#at least according to the lore

[soupmanspeaks]

You know what

In celebration of a common CC W

Here's some rare Soup art of the boy

[necrotic-nephilim]

there is not enough femslash in batcest circles. the girls deserve to be just as weird about each other as the boys are. if BruDick gets to be weird father/son/brothers/lovers/friends/rivals/soulmates then it is only fair that Babs/Cass get to be mother/daughter/sisters/lovers too. Something about that deep intrinsic but undefinable love that is born out of trauma, especially if you consider Cass not knowing what healthy love looks like in the first place. i think it's fun and deserves just as much fandom content.

besides that, you can get even more niche with rarepairs like Helena/Steph. Huntress/Spoiler: Blunt Trauma is already a fantastic comic and even though it's their only real canon interaction it has so much potential. very comparable to TimJay in how Helena tries to get Steph to understand her morals and the corruption you could play with it.

batman: huntress/spoiler: blunt trauma (1998)

that comic also highlights on how both Steph and Helena are outcasts of the Batfamily and don't have the approval of Bruce to be doing what they do in "his city". I think there's so much Potential in Helena taking Steph under her wing because Bruce won't let her in and it becomes a weird codependent toxic sapphic mess. I think the protectiveness Helena feels over Steph from the get-go is so clear and the way she wants to look out for Steph, wants to make sure Steph understands the real world? I love them. Helena should be allowed to steal Steph, actually. I think it'd be fun.

there are a lot of other possibilities too like Babs/Steph or even getting weird with Helena Bertinelli/Helena Wayne and the existential question of "is it selfcest or not." But these two specifically live in my head rent-free, especially Helena/Steph and one day I'll convince everyone else to ship it too.

[italian-pastry]

If you can't come up with ideas for your own Smiling Critters Fankids, store bought is fine

Brycen - Dark Blue roan Cocker Spaniel, DayNap kid 1

Daniella - Reddish Pink Ringtailed Cat, DayNap kid 2

Lil Bubba - ... Little elephant, Bubba's kid(?)

[linnaealyn]

They're just shooting stars, little one.

[vrisbian]

Im not shocked about there not being any follow through from previous games- bc other than small quips there really never was. My Warden’s wish for a free circle didn’t end up happening, or a self governing alienage, and Kieran is alive no matter what I chose for the ritual. It doesn’t matter how pro mage my Hawke is, how much they loved Anders, or if they sacrificed Isabella to the Qunari. Most of the world state assumes a level of canon. Leliana is alive no matter what you did, for example. Its always been up to fans to headcanon and interpret how the lore all fits in.

I think being in North Thedas is to the game’s benefit because most of what happened down South won’t matter. We are running around in countries that have completely different politics and dynamics- the center of the world isn’t Fereldan. In fact, Fereldan is a backwater in the eyes of most of the world. Tevinter doesn’t recognize the Southern Divine or really care too much about Orlais.

The ONLY choice that surprises me is that it doesn’t matter who drank from the Well. Because it felt like it would impact this level of plot with the stakes they gave- and especially with both Inquistor and Morrigan being back for this game. But oh well.

[deus-ex-mona]

how long will chapter 5 even be my g o s h

[fleetsonourgecentral]

so it first Scourge only stays in the dimension because he has no way out, but what about the Omniviewer or the Ring of Eternity? do they for some reason not have the ability to take him to his dimension? or are we just shoving them out of the picture for the sake of the story until we can think of a good reason for their absence?

hi can you tell how much I've got the Fleet!Sonourge bug

So the Omniviewer and Ring of Eternity, although they do have dimension-related powers, don't quite have the powers to send Scourge back to his own dimension (Sonic was distraught upon discovering this, because the Omniviewer was his first solution. Locals say he stormed off yelling "THEN WHAT EXACTLY IS THE POINT OF YOU???" when the Omniviewer said he couldn't help). Their powers, while impressive to someone from the fleetway dimension who didn't even know dimension travel was possible, are actually pretty standard and minor in the grand, cosmic, multi-dimension scheme of things, as both of them can really only use their powers on the fleetway dimension and nearby "connected" dimensions

