pilot fearless enough, reckless enough, and daredevil enough to take on Chase as a partner without caring about his criminal background and reputation. Together, the two of them have a balanced mix of bravery and evaluation, although they are also both impulsive enough to completely disregard orders, leading to a friendship for the ages. Their Jaeger is called Spitfire Eden and specializes both in blades, fisticuffs, and guns!

Red-Ayla: Red is patient and well-mannered enough to tame Ayla’s brash temper and abrasiveness, forming a powerful and balanced team that becomes known as one of the fastest-moving Jaegers in the program. With Red’s speed and ability to teleport, paired with Ayla’s agility and wind attacks, their Jaeger is named Whirlwind Dawn, and they are often called in to rescue or defend the coastline.

Halek-Croelle: Although Halek is initially paired with Tallys, his general passivity and laziness chafes against her thirst for revenge. He floats from partner to partner, eventually being informed that the next partner will be his last before he is ejected from the program. To his horror and dismay, he is paired with Croelle, and they get on like cats and dogs. However, Croelle’s utter lack of fear and pleasure in violence activates Halek’s berserk battle-rage, causing them to become an extremely formidable (if violent and unpredictable) team. Their Jaeger is named Redmoon Danger, and they are only called in as a last resort, as they will not stop fighting until every kaiju in the area is dead.

Riel-Shery: The kaiju discover the Jaeger outpost in which the team resides, developing a two-pronged plan that requires keeping all of the active Jaegers away from base and preoccupied in battle. In the meantime, more kaiju attack the outpost base, threatening to destroy all of the superiors who run the Jaeger program, as well as all of the non-pilot personnel who reside on the base. Left with no fighters and reinforcements and faced with no other option, Riel and Shery climb into a Jaeger under repair, becoming pilots when they drift together for the first time. They manage to repel the Jaeger attack single-handedly and later join the team without academy training, meaning they are only deployed as a plan B. Their Jaeger is named Fox Spirit Rho and is known for its excellent analysis capabilities, targeting a kaiju’s weak spots and deploying a swarm of drones to help attack while the Jaeger fires powerful laser-cutter beams usually used in the construction of rockets.

(That was fun, I hope you enjoyed reading!)

#Shepherds of Haven #Pacific Rim #Pacific Rim AU #AU #all characters #jaeger #kaiju #anon

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boop-le-snoot · 4 years

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PARTY FAVOURS I CHAPTER 34

💖 first time reader click here 💖

A little bit of plot, but mostly ironstrange x reader filthy porn. Bukkake stuff. Stephen finally opening up a lil bit, I mean... I've slept through a 1/3 of a hospital and lemme tell you, doctors are kinky bastards. On the same note, there's definitely going to be a chapter where all three men are involved after the plot shit is resolved.

There was something big brewing. I had a hunch... which was more like a strong sense of doom... hanging over me and the rest of the world. Peter also had noticed the sudden spike in anxiety, quoting the sudden disappearance of many low-tier mutants from the streets. Usually, Peter dealt with at least a few enhanced enemies during his patrols but the closer it got to Christmas, the less enhanced bothered with small-time crimes, the more intense the buzzing of his Spidey sense became.

Now that my immediate lack of income wasn't a problem anymore, I set business onto that damn mercenary. I was no spy, I was no SHIELD operative but... I could be very clever.

First things first, I had to make sure I would stay alive no matter what. A subdermal tracker was a good guarantee of security and I spent many hours making one - having to keep it a secret was incredibly hard, I hated lying to my loves and I hated avoiding Wanda even more - I was constantly on the edge around the telepath, hyperfocused on keeping up the pretense of normalcy.

I wouldn't be me if I couldn't successfully pull off a whole ass façade. Unfortunately, the continued failures of the people searching left and right for the mercenary only fueled my strength for the inevitable fuck-fest that I would have to create in order to make sure my people get the peace they fucking deserve. The web of lies grew in size every damn day.

Subdermal tracker, an implant that reports directly to Friday upon activation. It hurt like a bitch - I had cut myself open, an inch wide gash on the inside of my forearm - and put it in without any anesthesia in my own bathroom, not even thinking twice before making up a lie that I had been careless in the lab and hurt myself.

An antidote to common tranquilizers, creating it gave me a headache the size of Moscow but I'd been successful; Tony assembled the whole team when he found it out, offering me a ridiculous amount of money for the formula. It was weird. SHIELD was interested, too, and I had to witness Tony and Coulson argue. Apparently, the agency wanted to recruit me and Tony was adamantly against it, totally forgetting the promise Natasha had given me. In the end, the spy and Coulson shared a quiet conversation and the man left, respectfully complimenting my skills.

I sold the formula to Stark Industries, unable to get rid of the weirdness of the situation. I had to shake hands with my own boyfriend and his ex-girlfriend... In a business setting. What. Just what. Bucky and Stephen couldn't stop laughing at the face I made all throughout that day - and Clint even went as far as to bake me a gag cake, a cartooney handshake drawn in frosting on top of it. I hit him with a spatula, Loki smiled in his direction for the first time in, like, ever. It was a trip and Tony had way too much fun with the incident.

Perhaps, turning myself into a cyborg stew wasn't the best plan that was possible to think up in a few weeks' time but I've never claimed to be exceptionally intelligent; if anything, I've always considered myself to be a moderately educated idiot. It is common knowledge that there are two halves of a whole idiot: my second half was on his way from California, having had received my very detailed e-mail about the whole cursed box fiasco and the consequences that followed. I could barely contain my excitement at the prospect of seeing uncle Eddie and his symbiote again.

