#and i think c!wilbur reflects that?

[dr3amofagame]

my personal interpretation of c!wilbur is someone who read a lot of left over (functionally) historical propaganda over the revolutionary war and became radicalized, not fully grasping how his position in the world changes what his own desire for revolution really means. hes like a white knight lib to me (simplification but i hope it gets across)

ehhh i see where you're coming from but i don't really agree

to be clear i'm not super c!wilbur brained he's a fascinating character but i haven't watched enough c!wilbur content recently (especially early c!wilbur content) to really consider myself particularly uh able to give like, a nuanced read of the guy. but c!wilbur is honestly a lot more self-aware than a lot of people give him credit for. he crafts these narratives not because he inherently 100% believes them, you know?

there's a lot about mmm the lmanburg revolution and all that's quite openly ig like, underhanded even in the way that he plays it early on. the whole "words, not weapons" moment where he reveals that that's actually a ploy to stab people who believe them in the back comes to mind. the content creator himself has always asserted that a significant part of the creation of lmanburg is meant to assert and keep power, and this is something we see reflected again in the elections, which--uh, pretty obvious power thing, imo.

this isn't to say that like, being a good person and all isn't important to c!wilbur. it is. it's very important to him, and part of what shatters him so much in pogtopia is looking at what he's done and realizing that it doesn't really make him the best guy. but i don't think c!wilbur buys what he's selling like, at all in early lmanburg era. mans knows that he can speak things into reality and he uses that. a lot. part of why c!quackity unsettles him so much even as early back as the elections is because c!quackity was someone he couldn't get a clear read of and someone that therefore left him on the back foot. but in terms of the revolution, delivering them from oppression, etc etc--the fact that he owns this whole "we aren't like the brutish, tyrannical americans and their barbarity" while himself being american as established in boundless sands reeeeeally hammers in the whole irony of his lmanburg sales pitch.

as far as i can tell, i usually operate on the assumptions that like. 1) c!wilbur wants to make an impact, be remembered, legacy is a whole thing yadayada my unfinished symphony yadayada ozymandius yadayada literally all of the hamilton references. self explanatory. 2) c!wilbur is a character that often navigates the world + relationships to power in terms of "either you're the one with power or you're the one having power used against you"--a lot of his interactions reflect a need to have control over a situation, his interactions with people that he perceives as having power or threatening his power/control tend to involve challenging them and their authority, stick it to the man, the whole thing of putting a block under himself while talking to people. this could've been put better but yeagh. 3) c!wilbur wants to be respected + wants to be, like, a good leader? and he can get wrapped up in a lot of that while you know not having the most accurate perception of his Actual strengths 4) c!wilbur is self-aware and intelligent and charismatic, and he's quite confident of all of these qualities. he's a hell of a manipulator and uses manipulation quite often to get the upper hand in social situations 5) a lot of the power/control issues have roots in very real fear--he's a guy that's quite ill and obviously as we get into elections and pogtopia especially (schlatt scares the bejeezus out of him) we see a lot of that. realizing that his actions makes him a bad person affects him greatly and he ends up struggling with this idea for Quite a long time--he tries to get control over this by trying to Own the whole "i'm evil" thing <- also not put the best but ehhhhh ehh. again, not a c!wilburian and 6) c!wilbur, in the role of the "lmanburg narrative", takes the role as its writer. he's the one that comes up with the story in order to validate his creation and make it into a Thing, and this succeeds--but the mythos also quickly snowballs beyond him. he creates the story as it exists but it becomes something More, yknow? i don't think he ever truly believed in it i don't think that c!wilbur actually buys any of his stuff about revolutions and oppression and all of that, i dont really think lmanburg was any more legitimate of a cause when he began it as the drug van breaking bad rp that he made the day before. but it's a story that took hold and grew to have very real, tangible power that affected the whole server and affected him as well. which obviously goes into the whole exiting the narrative thing.

anyway that's all a bit of a rant and i'm not exactly the person to ask for c!wilbur thoughts but yeahhhh 🤷. i tend to no-nuance him a little bit bc he's a complicated character and im a hater 😂

[teethkid67]

PAYDAY

aka a valentine for the lovely @itsnotmystic / @corvids-calling - fanart for stars fic of the same name, which you can read here !!! i really enjoyed this concept and wanted to do some art for it :3 hope you like it because i REALLY loved your work & i hope this shows that !!! HAPPY VALENTINES DAY !!!!

this is also a loose love-letter to the wonderful @arginnit 's crazy background-drawing-ability and style/skill at portraying environments . wadds your stuff is insane and i love it

happy @mcyt-valentines exchange !!!!

[deadpatrol]

Tubbot made by Wilbur is like so. He was another part of L’manburg to Wilbur, for better or worse. He doesn’t know how to be a person but he has to anyway. How does Wilbur feel, now that his creation has outgrown him, now that it’s remade itself (Tubbo had to, the resemblance is still there despite everything)?

If c!Wilbur felt such an intense need to destroy L'Manberg, his creation, along with himself... because he felt responsible for it, as if it were another part of himself that needed to be destroyed...

Then how do you think Wilbur feels about Tubbot?

[missycolorful]

Forgiving yourself is the hardest thing in the world, especially when you’re someone like c!Wilbur who, like it or not, has done terrible things and hurt a lot of people. Yes, he’s in a lot of pain, but that cannot undo the suffering he wrought, even though he’s tried to make amends to people. It’s hard because it means opening yourself up to the most raw bits about you, the scars, the flaws, the trauma. There’s so much, and if you’re not ready to face all of that, you’re willing to wait until you can look inside yourself, see all that damage, and breathe.

