#but sort of my worldbuilding

[a-world-in-grey]

What exactly are the role descriptions of the royal retinue? I saw some description but I am still not completely sure on it 🤔

Welp, found this at the bottom of my ask box, sorry 0hmydekiru.

So, I've got stuff from @secret-engima that I'll copy here, and I'll add on my own stuff.

Shield:

SE: "Shield of my body, rampart of my resolve." The First is a Shield when they need a protector, and anchor. They are the ones who stay the closest and the longest, even if the others fall away or die.

Me: So this probably started out as only a bodyguard position. THE trusted bodyguard, able to go anywhere with their monarch, even to places other guards would be denied. Over time, with such close contact, the position would have morphed into the one we see by Somnus' time. In addition to being a physical protector, the Shield's job is to help their monarch when they waver. When Noctis' resolve falters after Regis and Luna's deaths, Gladio is there to metaphorically kick his ass back into gear. The Shield does not guide their monarch on their chosen path, but ensures that they are able to keep walking it. Wherever they go.

Hand:

SE: "Right Hand of my body, strong guide for my mind." A Hand is claimed first by LCs who are most unsure of their place in the world, who need a guiding hand and a brother that will catch them when they emotionally stumble rather than physically.

Me: Adapted from the role of Royal Advisor. As SE says, these are the mentors. They can be one of, if not the most, influential member of a Retinue. They help their monarch find their purpose, help guide them along whatever path they choose to take, guiding them whenever they stray from that path. The most concerned with the monarch's morals, and making sure that their monarch won't tear the country apart. The Hand is responsible for the details of how their monarch's decisions are carried out - ensuring that the outcome is most favorable. Shares care of the monarch's physical wellbeing with the Shield, but more in the sense of making sure their monarch has healthy habits - hence Ignis' mothering Noctis over his diet whereas Gladio focused on Noctis' physical safety and martial ability. The Hand also shares responsibility for mental and emotional well-being with the Heart. The Hand focuses on the monarch's mental state as it concerns others, where the Heart's concern is their monarch's mental state concerning themselves.

Heart:

SE: "Heart of my soul, light in my darkest hours." Claimed first when an LC needs a physical, living being to remind them how to feel, how to cry and smile and function outside their duty or shatter and become nothing more than a weapon.

Me: The Heart is the member most responsible for keeping an LC true to themselves. To remind them that alongside a monarch's duty to their people, they have a duty to themselves. I hc that losing a Heart often does the most damage to an LC. Some LCs - like Mors - turn hard and sharp as they submerge themselves entirely in duty. Others - like the Warrior - go absolutely feral, leaving the rest of their Retinue to do their best to point their monarch in a direction that will cause the least amount of collateral damage. Like Swords, Hearts are inherently focused on the monarch's well-being. But where the Sword is focused on outside forces, the Heart is focused on inner forces that impact their monarch. Despite popular belief, Hearts are not usually a monarch's spouse/lover. Oh, it's common for a Heart to have a romantic relationship with their monarch, but less than half of all recorded Hearts have ever fallen into that role. Just as often Hearts are siblings, best friends, and in one notable case a professional therapist.

Sword:

SE: "Sword of my left hand, steel of my will." Cuts down an LCs enemies.

Me: This is the rarest of the Retinue, partially because it is the most recently recognized position of the Retinue, and partially because LCs are all warriors in their own right. A Sword's duty is to cut down enemies their monarch cannot reach, to cut through chains/obstacles keeping their monarch from flying. Most LCs are able to handle their enemies just fine. But if they can't, be it through physical distance or infirmity, emotional complications, or politics, a Sword takes up the duty of removing the threat to their monarch before it gets close enough to harm them. Hence why the Sword is the one that can often be found the furthest from their monarch. Swords are generally granted a measure of autonomy beyond others in the Retinue, to deal with threats as they arise without always having to wait for their monarch's orders. Like the Shield, the Sword can act as a kick to the ass when their monarch's resolve falters. However, where a Shield steps in when a monarch falters on an already chosen path, a Sword steps in when a monarch falters in choosing a path. The Hand helps guide a monarch's choices, but when faced with a difficult choice, when there is no right answer, a Sword is the one that helps their monarch make those hard decisions. It's why Swords often come off as ruthless and blunt - they usually have to prioritize practicality before any other concern.

Members of the Retinue can try to shoulder some of the duties of the other roles, sometimes even successfully, a Hand will never do as well trying to do a Heart's job, etc. An LC doesn't necessarily need all members of their Retinue to have a long and successful life. An LC could go their entire lives without needing a single bonded Retinue. However, an LC without a Retinue, without anyone to anchor them, is more likely to break if ever confronted with something that threatens to shatter their soul. Even just one Retinue can make all the difference.