Tony wasn't even half as excited; if anything, he bordered on outright hostile, bickering, and sassing everybody left and right. It could have been the situation at hand finally getting on his last nerves. It could have been his jealousy, the same that appeared every time I paid extra attention to someone that wasn't him, Bruce or Stephen. Either way, Bruce was sighing all the time now and Stephen's remarks began to fill with poison once again.

Just like the good old times, I guess. I was forced to pull a Me over and over, interrupting their petty arguments with increasingly absurd remarks. I felt like everybody was laughing at me these days, which ended in only one way it could have...

"Brat," Stephen's patience was paper-thin and, being forcefully distracted from yelling at Tony, he directed his angst at the nearest person - me. "I oughta put you over my knee. I swear to Cosmos..."

"Blah, blah, blah. Don't you ever get tired of listening to yourself talk?" I raised my eyebrows, tone deceptively calm. "You're talking too much for someone who can't even..." I didn't get to finish my sentence, suddenly finding my mouth firmly glued shut. It was magic - the sensation was pulling, but not unpleasant. Reminded me of a ball gag Tony had used on me in the early days of our relationship.

"Now, Dumbledore, hold your horses..." Tony interjected looking none-too-happy. The engineer placed a warning arm on the sorcerer's bicep, their little spat seemingly forgotten.

"What, Tony? She's been nothing but a mouthy urchin the past few days, I can't stand it anymore," They shared a meaningful look; no matter how much Tony wanted to argue, he knew Stephen was right. What he didn't know was that there probably have been a magic versus science altercation... Or worse. Humiliation was a small price to pay for some (relative) peace.

I did what I do best. I annoyed them further, throwing up a juicy middle finger to the two men and turned around with a huff, mind set on finding Loki to undo the mute ban Stephen gave me. Needless to say, I didn't make it very far.

In mere seconds, I was sandwiched between the two men, Stephen's finger delicately holding my chin to force me to look into his eyes. Tony was holding onto my shoulders from behind me - I could feel the tension, my engineer was almost buzzing with it. I was pretty sure my eyes were laughing anyway because Stephen's frown slowly transformed into a coy smirk once his stormy blues focused on my face.

"Brat," He repeated once again. "She's doing this on purpose."

"I can't say I'm surprised," Tony's breath tickled the nape of my neck. "That does sound like our little Princess," Apparently, it took all of a 0.1 second for Tony to switch from annoyed to horny. Men, they were so easy to play. "Baby, if you wanted our attention you could have just said so," He chastised me, hands sliding down to my waist.

I hummed, and then aggressively hummed some more until Stephen removed the magical gag. "Not like you'd notice it, being occupied with tearing each other's hair out," I pouted.

The sorcerer briefly averted his eyes, leaning down to softly kiss my pout. It was very unlikely I'd get an actual apology but a kiss I won't be complaining about either. "So, your best tactic was to annoy us even more? How does that work out for you?"

I pulled on the tied fabric around his waist, bringing him closer to me. "Pretty good, if I'm being honest. You're exactly where I wanted you to be," Carelessly, I began untying the layers of silks and cotton I had become intimately familiar with over the course of the past few weeks. Most of the time Steph wore his wizard garbs and while figuring out how to undo them was a trip at first, I had gotten him desperate enough a few times, for him to show me a few tips and tricks for easier access.

Tony snorted somewhere behind me. "You just want us for our bodies," His hands wormed their way under my shirt, brushing the underside of my breasts. Bra? Hardly know her. "Our beautiful, sexy bodies." Yes Tony, very humble.

"When will you learn, people?" I asked rhetorically, simultaneously leaning into both Tony's and Stephen's touch. "Why fight each other when you could be fucking me into oblivion instead?"

Stephen snorted, still not completely used to the at times crude things that left my (and occasionally Tony's) mouth. I had a hunch the sorcerer was holding back somewhat - for whatever reason - and I was eagerly waiting for him to get comfortable enough to reveal that special part of himself. Whatever it was, I just knew it was delicious and sinful and-

"Do you really think I will be giving you what you want after your little... Stunt?" Steph went balls out; his voice dropped and the intensity of his stare left me breathless. The hand that was stroking my face wrapped around my throat as he had some sort of a silent conversation with Tony.

"Yeah," I emphasized the word with an inaudible 'duh' behind it but obediently trotted along as Stephen backed up towards the couch, leading me by the throat like a pet on a leash. I was steadily going into 'no thoughts, head empty' territory.

"I like it when you get all bossy," Tony remarked casually but he was close enough for me to hear the strain in his voice. Every time we fucked, Tony eagerly gave up the control to Stephen. I definitely saw the appeal. Stephen Strange demanded authority effortlessly, his stern but fair attitude simply demanded to kneel.

That's just what I did. As soon as Stephen made himself comfortable on the Italian leather couch, I dropped to my knees, looking up at the man with big round eyes. Just like Tony and Bruce, Stephen had his own weaknesses when it came to moi and I wasn't ashamed to exploit them. Steph's stroked my hair, carding careful fingers through it, slowly unbuttoning his pants with his other hand.

"If you insist on being mouthy, I have a better task for you," He husked, pulling me closer towards him. I called it his doctor voice. Honestly, I don't have a clue how his surgical team could be around him with their pants on back in the day... The man was a snack on a silver platter.

Steph's erection sprang free. I didn't hesitate to wrap my hand around it, stroking the underside of his glans just like he liked it, looking to the side where Tony landed on the couch next to Stephen, a curious look on his face. Yeah, Tony liked to watch. Me and Stephen or me and Bruce... Me and Stephen and Bruce? That's an idea for later.