The Omniviewer's power is mostly limited to Mobius and the Special Zone, the latter of which is still inside the fleetway dimension. There's the bonus of time travel, but that still only really impacts the fleetway universe. I don't remember if we ever see him use his powers for anything outside Mobius and the Special Zone, but if he can, it's limited. The Ring of Eternity has a bit more power, as it can connect to other dimensions, but only... local dimensions, I guess is the way to put it? The Cosmic Highway is big, there are a lot of alternate dimensions to hold, and not all dimensions are within the same distance as each other

Think of it as like a bubble, I guess? The Ring of Eternity can reach dimensions that are within the bubble, and most if not all of those dimensions have a direct connection to the fleetway dimension. The universe that has King Sonic, for example, is directly connected to the fleetway universe, because, well, it's a parallel for it. It's a relatively close dimension, from a multi-dimensional perspective, which means it's within the reach of the Ring of Eternity's powers

Moebius, however, is not part of these connected dimensions. Different bubble, or neighbourhood, or whichever metaphor you wish to use. It's not a dimension that's close to the fleetway universe, so even if the Ring of Eternity or the Omniviewer were aware of that universe to begin with, they couldn't send Scourge there, because they just don't have that kind of power. Probably for the best, otherwise there could have been some... unforeseen complications when the Omniviewer trapped Super

The fleetway universe, and similarly, it's connecting universes, are pretty well-contained. Travel between connected dimensions isn't very common as it is, unless you count Sonic's trips to the Special Zone, so getting outside of that little bubble is incredibly difficult. Portals that open directly onto the Cosmic Highway just don't spawn often, and it's incredibly difficult to find an alternate way out. Perhaps it's a cosmic evolution; a dimension that specifically spawned and adapted to keep things and people (like Super) contained

Either way, it's effective at keeping people in. Between that, and Scourge's dimension being not only completely unconnected to the fleetway universe, but also thousands of miles away on the Cosmic Highway, neither the Omniviewer nor the Ring of Eternity can help, so please stop yelling at us Sonic it's not our fault there's nothing we can do

[diamondnokouzai]

so the nine hour fnaf lore video may have altered my brain chemistry

[mstopportunity]

It's Digimon. Pokemon's a decent fit but Digimon fits better and in this essay I will -

Spirit Animal is racist.

Patronus was invented by a transphobe.

I think it’s time we all suck it up and say what we mean: fursona.

[earthenterran]

Im having thoughts about the lore in the 1oo again and its bottheeering me

[yurrrsssss-ghoul]

Big fan of Damian unpacking lores that aren't even exclusive to the LoA. Like, the BatFamily thought that they helped him (they didn't) but then they realized that they may have unintentionally exposed him to the same stuff, just in different fonts.

__________

Duke: I never got to ask, but what are these markings on your door? I don't see them on everyone else's

Damian: Oh, those are from the time father installed extra locking mechanisms from outside

Dick, doing the slowest fucking head turn towards Bruce: He did what

Damian, shrugging: To be fair, I was a danger to Drake. At least according to father

Stephanie: Okay, but that seems a bit of an overkill. You were like, what? 10 years old at the time?

Damian: 11, but then again I was a trained assassin

Dick, stressed out: So are everyone else that is occupying this manor?? The difference is that you're a whole child and we're grown adults?? Who had access to firearms???

[cawareyoudoin]

This is an insane thing to say out of context. Love it.

The most important question about s3, is David Tennant going to be set on fire?

If Amazon decide not to commission Season 3, I will personally set David on fire to make up for it.

[yes-no-maybe-soo]

Elysium pretty much confirms what a lot of us have suspected about Sylus' official age — it's just a random number he picked out for himself. Not his true age.

Just think about it and you'll see what I mean about it not making sense.

So according to his profile, Sylus is 28 years old in 2048.

The N109 Zone gang wars took place in 2036, ie 12 years earlier. Which would make him 16 years old at the time.

Do you guys see what I'm getting at?

Are we supposed to believe that Sylus was 16 or younger in his anecdote?

Are you deadass telling me to buy for even a second that Sylus was hunting down intergalactic overlords for sport, conquering entire planets, and cementing his reputation as the most feared and wanted man in the history of an entire civilisation before legal drinking age? Before he'd be eligible to get a driver's license?