[yardsards]

something interesting about dungeon meshi's worldbuilding: the elf-tallman hybrids that we see are referred to as "half-elves" rather than "half-tallmen"

hell, they're oftentimes just called "elves" by other characters.

in the case of laios's party not knowing marcille was a half-elf, it's explained that they just didn't know she wasn't a full elf. which makes sense, none of them pay enough attention to that kind of thing, or know enough about elves to know that certain features like rounded ear tips are highly unusual for full-elves. 

but it's more interesting in the case of kabru's party. kabru, who is super observant and was also raised by elves, describes both marcille and fionil (who are both canonically half-elves) simply as "elves". kuro also simply identifies marcille's scent as "elf", despite half-elves probably having slightly different scents than full-elves.

and! even word-of-god type material casually lumps marcille and fionil in with elves, rather than lumping them in with tallmen or giving them their own half-elf category

is this a case of hyperdescent (or hypodescent, depending on if elves are thought of as higher or lower status than tallmen in a given culture)? is it just that half-elves tend to be more similar to elves than to tallmen in matters like lifespan?

of course, our sample size is literally 2 and we know so little about fionil, it's hard to know for sure or rule out other factors.

SIDENOTE:

what is this random character from the elf page's deal? their rounded ear tips definitely look like they're a half-elf, but their facial features and size and ear shape makes me think their other half is half-foot, rather than tallman (...or maybe they're just a kid, lol). the adventurer's bible does say that tallmen can have fertile offspring with half-foots, and we know that tallmen can have infertile offspring with elves. so it would kinda make sense if half-foots could have infertile offspring with elves too.

[lucalicatteart]

 sculpted a strange shimmery two headed snail, speckled with wild flowers on it's shell~

[chiropteracupola]

Ain't nothing come easy / No, nothing comes quick / But I want for you this, that you are well / I want for us this, that we are well...

Another illustration of Temeraire-crossover fic — this time, James Norrington and Tempest, from @boltlightning's delightful Pirates of the Caribbean crossover 'windfall / landfall'.

[generic-sonic-fan]

I’d love to hear your headcannons on what G.U.N. thinks of the sonic cast! Idk what it is exactly but the idea of G.U.N. coming up with a bunch of plans in regards to (mostly) a bunch of teens and kids is intriguing to me

This is such a fun and interesting prompt, thank you so much for sending it! I love worldbuilding in the Sonic universe lol. LONG post below cut

Sonic:

The ultimate worst case scenario.

Much in the same way an ICBM can be anywhere in the world within 30 minutes, Sonic can be anywhere at any time and cause MASSIVE amounts of destruction.

GUN wasn't nearly as worried about Sonic before they tried to frame him in SA2. They thought it'd be easy to pin the blame of Shadow's behaviors on Sonic and then pardon him later.

They were wrong.

Now GUN threat evaluators place Sonic just behind Eggman in world threat level. They struggle to understand what his morals might be and all their attempts to reach out to Sonic and ask him to clarify have been met with a "nah!" from the hedgehog himself.

There's one group in particular within the organization who are extremely paranoid about Sonic to the point of suggesting proactive measures against him.

. . . which everyone else in the organization either laughs at/ignores/prohibits.

There is no set-in-stone contingency for Sonic, as nobody can agree on one, but the plan that has the most consensus is to somehow utilize Team Dark.

Any attempts to discuss this with Team Dark have been turned down. Shadow refuses to speak of it, Rouge laughs it off, and Omega refuses to collaborate because he promised Shadow he wouldn't.

Tails:

Due to Tails' extensive social media presence, GUN feels like they have pretty good tabs on what's going on in Tails' head at any given moment, so they're a lot less paranoid about him.

A very exclusive group of people brainstorm what the contingencies might be on the off chance Tails does present a threat to the world.

(Because even in discussing Tails, they're much more worried about Sonic's reaction to them have contingencies for the fox)

A lot of their contingencies for Tails are the same as those for Eggman. GUN feels pretty prepared for any sort of Tails Overlord scenario, actually.

Minus Sonic, that is.

Current GUN protocol is to treat Tails very very nicely so that Sonic doesn't start getting concerned.

This is why Tails is allowed to be Omega's primary mechanic.

Knuckles:

GUN sent drones directly to Angel Island. Once.

Their old protocol was for him to remain "uncontacted". Yikes.

After Knuckles started getting more involved in struggles against Eggman, GUN started doing more research into him.