But to be so willing to expose yourself to all of that? It doesn’t happen right away.

It’s okay that c!Wilbur isn’t healing right away. The ending is the best of what we can have, because we know he’s going to try and will someday be okay, and will someday forgive himself. And yeah, we won’t see that path, but I personally believe it’s enough just knowing that he’s ON that path.

[sunshinetrinket]

okay i do have a one more thing to say. i think. i think i got the ending i wanted. like. hear me out. we got c!crimeboys happy ending. we got c!wilbur alive ending and c!tommy alive ending. we even got c!wilbur happy ending. aND. AND!!!! MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL!!!! WE GOT GHOSTBUR HAPPY ENDING!!!! i dont know if i could ask for more to be honest

[loveanime321]

Wilbur's victims

I am glad that shubble and niki are being supported but i think it is high time that we give minx some love too

Like her or not, that girl had nobody willing to believe her and is rightously angry

Victims can be problematic but it does not mean they did not get hurt

You know how we talk about life reflecting art? This is what was done to c!tommy's character

Please be gracious and kind to everyone who was hurt by this terrible man, whether you like them or not

[alienssstufff]

been thinking about how there was gonna be one more stream where c!slime and c!quackity we’re gonna find solace,,,how do you believe their story ended? (since you are the ceo of dapduo)

With what we currently have in canon here is how that final stream would have panned out: NOTE- the following happens after the HO16 fic, after Wilbur apologises to everyone except Tommy, and the 9/10 LN ending

The beginning of the stream starts with c!Wilbur leaning against the pool balcony area of Las Nevadas in the early morning as c!Quackity joins him, they both look visibly haggard and fucked up (also Quackity is in a wheelchair). It's a very darkly lit scene, clarity only shown by the light of the cigarettes they share. If I were to pin a Hamilton song to this moment it would have the lines from Angelica's 'Congratulations' notably

I look at us and think, "God, what have we done with our lives, And what did it get us?"

Though I don't know if any of them would actually say anything. None of them say anything, as stubborn as the other despite everything they've been through separately, it'd take hell for either of them to truthfully open up to the other about anything let alone themselves. It's stubbornness but it's also mutual, an agreement that neither of them would apologise to the other. Two sides of the same coin, the reflections of eachother in the water being reminders of this. The both of them leave in opposite directions of the shoreline, towards bringing an end to their final arcs.

[ok ACTUAL part with c!Quackity and c!Slime are undercut. I promise]

After the title screen, this new scene actually opens a week prior to the tntduo scene up top. Quackity on his last canon life wakes up exactly where he had fallen from the hotel, a green puddle noticeably on the floor next to him.

In my headcanon, it is implied (offscreen) that out of guilt Slime jumps off the ledge after pushing Quackity - paralleling when Quackity jumped after Slime in the 27/11/2021 finale.  "the consequences will be bitter. I will not fail. Because Quackity from Las Nevadas, we have one thing in common. Through everything we've been through. The same human ruined our lives. Because you are not a good person." -Slime

The camera is a long shot, from POV of one of the deck chairs and it shows c!Foolish hurriedly rushing to Quackity's aid to help him up. [Cut to black]

At this moment in time, there is no war on the server. Las Nevadas instead dealing with a completely new problem that is the slime clones infestation. Security footage showing different places of the country just filled with the clones aimlessly wandering around. Foolish and Quackity, the only remaining members of Las Nevadas left discuss in the now-empty and ruined Amongus research bunker on what to do next. Quackity ponders, thinking about what Slime said to him on the balcony and all the things Quackity did wrong -- and so begins the true reprise of Quackity's lessons.

The general format of this section of the stream being the same as the 27/11/2021 Las Nevadas finale: Quackity says the new (revised) Lesson, and it shows Quackity teaching these lessons to the slime clones. Hypothetically there could also be a scene of Quackity making amends with Kinoko kingdom and him sending the letters to the Syndicate etc.

Meanwhile I would have liked to think Slime, now finally free from... anyone really - spends its time wandering the server interviewing all forms of life and figuring out itself on what it truly means to be human. These wouldn't happen in the one Quackity stream but small bits of Charlie's, every new day starting with Slime watching Quackity from afar. (Featuring this also helps better portray Slime as its own person beyond Quackity's influence). If I were to pin another Hamilton song to this it would be 'It's Quiet Uptown'

ANYWAY the true finale, after having grown in their respective ways - ends with the two of them in the bright dawn at the beach. They go to each other and embrace, crying and happy as the world burns to white :,]

[peninkwrites]

(putting my very long, very personal ramble under a readmore so folks can avoid it) (this won't include any of my plans for going forward or for my writing but I'm not going anywhere so don't worry about that. love to you all.)

A little disclaimer: If you have zero context for what I'm talking about, apologies for not explaining in depth, but this post won't be relevant to you otherwise. All you really need to know is that it seems that Wilbur Soot is an abuser, and Shubble came forward and talked about it recently. He was not named, but from what she shared, I believe that was who she was talking about. I don't say this to speculate, and if you disagree, I'm not here to argue over it, but it's enough for me personally to not to want to support him indefinitely, save for Shubble explicitly saying she wasn't talking about him.

Additionally, these thoughts are some incredibly personal and self-centered rambling. It does not reflect where my priorities lie, with supporting Shelby for coming forward above all else, but other people have said that much better than I have, and this post is really just a place for me to vent some of my feelings.