"Don't mind little old me," Tony smirked his trademark Stark mischief, getting comfortable, ditching his oil-stained shirt and unbuttoning his pants to lazily palm himself through his boxers. "Carry on," The smirk only grew when Tony noticed both me and Steph eyeing him with amusement.

I hid my grin, nodding my head, before wrapping my lips around the tip of Stephen's cock, relaxing my throat to prepare for the intrusion. Sweet and salty, the slit on his cockhead was mercilessly teased by the tip of my tongue.

Stephen murmured encouragements under his breath as I began to bob up and down, him controlling the pace with a hand in my hair, just the right balance between cruel and gentle. The sorcerer was always too good to me, bringing me to the point of overstimulation and instantly soothing the ache afterward; "Fuck, darling, your mouth feels like heaven," He groaned as I snuck a look upwards to see his lips parted and a steady flush crawling up his neck.

"She knows how to work a man, doesn't she?" Tony's lust had him panting, hips moving into his own hand. He leaned closer to Stephen, brushing my hair behind my ear with a tender hand. "Merlin needs to share," Tony began pulling me in his direction. I reluctantly let go of Stephen's cock, keeping up the pace with my hand as I scooted closer to Tony to be able to mouth at his stiff erection.

Watching me suck cock always got Tony hard enough to pound nails with. I couldn't blame him, I knew what I could do and did well; by the time I made my way down his thick flesh, drool was dripping down my chin and the make-up around my eyes was surely smeared by tears. My engineer was much less gentle than Steph, pounding my face without reservations.

"I know you can take it, baby girl, fuck," My face was held in his strong grip, thumbs digging into my jaw. "Such a good girl," The two words went straight down to my pussy and I had to squirm and clench my thighs together, whining at the lack of friction.

The air was pierced by a low moan - Stephen was fisting his erection almost desperately now, almost as desperately as I was humping the air, whining like a bitch in heat at the taste of Tony's cock in my mouth. I knew neither of the men would last long, not with all that pent up tension running through their minds and bodies.

"Fuck, come here, baby girl," The engineer yanked me off his cock, gripping the base of it so forcefully his knuckles turned white. I was all but dragged into the space between them; still kneeling, barely seeing with snot and tears smeared all over my face, I couldn't hold in the broken moan as the realization set in.

"Keep your eyes open!" Steph instructed furiously, scooting to tower over me. Tony followed in his steps as I obediently lifted my eyes to their cocks and then their faces; nearly identical furrowed brow expressions stared back at me, lips moist and eyes wide. Both men stroked themselves with renewed vigor.

I hummed softly before sticking out my tongue; their reaction didn't let me wait long. Strings of pearly white cum landed in my hair, on my face; I felt the warmth on my skin and tasted their salt and musk on the tip of my tongue, reflexively swallowing each and every drop that landed in my mouth, savoring it just like I savored the sinful groans that left their mouths.

"Fuck, you're so good to us," Tony panted, gracelessly falling backward onto the couch.

Stephen, however, didn't hurry to catch his breath, giving me a thoughtful look. His fingers shook more than ever but he paid no mind to the discomfort, gathering the cum dripping down my face with two fingers and offering it to me, holding them up to my lips as I gently cleaned them off. And he did it again, and again, until Tony gave a weak moan of recognition, throwing an arm under his head.

"Be polite, Princess," Stephen's voice hadn't lost the lust in it just yet.

"Thank you, sir," I mumbled, utterly captivated by the way he was looking at me. Stormy blues radiated a strong sense of intensity, devotion perhaps, that I wasn't ready for.

Stephen smiled at me, almost coyly, before kneeling right next to me and bringing me over the edge with a few sharp, clever movements of his hand. I held onto his shoulders for dear life, barely noticing Tony's reaction - if there was one - my other lover seemed to be as surprised as I was, choosing to hang back and observe the unusual situation.

I had a feeling that whatever it was, it would make another appearance during our playtime. It wasn't just sex, it wasn't making love - it was... Something. I loved every second of it.

@another-stark-sub @mostly-marvel-musings @vozit @littlegasps @pilloclock @shereadsinquiet @downeyreads @hermione-grangers-wife @individualistfem @sleep-i-ness @capbrie @lillsxd @agustdowney @dee-vn @justanotherblonde23 @fanngirl19 @persephonehemingway @softie-socks @schemefrenzy @letsby @romeo-the-cactus @jelly-fishy-babie @mikariell95 @gladiosamicitias @toomanyrobins @i-cant-hangout-im-drumming

#bun writes #party favours #tony stark x reader x stephen strange #Tony Stark x reader #bruce banner x reader #stephen strange x reader #tony stark x you #bruce banner x you #stephen strange x you #tony stark x y/n #bruce banner x y/n #stephen strange x y/n #tony stark smut #stephen strange smut

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thedreadvampy · 3 years

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So like there's still that ask expanding on the Exclusionist Leads To TERFery argument sitting in my inbox and I will respond to it when I can formulate an answer that's less than 2000 words long.

but I wanted to spin out a specific thing which is that anon repeated the ol' "queer is a slur is TERF Rhetoric that TERFs Started" and that is something I have a very DIFFERENT lot of feelings about

the idea that queer is a slur wasn't started by TERFs. It was started by.......people using queer as a slur........a thing that they still very much do.....