Are you expecting me to buy that this

or this

is basically a high-schooler??? A literal child???

Nah. I'm willing to suspend my disbelief on a lot of stuff but this?

Absolutely not.

Sylus is not 28.

Tbh though I never believed he was. I thought it was just a number he picked for the sake of creating an identity. Someone pointed out in a comment to one of my posts that it might actually be a reference to how old he'd be in dragon years rather than in human years, and I like that theory. Honestly, I've always figured that Sylus was not reincarnated or reborn, but rather resurrected/reassembled—the scar on his chest, as well as the fact that he retains all his memories of the past unlike MC or Zayne, strongly hint towards that being the case imo. So I think he's most likely been a fully grown adult for decades, at least, depending on when exactly his resurrection/reassembling took place.

Man, I need more Sylus lore... I need more info on his planet conquering days, his prison escape, the timeline of his first stay in the Oasis etc.

@/Paperfold

Anyway, I rest my case.

[str4wb3rrysw3etheart]

Do you think you could write hcs of the boys at prom? 🥹 (post comic book store fire, since in the lore they didn’t go the first time)

OFCC!!!

Sfw ♡

Cw: suggestive in Petes and bills, bill needs to be pegged/j, usage of slut, Josh has a binge ed

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷

Bill

♡Did not want to go.. his mom barely let him go, but decided he needed to hang out with someone ..

♡He stands with you in the corner at the food table, eating the occasional snack, and complaining that his tie was too tight (his mom made him dress up)

♡If you try to dance with him, he will blush from embarrassment and refuse, saying that it's dumb.. just make him he's pathetic (I love him)

♡Try to kiss him? Hes bright red. He chewed four packs of gum and brushed his teeth for 30 minutes to prepare for this, but still..

♡He stares.. a lot, he finds you so domestic in a dress, and he feels manly. He yaps about how good of a house wife you'd be..

♡He sulks in the corner if you go off to talk to someone else.. you're litterally his only friend there.

♡Will ask to go to the bathroom (to get lucky..) multiple times. Unless you say yes he gets whiner and whiner each time

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷

Pete

♡Finds the whole thing stupid, but goes, he doesn't wanna upset the only women to EVER talk to him..

♡Dances with you, and tries to be romantic, but kinda sucks at it.. just making sexual (and slightly objectifying ..) remarks

♡Doesn't dress up at all. He's wearing his normal clothes..

♡Refuses to let you go off with your friends, following you around, not really interested in your friends in the slightest.. what good are they anyway?

♡Tries to ... well.. get lucky with you at the end of the dance (if you want more details thats another fic)

♡If you kiss him he's just a bit too into it.. he sucks at it though.. (teaching Pete how to kiss fic coming up??/hj)

calls you horrendous petnames the whole time (women , sugar, slut)

♡Lowkey he makes you leave early and watches a movie with you instead, complaing that there were too many normies there..

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷

Josh

♡VERY nervous to go to prom.. he made his mom do his hair, spent two hours cleaning himself up, and practicing how to kiss and what to say in the mirror..

♡Forgets all that he practiced as he sees you, You're the prettiest thing he's ever seen..

♡Tends to eat a lot of food out of his nervousness, so best believe he is by that snack table..

♡When you try to dance with him, he sucks at it. Stepping on your feet and tripping the whole time.. he has clearly never done this before

♡When you kiss him, he doesn't reciprocate at first, freezing up, he eventually leans into it, I'll admit a bit messily, but he's okay at kissing

♡Nervous rambles the whole time, he can't shut up. Normally he goes silent from anxiety, but I guess if he can't give you a minute alone with your thoughts you won't decide to leave him because you can't think about it

♡Once he gets more comfortable, he sweats a bit less, still on edge, but trusts you.. happy to be there with someone he loves.

♡Definitely called you milady at least once. Wanting to cry from embarrassment when you laughed.

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷

Jerry

♡Actually went there mostly on his own accord , didn't take much convincing when you asked

♡He is still a bit awkward the whole time, but he tries to mask it, acting confident as if he didn't cry over his hair not looking right for you 20 minutes ago..