Because he mostly stays up on Angel Island and acts as a competent guardian of the Master Emerald, GUN isn't too worried about him? If anything, they're glad that someone with a significant power level is preventing Eggman from stealing the ME.

They've tried to initiate diplomatic contact with him but he's turned them down every time

He knows that GUN monitors the ME from afar- sometimes on clear days he sees a GUN drone floating a few miles off of Angel Island.

It's a bit of an uneasy truce honestly. GUN's biggest concern is that Knuckles could start using the ME for his own purposes, but so far it hasn't looked like that would ever be the case.

As for contingency plans- GUN has asked Rouge if she thinks she'd be able to steal the Master Emerald. (To which she's replied yes, of course.)

The plan is to get the ME off of Angel Island and into a specially designed GUN stronghold in an undisclosed location.

Once the guardian is separated from his emerald, GUN is pretty sure they'll be able to deal with him.

(They are VASTLY underestimating him due to a lack of data)

Amy:

No contingency plans. She's flying under GUN's radar.

They probably should have something in place for her honestly.

See Knuckles' note about vast underestimation due to a lack of data.

Shadow:

The contingency for Shadow is the most detailed contingency file GUN has.

. . . and Shadow himself has helped write some of it.

The file has a long and storied history reaching all the way back 50 years. It's always been something on GUN's mind.

The current contingency is based on the idea that the first thing he'll do once he goes rogue is try to collect the chaos emeralds.

A lot of the plan involves setting a trap with lots and lots of firepower.

There's also an addendum of the plan about utilizing the other members of Team Dark, either to combat against Shadow or as hostages. Shadow is unaware of the latter. In either strategy, Omega is considered vital.

GUN has a lot of scientific data on Shadow's weaknesses to certain kinds/amounts of chaos radiation and all that jazz, so they feel a lot more confident about their ability to bring him down compared to Sonic.

Something about the enemy you know being better than the enemy you don't.

Rouge:

GUN has determined that Rouge is very unlikely to be a world-ending threat.

But a GUN-ending threat? Absolutely.

Rouge going rogue is the worst case scenario for GUN's continued survival as an organization.

They know they can't keep her out of their files or any of their locations. If she wants to sell all of their secrets or steal all of their tech, they know they're very unlikely to stop her.

Current contingencies include using the other members of Team Dark to persuade her against destroying the organization if they're willing to cooperate, or taking them hostage to negotiate if they're not.

They also plan on a public smear campaign against her- basically revealing everything they know about her while she tries to reveal everything about them.

Rouge knows about all of these plans, of course.

There's definitely a tension between her and GUN because of this.

The current plan is to treat her well and convince her to stay on GUN's side at all costs (usually through bribery!)

Omega:

GUN's contingencies for Omega are really, really barebones.

It pretty much just boils down to "destroy him".

They aren't too worried about him, kinda like with Tails. GUN knows how to destroy Badniks. They've been destroying Badniks for lots of years at this point.

If anything, they consider Omega to be the least threatening member of Team Dark and the best lynchpin for if either other member of the team goes rogue.

(It should be noted that they still expect any scenario where Omega goes rogue to have the highest number of immediate civilian casualties.)

See my fic on this

Silver:

HOO BOY, is GUN worried about Silver.

Not because of his powerset- GUN is pretty sure they can just knock him on the head to neutralize him.

(Like Knuckles and Amy, they are vastly underestimating him)

But the time travel shenanigans scare the shit out of them.

GUN is the sort of organization to have protocols in place for working with future or past versions of themselves.

They also fund a shitload of research into detecting changes and potential threats in the timeline.

(They detected the Sonic Generations incident when it happened and it remains one of the most intensely studied events.)

(They've also detected a strange sort of time blip over Soleanna, but every time someone gets interested in studying it, their drive seems to wane until they're no longer concerned about it. Strange. . .)

TL;DR: They treat Silver like a fucking SCP. Current protocol is for all agents to limit contact with him in order to prevent damage to the timeline.

Honestly if GUN wasn't so scared of him, Silver wouldn't exactly be opposed to getting their help managing the timeline shenanigans.

Blaze:

Blaze has not initiated any sort of formal diplomacy with any government or organization in Sonic's dimension.

GUN tracks the unique energy signatures of the Sol Emeralds through their strange link/interaction with the Chaos emeralds.

They haven't quite figured out what's going on.

And frankly, they don't actually know that Blaze is from another dimension.

They see her very rarely. They know that something is strange about her energy readings but just assume that she's one of Sonic's lesser known friends who doesn't get out very often.

Team Chaotix:

I'm grouping them together because GUN doesn't have any contingencies for them. Vector, Espio, and Charmy are all under their radar.