Look, I like the word queer. I self-describe as queer and I use the word queer interchangeably with LGBTQ. I have friends who only want to be called queer bc it sums up the fluidity or nonspecificity of their identity. I think queer is a useful and valuable terminology for us to have in our wheelhouse and personally I prefer it to LGBT because it makes a lot more space for the muddiness and complexity of sexual and gender identities.

but it's a slur.

or at least, it originates as a slur. it gets its power from being a reclaimed slur. when people say "we're here we're queer get over it" they're throwing the word back in the faces of those who use it against them and saying "you don't get to own this part of me, I'm taking back ownership".

and like. that's a reclamation and I believe powerfully in the strength and beauty of reclaiming that word

but it's also not unreasonable that people who have been hurt by it (which. in the wider world it still is often a slur) might not want to reclaim it or deal with it.

like. I love the word queer and while I wouldn't refer directly to someone who hates it as queer, I do passionately believe in its value and use as a general term. but. it's reductive and honestly offensively unkind the way many people act as if having a complex or negative relationship to a word often flung as a weapon, with a long history of violence as well as reclamation, is evidence of gullibility or malice.

there are a lot of reasons people don't like the word queer and some of them I find odious - the vitriol some people sling around at "kweers" in their hatred of the term queer is honestly just. depressing. and there are people who hate it because it runs counter to their desire to carve the community up into neatly divided Ls, Gs, Bs and Ts and also forget the Ts. but there are also people who think queer is a slur because it's been used as a slur against them. or who don't believe in reclamation. or who are uncomfortable with a word reclaimed as a defiant political statement being coopted by corporate interests.

like there's a lot of reasons people have to dislike the word queer and consider it a slur. and to boil them all down to "oh it's TERF Rhetoric" is not just reductive it's largely untrue and it's aggressively uninterested in other people's experiences and needs. and to say "queer was never a slur until TERFs started spreading this rhetoric" is a) factually untrue and b) ignores a century or so of very diverse opinions about the use of the word.

also. relatedly. other people have said this better than me but this watering down of what TERFism is and this framing where everything bad is TERF Rhetoric honestly just feeds into TERF's ability to fly under the radar like. a lot of TERFs consider themselves queer, because TERFs are not a monolith, they're a disparate group limited by a core philosophy that is specifically and only defined by a hatred and distrust of trans womanhood.

and a lot of people who aren't TERFs hate the word queer, or, like me, like the word but think whether or not it's a slur is very situation-dependent.

and this tendency to say something false about TERFs to bolster an unrelated point (TERFs created the concept that queer is a slur) if anything helps weaken people's resilience to TERFism because ultimately the strongest recruitment tactic TERFs use isn't a slippery slope of exclusionism, it's trauma. like any reactionary movement, they hook onto people's trauma and fears and they tell them 'you're right, you're heard, you're suffering and the world's against you and it's their fault.' and if someone comes into an LGBTQ space and says 'I am exhausted by having the word queer spat at me I never want to hear it again' and a bunch of people turn around and say 'uhhhh claiming that queer is a slur is actually terf rhetoric so we're not interested in you spouting TERF Propaganda' like. Is this helping the community? is this resisting TERFs? or is it just muddying the lines of what TERFs are and why we don't want them here and reducing them to an abstract The Bad People?

#brace for impact #also like do not mistake that last bit for terf apologia #terfism gets its hooks in via Trauma but that's an explanation not an excuse #most of us cam experience trauma and not get so navelgazey that we think we're the only ones to ever suffer #and most of us don't take it out on unrelated nearby women #but it's a true thing nonetheless that for most reactionary movements they find pain points and offer validation #anyway this is pretty confused i just had some Thoughts #transmisogyny tw

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untitledtheunknown · 4 years

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Psychofans & Mediacorps

(Backstory and lore on some psychofan encounters and the attempted kidnapping of Kerry Eurodyne along with some related events with Johnny Silverhand. Written as a Screamsheet because I was bored, and this all isn’t 100% since actual events aren’t always fully disclosed. Word count: 2976. Sources at the end.)

Being a world famous Rockerboy is really all it’s chalked up to be, doesn’t mean there isn’t its fair share of snags along the way. Fame and glory comes with a heavy price tag many don’t realize as they’re building their way to the top. Blinded by having your name in the lights, seeing hundreds of thousands of fans all eagerly waiting to just get a glimpse of you. Night City Legend Kerry Eurodyne commented, “It’s scary. I mean, to think that one hundred thousand people are selling their souls to see you, and you’ve got them hanging on your every word.” The very fans that would kill for a chance to see their idols live, are the very same that would put them on Trauma.

Not just the fans either. Corporate is everywhere, in everything. Fight the system through lyrics while making them richer all the same. Media giants like N54 and DMS buying up the whole show to beat on their chest about who has the most control. The issue comes with their greed for it, keeping those who give them wealth on short leashes. Best offers, benefits, prestige of having a higher name attached to yours. But when friendship runs deeper than the quick climb to fame, other options of “persuasion” may occur. Aggressive strategies to keep themselves on top, because the company always come first.

We’re going to start this article off on arguably a lighter topic, that being the psychofans. I say arguably because they can do just as much damage as the corporations, but it's usually a bit more controlled. We'll hit on that later. There’s the usual rush security, jump fences, steal an axe, the almost seemingly normal chaotic fan behavior you can expect at most high profile gigs. Don’t lie, there’s always one in the audience.

The sudden rise to fame with Samurai also helped play a part in this erratic behavior, Eurodyne had previously stated, “One minute we’re chugging through our old numbers in some small, no name club to the same crowd; the next we’ve sold out Wembley Stadium and there are a hundred thousand killing each other to get a look at us.” This wasn’t much of an overstatement either. Samurai’s rapid rise to fame took a mere three weeks after signing to Universal Music to reach the number one spot on EuroRadio charts. Everyone wanted a piece of Samurai then, and following the break up in late 2007 that craving didn’t soon die out.