♡Is most familiar with dancing, he's been to plenty of weddings for family members he doesn't remember

♡When you kiss him, he kisses back almost immediately, but you can feel how sweaty his palms are

♡Actually makes an effort to seem.. normal? While there. Talking with your friends if you bring them over, and being respectful of you wanting space

♡Tries to drink the punch, and it ends up being spiked and is so wobbly is almost comical. He is a huge lightweight

♡Compliments your dress like 15 times, trying to cover up that's why he was staring, and not anything else... nooo...

꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷꒦꒷꒦︶꒷꒦︶ ๋ ࣭ ⭑꒷

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[meglosthegreat]

So... everyone pretty much hated Veilguard's "secret ending", right? Beyond speculation about the Executors themselves, I haven't exactly seen anyone excited about its presence, and for that matter, haven't seen many people talking about it at all.

The closest way I can describe my initial reaction to it was an immediate, visceral disgust. I think I remember uttering at my screen something along the lines of "Fuck off! What the fuck?! Are you fucking kidding me???" and ever since then I've wanted to put into words exactly why it made me feel that way.

For the 88% of you (according to Steam achievement statistics) who didn't see this ending due to not picking up three very specific codex entries by complete chance, you can watch it here. In short, the clip depicts a mysterious voice who sounds suspiciously like Matt Mercer talking about how a group of shadowy figures has "balanced, guided, and whispered" over scenes of villains from the previous DA games, implying that these shadowy figures have been at least partially responsible for all of the bad things happening in Thedas, towards some unknown nefarious purpose.

Now obviously, this sucks. This is hamfisted, unimaginative writing that simultaneously retcons and re-contextualizes elements from DA's past that absolutely no one thought needed further explanation, as well as being exactly the kind of irritating sequel-bait tactics that people have largely grown tired of these days. But why does it suck so much? Why did I feel such palpable distaste for this scene?

For starters, it simply reeks of entitlement, and a lack of respect towards Bioware's own past games. Remember those villains you loved and thought were compelling? Well, their own personal, very complex and thought-out motivations were really just the Executors whispering in their ears the whole time! Loghain making a difficult and calculated decision at great personal cost for a greater good he truly believed in? Executors. Bartrand succumbing to his own greed to the point that he betrays his only family and devolves into a tragic husk of himself? Executors. Corypheus and the Magisters breaching the Golden fucking City??? Executors.

Ignore the infuriating lore ramifications for a second and consider: what do all of these things have in common? They're all instances of complex character motivation; of people in this world doing things for their own reasons that ended up having massive ramifications. In short, they're not events that can be explained easily in terms of black and white morality. And from what we've seen in Veilguard, the current dev team has a serious inability to work with any story elements that do not have absolute moral clarity: the Venatori and the Antaam are Evil. The Shadow Dragons and the Crows are Good. Any nuance; any potential questioning of this duality is quickly explained away or snuffed out.

And that's exactly what they're trying to do, retroactively, with the rest of the series. Having a hard time deciding whether Loghain was right or wrong? Well, worry not, the Executors are Evil and if they were guiding him the whole time, then what he did must have been Evil too! Grappling with how the plot of DA2 was about the inevitable tragedy of a series of oppressive systems reaching their natural breaking point? Well, wrestle no further, for if the Executors were involved then Meredith and Bartrand must've been Evil, no question! What the Magisters did was definitely Not Great, and what do you know, there were consequences for it that they and the whole world very much did pay for. But if the Executors were behind it all, then it was someone else's fault, some Evil power reaching in and making them do what they did, rather than their actions being the result of a horrific series of power abuses done by actual people.

Which leads me to where my initial disgust comes in. Because in a world which has always had core themes of power and its many abuses, actions that have consequences, and the idea that there are no true higher beings; every horrible thing that has ever been done was done by people, the simple act of putting shadowy figures behind key moments in history completely debases and neuters all of those themes. The whole point of Dragon Age as a series up until this point has been to illustrate the complex relationships people and societies have with power, choice, and morality. To remove that link - to place an external force between those characters and their choices - is to rob the series of any meaning whatsoever.