I prided myself on not falling prey to “parasocial relationships.” I didn’t get invested in the personal lives of content creators, only in their creative works. I thought this protected me somehow. I knew next to nothing about Wilbur Soot’s personal life, but I admired him deeply as a writer and empathized with him as an artist. I projected so heavily onto his character and did so for over three years. When I waited for his final dsmp stream, I felt panicked. Like my survival hinged on how he ended this story, and then he ended it in a way I could live with, and I thought I could go on loving this story and these characters for what they had been, no matter how messy the rest of the endings to follow were. His character was mine in so many ways. He had some of my problems and I gave him some of my own. I used him to process quite a bit. And now that part of myself is irrevocably tainted.

When the stuff came out about Dream, I was upset, but not betrayed. I never followed the creator and he existed only as a character to me. All I grieved then was the community his actions destroyed and most importantly the people he hurt. I planned to continue writing for the DSMP, even as I refused to follow any content involving him. It felt like a pause, not a full stop, while I ensured what I was doing did not show him any support. I also gave that character no pity and therefore the man behind him no pity, I had no personal investment in his character.

Now my response is visceral and bitter and I don’t know how to go on writing, because this character meant the world to me. I don’t know how to write about a character I truly love and see myself in, knowing the person who also loved and saw himself in that character, who created that character, has done horrible things. I don’t know how to write any of these other characters I have loved and cared for for over 3 years because he has poisoned them. All of it turns my stomach now and I feel so betrayed. The thought of his character is tainted because it’s connected to his voice and his face. I cannot separate the art from the artist both because it was the inclusion of the authorship within the story which affected me so strongly, and because there are things within the text that I look back on now and can only see that this person was always this way. I couldn’t sleep last night. I kept thinking of c!Wilbur’s line when he found out about exile, “he didn’t actually hit you though“ and his horror when c!Tommy responded that he had, that for some reason that was the turning point. The implication that it was only crossing that line, that particular type of violence, which made something wrong. Fucking disgusting.

I’ve tried to find another story before now. For the last few years, honestly, I’ve looked for something to latch onto the way I have with this one, but nothing feels the way this did. I know I’ve been clinging to something gone or at least mostly gone, both the community and the story, but I haven’t known how to let go when nothing makes me feel the same way, even when the feeling has faded and changed so much with time. This was never supposed to go on this long. Honestly, the reason I started posting mcyt stuff to my sideblog instead of my main was because I assumed I would get over it in a few weeks, delete the posts, and move on. Three years. 40 works. Over a million words. Just. Fuck.

I loved these characters so much and I’ve wrapped up my writing in them for so long it’s hard to separate the two. At this point, it feels like these characters are what allow me to write, separate from the main story, but a place where I could work things out for myself as a person and try new things as a writer. And I’ve tried so hard to feel the same way about the QSMP, but maybe it’s because we’re out of lockdown so I don't have time to watch much, or I’ve just changed more than I’ve thought, but I haven't gotten attached the way I did even when I look at the stories being built there and can see the heart in them, the storytelling, the care, just as much as the DSMP if not more. There’s no good reason for it, it just hasn’t locked into place the way this story had, having been the perfect storm of circumstances. The DSMP came to me during one of the worst years of my life, and I have loved it so much I miss that time even with all the bad it carried too.

And now this thing I have been holding onto can only make me angry, hit me with grief and disgust. Fuck, the only plan I’ve had for an original novel in years is a loose adaptation of TDDD. My senior thesis was largely a novella about two siblings with a complicated relationship, the older fatalistic, the younger brave to the point of ignorance. So even that original project has poison in it now. All of it, all of my fucking work, all of my growth as a writer, all of my writing for over three fucking years has poison in it.

I’ve felt lost as a writer for a long time and the only thing keeping me anchored was these characters. And I don’t know how to cut them away from myself and I don’t know how to cut him away from what’s left when his writing, his character, undeniably gave me so much of a spark. When I’m happy, I write. When I’m sad, I write. There's so much bad in the world right now, but I could always fall back on writing. And now my main means of escape is the grief. Far more than ever before. I know this too shall pass and all that, and this hasn’t actually stolen my ability to write, but right now it all feels so ruined. I don’t know how long it will take for me to be able to look back on what I’ve made and not feel like this. I'd maybe moved on in some ways, but not all. There was so much left I wanted to do.

If you’ve somehow read this far, know that I love this community with my whole heart. I never quite made friends with any of you, even as I wanted to, and it's felt too late for a long time now. My beloved mutuals (and followers that are mutuals in all but name) I have found so much joy with you, in what all of you have created. I wish I could hold onto that above all else, even if I’m not quite sure how. I’m not going anywhere, to be clear. I won’t delete my blog and fall off the face of the earth or anything. I still love what all of you create and care about, even if things have changed and our interests don’t always align anymore. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to detach this story from the creator, to love any of it the way I did or even love what I myself created again. I don’t really know why I’m writing this or if I’ll even post it except for the fact that you all are the only people who could understand.

Again, this was a deeply personal rant, not a statement about the situation as a whole, nor do I think this situation's impact on me takes an ounce of precedent over the person actually involved. The most important takeaway from this is what Shelby has shared, the importance of believing victims, to do what we can to protect ourselves from abuse that doesn’t seem obvious, and to look out for each other. Take care of yourselves, everyone.

[lasnevadaslaborunion]

I've given this spiel on Discord already but I'm thinking about it again today so here goes

The reason Las Nevadas worked as pre-recorded, highly polished lore whereas other arcs were better served by improvisation (or, especially later, fell flat in the attempt to be more "cinematic") is because that style of presentation reflected and enhanced the themes of c!Quackity's story.

c!Quackity is a very image-conscious guy. He's performing strength, coldness, and viciousness. He's performing power, wealth, and masculinity. He wants to look respectable and frightening in the ways he's seen respectability and fearsomeness modeled by others.