A number of incidents have happened, being on world tours is a crazy place. Never really know how fans are going to act until you’re in the thick of it. Most these incidents happen backstage, after gigs, or just by random chance coming across someone on the streets, in the open. One particular incident was documented in 2020 in the following of Trauma Team’s Rich “Meatball” Cramer M.D., Lifeline Trauma Inc., Night City Branch #23.

Broken card call, 15:55, to the Grand Illusion Dance Hall and Bar. Patient being none other than one Rockerboy, Kerry Eurodyne. Compared to the rest of the logs of the night this was a breath of fresh air for the Lifeline agents, not so much for Mr. Eurodyne who was being assaulted by a gang of young female fans. Teargas was dispensed and our Rocker was extracted from the scene. Kerry was in good health at time of extraction, footing the bill of the call to the studio as well as a new set of clothes. Lawsuits were never charged as the fans left enjoying the chaos.

Another lesser known act back in 2043-44, while performing in Memphis TN an assailant got backstage and put a knife to Kerry’s throat. Intentions of the attack are unknown. Could have been a psychofan making demands of an idol, or someone who knew the net wealth of the name Kerry Eurodyne at the time? Either way the incident ended without bloodshed, Kerry was able to talk the assailant down and promptly knock him out with a stiff pour of that high life tequila. The rest was handled by the venue’s security. Unfortunately events like these are almost common for the stardom lifestyle.

Lives are kept under public scrutiny 24/7. “Be prepared to have your private life open to the world,” Rockerboy, Johnny Silverhand, had mentioned in a column from Advice From the Pros. Name in the lights simply means just that, private life is on show as well and nothing can truly be kept secret forever. Kerry Eurodyne had added, “Cover your ass on your social life, the mediacorps are capable of setting you up bigtime in compromising situations… Make sure you know who you’re hanging out with, and something about their friends.” Not just fans and so called friends you need to watch out for, but the very people you sign yourself away with.

Rockers Kerry Eurodyne and Johnny Silverhand are no stranger to this cold truth. Even mediacorps you don’t sign with will have motives, and often resources, to try and gain a signature. Corporations will often go after the output/input or family of the Talent instead of the Talent itself. However, big companies like DMS, the rival to N54 News, also have other methods to “persuade” a contract breach and change. Both Kerry and Johnny were targeted by this particular company, though this time it was Eurodyne dragging Silverhand into trouble.

After the time Samurai had broken up for good, late 2007 early 2008 Kerry was looking for a decent solo deal. This was a gamble for most Labels at the time, Johnny was the frontman of Samurai, Kerry’s true talent had yet to really flourish into the Legend we know today. At this stage in their careers they were just some new-boy artists, that had a couple songs and albums that made it big. A lot of bands will have their handfuls of top sellers and then disappear into a faded memory. However, media giant DMS saw promise in Kerry, and they quickly came out with an offer for the young Rockerboy that would put him right back on the road to stardom.

Kerry was going to take the offer until Universal came up with an offer that wouldn’t just set him up but Johnny as well. The two decided that the offer Universal had was too good to pass up, and with good reason. Universal not only was packaging the two Rockerboys together as independent solo artists, they were offering a better deal as a whole. Since Universal already knew them from Samurai, and knew what the two could produce, formalities of signing a new band was skipped. Re-signing with Universal gave them guaranteed concessions normally only offered to major bands or superstars.

DMS didn’t come back with a counter offer, they came back with threats. Eurodyne, and those close to him, started to receive threats from the mediacorp, these quickly escalated to hired thugs harassing and assaulting everyone in the Rocker’s inner circle, as well as himself. A common tactic for many corporations to get what they want. However, Kerry wasn’t folding to their pressure, sticking with his decision with Johnny to sign to Universal. At this point the signatures were received and Kerry’s talent was the official property of Universal Music once again. This only made the situation worse, and turned into a rather rare occurrence for the music scene.

Major corporations have a number of outlets that they have at full disposal to get what and whom they want, when they want. DMS is not unique in this fact, but they do have one of the more unique techniques. DMS is creative, deadly, and, for a corporation its size, dangerously agile. They are known for their aggressive and ruthless recruiting tactics, and they do not take “no” with grace.

Eurodyne’s fate, to DMS, was sealed the moment they selected him, no matter his choice. DMS starts with a fair offer, most of it coming with the prestige of having their name backing you and their benefits package. In the case of Eurodyne, where this was not enough, DMS will call on their Special Recruiting Division, which is devoted solely to recruiting and converting people who are reluctant to sign to DMS. A fancy way of saying they send in their black ops section to perform extractions on those who are bound by contract or reluctant to leave their current company.

Extractions are illegal, but the government is in the pocket of these corporate giants. Though they hardly ever send their own people, so even if the extraction does fail the proof of finding out who sponsored the extraction is normally too timely, over looked, or asking corpses. Most these companies hire Solos to get the job done, a number of groups exist in this profession alone. Extractions are unsettling common in the corpo world that counter extractions are budgeted into company spending plans. As well many big companies have jealousy protection, and pre-planned countermeasures to prevent extraction attempts of their employees or Talents.