They should be worried about Espio. They're already worried about Rouge's stealth capabilities. I'm pretty sure whoever's managing these contingencies within GUN would have a heart attack upon learning that somebody on this planet figured out how to actually turn invisible.

And that's it!

I'd actually like to end this post with a bit of a weird note- I don't think that GUN would be evil for developing contingencies like this.

I myself work in the field of safety. This field includes things such as occupational safety, and most pertinently for this post, emergency management. I've actually helped write protocols for companies about what workplaces should do in the event of an active shooter or other outside threat such as a natural disaster or a civil conflict.

(If I lived and worked in Sonic's universe, I would most certainly have to write safety protocols about what to do if Eggman attacks, for example!)

It's important to have protocols in place for the worst case scenario, no matter how unlikely or unthinkable that scenario is. And in Sonic's universe, this is especially important! This is a universe where society is regularly attacked by a mustache-twirling, robot-building terrorist! Of course GUN is going to keep tabs on other individuals who could post a similar threat and plan on how to stop them should they ever become a threat to the public.

I'm definitely not excusing GUN for any of the shady things they've done in canon, but it is an interesting point to think about that they're the best equipped to handle any sort of Dark Sonic/Sonic.exe/insert your favorite name for "this character but evil" here/mirror universe scenario.

[biggiedraws]

thinking about. yoohankim body swap......

mild novel spoilers ahead but no big story moments or anything just. brief mentions of skills they get later and such

okay so weve got 2 options here, right (well technically theres 6 ways to arrange 3 objects but. if we assume each of them swaps into someone else. theres 2). first one. kdj -> yjh, yjh -> hsy, hsy -> kdj. right off the bat - extremely funny. kdj in yjhs body having the time of his life (i am the protagonist!!), but also adjusts fairly quickly bc like. hes done this before. hsy in kdjs body is a menace. immediately rummaging through his pockets. everyone is unsettled by unreadable normalguy kdj making hsys evil little gremlin expressions. and yjh in hsys body is like. immediately getting bullied because his menacing aura does not work at all in hsys 5 foot frame. kdj-as-yjh is picking him up by the scruff of the neck and all he can do is glare murderously

second arrangement. kdj -> hsy, hsy -> yjh, yjh -> kdj. i think i like this one less but lets see. yjh as kdj is pretty good, i think yjh would be disgruntled no matter who he swaps bodies with but since the 2 of them are on such even footing in the narrative, i think actually spending time in kdjs weak pathetic body would make him lose some respect for him lmfao. like "what have you been doing all this time that your body is in such poor shape. pathetic." hsy as yjh is extremely salty about how op he is. muttering about cliches under her breath. definitely uses her new power to relentlessly bully kdj (omg wait that means hsys body is getting harassed by yjhs body in both scenarios..... what can i say. shes the perfect size to be bothered. the only reason she isnt bothered more in canon is because of her sharp teeth - i stand by this). kdj as hsy is. unremarkable i think. loudly complains about how much shorter he is now just to piss her off. finds an unholy amount of candy in her pockets and publicly shames her about it until she points yjhs sword at him and he shuts up real quick.

honestly i think both of these scenarios have great potential for physical comedy though. they all have such different mannerisms and such different appearances that reshuffling them is always gonna be striking. i need to draw it.....

okay lets talk logistics. do they keep all their skills or do the skills stay with the body? they probably keep them, although it might be more interesting to have like. physical skills like swordfighting and whatnot stay with the body. so if they get stuck like that for a while and end up fighting in each others bodies they kinda have to adapt to the bodies skills and fighting style. could be fun! hmmm that kinda leaves whoevers in kdjs body in the lurch though, since all his skills are mental..... and then kdj has a massive advantage, because surely the bookmark skill gets a boost if hes literally in the body of the person hes copying. so perhaps they keep all their skills - hsys avatar skill in yjhs protagonist body would be pretty op. and yjh has so many skills that he could make anything work - he might end up ripping kdjs body to shreds though lmfao. also im not sure if we get much of kdj using hsy as a bookmark in the novel? i actually dont remember an instance of it, although i can see him wanting to steal predictive plagiarism so it may have happened and i just forgot. but anyway kdj as hsy using bookmark + avatar, and then hsy as yjh also using avatar is an INSANE combo. two man army. and then theres kdjs body there like *struggling to hold up a sword* "i am yoo joonghyuk......" *passes out* LMAO sorry kdj i know youre not that pathetic its just so funny to imagine the protagonists sheer power literally destroying your fragile salaryman body from the inside out.