But in the process, he eclipsed his emotions, his better self, and his very humanity.

Las Nevadas itself is a testament to that desire. It's grand, impressive, and entirely artificial. It's a harsh contrast to the organic awkwardness of El Rapids and the ramshackle simplicity of early L'manberg and the White House. c!Quackity intended it to be unlike any country before it - an improvement, an escalation, his unique legacy.

Even the style of the streams reflects that! They become more and more elaborate as time goes on, and yes, you could say more artificial. There's no improvisation. There's no room for silly mistakes. There's no breaking character. It's flashier, grander, more impressive. It's a bunch of bright, sterile lights, all alone in a cold desert.

...okay, now I have to talk about the face cam.

On the DSMP, there are only a few characters who never streamed from their own perspective. Of these, c!Schlatt and c!Dream are best known, and this lack of first-person perspective is often cited as a reflection of their villainy. However, I would also describe this as symbolic of emotional masking. It's vulnerability, and whether the narratives and the characters allow themselves such vulnerability.

c!Schlatt may very well be the embodiment of stereotypical toxic masculinity. He is obsessed with appearances. He lifts weights, takes steroids, drinks protein shakes, and harshly belittles anyone who doesn't live up to his standards. At the same time, he is a deeply paranoid ruler, who increasingly suspects (not without reason) even those closest to him of treason. His commitment to his "tough guy" persona in spite of his faltering health ultimately kills him, as his heart gives out - alone in a crowd.

c!Dream is also a deeply paranoid man (again, not without reason) who is so afraid of coming to terms with a changing world and his own changing relationships that he cuts himself off from all but a few other people and schemes for a near-impossible reunification. He becomes a caricature of a villain and locks himself in both a literal and metaphorical black box, in which he suffers and, yet again, ultimately dies. As with c!Schlatt, what began as a means of self-protection becomes an avenue for demonization.

(As an aside: c!Techno also never uses a facecam, although he did stream his POV. His arc proceeds in a much different way from other "antagonistic" characters; c!Techno manages to overcome his mistrust of others, refine his anarchist ideals, form a community of friends who help one another, and end his story happy. He's a wonderful foil to c!Quackity, though for slightly different reasons than the other two figures mentioned.)

These two (three with c!Techno) figures, alongside c!Wilbur (their polar opposite, insofar as his penchant for Hamlet-esque soliloquies goes), form c!Quackity's idea of what it means to be powerful.

In the first Las Nevadas episode, Quackity uses the facecam in the same way he did previously. We see every flinch, hear every doubtful thought, feel every change of expression. Where this changes, though, is the final scene: Quackity tears apart El Rapids, the last remnant of his early life and connection to his loved ones, and returns home covered in a prisoner's blood.

Las Nevadas 3 has a much different ratio of facecam to non-facecam scenes. During the confrontations with c!Foolish and c!Purpled, those in which he is at his most expressive and physically vulnerable (as both of these characters could easily defeat him in a fight, forcing him to rely on personal appeal), we see him acting through the facecam. But during his discussion with c!Sam about potential recruits, he's all business and all masked up. In c!Fundy's nightmare, in which he is more a manifestation of insecurity than a character, we only see his smiling skin and a frosty voice.

As for the prison scene... hoooooly moly I gotta talk about the details in that scene a different time. But I think it's fair to say that while c!Quackity is undoubtedly in a position of power here, he also breaks down in a way we haven't seen in this context yet. And by the end… well, he's confident. What reason is there to hide? The only person he might hide from already knows what he's capable of. This is the most honest he's ever been about his motivations for torturing c!Dream, and his straightforwardness and undisguised hatred amplifies the horror of the scene.

Las Nevadas 4, however? This is where the pattern gets really interesting.

The first segment of the stream is made without a facecam. c!Quackity walks c!Slime through lessons on how to be successful and powerful, each of which is challenged and peeled back. c!Quackity never fully removes his mask, even around this person he trusts, because he is trying to be an example for that person to emulate.

But there are two scenes in which the facecam returns. One, during the reunion with his fiances in Kinoko Kingdom, in which c!Quackity lets himself be relaxed and affectionate for the first time in months before pivoting to an outburst of all his resentment, sorrow, and anger. Two, when c!Purpled traps him and c!Slime and he is forced to fight for his life before screaming in grief at his friend's death.

And the final scene of the episode? We see not just the facecam, but full live action. The actor showing his full image, and c!Quackity being completely open and sincere. There's hope! There's a real human person still in there! Perhaps he can trust again and change before it's too late!

And guess what happens in the End of Las Nevadas?

THAT'S RIGHT, NOT A SINGLE SECOND OF FACECAM. NOT EVEN A CRUMB. HE'S GOING MAD (SCIENTIST) WITH POWER AND TERRIBLE COPING MECHANISMS FOR GRIEF. OUR MAN IS FULLY LOST IN THE MOTHERFUCKING SAUCE.

And that persona - no, not just the persona, the very person he tried to squeeze into his own image! - is the one who kills him!

And this is why I never liked the notion that Quackity's lore being so polished set the bar too high for other storylines. Because first off, imagine trying to insult someone by literally saying they're too good. Second, c!Quackity's whole arc in Las Nevadas was about how the pursuit of power and acclaim at the expense of your ability to be sincere will fucking destroy you. This way of telling a story is neither superior nor inferior to the more naturalistic style of other arcs. It all comes down to personal taste and how the medium can enhance the creator's intention.