Now, you may be asking yourself, “If they didn’t want to work for them before, what would kidnapping them do?” Well, DMS and other companies thought about this issue as well. How do you force someone to work for you? Blackmail is the obvious answer, to the Talent, to their friends, their family, etc. It's a simple fix that will get a result, but can’t guarantee the product. Its proven effective though, reputation is everything- threats to destroy that are not taken lightly. For a company like DMS, they have a one up on this if they can't get the Talent to see eye to eye with their terms. “Talent Indoctrination”, TI for short, otherwise known as brainwashing to the common choom. It's a program used for winning over people who express resistance to “joining the DMS family” even after extraction.

TI is only a rumor outside of the highest levels of the corporation, and those who have been subjected to it. Luckily, TI section failures are rare, unluckily survival of TI section failures is even rarer. DMS, however, is willing to risk TI only on targets with a high enough revenue generation potential. Executives are more at risk than artists, given artists are seen as disposable and the average commercial shelf-life of a DMS Music artist is only a couple years. Most only making it an average of two before they’re dropped back to performing at clubs and bars for the same hundred fans, if that.

This was the threat Kerry was under, one that became very real one fateful day when the Rockerboy was abducted by a group of hired muscle from the corporation. While Kerry was successfully kidnapped and relocated, the extraction itself failed due to intervention of Legendary Solo, Morgan Blackhand. Blackhand was able to capture all five kidnappers, alone, and turned them over to the Federal Authorities. Beaten, battered, and bruised but all five were alive when they were handed over. This act alone humiliated DMS, who was only found later on in investigation to have been the group’s sponsor. Its not unheard of extractions being foiled, but for a company like DMS it was a shot to their pride since Kerry would know it was them that called it. The real humiliation of it comes from the fact Blackhand snagged them all alive, allowing the truth to be exposed to the public, tarnishing that royal reputation of theirs, though no legal action would be taken.

Embarrassing a huge company like that puts a major target on your back. Legality they could care less about, but reputation is not something any corporation wants to gamble with. Morgan Blackhand would become a target for a later date, DMS wasn’t done with Kerry Eurodyne yet. Now, though, their attention was brought to one of the key elements for why Kerry declined their original offer; Johnny Silverhand.

“They were threatening Johnny and I with things like government investigations and stuff. By the time that threat was made, we’d already signed with Universal…” Eurodyne recalled during an interview. It was true, DMS had dug not only into Kerry’s past life but Johnny’s as well. They were at the stage of “If we can’t have you, no one will.” While Eurodyne’s rap sheet was arguably cleaner, DMS was preparing to go full out, and all in to find anything they could. What they had as their ace was Silverhand’s military past, and they knew they could find the same information about Eurodyne as well or paint him for it. Both Rockers had served during the 2000’s Central American Conflict, Johnny’s desertion was all they needed to start the fire.

DMS was preparing to take this knowledge to the government, and at that point they could say and paint anything on Kerry as well. Their careers were about to end before they even began. Short on time, they did the only thing they could do, they went to Universal Music. With the counter threat of exposure of DMS’s corruption and abusive power over their Talents, Universal made their position clear. This was a PR move, DMS could go to their pocket government agents to have the Rockerboy’s locked away for life, but Universal was going for their public appearance. The ends didn't justify the means, DMS backed down.

Lawsuits were dropped, threats ceased, no more extraction attempts were made on either rockstar. They were given freedom to produce their albums and do tours under the protection of Universal. It wouldn’t be for another several years down the line when DMS would rear its ugly head back into their lives. Well, only in passing.

Denny, the former drummer of Samurai, had a new band called Mastermind that was being recorded by DMS Music. “She knows how I feel about them, but the contract they’ve got is suitable for her, so I’m not going to interfere as long as she is happy.” Kerry had stated on the matter back in late 2013, “Even now you won’t find Johnny or I saying anything remotely positive about DMS… I’m just glad no one was listening when I made certain comments or some of my fans might have taken those rash words to heart and we might have had some serious problems.” A tongue in cheek response to the 13 April 2013 Arasaka Riots led by Johnny Silverhand, under the old band's name of Samurai. Rioters killed 18 and wounded 51 on that night, gutting the Arasaka complex. An event that would only deepen the wedge between the two Rockerboys, yet redefine them entirely.

Silverhand, however, would be blackmailed again later on in 2009 by EBS Records to leave Universal and sign a solo contract with them. EBS had found out that Johnny was an AWOL U.S. Marine who had deserted during the Second Conflict. The blackmail attempt was quickly dropped as Johnny came clean himself, revealing all his secrets and shining light on the plight of veterans of the covert war, with his now famous album Sins of Your Brother.

One thing the Rocker was known for was starting changes with his music, back in late 2012 Silverhand had an assassination attempt on his life believed to be sourced from Biotechnica do to their belief of controversal opinions to their practices heard on his album Clone Wars. Being forced to take several months of seclusion to let the heat die down before going on tour himself.

Given all of this, and much more, they had been relatively lucky. Maybe not with the fans, Eurodyne still faces the masses though in some more creative ways now. Having his biometric data copyrighted, and agreements with NCPD to monitor CCTVs for any unauthorized replications. Hasn't stopped some from trying, going as far as faking nudes that broke headlines awhile back only to have frisky imaginations shot down by his management. As far as Johnny goes, I don't think anything beats the rumor that was circulating sometime after the events of Arasaka Tower back in 2023. The idea some obsessive fan sneaked past security of the city to dig through the rubble, locating his body to put on ice and keep like some kind of memorabilia? It sounds crazy, but everyone in Night City knew what kind of fans Samurai, and more importantly, Johnny Silverhand had. Made it completely possible and people didn't really doubt that it could be true.