There is a staggering difference between the messaging of a game that tells you ordinary people are to blame for society's wrongs and a game that tells you a secret shadowy faction of evil forces are to blame for them. The former invites thought about one's own society; it has the potential to be uncomfortable and difficult to reconcile with. The latter assures its audience of the fantasy it is couched in. It gives the audience a boogeyman to be angry at, and in so doing deflects any potential for introspection. And that, I think, is the real point of the scene in question.

In a time where our media has become inundated with bland, unchallenging liberal politics, the idea of "cozy" stories have become a growing trend. These types of stories often sport a broad rejection of complicated themes, painful emotions, and nuance, preferring instead to provide a "safe" place to escape to. And with that "safe" space comes a directive not to engage in critical thinking about a work, and not to draw any message from that work and apply it to the real world. Yet this is exactly where Bioware seems to be heading nowadays.

Veilguard has already been faced with heavy criticism about playing things overly safe; removing anything that might be potentially uncomfortable for the player. And the end credits scene is no different. Don't think about things too hard, it whispers to you seductively, in Matt Mercer's soothingly Evil voice. See? The Bad Guys were behind everything, all along.

[dalishious]

This is an excerpt from my work-in-progress large meta examination on thet qunari from DAO through to DATV. But since that is taking a long time, I thought it might be worth it to post this piece alone now, since it works on its own as well.

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The Qunari Design

In Dragon Age: Origins (DAO) the qunari all had the same brown metallic skin. This is because the developers only bothered to make one skin tint for the use of Sten, the qunari companion. They gave this skin tint to every other qunari NPC as well. This is also why there is only the one hairstyle that Sten uses for qunari, with the few NPCs either being bald or using his same hair. Essentially, Sten was the blueprint for all qunari, originally.

No qunari have horns in DAO like they do in the rest of the franchise. According to developer David Gaider, the qunari were always meant to have horns, but did not in DAO because it would have meant Sten couldn’t wear a helmet. This led to the lore decision that some qunari are born hornless as a rare genetic quirk, to account for the later change in design.

Dragon Age II (DA2) saw a drastic change in how the qunari look. Unlike the elves, humans, and dwarves in DA2, the qunari do not use head morphs allowing for individual designs; they have standardized creature models. (The only exception in the base game is the Arishok, who has his own special model.) The qunari moved from having Sten’s brown skin to grey metallic skin, their eye sclera was changed to black, and they were given the horns the developers originally wanted.

It is a well-known fact that DA2 was under immense development restrictions that led to all kinds of cut corners. However, it is worth pointing out the negative impact of choosing an entire race’s design functionality as one of those cut corners. The qunari in DA2 are, for the most part, treated like nothing but unthinking monsters for Hawke to squish, no different than giant spiders or darkspawn. Making them all look the same adds to this effect; they are stripped of any sense of personable traits.

A medium between DAO and DA2 was reached in Dragon Age: Inquisition (DAI), through introducing the player’s ability to make a qunari protagonist. DAI allows the player to choose between few brownish and a few greyish skin colours for their qunari character. The black sclera was changed to white again, as the qunari use the same eye texture and colouring functionality as all the other races. The character creation works just the same for qunari as it does for any other race, allowing for individual appearances left to the player’s imagination. However, as far as NPCs go, there are no qunari in the base game of DAI, making Iron Bull as a companion the only qunari presence until the Trespasser DLC. This does not leave much room to judge the appearance of other qunari characters.

DATV is just like DAI in its character creation capabilities, with the one expansion being the player can make their character have black sclera like in DA2 if they so choose. For all DATV’s faults with the qunari, at least we can say that the character creation is great. Taash and their mother Shathann also have lovely, unique designs. Where things become uncomfortable with the qunari designs… is in the Reavers.

It is established lore from the previous franchise installments that Reavers gain their special powers through drinking draconic blood, though these Antaam Reavers have been altered by Ghilan’nain. My personal assumption is that blighted dragon blood was used. Regardless of how these Reavers came to be, they are unprecedented, horrific monsters, and it is only ever qunari that we see subjected to this kind of disfigurement. This really doubles down on turning them into standardised monsters like in DA2.

Going through all these qunari design changes can make a player’s head spin. But I believe it is an important, visual example of an overarching theme with the qunari: the developers have never really cemented what they want them to be. The writing throughout the years suggests the same.

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Stay tuned for the full piece sometime in the future, where I will get into the writing!