And if Las Nevadas rings false to you?

Good. You understood.

Learn something from its fall.

[i-am-beckyu]

Addressing Recent Events

Okay this was definitely a post I never ever wanted to create.

If you haven't already heard about the Shubble Allegations, just check out this article here.

tw: talking about abuse.

To be honest, I don't really know what to think about it all because as most people know crime boys and sbi are all I really ever write so going forward from here has me a bit hesitant.

Now I just want to be clear that I have only ever written about c!tommy and c!wilbur from the dsmp and not the actual content creators themselves, using lines and stuff from the world of dsmp. My works do not reflect and are not based on the content creators personal lives and I actual tend to stay away from diving to deep too. All my works are based on fiction and should be treated as such- just make believe stories.

I want to be clear I do not support any forms of abuse or the abusers actions. It's not right and shouldn't be treated as okay. It's just a difficult decision when c!wilbur is literally one of my comfort characters, and while it still has not been confirmed to be the creator, I can't ignore the possibilities it could be him.

Since I know most people on Tumblr are here for the gt aspect rather than the crime bois/sbi stuff, I have decided that I will be continuing to write the remaining fics I've already started for them. I currently have 4 wips that I really want to finish and post, but until Wilbur addresses the accusations or something changes I'm not sure how I want to continue writing new stuff moving forward.

I BEG writers/artists that have already created content surrounding the creator to not remove content they've already made because I swear I read those fics just to get by some days, but I definitely will not be removing my fics.

So that's where I'm at this stage. If anything changes I will try to let you know. If anyone has issues with this or comes at me in my inbox and starts abusing me for my decision, I will be blocking/deleting asks and comments. I'm a writer on the internet. I make silly fics about block men. I avoid drama like this....

Thanks for your time,

-Beckyu

[dr3amofagame]

not super polished meta or anything but something i do think is really interesting and kind of a trend with how c!dream sees factions is how...quite consistently, c!dream doesn't judge a faction as umm holistically as one might guess, especially because a common thought in this fandom is that c!dream just hates factions in general by default (and i mean, id say he's not fond of factions and obviously has a distaste for faction conflict, but he's not nearly as immediately going after factions guns blazing the way that i think people can think of him sometimes)--rather, quite consistently, c!dream's perception of a faction at any point in time is a reflection of his perception of its leader.

lmanburg, at the very beginning, he clearly saw as unreasonable, kind of stupid and delusional, but still something to be treated with a degree of caution...which is how he saw c!wilbur, this guy who was making really fucking preposterous claims (what the fuck do you mean new server. like for this guy he might as well have been declaring that this place was a whole new planet while making pretty overt moves towards war if you disagreed with him) but also had gathered quite a following and wasn't going to take no for an answer. l'manchildburg and all that

later on, c!dream sees lmanburg more neutrally and even positively when his relationship with c!wilbur improves. this is most telling when he talks abt lmanburg to c!wilbur at the beginning of pogtopia and during vassal--of course it's up to debate what c!dream's concrete plans were, but i'm pretty solidly of the belief that he wasn't planning to get rid of lmanburg at this point as i outline here. c!wilbur was willing to be reasonable and even peaceable, and so the same applied to the faction he ruled over

c!dream repeatedly expresses that his disagreement with c!schlatt is what causes him to align himself against manberg, and downright says that with c!schlatt at the helm he doesn't believe that peace between their two nations can be maintained. this is a constant, honestly, down to when c!schlatt dies--c!dream never truly thinks well of manberg, and it seems quite obviously to be a direct result of who was in charge

after c!wilbur dies, despite expressing positive sentiments to c!wilbur later on in statements such as "the smartest person on the server" and quoting him during doomsday and the like, c!dream's assessments of him as a leader as he expresses to c!quackity are quite negative. which is interesting, when you consider that part of the angle c!wilbur takes up during vassal is specifically that he'll be ambitious like schlatt the way c!dream explicitly says he felt threatened by in his sales pitch to convince c!dream to blow up lmanburg with him. c!dream wanting lmanburg to be blown up at the same time as its "ruler" (as c!dream clearly did see c!wilbur as the authority over lmanburg) wanted it to be blown up...hm.

c!dream expresses sentiments along the lines of willing to cooperate and coexist with c!tubbo especially after c!tubbo "puts the good of the nation" first instead of choosing to pursue a conflict against c!dream. to c!quackity, c!dream talks about c!tubbo to be fair and reasonable, qualities he evidently values in a ruler

in stark opposition, c!dream's disagreement with mexican lmanburg has everything to do with his perception of c!quackity as a reckless, conflict-seeking (and that's the common thread, really. c!wilbur sought conflict in the revolution and then with his painting himself as chaotic and ambitious and seeking destruction, and c!schlatt was ambitious and murderous in a way that had very clear consequences in terms of starting conflict on the server) ruler with little regard for the consequences of his actions, as he says repeatedly over the course of the mexican lmanburg debates

finally, c!dream explicitly outlines c!tubbo's "failings" as ruler as being the breaking point in terms of green festival + doomsday and specifically says that c!tubbo is willing to let people in the cabinet walk all over him, as well as the fact that c!quackity is more of a president than he is. when we consider c!dream's already very negative assessment of c!quackity as a leader and how c!quackity had pushed a lot of the decisions that really made nlm a threat that was impossible for c!dream to reconcile with (especially with moves such as the butcher army), some of the underlying sentiments behind well the overt villain-isms of c!dream's speech here do seem to come to light.

and for some other moments that aren't quite as Big but still reflect this same idea--c!dream explicitly rejects nlm if it was under c!tommy's rulership but is willing to coexist with c!tubbo as president, both dethronements have a lot to do with c!eret and c!george's actions having negative consequences for the whole faction by compromising a neutral stand (and therefore compromising the quote unquote neutrality of the entire faction and possibly embroiling everyone into conflict), c!dream's willingness to work with the badlands, the difference between the factions that c!dream ignores post-prison versus the one that he attacks (las nevadas, obviously). it's interesting to me how often c!dream seems to view factions as almost being extensions of the will of the person leading them and how his opinion of a faction an his opinion of its leader bounce off of each other, yknow?