With corporations though, the two Rockerboys dodged a bullet. Multiples if you were keeping count. Others haven't been so lucky. A number of stories of Talents being threatened and giving into demands, multiple assassination attempts to end someone's career, Talents being kidnapped and tortured, so far as one account of a musicians hands being crushed to prevent preformances. From the outside being a Rockerboy looks like a party scene, and a lot of it is, but as the longest living in the scene will tell you, keep a Solo and a Netrunner you trust close on personal pay.

Events come full circle, once you make it to the big time stardom, the public eye notices everything, hangs onto every word. Talents like Silverhand and Eurodyne control the masses in the same way the corporations do. The audiences look to them for guidance, though in some cases the lessons are lost in translation. With everything from greedy labels making backdoor deals behind their Talent’s backs, something Kerry Eurodyne and Us Cracks went through this year, to psychofans making their own demands, to corporate reputation wars. Being a Rockerboy never gets easier, but few have hardly ever survived the test of time as Kerry has. An uphill battle from his earliest beginnings, to sitting on the Rockerboy throne of Night City, well into 2077 and still holding the title of "God of Rock" without a fault.

Sources and Quotes:

Rockerboy Source Book

Backstage with Kerry Eurodyne page 7-9

Extortion. Bribery. Kidnapping. Brainwashing. And Other Nasty Tricks. Page 44-45

Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0. The Second Edition

Silverhand Update: Clone Tour Begins page 225

One Night with the TRAUMA TEAM page 231

Live & Direct

Diverse Media Systems “Technotainment” page 81-82

Solo of Fortune Vol II Source Book

American Angels: One of Europe’s Best Rates the Top U.S. Pros. page 63

Cyberpunk Red

Welcome to the Dark Future page 239

Cyberpunk 2077

Spector Melee Vendor Westbrook

Gig: Psychofans Gaston Slayton's computer

Shard Glam Now! - The Mag For Those Who Love This For Themselves

#johnny silverhand #kerry eurodyne #cyberpunk 2077 #cp2077 #cp77 #s.screamsheets #this was honestly pretty fun #included sources in case anyone wants to pick up the books #hope you enjoy and maybe learn a thing #took liberty on frills to make it more like an actual sheet piece rather than just lore/facts #years are the only thing i fudged a bit #2003-2013 is a hella confusing time in cp and it doesnt make any sense when you do the math

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fallout-lou-begas · 4 years

Text

Fallout New Vegas Competitive Super Smash Bros. Melee AU

Caesar and Kimball both main Fox, easily, though Caesar lacks the tech skill to make it work as much as he wants it to whereas Kimball lacks the strategy and raw gamesense to capitalize on Caesar's errors. Their rivalry makes for very intense pools rounds, like seeing two babies get in a slap fight. Both of them are managers for rival clans anyway, and Caesar's star player [LGT] Lanius is the most brutal Captain Falcon in the region. Caesar recruited him to his clan after witnessing Lanius singlehandedly turn around a crew battle against an entire opposing team without dropping a single stock.

Mr. House is a veteran from the Golden Age of Melee who would be better known if Ken hadn't clinched his place in the history books first. He has a very elegant style of play but is so stuck in his ways that he falls to newer strategies and advanced tech. No one has seen him at locals in years though he apparently lurks on Netplay.

Yes Man mains Luigi. Chaos reigns. He always misfires every time he needs to.

Benny, true to his gambling heart, mains Mr. Game & Watch, a character who is literally incompletely coded in-game and is missing critical data such as an L-Cancel and full shield. He will constantly fish for 9s and whiff them every time except once. Benny is also 100% a john who will complain his controller wasn't working or something when he loses.

Boone mains Donkey Kong. Despite being such an intense sniper, he gets a kick out of throwing people around as big monky, though he still plays pretty seriously. you can aaaaaaaaaalmost see him smirk when he gets a cargo-throw stage spike

Raul doesn't know what Melee is and he calls the Gamecube "the nintendo." if forced into a game he would instinctively choose "this cool guy in the armor," Samus.

Arcade plays casually and mains Pikachu. He constantly spams Thunder.

Cass doesn't play very dedicatedly but somehow gets better at the game the drunker she is. She mains Peach, of course, and will fucking destroy you offstage.

Veronica mains Captain Falcon and usually just plays casually, screaming every time she lands a funny Falcon Punch. However, if you ask her to face you in a “real game,” she will effortlessly destroy you with some of the flashiest and so-stupid-it-works combos you’ve ever seen.

Christine is like Mew2King in that she's a "master of diversity," capable of playing almost every character capably at minimum. She mains Shiek and is one of the most tactical players in the region and a solid PR, but lately she's been feeling burnt out. She misses when she used to just play casually with her friends and do Kirbycides off the ledge for laughs.

Cassandra Moore is the Fox main that Kimball wishes he was, infamous for her hyper-aggressive, utterly oppressive playstyle.

Corporal Betsy has also never played Melee but would immediately latch onto “the hot blonde” (Zelda).

#fallout new vegas #fnv #ssbm #super smash bros melee #cesar #aaron kimball #president kimball #legate lanius #mr. house #yes man #benny gecko #craig boone #raul tejada #arcade gannon #rose of sharon cassidy #veronica santangelo #christine royce

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theggning · 4 years

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1/2 Why do you think Danse hates ghouls? Super mutants, sure, they caused the death of Cutler, & they are so brutal that even PRESTON wants them exterminated. Synths, fine, if you buy into the idea that technology out of control, rather than corrupt rich elite, caused the apocalypse, and if you know that synths murder and replace humans, then I can see why the idea of machines with a will would be terrifying. I wish he had realised that they are victim-blamed slaves, but propaganda is a bitch.