omg also. if the swap lasts more than a few minutes theyre DEFINITELY getting their weapons and coats back from their bodies. black coat hsy...... wait omg. okay i know kdjs coat is like a high grade magic item that changes size with him. not sure if yjhs is the same but allow me for a moment - yjh-as-hsy trying to look menacing (already failing) but his coat is way too big. its dragging on the floor. the sleeves cover his hands. 😭😭😭😭 its so ridiculous...... other notable combos - white coat hsy (head in hands). hsy-as-yjh gets yjhs coat stolen from her which means the protagonist physique is on full display - she makes a comment about how WoS should have made more use of this kind of fanservice and now she and kdj are arguing. black coat kdj..... i am yoo joonghyuk......

okay i think thats all i got for now. i hope its in character because i really havent read orv in a while..... anyway i think this has a lot of potential so i wanna try drawing it - maybe ill have more thoughts on specific character interactions once i can like,, put personalities to faces lmao

[bookshelf-in-progress]

Did you know that if you actually work at coloring in the setting of a story idea, the story becomes much more interesting? Especially if, in the process of adding details to make this setting less boring, you think about why things are this way, or how this tradition might have come about, or how this might have affected history? Sounds crazy, but it's true!

[rawliverandgoronspice]

regarding common tropes about ganon's writing in fics, I am kind of always taken aback a little anytime ganondorf uses degrading sexist terms in fics and such. Because to me, even his most evil interpretations would probably have no reason to have negative associations with women who have sex a lot, unless he picked it up from elsewhere (like there's some room for it to be interesting psychologically speaking if that's directly addressed, but it never is). I'm not sure why the gerudos would ever cultivate these kind of misogynistic ideas in their own culture, or why Ganondorf would spontaneously decide to form any essentialist ideas he may potentially develop on the basis of promiscuity, of all things. And, if he would pick that up from Hyrule... why would he, why this, and how does that map out with him remaining proudly gerudo in most iterations if he sees any non-married woman getting funky in a negative way?

it's kind of a very small thing, but it does kind of beckons a lot of questions regarding worldbuilding and psychology and it tends to take me out of fics a little, because it's always kind of assumed and never investigated

[bunnieswithknives]

As an avid D&D player and DM, I love this magic system you've created so much- bc it means that necromancy exists like it does in D&D, but because David is David (TM), he just goes "yeah, but yk what would make this better? Puppets." and just is flying by the seat of his pants trying to create a fusion of DIY crafts and reanimation. he even could be inadvertendly creating an entirely new form of magic while messing around with the Book and his puppetry, but no one will ever know bc he just wants to play around with his little flesh puppets instead of, idk, sitting down and writing an actual grimoire/codex on it and i love him so much for that <3

Really tho!! This is the closest anyone has ever come come to actual reanimation in this universe, not just souless zombies or possessed lamps, real breathing creatures with the souls of people and working innards to back it up! And he's not even writing it down!

[castformation]

Question for my Pokémon IRL/Rotomblr peers as I consider rebooting this blog in the wake of Pokémon Hyperfixation(tm)

Bonus points for elaborating as to whether another user's in-character location influences how you interact with them! Do you find it harder to interact with users from or based in non-canon regions, or do you find it fun?

Thanks for your input! Feel free to reblog for a larger sample size etc etc :D

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

spa day at the engraver's plaza~

[befuddled-calico-whump]

A Dryad shifts into their tree form to hide from humans, and is too afraid to come out, even when a well-meaning gardener starts to cut away at their branches

(colored dryad below the cut, cw for slight gore)

whump art tag:

@kira-the-whump-enthusiast , @whumpsday , @regrets-realization-acceptance , @kixngiggles

[teshamerkel]

Hi, I have a randomish question, that hopefully makes sense.

Do you have any behind the scenes world building that you have but probably won't get to show off in your works?

Nothing that's spoiler-free. ^^' I think the closest we've got are the asks on this blog that get me thinking about those unexplored aspects of Seekers, haha!!!

Sorry for the dull answer!

[chiropteracupola]

A May morning.

[clay-pidgeon]

every day i think about feferi peixes

[fallenandproud]

fun fact, the breaking point that led me to finally cave and make this sideblog was watching youtube shorts and the algorithm decied to throw a TON of hazbin hotel / helluva boss stuff at me and one came up with Lucifer Charlie's dad just as like. one of those edits and THEN i scroll and THE NEXT ONE IS SOMEONE DRAWING THE FALL FROM HEAVEN and i decided right then and there that on top of my demon fixation coping mechanism i now am going to project heavily onto LUCIFER HIMSELF.