(this post is mostly a series of observations and absolutely oversimplified to a certain degree, but yeah 👍)

[raineyraven]

yknow this is a thought that has been rattling around in my head for a long while, so i figured i may as well share it.

almost everyone is very well aware that the dream smp is a very morally grey narrative. we all know that, there are no perfectly righteous or purely evil characters, etc etc.

the thing that's been grating on me of late is that the fandom reactions to significant lore events don't really.. reflect this knowledge. hear me out.

ever since the red festival i've felt acutely aware of this. one of the longest-running debates in this fandom was who was in the wrong for tubbo's execution. techno for pulling the trigger, tommy and wilbur for not helping him. i saw post after post after post debating it the rest of that year. and i heavily disliked it. seeing people watch these characters have to improvise with an unpredicted circumstance and react to it imperfectly, reacting how their characters would be expected to, and then deciding to label some as right and some as wrong. to put them on those levels of morality, rather than viewing it through the morally grey lens the narrative has pushed. again, it just grated on me. treating these characters' decisions and actions as either wrong or right instead of treating them as decisions that move the narrative in fascinating ways and give us a window into their character.

i. dislike. when characters are made to embody either good or evil and have their flaws made respectable and palatable and easily overcome instead of more.. human i guess? it doesnt work for me, thats why i love the dsmp like i do. it's so human.

my brain started revisiting this train of thought after the c!wilbur and c!eret stream in may. the fandom reaction to that was.. a lot. again, post after post i saw opinions on c!eret did worse and c!wilbur's apology didnt make sense, or c!eret was right to be angry at c!wilbur for villainizing them, or any other number of thoughts that stem from the view that one of these characters are right and the other is wrong, that some actions and words were morally justified and others weren't.

very little did i see posts stepping back to look at this conflict in its purest form: a part of the narrative. talking about how fascinating it was that wilbur decided to apologize to eret now, how eret finally admitted how his words had hurt her. every discussion i saw was riddled with the question of did eret really deserve an apology from wilbur, was eret in the wrong for forcing a better apology out of him, who hurt the other more and who really deserved an apology from the other.

i could not help but think back to tubbo's execution after that stream. morally grey characters, morally grey decisions, viewed through the lens of sorting out who's right and who's wrong. who deserves what and how much do they deserve it. what moral box can we put this character into next.

and i've seen this pattern with so many other conflicts!! tubbo's decision to exile tommy, techno betraying pogtopia, doomsday. the narrative places absolutely no blame or condemnation on either side of these conflicts, it doesnt label either as wrong or right, so i guess people just. draw their own conclusions on it? it's weird to me, this need to discuss and debate the rightness and wrongness of these known morally grey characters and their morally grey actions and decisions. which one is better than the other, which one deserves to be listened to and the other condemned, which ones deserve to fight for forgiveness for the rest of their lives and which ones get to recieve it straight away. obviously, i'm not saying people shouldn't have opinions on these topics, i suppose just the constant insistence on subjectivity rather than objectivity when discussing controversial lore events like these irritate me.

i don't particularly know what i hope to achieve with this. i'm certainly not trying to attack anyone who's done this, just expressing my not understanding. it's just a weird way to discuss a morally grey story to me. i'd like to know if anyone else shares this sentiment, or if i'm just spouting nonsense. i don't think i am. this habit in the fandom has been frustrating me since i joined it in august 2020.

[the-final-sif]

Hi Sif! I saw you addition to my post and I wanted to follow up and say that I did a more complete analysis looking at every character on the Dream SMP. I definitely didn't think my original post was going to spread as far as it did, since it was me just gushing my surface level thoughts. Part of the reason I followed up with a more thorough look was that I didn't want to let misinformation spread without actually looking at the full data.

I agree with some of your points but I would like to push a little and say that I do think that there is still a gender bias. While Hannah's situation might be more related to her later addition to the server and lack of prominent romantic relationships (beyond Tinarose, which still counts as a rarepair by numbers), the numbers for Niki are a significant outlier considering her early presence and involvement in numerous character/story arcs, especially compared to some characters that fared better than her.

I obviously can't control for every variable and every reason the numbers may show what they do. And there are many, many reasons people can and should use tags the way they do. But I think it is not too far-fetched to say that the Dream SMP fandom does have a problem with overusing tags that don't actually portray what happens in their fic AND with under-valuing characters with marginalized identities, which are partially reflected in the way relationship tags and character tags work together as they do today.

Here's the thing, I actually don't think that Niki's story count is weird at all, I think you may just be underestimating how popular certain pairings/platonic relationships are.

Let's take a comparison that I think is more than fair, c!Punz. Punz has a pretty comparable if not larger impact on the story than c!Niki. particularly towards the finales he plays different roles in them. But outside of c!Dream he doesn't have a lot of other major relationships that are popular in fanon, outside of him and c!Purpled. Despite this, c!Punz is often important to the plot, and he joined a full month before Niki did. Hell, he joined before Tubbo and just after Tommy.