Pardon me, anon, I’m not very good at tumblr so I don’t know how to post your asks all together. In lieu of this, I’m just going to post the other two parts together here and answer all at once:

2/3 But sentient Ghouls? They have nothing to do with technology. If anything, they are an example of humans hurt by technology, so you'd think Brotherhood propaganda would love them, like 'look at what the big bad science did to those poor guys!' They are usually very meek, and the aggressive ones are part of groups of aggressive humans like raiders or gangsters. And the scars can't be a problem for a military group whose members are often horribly injured. So what's with the hostility?

3/3 For that matter, do you think Danse will overcome his bigotry towards ghouls once he finally comes to terms with his worth as a synth?

Y’know, I don’t think Danse actually hates sentient ghouls.

When people list Danse’s likes and dislikes in short they often characterize him as hating mutants, synths, and ghouls-- he certainly hates feral ghouls (as do most wastelanders, really,) His perk even gives you a damage boost against all three enemy types. But I think “mutants, synths, and ghouls” are more of a list of the Brotherhood of Steel’s enemies and thus an appropriate perk for Danse to offer.

Because for the most part Danse DOESN’T treat sentient ghouls any differently than other people. He is notably kind to Billy the ghoul kid and hates it when you’re not. He is supportive of Kent Connelly, likes it when you encourage him to follow his dream (even if he’s a little skeptical of the practicality) and loves it when you save his life. He likes when you’re polite to Daisy in Goodneighbor, and likes when you help her by clearing out the library at her request. He is complimentary to the residents of The Slog and expresses admiration for their ingenuity, and hates it when you’re rude to them or disparage them.

There’s really only two sentient ghouls that Danse is actually rude to: Hancock and the Vault-Tec rep. And Danse is super quick to jump to insulting them for being ghouls, absolutely, which points to him at least somewhat buying into the BoS’ overall disdain, but I also don’t think he’s rude to these two specifically BECAUSE they are ghouls.

Hancock openly and actively hates the Brotherhood. He’s a chem addict and at least in Danse’s eyes, a criminal. I ain’t gonna say Danse is RIGHT to dislike him for these reasons (or to call him a “filthy ghoul” as his first retort,) but Danse is nothing if not hardcore lawful neutral, and a chaotic person like Hancock is going to grate on him no matter what they are.

And Danse is super, unnecessarily nasty to the Vault-Tec rep, but I almost wonder if this is more because he was with Vault-Tec. Danse vocally hates Vault-Tec. He talks about their cruel experiments and abuse of technologies, and includes them among the hated pre-War corporations that he believes doomed the world. No, it’s really not cool that Danse jumps straight to calling him a “thing,” but given his really acid reaction to this guy in particular, I have to wonder if it wasn’t intended to be a swipe at his affiliation with Vault-Tec rather than purely anti-ghoul bigotry.

So anyway, I’m not going to say Danse doesn’t have some issues with ghouls, likely ingrained into him by drinking the Brotherhood Kool-Aid, but I feel like it’s often overstated how much he dislikes them. He is perfectly accepting and nice to most of the named ghoul NPCs that companions can interact with, and for those he’s rude to, there’s other reasons why he might be acting that way. I do think any prejudice Danse may have will soften once he’s removed from the Brotherhood influence. He is clearly fully capable of treating ghouls with respect and kindness- perhaps something ingrained into him during his time living as a wastelander in the Capital.

As for the Brotherhood as a whole? They’ve always had some human supremacist problems. I’m not familiar with the earlier games, and diving down the Brotherhood rabbit hole is a MESS, so I’m not sure if there’s any canon information as to why that is. Maybe they believe ghouls are already a “lost cause” or maybe they buy into the “all ghouls will eventually turn feral” idea (which is actually not canon, by the way. Widely-accepted fanon.) But ghouls and any other types of sentient non-humans are generally looked down on by the Brotherhood, are not allowed to enlist*, and are treated as second-class citizens at best and targets at worst.

And this is a problem with the Brotherhood as a whole, absolutely NOT something caused by Arthur Maxson. In FO3, the Brotherhood is callous about the lives of ghouls and its soldiers are freely allowed to take shots at ANY ghouls they see, even sentient ones. And that was the “nice” Brotherhood led by Elder Lyons. By FO4, Maxson has discouraged his people from opening fire on sentient ghouls-- and presumably, they’re treated like all other civilians, as far as being compensated for their tech and traded with rather than robbed from. I may give Maxson a ration of shit from time to time, but he is quite a bit LESS shitty than other Brotherhood elders on this front. That doesn’t change the BoS at large’s shitty attitudes towards anything nonhuman, which is so deeply baked in that I think a lot of its members don’t question it anymore. (You’re not supposed to ask questions in the military, especially not one designed like the Brotherhood.)

ANYWAY. Tl;dr: Danse is kind of shitty to a couple ghouls, but for the most part treats them as fairly as anyone else, I suspect this is because of the overall Brotherhood influence; the Brotherhood is shitty to ghouls at large because reasons.

* Allegedly, the Midwest Brotherhood of Steel (based in Chicago) recruits ghouls and mutants. This branch is the result of a BoS group that crashlanded in the area, and hard up for recruits, they developed a far more open recruiting policy. These guys are from Fallout Tactics, another game which I have not played.

#Anonymous #gg answers #fallout 4 #fallout meta #fallout ghouls #i'm sure there's some lore out there somewhere that explains the inner logic of the bos on this #idk where or what it is and you may understand why i don't feel like asking about it #the brotherhood are interesting but they do attract a certain type of #fan... that i don't feel like interacting with lmao

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