But look at his top 10,

He does have 2/10 of his top relationships, but it's platonic/romantic drunz, so just different flavors of the same relationship. Outside of that, you see all the same super popular ships that you saw on ever other characters. It's just what happens in fandom.

As it turns out, some dynamics are just incredibly popular. DNF alone has nearly 25k fics written just for it. So honestly, with that many raw fics, it's hardly surprising that about 5% of them happen to feature Punz. Which ends up being more fics than the rest of his relationship category.

It's not that Punz is being incorrectly tagged in these fics, it's just that DNF is incredibly incredibly popular, and by virtue of that you end up here.

SBI similarly has about 21k fics, and Wilbur & Tommy have about 22k.

Niki's numbers aren't particularly weird, it's just that these particular dynamics are extremely popular. If you filter out just those three insanely popular dynamics, you get this,

Niki ends up in 4/10 (sorta 4/9 since one of these is just "no romantic relationships" which people use as a relationship tag for some reason rather than just putting that in additional tags).

I'm not saying that there aren't gender biases in how certain characters are treated. To some extent people often feel less comfortable shipping female creators because people in the past were being creeps about it and forcing it onto female creators in their chats (lots of creators had to address this with their chats, Techno included). Which will lead to a specific decline in the amount they get tagged in the ship section.

What I am saying is that I don't actually think there's a gender bias in how characters are tagged, and I don't think ship stats are a good way to prove that. Characters can be important to a story and not be tagged in the ship section. Also, frankly, a lot of times authors force in or tag a "popular" ship just to get more attention for their story, even if that ship isn't a huge part of the story.

I'm also not rely sure what exactly you want to see happen with a post like that. Like, should people not tag female characters that are relevant to their story if they're also tagging a really popular ship? I don't think that's a good idea. It is just kinda being the fandom police if that really is your take on it, if you come at it from the perspective that you get to decide how other people should tag. I know you said you weren't trying to be that, but like, that's how it comes off.

Some people will tag based on relevancy, some people tag as warnings. Both are valid methods of tagging, and you don't have a right to control how other people use their tags. That's something I believe very strongly in.

I've also never really been fond of turning enjoyment of characters into a moral thing either. People will enjoy what characters they connect to for any number of reasons, and shaming them for not enjoying particular female characters has never done anyone any good. I've seen it a thousand times before in every fandom I've been in and all it does is make people feel guilty. What actually does a lot more good is instead being excited about the female characters you like, and creating interesting fandom content for them that helps get other people interested.

If you want more people to be passionate about something, start from a point of passion, not a point of shame.

[missycolorful]

The discussion of Niki and the struggles she and other Dream SMP streamers go through makes me appreciate Niki's time with the Syndicate more and more. Because it wasn't just about the character.

One hand, yeah, the Syndicate was a catalyst for her character to heal from the trauma she dealt from all the wars she endured, from what she endured during Manberg, from not feeling heard. That compounded with tragedies such as losing c!Wilbur fucking broke her. But then c!Techno came along, gave her a seat in the Syndicate room, and she felt like she belonged in a place in which she can heal. We would not have gotten that tearjerking “I’ve started baking again” without that group.

But it was ALSO about Niki, the person, the streamer, being reached out to when she felt she was ignored by the server as a whole. She made that as part of her character because it reflected her true feelings, and that hurts to watch. She’d get talked over, ignored, not really regarded for any lore at all lore. Even when she made a new city, that wasn’t even respected! She wasn’t respected! And I still think about that clip where she was sooo happy about joining the Syndicate. Because Techno, Phil, and Ranboo let her use her voice, gave her the chance to be heard! She could speak up around them. And she confessed how she just wasn't used to that, and it broke my heart that something as simple as having a voice seemed impossible for her, but also solidifies how the Syndicate was the best goddamn thing for Niki in the Dream SMP, as a character but most importantly, as a person.

And I wanna scream at people that would try to say c!Niki joining the Syndicate was bad or forced or whatever the fuck like first of all you're wrong but even if that was the case, no one cares, bucko, Niki the streamer the real goddamn person is happy and that's all that matters.

[mellorphic]

C!Niki Design Timeline

My thoughts about her design under the cut!

L’MaNiki

I have an art piece of everyone’s L’Manberg uniforms that Tumblr won’t let me link, but the general gist is that anyone who joined post revolution got to choose the shade of their coat, and got a light blue sash instead of a red one. They also don’t have the lines on the boots.

Elections

She dyed parts of her hair orange to match Fundy for coconut2020, and a lot of her outfit was styled to reflect to the people that she was loyal to L’Manberg - keeping the same collar shape as her uniform, wearing the same turtleneck, wearing the shoulder pads

Manberg

She dyed her hair! Niki tied the sash from her L’Manberg uniform around her leg as a sort of rebellious act against JSchlatt (which she did a lot of), showing she was loyal to Wilbur’s nation rather than his. She also tied the hairtie around her wrist. Her sweater is the mental-breakdown shade of pink that she dyed her hair later, showing that this was the start of her mental decline and that this was a massive period of loneliness.

Pogtopia

She cut her hair and put it up into pigtails so that it was out of the way while she was in the ravine. I headcanon that this was when she got Wilbur’s cloak and that he gave it to her once she joined. Also, despite not participating in a war yet she has a scar on her leg from being chased out of Manberg and murdered by Ponk on the day of Tubbo’s execution, which is what led to her joining Pogtopia. The L’Manberg hairtie is still on her wrist but the ones in her hair are the mental breakdown colour, however there is less of that pink on this design than the Manberg one as joining Pogtopia reunited her with many of her friends, so she didn’t feel as alone even if she was still scared.

Breakdown

This design is for the entirety of New L’Manberg, Doomsday, and the rocket duo arc, up until the point where she stopped trying to kill Tommy and focused more on her secret city (where she locked herself up due to sleepwalking and night terrors). This arc lasted a long time and goes acrosss multiple eras her appearance remained how it did from NLM because she had no motivation to change anything, despite usually taking pride in aspects of her appearance such as her hair (which had grown out slightly between Pogtopia and now). There is no a single reference to L’Manberg in this outfit but she does still have Wilbur’s cloak.

Healing arc

Niki’s healing began after joining the syndicate but I think the appearance change would not come until at least a few months after joining as she was still trying to find her sense of self again. When she did, she went back to her blonde hair but dyed half brown, like a reference to Ranboo and Puffy. She continues to wear Wilbur’s cloak but is now in a much classier fit, having spent too much time with Techno (who definitely gave her the gold). The L’Manberg hairtie is back, this time with a braid, because I think Syndicate braids is an even cooler concept than sbi braids

[giiyus]

the tornado by owl city is c!tubbo's song and c!tubbo's only (or in other words im bored so let's analyze the tornado in a c!tubbo lense)

—

It was just startin' to drizzle as I walked out the door

But I've delivered papers in the rain like that before

3:30 in the morning, I was happy as a lark

As I grabbed my bike and rode into the dark

i think of this as him first arriving to the dsmp as his innocent, bubbly self. the phrase "happy as a lark" showing that he's overjoyed to be there and that he is carefree and unaware of the grimmer realities about to take place ("rode into the dark")

I pedaled through the neighborhood, the weather on my mind

The wind was pickin' up and howlin' louder all the time

The sky churned like a cauldron and the distant thunder roared

And I knew that I was in for quite a storm

this is the early dsmp arc, before the lmanburg war for independence. tubbo is getting into some small conflicts, including the disc war, and wondering what's happening in the caravan with wilbur and tommy. he doesn't know it yet, but both the disc war and wilbur/tommys caravan shit would get him into so much future trouble that is soon approaching hence the "the distant thunder roared".

i see the lyric "and i knew that i was in for quite a storm" as me reflecting on tubbo's story because even though in some extent he knew that it wasn't going to be easy to declare independence from dream, he did not know how big that conflict and the following conflicts would be and affect him, but i do (and he was most definitely in for quite a big horrific storm)

A little rain never hurt no one, so I kept pressin' on

And I tried to tell myself it's always darkest before the dawn

shit is starting to get real in the lmanburg war

Lighting struck an oak tree as I leapt off my bike

The sirens started wailing, but there was no good place to hide

I knew without a doubt there was a twister touchin' down

So I crawled into a culvert to wait it out

enter schlatt and his administration/tubbo acting as a spy

culvert = his tunnels from schlatt to pogtopia

The little bit of courage I had left was almost gone

But I tried to tell myself it's always darkest before the dawn

execution, he still tries to see the good in everyone though

And then the nightmare started, it got deafeningly loud

Every fiber in me screamed out, but I couldn't make a sound

The whirling of a vortex, a violent carousel

It sounded like a freight train was draggin' me to hell

lmanburg destroyed first time leading into c!tubbo exiling tommy, "deafeningly loud" = tnt raining on the city, fireworks hitting everywhere (trauma alert)

And this was my prayer

"Save me from this terrible nightmare"

he is utterly alone, everyone calls him schlatt and a villain, he was this happy go lucky guy turned traumatic devastating teenager

That was when I saw my family with my eyes shut real tight

Would they know how much I loved them if this was how I died?

No, I vowed I'd not be murdered by a monster in the sky that night

c!tubbo doesn't end everything?? lmanburg destroyed AGAIN (seriously they love exploding that shit)

"murdered by a monster in the sky that night" referring to the tnt raining down on lmanburg

But if I went home to heaven, at least that's where I'd belong

Yeah, I tried to tell myself it's always darkest before the dawn

So I kept hangin' on

I kept hangin' on

he keeps persevering, the creation of snowchester (his new supposed safe haven) is made

The shadows slowly melted as I was hunkered down

'Til at last the worst was over, the storm was dyin' out

I crept out of that culvert and I went weak in the knees

'Cause what I saw was a somber sight to see

they start the finale disc war, there's fighting. "somber sight" being the place where dream was going to kill tubbo (the prison)

There was nothin' but destruction and wreckage in that town

Cars were upside down and houses leveled to the ground

A twisted trampoline was hangin' from the power lines

I blinked a tear back 'cause I felt lucky to be alive

finale disc war, dream didn't kill him. i think that even though he was passively suicidal in this, he felt a sliver of hope that things would look up. "a twisted trampoline " part relating to c!dream losing two canon lives and being stuck in the prison for (supposedly) forever

And that was how I learned to live when you can run, but you can't hide

How to feel trapped in a tunnel but come out the other side

'Cause with all the stormy weather in the world, you learn to take life one storm at a time

You don't have to be afraid

And now when there's bad weather on the way, I stay calm

more snow chester healing arc + cabinetduo drama but instead of being afraid and silent, tubbo sticks up for what he wants/believes in and won't let quackity push him around

And I keep hangin' on because it's always darkest before the dawn

And I keep hangin' on

I keep hangin' on

i see this as tubbo telling micheal about some of his story as a life lesson to be taught (watered down ofc he's still a kid) and living happily with c!ranboo

i see this as a nice ending to the dsmp in my mind so thats the point in the lore where i stop :)